'Look behind you'? For also when you say: 'Redeem your souls,' from where did you buy them, that you should sell them? Who is that I-know-not-what angel, who holds a market of souls? When you say: 'Redeem your souls,' you renounce the Redeemer, since Christ alone is the Redeemer of souls, which the devil possessed before His coming. These Christ our Saviour redeemed with His own blood, the Apostle saying: 'For you were bought with a great price.' For it is established that all were redeemed by the blood of Christ. Christ did not sell those whom He redeemed; the souls bought by Christ could not be sold, so that they might, as you wish, be again redeemed by you. Or how can one soul have two lords? Or is there perhaps another redeemer?
What prophets announced that another was to come? What Gabriel spoke again to another Mary? What virgin gave birth again? Who wrought new or other mighty works? If there is none besides the One who redeemed the souls of all believers, what is it that you say: 'Redeem your souls'? Now of what sort is that which you say to Christian men, even to clerics: 'Be Christians'? And with a certain marvel you dare to say to each one:
'Gaius Seius, Gaia Seia, are you still a pagan man or pagan woman?' Him who has professed himself to be converted to God, you call a pagan; him who has been baptized either by us or—if not by us—not in our name nor in yours, but in the name of Christ, you call a pagan—for there are those who have been baptized by you and afterwards passed over to our communion—him who has entreated God the Father through His Son before the altar, you call a pagan. For whoever has believed, has believed in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and you call him a pagan after the profession of faith. If any Christian, which God forbid, has gone astray, he can be called a sinner; a pagan again he cannot be. But all these things you wish to be of no account;
as if, when the one whom you seduce has agreed with you, a single consent and the extending of your hand and a few words already make him for you a Christian out of a Christian; and that man seems a Christian to you who has done what you wish, not whom faith has brought. And if assent is granted to your seduction a little too tardily, even those arguments are not lacking to you, by which—as though easily, even to the unwilling—you might persuade what you wish, when you say that it was heard from the mouth of those who had long been in your college, that whoever should taste or receive of the sacrifice of the approaching unity would seem to taste of the profane. We do not deny that these things were said by some, who, it is established, afterwards did with full security that from which a little before they were deterring the peoples.
But one reason demanded these utterances, another invited to the deed. For in order that those who are reported to have said these things might say them, a false rumour had filled their ears and the ears of all the peoples. For it was said at that time that Paul and Macarius were to come, who would be present at the sacrifice, so that, when the altars were solemnly being prepared, they would bring forth an image, which they would first place upon the altar, and so the sacrifice would be offered. When their ears received this, both their minds were struck and the tongue of each one was moved to these words, so that everyone who had heard this would say: 'Whoever tastes from there, tastes of the profane.' And it would have been rightly said, if a like truth had followed such a report.
But when men came to the places mentioned above, nothing of the kind was seen which rumor had shortly before falsely reported: Christian eyes saw nothing to shudder at, the sight confirmed nothing of those things by which the hearing had been disturbed. Purity was seen, and the solemn observance was beheld in its accustomed rite, when men saw that in the divine sacrifices nothing had been changed, nothing added, nothing taken away. The peace commended by God pleased those who were willing; therefore none of them ought to be reproached who passed over from your communion to peace. Those who had been troubled by an unfavorable opinion were strengthened by the simple and pure truth. Nor let it be said that they made the bitter sweet or the sweet bitter.
The bitterness which seemed to have been announced out of falsehood settled and remained in the bosom of mere opinion; the truth, beheld by the eyes, having its own sweetness within itself, was separated from the bounds of false opinion. Therefore neither was the bitter made sweet nor the sweet made bitter, because what was seen is both another thing and outside, and far different was what seemed to have been heard. Hence you see that without cause you uttered abuse, inventing at your pleasure whatever you wished, in order to tear apart Macarius and Taurinus. You have lost the reputation of seeming wise, since envy corrupted your senses and closed to you the entrance of understanding. It has been plainly and clearly shown by you to us, brother Parmenianus, that the accusation about the soldier sought was made in vain.
Learn this also: what you said about the oil and the sacrifice of the sinner pertains rather to you. For he ought not to be a sinner whom you may wish to be such. For we too can imitate your presumption and say that you are the sinners. But let presumption be done away on both sides: let none of us condemn another by human judgment. It is God's to know the guilty, His to pass sentence. Let all men be silent; let God alone point out the sinner, whose sacrifice is a dog for a victim and whose oil anoints him who desires it. Let it strike fear. Acknowledge, brother Parmenianus, the most manifest truth of this matter.
