On that which is written: 'In the beginning God made heaven and earth,' up to that which is written: 'And there was evening and there was morning, one day.' The most foolish Manichaeans suppose that this chapter of the Law is contrary to the Gospel, saying that in Genesis it is written that God by himself made heaven and earth and light, whereas in the Gospel it is written that the world was fashioned through our Lord Jesus Christ, where it is said: 'And the world was made through him, and the world knew him not.' For they are refuted in three ways. First, because when it is said 'In the beginning God made heaven and earth,' the Christian understands the Trinity itself, where not the Father alone, but also the Son and the Holy Spirit are understood.
For we do not believe in three gods, but in one God: Father and Son and Holy Spirit—although the Father is Father, and the Son is Son, and the Holy Spirit is Holy Spirit. Concerning this unity of the Trinity it is too long to dispute in this place. Next, because where it is said 'God said: Let it be, and it was made,' there it is necessary to understand that he made through the Word what he made. And the Word of the Father is the Son. Therefore this chapter of Genesis, where it is written 'And God said: Let it be, and it was made,' is not opposed to that passage of the Gospel where it is said 'And the world was made through him,' that is, through our Lord, because he himself is the Word of the Father, through whom all things were made. Finally, if for this reason the Son is not understood in Genesis, because it was not said
that God made through the Son, then neither in the Gospel does God feed the birds and clothe the lilies and the countless other things through the Son—things which the Lord himself says God the Father does, although he does not say that he does them through the Son. But as for the testimony of the Apostle which they add, in that he says of our Lord Jesus Christ: 'He is the firstborn of all creation; and all things were made through him in the heavens and on earth, things visible and invisible'—and they say this chapter too is opposed to Genesis, where God is said to have made the world in such a way that the Son is not specifically named there—they err vehemently; they do not see this. If it were so, the Apostle himself would be contrary to himself, since in another place he speaks of one:
'From whom are all things, through whom are all things, in whom are all things'—and he does not name the Son. But just as here the Son is not named, yet is nonetheless understood, so also in Genesis; and just as these two chapters of Paul do not oppose each other, so neither does Genesis oppose the Gospel. On that which is written: 'And God completed on the sixth day all his works which he had made, and on the seventh he rested from all those same works of his which he had made.' To this passage also the Manichaeans raise a false charge and say that it is contrary to the New Testament, in that in Genesis it is written that God rested on the seventh day from all his works which he made, whereas the Lord in the Gospel says: 'My Father works even until now.' Which is in no way contrary.
For the Lord refutes the error of the Jews, who supposed that God rested on the seventh day in such a way that from then on he wrought absolutely nothing. But he rested from all his works which he made, so that he no longer made the world with all the things that are in it—yet not so as also to rest from the administration of the world. For it is not written 'God rested from all his works' so that thenceforth he should not work, but it is written 'God rested from all his works which he made,' so that thereafter he might work not in making the world (from which work he had ceased after its completion), but in administering it—in which work the Lord intimated that he is engaged. Nor does that rest mean that God, as it were, sought a pause after labor,
but it signifies that he ceased from establishing the natures of things after the completion of those things—although even until now he works in administering them. But the Jews did not understand the observance of the Sabbath, they who supposed that one ought to cease even from those works which avail for the salvation of men. Whence the Lord in other places also refuted them with a marvelous comparison concerning the sheep that fell into a pit and the beast of burden that must be loosed so as to be led to water. But the Sabbath was not repudiated but understood by the Christians: it ceased indeed to be observed carnally, but is retained spiritually by the saints, who understand the voice of the Lord calling to rest and saying: 'Come to me, you who labor, and I will refresh you;
take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.' This Sabbath—that is, this rest—is what that Scripture signifies, which the Jews did not understand and, according to the dispensation of the times, followed carnally as a shadow; and the body, as it were, of that shadow—that is, the truth—was to be given to us. But just as that rest of God after the fashioning of the world is intimated, so the rest which is promised to us we shall attain after the works which we have in this world, if they shall have been just—namely in the seventh and likewise last part of the age, concerning which it is long to dispute.
Therefore the Lord does not annul the Scripture of the Old Testament, but compels it to be understood; nor does he dissolve the Sabbath so that what was figured should perish, but rather he opens it, so that what was covered may appear. On that which is written in Genesis: 'And God said: It is not good for man to be alone; let us make him a helper.' And God sent a sleep upon Adam, and he fell asleep; and he took one of his ribs, from which he formed Eve, whom he brought to Adam and said: 'Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife.' To this passage again the Manichaeans raise a false charge, saying that this sentence is against the New Testament—the sentence in which God is written both to have formed the woman and to have joined her to the man—because in the Gospel the Lord says:
'Everyone who has left house or wife or parents or brothers or children for the kingdom of heaven shall receive sevenfold as much in this time, and in the age to come shall possess eternal life.' In which false charge I marvel that they are so blinded—or rather I do not marvel, for their malice has blinded them, as it is written. But yet who would not see how many precepts there are in the New Testament about loving one's wife? Why then do they rather say that the Old Testament is contrary to this sentence of the Lord, in which he says that the wife is to be left for the kingdom of heaven, and not that the New Testament itself is contrary to itself?—which it is impious to say. For things which seem to the unskilled to be contrary must be understood, not rashly accused.
