Letters & Polemics (CSEL) 15 part 15/37

'Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the land by inheritance.' Here now even that Gentile, if he did not have too stony a heart, or if he were one of those stones from which God raises up sons to Abraham — would he not marvel that in the ancient books of that same nation from which Jesus was reported to have been born, so evident a prophecy was written concerning him that even his name was expressed? And at the same time he would notice there that it was not just any man who had been foretold as Jesus, but assuredly God, since concerning that man — who, being appointed to rule and lead the people into the kingdom, was, with his name changed, called Jesus — God said that the name was his own, and named him an angel by that very fact that, with his name changed, he was being sent, as one announcing something great and divine.

Indeed, who that is even slightly tinged with that language is ignorant that 'messenger' is called 'angel' in Greek? Wherefore any Gentile, if he were not willing to be perverse and obstinate, would not despise those books because they were Hebrew, by whose law he was not bound, but would rather value highly the books of any nation whatever, because he would find written in them, so long beforehand, things which he now recognized as fulfilled in his own times; and he would not spurn Christ Jesus himself for the reason that he saw him foretold in Hebrew letters, but rather he who, by whatever letters, before he was born among men,

through so many volumes of the ages, partly by more open testimonies, partly by figures and sacraments of deeds done and of discourses, had deserved to be thus foretold and commended — he would judge that he was to be followed and venerated with vast admiration and due religion. Thus, from the effects of Christian realities now presented, the prophecy of the books would be proved true to that man; and from the prophecy of the books, Christ would be recognized as one to be worshiped. Let me be reckoned to speak vain things, if it has not so happened, if it does not so happen, if the whole world does not run together into that faith by the recitation of those same books. Whence the madness of these men is wonderfully to be laughed at,

who demand of us, as though it were impossible, how a Gentile man could wish to learn the Christian faith through the books of the Jews, when he sees all nations, with so great devotion and so great renown, becoming the disciples of those very books. And so much the more strongly and firmly, no doubt, in that from the hands of enemies so many testimonies concerning Christ are brought forth: in which, for that very reason, the nations who believe can suppose nothing about him to have been fabricated for the occasion, because they find Christ in those books which are served by those who, through so many ages, crucified Christ, and which are held in so high a peak of authority by those who daily blaspheme Christ. For if the prophecies concerning Christ were brought forth by those who preach Christ, they might be thought to have been fabricated by those very men;

but now he who blasphemes expounds what he recites. For all the blindness of the impious is ordained by the most high God for some use of the saints, who, in the equity of his governance, makes good use even of evil men, so that those who by their own choice live unjustly are, by his judgment, justly disposed. Therefore, lest the testimonies of the prophecy — that Christ was to be born, to do wonders, to suffer indignities, to die, to rise again, to ascend, to disseminate through all nations the gospel of eternal life — should be believed to have been invented by those who announced him to the peoples, something great was accomplished for our use out of the unbelief of the Jews: that the very ones who did not have these things in their hearts for their own sake, might have them in their codices for our sake.

Nor is the authority of those books diminished on this account, that they are not understood by the Jews — nay rather it is increased; for even their very blindness was foretold there. Whence, by not understanding the truth, they all the more bear witness to the truth, because, since they do not understand those books by which they were foretold as not going to understand, even by this they show them to be truthful. From this also is that saying, by whose ambiguity Faustus is deceived: 'You shall see your life hanging, and you shall not believe your life.' Which words someone can say may also be understood otherwise; but that they cannot be understood of Christ, neither did Faustus dare to say, nor will anyone at all dare, except one who has denied either that Christ is life, or that he was seen by the Jews to hang, or that they did not believe him.

But since he himself says, 'I am the life,' and it is established that he hung before the eyes of the Jews who did not believe him, I do not see why we should doubt that Moses too wrote of Christ this very thing — Moses, of whom Christ says, 'for he wrote of me.' Accordingly, if Faustus tried to show that what is written, 'I will raise up for them a prophet from among their brethren like unto you,' cannot be understood of Christ, because Christ is not like Moses — and yet he has been convicted on every side — what need is there to labor over this testimony? Or surely, just as he said that Christ is not like Moses, in order to refute that prophecy, so also, in order to refute this one, let him say that Christ is not life, or did not hang in the sight of the Jews who did not believe him.