If, however, you deign to hear gladly this name of brotherhood so often spoken by me, grant that, though it be wearisome to you, it is nevertheless necessary for us, lest perhaps by keeping silent, in accordance with the proof of this name, we should seem to be guilty. For if you do not wish to be a brother, I begin to be impious if I keep silent about that name. For you are our brothers and we yours, since the prophet says: 'Has not one God created you, and one Father begotten you?' For you cannot but be brothers, since it has been said to all: 'You are gods and all sons of the Most High.' Both we and you have received one commandment, in which it is said: 'Call no man father for yourselves on earth, for one is your Father who is in heaven.' Our Savior Christ alone was born the Son of God;
but both we and you have been made sons of God in one and the same way, as it is written in the Gospel: 'The Son of God came: as many as received Him, He gave them power to become sons of God, even to those who believe in His name.' We both have been made so and are called so; you have been made so and are not called so, because you are unwilling to be peacemakers, nor to hear the Son of God Himself saying: 'Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.' Christ, in His coming, recalled God and man into peace; and He made both one, removing the dividing wall of partition. You are unwilling to have peace with us, that is, with your brothers. For you cannot but be brothers whom one mother, the Church, has begotten in the same vital fluids of the sacraments, whom God the Father has received in the same manner as adopted sons.
Whence Christ, foreknowing this present time, since it was to come about that you would today be at discord with us, gave such commands concerning prayer, that at least in prayer unity might remain, that those whom factions were going to set at variance might join their prayers. We pray for you, because we wish to, and you pray for us, even though you do not wish to. Or let each one of you say: 'My Father, who art in heaven,' and 'Give me this day my daily bread,' and 'Forgive me my sins, as I also forgive my debtor.' Therefore, if those things which have been commanded cannot be changed, you see that we are not wholly separated from one another, since we both pray for you willingly, and you pray for us, although unwillingly.
You see, brother Parmenianus, that the bonds of holy kinship between us and you cannot be wholly broken. Now the sinner must be sought, whose oil could be feared or whose sacrifice rejected. Let human suspicion cease, let the presumption of both sides be silent; who is the sinner, let God alone declare. We read in the forty-ninth Psalm, under the second 'diapsalma,' that the Holy Spirit said: 'But to the sinner God said.' In this place the whole attention of the mind must be applied, and it must be seen who the sinner is. For if, after what was read: 'But to the sinner God said,' there followed words of this kind, that He should say: 'You took up arms, you threw yourself into the camp, you stood against the enemy in battle line,' then the soldier had cause to fear, because he himself could seem to be the sinner.
Or if He should say: 'You bought wares, you traveled abroad, you conducted markets, you sold for gain what you had bought,' then the merchant had cause to fear, because he himself could seem to be the sinner. Or if He should say: 'You built a ship, you fitted it with ropes, you decked it with sails, you watched for favorable winds in order to sail,' then the sailor had cause to fear, because he himself could seem to be the sinner. Or, after what was read: 'But to the sinner God said,' if these words should follow:
'Dissension and schism displeased you, you came to concord with your brother and with the one Church which is in the whole world, you communicated with the seven churches and the memorials of the apostles, you embraced unity'—if the following passage contained these words, then we had cause to fear, we could be the sinners. But when God says: 'Why do you set forth my ordinances and take up my testament through your mouth? But you have despised discipline and cast my words behind you; sitting, you spoke against your brother and laid a stumbling-block against your mother's son; you saw a thief and ran with him, and with adulterers you placed your portion'—all these things are said against you. Excuse yourselves from all these, if you can.
For by you discipline has been despised; why do you recite the testament, you who do not keep the testament in which is written the discipline which you are unwilling to keep? For you cannot say that you keep that against which you wage war. God says: 'Seek peace and you shall attain it'; you have rejected peace: is this not to despise discipline? In the Gospel it is read: 'Peace on earth to men of good will'; you wish to have neither good will nor peace: is this not to despise discipline? Likewise in Psalm 132 it is read: 'Behold how good and pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity'; you do not wish to dwell in unity with your brothers: is this not to despise discipline? Christ says in the Gospel:
'He who has once been washed has no need to wash again'; you, by rebaptizing, wash again: is this not to despise discipline? God says: 'Touch not my anointed ones, neither lay hands upon my prophets'; you have stripped so many priests of God of their honors: is this not to despise discipline? Christ says: 'By this I know that you are my disciples, if you love one another'; you hate us, your brothers indeed, nor have you wished to imitate the apostles, among whom even Peter the denier was loved: is this not to despise discipline? You set forth God's justifications and take up His testament through your mouth. How do you argue: 'Seek peace,' when you do not have peace?