For the Lord too, when asked by the Jews whether it pleased him that a wife be dismissed upon a bill of divorce being given, answered them saying: 'Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female, and said: For this reason shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and the two shall be in one flesh? And so they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder.' And they say to him: 'Why then did Moses command that a bill of divorce be given and that she be dismissed?' Jesus says to them: 'Because for the hardness of your heart Moses permitted you to dismiss your wives; but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you:
whoever dismisses his wife, except for the cause of fornication, makes her commit adultery; and he himself, if he takes another, commits adultery.' Behold, they have the sentence of the Old Testament confirmed by the Lord himself against the ignorance of the Jews. At the same time he also bore witness to Moses, in that he permitted the divorce to be given on account of their hardness. Do they say that even the Gospel is contrary to the Gospel? But if they say that this chapter is false and was added by corruptors of the Scriptures—for this they are wont to say when they do not find what to answer—what then? If another should say that that which they themselves put forward is spurious and false, where the Lord says:
'Everyone who has left house or wife or parents or children for the kingdom of heaven,' and the rest—is spurious and false? The wretched men do not understand how, in saying these things, they are trying to overthrow the whole Christian faith. But the true faith and the discipline of the Catholic Church confirms that both are true and were spoken by the Lord, and that in no way are they contrary; for both the joining of husband and wife is from the Lord, and the leaving of a wife for the kingdom of heaven is from the Lord. For just as, because Jesus Christ raised the dead and gave them life, life itself is not on that account not to be relinquished for the kingdom of heaven—so therefore, although the Lord gave a wife to a man, she is nonetheless to be left, if there is need, for the kingdom of heaven.
For this is not always necessary. As the Apostle says: 'If any believer has an unbelieving wife, and she consents to dwell with him, let him not dismiss her.' By this he signifies that, if she does not consent to dwell with him—that is, if she abhors in him the faith of Christ and does not tolerate him because he is a Christian—she is to be left for the kingdom of heaven; just as the same Apostle says in what follows: 'But if the unbeliever departs, let him depart; for a brother or sister is not enslaved in such cases.' If, therefore, anyone relinquishes the kingdom of heaven while unwilling to relinquish a wife who cannot bear a Christian husband, he is disapproved by the Lord;
and likewise, if any man leaves his wife by giving a bill of divorce when the cause of either fornication or of obtaining the kingdom of heaven does not exist, he is similarly disapproved by the Lord. Thus neither are these two Gospel chapters found to be contrary to each other, nor is the Gospel contrary to the Old Testament, because there the wife is joined to the man so that together they may deserve to possess the kingdom of heaven; and thus the wife is commanded to be left if she should hinder the man from possessing the kingdom of heaven. And therefore, when the Apostle admonishes both Christians—that is, husbands and wives—does he not speak thus: 'Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the Church and gave himself up for her'? And: 'Let wives be subject to their husbands as to the Lord.'
'For the Church too is subject to Christ.' Does not that very thing which these wretched men mock in the Old Testament—that which is written: 'Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and the two shall be in one flesh'—the same Apostle take in a great mystery, when he says: 'This is a great sacrament; but I speak in Christ and in the Church'? Then he adds: 'Nevertheless, let each one love his own wife as himself, and let the wife fear her husband.' Does he not in another place most evidently show that both the nature and the joining of either sex subsists from the Lord God, its creator and orderer, when he says: 'Nevertheless, neither is the woman without the man, nor the man without the woman, in the Lord.
For as the woman is from the man, so also is the man through the woman; but all things are from God.' If these men were willing to consider this, they would not, by certain chapters taken separately and set against one another with great fraud, make darkness for the unskilled, but would perceive that all things, both in the Old and in the New Testament, were written and commended by one Holy Spirit. For in the Old Testament also they have, in the prophet Isaiah, how great things are promised to eunuchs—lest they should suppose that in the New Testament alone are such praised by the Lord, where he says that there are some who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven, and adds: 'He who can receive it, let him receive it.' For Isaiah too speaks thus: 'These things says the Lord to the eunuchs:
those who keep my precepts and choose the things that I will, and who are receptive of my covenant—to them I will give in my house and within my wall a most renowned place, much better than sons and daughters: an eternal name I will give them, and it shall never fail.' For by certain shadows and figures of things, before the Lord's coming, according to a marvelous and most orderly distribution of the times, that people was held bound which received the Old Testament; yet in it there is so great a preaching and foretelling of the New Testament, that no precepts and promises, however lofty and divine, are found in the Gospel and the apostolic discipline, which are wanting even in those ancient books.