But since he did not say this, nor does any of them dare to say it today, there is no reason why we should delay to embrace this prophecy also, made by his servant, concerning our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But indeed, among other curses this too is set down. Is it therefore not a prophecy, seeing that the others too, among which it is placed, are nothing else than prophecies? Or is it therefore not a prophecy concerning Christ, because those things which in that reading are woven in, either preceding or following, seem to pertain in no way to Christ? As though, forsooth, there were anything worse among the curses which befell the Jews according to the desert of their proud impiety, than to see their life — that is, the Son of God — hanging, and not to believe their life.

For curses, when they are uttered out of prophecy, are not from the evil wish of one imprecating, but from the foreknowing spirit of one announcing. For those which are from an evil wish are forbidden, when it is said: 'Bless, and curse not.' But these are often found in the speech of the saints, as the apostle Paul: 'Alexander the coppersmith,' he says, 'did me much evil; the Lord will render to him according to his works.' For that other saying the apostle seems, as though vexed and indignant, even to have wished evil: 'Would that they were even cut off, who trouble you!' — which surely, if you consider the person of the writer, you will understand rather that, by a most elegant ambiguity, he wished them well. For 'there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven.'

Which in these words also Faustus would have savored, if he had brought a devout palate to the Lord's foods. For thus perhaps it sounded to the Jews, what was said: 'You shall see your life hanging, and you shall not believe your life,' so that, seeing their own life hanging in uncertainty amid the threats or the wiles of their enemies, they should not believe that they would live. But the son of the gospel, when he hears, 'for he wrote of me,' sees in this very ambiguity of the saying what the prophets cast to swine, what they signify to men; and immediately there occurs to him Christ, the life of men, hanging, and the Jews not believing him for this very reason, because they see him hanging.

And indeed some other person would quickly say that, among the other curses which in that reading do not pertain to any understanding concerning Christ, this alone there is concerning Christ, which is written: 'You shall see your life hanging, and you shall not believe your life'; for it could not but be that, among the various curses which were prophetically foretold to the impious people, this too should be set down. But I, and those who along with me consider somewhat more attentively that evangelical and dominical sentence, in which he did not say, 'for he wrote also of me' — as though other things too, which do not pertain to Christ, might be believed to have been written — but said:

'for he wrote of me,' so that we should consult, by searching out, the whole intention of that Scripture toward nothing but the understanding of the grace of Christ — we recognize that the other curses too in that reading were foretold on account of Christ; which if I should now wish to show, it would be too long. Whence it is so far from being the case that this which Faustus has mentioned does not pertain to Christ because it is set among the other curses, that not even those other things themselves have a right understanding, unless, when prophesied, they be referred to the glory of Christ, whereby the human race is provided for. How much more this! And even if Moses had been such a man as to pour out from his mouth, while beholding something else in his heart, I would more readily say that he prophesied unknowingly, than that, when I heard it said to the Jewish people:

'You shall see your life hanging before you, and you shall not believe in your life' — were I to deny that this was prophesied of Christ. For Caiaphas did not have in mind, when he said it, what was afterward understood from his words, when, persecuting Christ as an enemy, he declared that it was expedient that one man should die, lest the whole nation perish. Whereupon the evangelist added that he did not say this of himself, but that, being high priest, he prophesied. But Moses was not Caiaphas. Wherefore that saying which he addressed to the Hebrew people, 'You shall see your life hanging before you, and you shall not believe in your life,' he speaks not only concerning Christ; for even if he had said it unknowingly, it ought not to be understood as spoken of any other, yet in truth he said it knowingly.

For he was the most faithful steward of the prophetic sacrament, that is, of that priestly chrism from which we recognize the name of Christ; in which sacrament even Caiaphas, though a most wicked man, was able to prophesy even without knowing it. For the prophetic chrism wrought this in him, that he prophesied; but his impious life wrought this, that he prophesied unknowingly. By what mouth, then, is it said that Moses prophesied nothing of Christ? — from whom that chrism took its beginning, whence the name of Christ became known, and whence even a persecutor of Christ, though unknowingly, prophesied of Christ. Now concerning the curse of him who hangs upon the tree we have already said above as much as seemed sufficient. But that a prophet or a prince of the people is to be put to death,

namely, one who would seek to turn the sons of Israel away from their God, or to break any of the commandments — that Moses did not command this against Christ is, from these things which we have already discussed at length, sufficiently clear; and to one who considers ever more the words and deeds of the Lord Jesus Christ it will become ever clearer, since Christ did not wish to turn away any of them from their God. For the God whom Moses commanded them to love and worship is surely that same God of Abraham and God of Isaac and God of Jacob, whom the Lord Jesus Christ commends with the same commendation, and by whose authority he refutes the error of the Sadducees who deny the resurrection, where he says: 'But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what God spoke to Moses at the bush:

"I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob"? He is not the God of the dead, but of the living; for all live to him.' Fittingly, therefore, the Manichaeans are now convicted by the same word by which the Sadducees were then convicted; for these also deny the resurrection itself — in another manner indeed, yet they too deny it. Likewise, when, praising the faith of the centurion, he said, 'Amen I say to you, I have not found such faith in Israel,' he added and said: 'But I say to you that many shall come from the east and the west and shall recline with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; but the sons of the kingdom shall go into the outer darkness.'

If, then — which Faustus cannot deny — Moses commended to the people of Israel no other God than the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and Christ without doubt commends that same God from these and other testimonies, he did not attempt to turn that people away from their God, but rather threatened that they would go into the outer darkness because he saw them turned away from their God, into whose kingdom he says the nations called from the whole world would recline with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob — for no other reason than that they had held the faith of the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. Whence the apostle also says: 'And the scripture, foreseeing that God justifies the nations by faith, foretold to Abraham, saying: In your seed shall all the nations be blessed.'

That is, that those should be blessed in the seed of Abraham who would imitate the faith of Abraham. Therefore Christ did not wish to turn the Israelites away from their God, but rather reproached them for being turned away from him. But whoever supposes that the Lord broke any of those commandments which were given through Moses — it is no wonder if he thinks this, as the Jews did; but he errs for this reason, that in this the Jews too erred. Now where Faustus mentions the very commandment which he would have believed that the Lord broke, there it is necessary that we show how he is deceived, as we have already shown above where it was fitting. For the present I say this: that if the Lord had broken any of those commandments, he would not have reproached the Jews concerning this very matter:

For when they were slandering him, because his disciples ate with unwashed hands and on this account transgressed — not the commandment of God, but the traditions of the elders — he said to them: 'Why do you also transgress the commandment of God, that you may establish your traditions?' And he mentions the very commandment of God which we know was commanded through Moses. For following on he says: 'For God said: Honor your father and mother; and: Whoever curses father or mother, let him die the death. But you say: Whoever shall say to father or mother, Let the gift which is from me profit you — has not honored his father; and you have made void the word of God on account of your tradition.'

In which matter see how much he teaches us: both that he does not turn the Jews away from their God, and that he not only does not himself break his commandments, but even reproaches those by whom they were broken, and that none other than God commanded these things through Moses. Wherefore, since we believe that all things which Moses wrote pertain to the commendation of Christ — and because in this work we cannot demonstrate this,

we promised to show in these matters only that which Faustus selected for refuting or reviling from that scripture; and it is rightly required of us as a debt, that we show also this — that what Moses commanded, namely that a prophet or a prince who would seek to turn them away from their God or to break any of the commandments should be put to death — pertains to the guarding of the faith which is learned in the Church of Christ. For he seemed, by the prophetic Spirit and by God speaking to him, to foresee that many heretics, teachers of various errors, would arise against the doctrine of Christ, who would not preach that Christ who is the true Christ. For he is the true one who was foretold through the prophecies published through that same Moses and the other saints of that nation.

Whoever, then, should wish to teach another Christ, Moses commanded that he himself be put to death. And what else does the catholic tongue now do, save that by the spiritual sword of both Testaments, a blade twice sharpened, all should be slain who wish to turn us away from our God or to break any of the commandments? Among whom the Manichaean above all falls, since his error is destroyed by the asserted truth of the Law and the Prophets — he who wishes to turn us away from our God, the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, whom Christ commends, and who wishes to break the commandments of the Law, in whose very figures we recognize that Christ was prophesied. But now, as for that inference of his — whether I should call it most dull or most fraudulent, I know not; for Faustus had wit.