How do you recite the testament and not keep the testament in which the discipline is written? You are the chosen ones who, sitting, teach the people, and you disparage us, your brothers indeed. Since, as I said above, one mother, the Church, has begotten us, one God the Father has received us, and yet you place stumbling-blocks against us by commanding individuals not to greet us, not to accept any honor from us. Consider the words of your pride, consider your treatises, consider your commands, review also your acts, and you will find that he who made the request feared your oil. There is none of you who does not mingle abuse of us into his treatises, who does not either begin one thing or expound another. You begin the Lord's lessons,
and unfold your treatises to our injury; you bring forth the Gospel and utter abuse against an absent brother; you pour hatreds into the minds of your hearers, you persuade them to enmities by teaching, and by saying all these things against us you place stumbling-blocks. Therefore it has been said to each one of you: 'Sitting, you spoke against your brother and laid a stumbling-block against your mother's son.' Since God rebukes the sinner and chides one who sits, it is established that this was said specifically to you, not to the people, who in the church have no license to sit. You see therefore beyond doubt that it must be imputed to you, when God says: 'Sitting, you laid stumbling-blocks against your mother's son.'
I have already so often proved that we have one mother, nor can you deny it, you who place stumbling-blocks against us, since some of you bring forth lessons not understood, in order to take away even that which is wont to be common among all, namely the duty of greeting. For you yourselves, some of you, in a perfunctory greeting deny the customary kiss, and many are taught not to say 'hail' to any of us, and they think this is from a lesson, but, not understanding, they are commanded in ignorance concerning those of whom the Apostle said this: 'With such do not even take food'; 'Do not say hail to that man'; 'For their speech creeps like a cancer.'
He said this concerning heretics, whose doctrine had begun in those times to be corrupt, who by the subtle seduction of words, with diseases obscurely creeping, would corrupt the soundness of the faith: as Marcion, who, having become an apostate from a bishop, introduced two gods and two Christs; as Praxeas, who argued that the Father suffered, not the Son; as Valentinus, who tried to take away the flesh from Christ. Theirs is the speech which had a cancer to vex the members of the faith. Such also is the speech of the heretic Scorpianus, who denied that there ought to be martyrdoms. But let them keep their poisons to themselves, nor let the recounting of them, even slightly, vex the simple understanding of the hearers. His, therefore, is the speech which must be avoided, lest it creep like a cancer.
This was said also concerning Arius, who tried to teach that the Son of God was made out of no substances, not born of God; whose doctrine, had it not been dispersed in the Council of Nicaea by three hundred and eighteen bishops, would have entered the hearts of many like a cancer. This was said concerning Photinus, a heretic of the present time, who dared to say that the Son of God was only a man, not God. This could be said also of us, because your speech has inflicted no slight cancer upon the minds and ears of some. For yours is the speech which you hold toward the sons of peace, when you say: 'You have perished, look behind you; your soul will perish; how long will you hold out?' Thus you made penitents of the faithful, thus you put to death honors in the priests.
Behold, yours also is the speech which creeps today like a cancer, that greeting and fellowship may be forbidden. What of this kind could our speech do, who by simple doctrine retain the sons of peace, do not seduce strangers nor drive anyone into exile? It is therefore manifest that you daily place stumbling-blocks against us, and it would be long to run through all the ways in which you disparage us, and all the kinds in which you set stumbling-blocks. For also, when He says: 'You saw a thief and ran together with him,' of what matter do you think this was said? Surely not of a garment stolen, or of a bosom plundered, or of any goods which, being carried off, make gains or losses among men? Indeed, even these things are forbidden;
but in this passage God rebukes those thefts which are committed against Himself. You ask, what thefts are committed against God? Among you they are found. God's possession is the multitude of the faithful, from which the thief, the devil, daily desires to steal something, who wishes either to corrupt in some part the morals of a Christian man or woman, and, if not the whole person, yet to snatch away whatever he can of the person. When you see such a thief doing violence against us, you have aided him by your works; for it escapes no one that every man who is born, although born of Christian parents, cannot be without an unclean spirit, which must necessarily be excluded and separated from the person before the saving washing.