But the holy Scriptures desire not rash and proud accusers, but diligent and pious readers. On that which is written in Genesis: 'And God said to Cain: What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood cries out to me from the earth. Now you are cursed from the face of the earth, which has swallowed up and received your brother's blood from your hand's slaughter; for you must needs till the earth, since it will give you barren fruits.' To this chapter of Genesis, in which Cain received a curse so that he might be punished with the barrenness of the earth, the Manichaeans, raising a false charge and wishing to demonstrate it contrary to the Gospel, do not truly seem to me to consider that they are dealing with human beings, but altogether as though those who heard them or read their writings were cattle:
so have they abused those men's inexperience and slowness of wit, or rather blindness of mind. For they have said that to this chapter that saying in the Gospel is contrary, where the Lord says to his disciples: 'Do not be anxious about tomorrow; for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Consider the birds of heaven, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns.' As though indeed Cain the fratricide were to be compared to the disciples of Christ, so that, because he deserved the punishment of the earth's barrenness, it should follow that these too should suffer the same barrenness—they who, following our Lord Jesus Christ, the giver of laws, were being prepared for preaching the Gospel.
Nay rather, even in these two chapters—of which they set the one from Genesis and the other from the Gospel as though hostile to each other—so great a friendship and concord is found that no greater could be desired. For what is more fitting, what more suitable, than that barrenness should follow, even in the land where he labored, that man by whose crime his brother had been slain; but that fruitful land should serve those—through whose ministry, in preaching the word of God, brothers were being set free—who took no thought at all even for the morrow?
But if in the Old Testament they shudder at the barren land made so for the sinner by God's curse, why do they not in the New Testament shudder at the fig tree made dry by the curse of our Lord Jesus Christ, though it had committed no sin against its Lord? Likewise, if they delight in the Lord's sentence in which he tells his disciples not to be anxious about the morrow, since God takes care for their sustenance, why do they not also delight in the prophetic sentence in which he sang, saying: 'Cast your care upon the Lord, and he will feed you'—so that in this way, if they can, the wretched men may understand both that those things which they detest as spoken about God in the Old Testament are so entirely right that they are found even in the New, and that those things which they praise and proclaim in the New are found also in the Old:
whence to those who understand well there will become clear the manifest concord of both Testaments. On that which is written in Genesis: 'Let us make man to our image and likeness.' This passage, where it is written in Genesis that man was made to the image and likeness of God, the Manichaeans say to be contrary to the New Testament, because the Lord in the Gospel says to the Jews: 'You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do; he was a murderer from the beginning, and stood not in the truth, because the truth is not in him'—and because in another place the Jews are called broods of serpents and vipers.
They do not understand that the former was said of man before he sinned—that he was made to the image and likeness of God—whereas the latter, which is in the Gospel, 'You are of your father the devil,' is said to sinners and unbelievers. For in the holy Scriptures the name of 'sons' is taken in three ways: one according to nature, as Isaac is the son of Abraham, or even the other Jews who come from the same origin; another according to teaching, so that each is called the son of him from whom he has learned something, as the Apostle calls those his sons who have learned the Gospel from him; a third according to imitation, as the Apostle calls us sons of Abraham, because we imitate his faith.
In two ways, therefore, are the sinful, unbelieving Jews called sons of the devil by the Lord: either because from him they learned impiety—as the Apostle says of the devil himself: 'who now works in the sons of unbelief'—or because they imitate him, which pertains more to that which was said of him: 'and he stood not in the truth,' since the Jews themselves also stood not in the truth of the law which was given to them, the same Lord attesting and saying: 'If you believed Moses, you would believe me also; for he wrote of me.' According to the venom of these same sinners they are also called broods of serpents and vipers. But that man was made to the image of God, not only Genesis but also the Apostle proclaims, when he says: 'A man indeed ought not to veil his head,
since he is the image and glory of God, but the woman is the glory of the man.' And that it may be manifestly understood that man was made to the image of God not according to the oldness of sin, which is corrupted, but according to spiritual conformation—likewise the Apostle admonishes us, that having put off the habit of sins, that is, the old man, we may put on the new life of Christ, whom he calls the new man. And to teach that we once lost this, he calls it a renewal. For thus he speaks: 'Putting off yourselves the old man with his deeds, put on the new, who is renewed unto the knowledge of God according to the image of him who created him.' The sons of God, therefore, are men renewed unto his image and made like unto him, even to the love of the enemy.