Whence I rather judge that he wished to cast a fog before the less attentive reader, than that he did not see what I am about to say. For he says: 'But if Moses wrote these things not at all concerning Christ, either you will give others, or there will be none.' This proposition is true; but the consequence was that he should show both that these were written not at all concerning Christ, and that others could not be given. Yet he did none of these things. For both we have shown how these may be taken concerning Christ, and above we have given many others which cannot have any meaning except concerning Christ. There is no reason, then, Faustus, why you should conclude that nothing was written by Moses concerning Christ. For attend to what you say: 'But if,' you say, 'he wrote these things not at all concerning Christ, either you will give others, or there will be none.' You speak truly.

Accordingly, since we have taught that these things too were written concerning Christ or on account of Christ, and have given many others besides, your argument rather will amount to nothing. And these things indeed which you mentioned, although you have not made good your case, you have at least attempted to show were not written concerning Christ. But as to what you added — 'either you will give others, or there will be none' — you ought first to have demonstrated that we cannot give others, so that you might safely infer that there are none. But now, as though your little book were going to have hearers so deaf or readers so blind that none would notice what you had passed over, you rushed on to say: 'If there be none, then neither could Christ have asserted what is nowhere; and so if Christ asserted this not at all, this chapter will be established as false.'

O man who thinks himself a speaker, and thinks the other no thinker as an objector! Where is your keenness? Or in a bad cause could you do no otherwise? But your bad cause compelled you to speak vain things; yet no one compels you to have a bad cause. For what? If we shall give others? Surely then there will not be none, since there will be some. And if there be some, Christ was able to assert what exists. And so, if Christ was able to assert this, that evangelical chapter is not established as false. Return, then, to your proposition, in which you said: 'Either you will give others, or there will be none,' and see that you have not shown that we shall give no others. See also how many other things we have already said above, and mark what is concluded from this:

namely, that it is not false which we read that Christ said in the Gospel: 'If you believed Moses, you would also believe me; for he wrote of me.' And indeed the authority of the Gospel is so eminent and its truth so well founded that, even if, on account of the slowness of our understanding, we found nothing written by Moses concerning Christ, we ought to believe not only that there are some things, but that all things which he wrote pertain to Christ; for he did not say 'and he wrote of me,' but 'he wrote of me.' But as it is, even if, concerning this chapter of the Gospel — which be far from us — there were doubt, when so many testimonies concerning Christ have been discovered in the scripture of Moses, all that doubt would be removed;

and because there is no doubting the chapter of the Gospel, even if those things had not been discovered, they nevertheless ought to be believed to exist. Now as for that which you add — 'that the tradition of Christ was unlike that of Moses, and therefore it was not likely that, if they believed Moses, they would also believe Christ; nay rather this is the consequence, that if the Jews believed the one, they would of necessity oppose the other' — you would surely not say this, if you would raise the eye of consideration a little and behold the world, without the blindness of contention, in men learned and unlearned, Greeks and barbarians, wise and foolish, to whom the apostle called himself a debtor, believing in Moses and Christ at the same time.

If, then, it was not likely that the Jews would believe Moses and Christ alike, much less is it likely that the whole world would believe Moses and Christ alike. But when we see all the nations believing both, and holding the prophecy of the one, in agreement with the Gospel of the other, with a most robust and most widely celebrated faith, it was to no impossible thing that one nation was called when it was said to it: 'If you believed Moses, you would also believe me'; and rather to be marvelled at, and more vehemently to be reproached, is the hardness of the Jews, who did not do what we behold the whole world to have done. For whatever you say concerning the sabbath and concerning the circumcision of the flesh and concerning the difference of foods — that the tradition of Moses was one thing, and that Christians learned another through Christ —

we have already shown above that, as the apostle says, all these things were figures of us. Therefore the doctrine is not different, but the time is different. For it was one thing, in which these things ought to be foretold through figured prophecies, and it is another, in which these things now ought to be fulfilled through manifest and rendered truth. But what wonder is it, if the Jews, understanding the sabbath carnally, resisted Christ, who was now instilling it spiritually? Answer the apostle, if you can, who testifies that the rest of that very day is a shadow of what is to come. But if they resisted Christ, not understanding the true sabbath, do you not resist him, and understand the true innocence. For in that very place

where Jesus is especially thought to be a destroyer of the sabbath — when his disciples, passing through the cornfield and being hungry, plucked the ears and ate — he called them innocent, answering the Jews: 'If you knew what this is, I desire mercy rather than sacrifice, you would never have condemned the innocent'; for they ought rather to have had mercy on the hungry, since they did this compelled by hunger. But whoever among you should pluck ears is reckoned a murderer, not from the tradition of Christ, who calls this innocence, but from the tradition of Manichaeus. Or did the apostles perhaps show mercy to those very ears of corn, so that by eating them they might purge the members of God, as your fable has it? You then are the cruel ones, who do not do this.