This is what the exorcism effects, by which the unclean spirit is driven out and put to flight into desert places. The house becomes empty in the breast of the believer, the house becomes clean; God enters and dwells, as the Apostle says: 'You are the temple of God, and God dwells in you.' And since each one is full of God, from whom the thief, the devil, strives to steal something, you, by rebaptizing, exorcise the faithful man and say to God who dwells there: 'Accursed one, go out,' so that what was said by God through Ezekiel the prophet is fulfilled: 'And they reviled me among my people for a handful of barley and a morsel of bread, to slay souls which ought not to die, while they announce to my people vain seductions.'
God therefore hears injuries not owed to Him, and abandons such a dwelling; and the man who had entered the church full of God, goes out an empty vessel. The devil, who, like a thief, wished to steal something, aided by your works, sees the whole made his own, from which he wished to take only a little. Therefore God said of you: 'You saw a thief and ran together with him.' Finally, in the Gospel it is thus written: 'But when God has abandoned a man, an empty vessel remains, and the unclean spirit, wandering through desert places, hungry, says: My house is empty'—that is to say: he who had shut me out has himself been shut out—'I will return there and dwell;
and he brings with himself seven others more savage, and he will dwell there, and the last state of that man will be worse than the first.' This is: 'You saw a thief and ran together with him, and with adulterers you placed your portion.' He calls heretics adulterers, and their churches adulteresses, which Christ spurns and rejects in the Song of Songs, as if He should say: 'Why do you gather for me what are not necessary? One is my beloved, one is my bride, one is my dove'—that is, the Catholic Church—'in which, since you could be, you have, by rebaptizing, wished to have your portion among adulterers.' And since it has been most manifestly proved by divine testimony that you are sinners, this also has been shown, that your own aids have warred against you;
for as an aid you had added the prophet, in whom it is read: 'The sacrifice of the sinner is as one who sacrifices a dog.' Now, if there is any shame, learn with sorrow that you are the sinners. Learn this also, whose voice it is: 'Let not the oil of the sinner anoint my head.' For you did not understand whose voice this is—surely Christ's, who had not yet been anointed when He prayed that the oil of the sinner might not defile His head. Not understanding this, you said: 'For David the prophet feared the oil of the sinner.' He had already long before been anointed by Samuel, he who sang; there was no reason that he should be anointed again. Therefore it is the voice of Christ saying: 'Let not the oil of the sinner anoint my head.' They are prayers, not commands; they are desires, not precepts.
For if it were a command, He would say: 'The oil of the sinner shall not anoint my head.' It is therefore the voice of the Son of God, even then fearing to incur the oil of the sinner, that is, of any man whatsoever, because there is no one without sin except God alone. Therefore His Son feared the oil of man, because it would be foul that God should be anointed by man. Therefore He beseeches the Father that He be anointed not by man, but by God the Father Himself. The Son therefore asks; let us see whether the Father consented. This the Holy Spirit indicates and makes manifest in Psalm 44, where He says to the Son Himself: 'The Lord your God shall anoint you with the oil of gladness above your fellows.' His fellows had been the priests and kings of the Jews, who, each one, are established as having been anointed by men.
But since the Son was to be anointed by the Father, God by God, according to what the Son asked and the Spirit announced as promised, the Father fulfilled it in the Jordan; and when the Son of God, our Savior, came there to John, He was pointed out with these words: 'Behold the Lamb of God; this is He who takes away the sins of the world.' He descended into the water, not because there was anything in God to be cleansed, but the oil that was to come ought to be preceded by the water, for the initiating, ordaining, and fulfilling of the mysteries of baptism; and when, having been washed, He was held in the hands of John, the order of the mystery followed, and the Father fulfilled what the Son had asked and what the Holy Spirit had announced.
Heaven was opened, with God the Father anointing; the spiritual oil at once descended in the image of a dove and settled upon His head and poured over Him: the oil was dispensed, whence He began to be called Christ, when He was anointed by God the Father; and lest the laying on of a hand should seem to be lacking to Him, the voice of God was heard from the cloud, saying: 'This is my Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear Him.' This therefore is what was read: 'Let not the oil of the sinner anoint my head.' Learn the reason of the truth, brother Parmenianus, even though late, since now is the time to find learning. And as for that which you said was read in Solomon the prophet:
that the children of adulterers come to no fulfillment, and that spurious slips cannot put down deep roots—this also can be understood as said simply. Hence if you make it a figure, you have excused real adulterers. But grant that it was said figuratively: this was said concerning heretics, among whom there are false marriages of the sacraments, and in whose beds iniquity is found, where the seeds have been corrupted to the destruction of the faith. While Valentinus contends that the Son of God existed in phantasms, not in flesh, he corrupted his own faith and that of his followers. The seed of their birth has been destroyed, of those who did not believe that the Son of God was born in the flesh of the Virgin Mary and suffered in the flesh.
Now also as for that which you mention you read in Jeremiah the prophet—that heaven shuddered, because the people of God did two evil things, that they forsook the fountain of living water and dug for themselves worn-out cisterns which could not hold water—you read it indeed, but, as the matter stands, you were unwilling to understand. Out of zeal for accusing, composing everything into a reproach of the Catholics, you tried hard to bend it greatly to your own pleasure. For if you think that everything was said by the prophets so as to pertain to our times, you have excused the Jews, concerning whom it is established that these things were said, who abandoned the living God, the true God, the God who bestowed benefits on them, and made for themselves idols, that is, worn-out cisterns which cannot hold water.
In God an everlasting majesty overflows, just as in a fountain water gushes abundantly with flowing veins: but idols, if they are not made, do not exist, and cisterns, if they are not dug, cannot have capacious hollows; a cistern cannot be hollowed out without skill and iron tools, nor can an idol be made without a craftsman. In idols there is no natural power, but it is attached and applied by the error of men; a power is reckoned in the idol which was not born there: a cistern is worn out by skill, whose making is its undoing, so that it neither has water of itself nor can hold what it receives; thus also an idol is neither anything of itself and, while it is worshipped, is nothing.
This is what God said, that His people did two evil things, because they forsook the fountain of living water and made for themselves cisterns dug out and worn down. For the people of the Jews had abandoned the true water, had not known the majesty of God, and had followed the defiled religion of idols. This is what grieves God, this is what He says heaven shuddered at. For through Isaiah the prophet there is the same grief of God, when in this matter He calls two elements to witness, when He says: 'Hear, O heaven, and give ear, O earth: I have begotten and exalted sons, but they have forsaken me.' Why then, brother Parmenianus, did you say nothing of this passage? Is it because here water is not named?
For you are perceived to have, out of zeal for accusing, so assailed the Law that, wherever you have read water written, you would, by certain sleights of hand, collect it to stir up odium, and, by a kind of sweeping-net of malice woven from arguments, you have drawn to yourself all things that are good. For what kind is your understanding in this chapter of Jeremiah, when God cries out that He has been forsaken and the cisterns thus dug out—He is angry on His own behalf, not on behalf of His property; for the water of baptism is God's property, not God—and if you think them forsaken, since among you there were those who were baptized among us, so that your deserters might deservedly seem to come over to us? It is therefore proved that you spoke not against us, but against yourselves, what was said by you concerning the oil and sacrifice of the sinner.
Who were the betrayers of the Law and the authors of the schism, we have shown in the first book by the most manifest documents, and that among us is the one true Catholic Church we demonstrated in the second; in the third indeed we proved that the things said to have been done harshly pertain not at all to us, and we taught by divine evidence that you are rather the sinners. Now in this place we must speak of baptism; in which matter, which is now treated, the whole question consists, namely that your boldness has violated baptism, since you wished to repeat that which Christ commanded to be done once. And this you do not deny, brother Parmenianus, since at the beginning of your treatise you said many things against yourselves on our behalf, which are ours.
For in comparison with baptism you recalled that the Flood was done once, and that there was one circumcision for the people of the Jews. And although you treated these things at the beginning of your discourse, yet in the course of your treatise you became forgetful of them, by introducing two waters, and, about to argue with arguments concerning true and false water, you unwisely arranged the beginning of your discourse, building it up beforehand; by weakening it, you confirm the oneness of holy baptism; from the Jewish circumcision you wished to lay, as it were, a foundation, namely that the baptism of Christians had been foreshadowed in the circumcision of the Hebrews; you defended the Catholic Church while you attacked it. For in the progress of your treatise you professed to empty out the one, so that you might seem to fill up the other.