But of course Faustus knows how to destroy the sabbath, because he knows that the power of God always and untiringly works. Let those say this who understand God, without any temporal volition, making all times. This is much against you, who declare that the rest of your god was shaken off by the rebellion of the nation of darkness, and thrown into confusion by the sudden onset of enemies. Or, foreseeing from eternity that this would come to pass, did he never have rest, because he was never secure — he who reflected that he would wage so grievous a war with such ruin and loss to his own members? For the rest, that sabbath which you ignorantly and impiously deride — unless it too, among the prophecies which are written concerning Christ, had a meaning, Christ would not so bear witness to it,

who, since he suffered by his own will — as you yourself set forth in his praise — and therefore had in his power the times of his passion and resurrection, brought it about that his flesh should rest in the sepulchre on the sabbath from all his works, so that, rising on the third day, which we call the Lord's Day, which is counted the eighth after the sabbath, he might also declare that the circumcision of the eighth day pertained to the prophesying of himself. For what does the circumcision of the flesh signify? What, save the putting off of mortality, which we bear from carnal generation? On this account the apostle says: 'Putting off from himself the flesh, he made a display of principalities and powers, confidently triumphing over them in himself.'

For when he says that he put off the flesh, in that place we understand by 'flesh' the mortality of the flesh, according to which this body is properly named flesh. This mortality is properly called flesh, because in that immortality of the resurrection it will not exist. Therefore it is written: 'Flesh and blood shall not possess the kingdom of God.' Concerning which words you are wont to slander our faith, by which we believe in the future resurrection of this body, which has already gone before in God himself — dissembling those things which follow, in which the apostle openly explains what he means. For, wishing to show what he meant in that place by 'flesh,' he immediately added: 'Neither shall corruption possess incorruption.'

For this body, which on account of its mortality is properly named flesh, he says will be changed in the resurrection, so that it may no longer be corruptible and mortal. And lest this be thought to be said by our own conjecture, consult his very words which follow. 'Behold,' he says, 'I tell you a mystery: we shall all indeed rise again, but we shall not all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall rise incorrupt, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.' Therefore, that it may be clothed with immortality, it is unclothed of mortality.

This is the mystery of circumcision, which was commanded to be done on the eighth day, and on the eighth day, that is, on the Lord's Day after the sabbath, was already fulfilled in truth by the Lord. Whence it is said: 'Putting off from himself the flesh, he made a display of principalities and powers.' For through this mortality the envious diabolical powers had dominion over us; which he is said to have displayed, because in himself, our head, he furnished the example of that which shall be completed in his whole body, that is, in the Church to be freed from the power of the devil, in the final resurrection. This is our faith. And since, as Paul recalls the prophetic testimony, 'the just lives by faith,' this is our justification. For even the pagans believe that Christ died;

but that Christ rose again is the proper faith of Christians. 'For if you confess,' says the apostle, 'with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved.' Since, therefore, we are justified by this faith of the resurrection, this too concerning Christ is apostolic: that 'he died for our offences and rose again for our justification.' And because this resurrection, which, being believed, justifies us, was figured by that circumcision of the eighth day, therefore concerning Abraham himself, to whom it was first delivered, the apostle says: 'And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of faith.'

Therefore Moses wrote of this circumcision too, among the other prophetic figures, concerning Christ, of whom he himself says: 'For he wrote of me.' But as for what the Lord says: 'Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, who compass sea and dry land to make one proselyte, and when you have made him, you make him a son of hell twofold more than yourselves' — he did not say this because he is circumcised, but because he imitates the manners of those in imitating whom he restrains his own, saying: 'The scribes and Pharisees sit in the chair of Moses: what they say, do; but what they do, do not; for they say, and do not.'