Just as the Lord says that we ought to love our enemies, so that we may be like our Father who is in heaven. And that this is placed within our power by God himself, Scripture teaches when it says: 'He gave them power to become sons of God.' But men are called sons of the devil when they imitate his impious pride and fall away from the light and loftiness of wisdom and do not believe the truth—such as those whom the Lord reproves, when he says: 'You are of your father the devil,' and the rest. With which Gospel passage the prophet agrees, saying: 'I said, You are gods and all of you sons of the Most High; but you shall die like men, and shall fall like one of the princes.' On that which is written in Exodus: 'Honor your father and your mother.'
To this passage too, where God commanded concerning the honoring of parents, the Manichaeans say that that place in the Gospel is contrary, where the Lord, to a certain man saying 'I will go first to bury my father,' answered: 'Let the dead bury their dead; but you, come and announce the kingdom of God.' Which is resolved in the same way as that earlier one, where it was said about leaving a wife for the kingdom of heaven. For we both ought to honor our parents, and yet, for the sake of the announcement of the kingdom of God, we despise them with no impiety. For if, on account of that sentence, the Gospel is contrary to the Old Testament, it begins to be contrary also to the Apostle, who both admonishes children to honor their parents, and parents to love their children.
Moreover, the Lord too will seem to be at odds with himself — which it is impious to believe — because in another place he says to a man seeking eternal life: 'If you wish to come to life, keep the commandments,' among which he also mentions this: 'Honour your father and mother.' Yet once these commandments are fulfilled, one grows also toward the love of God, in which lies all perfection; for love of neighbour is a sure step toward the love of God. And therefore, when the man replied that he had kept all those commandments, the Lord tells him that one thing is lacking to him, if he wishes to be perfect: that he sell all that he has and give it to the poor and follow him.
From this it is manifest both that honour toward parents is to be preserved in its proper degree, and yet that they must nonetheless, when set against the love of God — especially if they are a hindrance — be scorned without any hesitation. For in the ancient Scriptures too you find it written: 'He who says to father or mother, "I do not know you," and does not acknowledge his own sons — that man has recognized your covenant.' Therefore, if in the New Testament love of parents is commended, and in the Old contempt of parents is commended, the two Testaments agree with each other from both headings. Concerning what is written in Exodus: 'I am a jealous God, requiting upon the sons of the third and fourth generation the sins of the parents who hate me.' The Manichaeans say that this passage of the Gospel is contrary to this one.
They allege that the Lord says: 'Be kind, as your heavenly Father, who makes his sun to rise upon the good and the evil'; and that other saying which the Lord likewise utters: that not only seven times must one forgive a brother who sins, but even seventy times seven. Yet if I should ask of them whether God does not punish his enemies, they would without doubt be thrown into confusion. For they themselves say that God prepares an eternal prison for the race of darkness, which they call God's enemy; and it is not enough for them: they do not hesitate to say that he will also punish his own members together with that very race. But when they come to the chapters of the Old and New Testament, in order to deceive the untaught and to slander them as being mutually opposed, they pretend to be exceedingly kind. But let them tell us: to whom is the Lord going to say:
'Go into the eternal fire, which was prepared for the devil and his angels,' if he spares everyone and condemns no one? Hence it must be understood that this too was rightly said: that God will requite the sins of the parents upon the sons who hate him. For from the fact that he added 'who hate me,' it is understood that those are punished by the sins of the parents who chose to persevere in the same perversity as their parents. For such men are punished not by God's cruelty but rather by his justice and by their own iniquity, as the prophet says:
'For the holy spirit of discipline will flee from the deceitful, and will withdraw itself from thoughts that are without understanding, and will be rebuked when iniquity comes upon it' — that is, a man is chastened when his own iniquity comes upon him, once the Holy Spirit has departed from him. And in another place: 'These things they thought and went astray; for their own malice blinded them.' And in another place: 'Each one is bound by the cords of his own sins.' With these testimonies of the Old Testament the Apostle from the New agrees, saying: 'God gave them up to the lusts of their heart.' By this concord of both Testaments it is sufficiently shown that God is not cruel, but that each man rages against himself by sinning.
But as for what is written, that vengeance proceeds unto the third and fourth generation, I judge that nothing else is signified than that from Abraham himself, who begins to be the father of the Jewish people, there are four ages, counting this present one which is now unfolding, which the evangelist Matthew distinguishes. One is from Abraham to David, another from David to the migration into Babylon, a third from the migration into Babylon to the coming of the Lord; and from there to the end a fourth is reckoned, as it were the old age of the world, longer than the other ages. These ages we believe to have been set down in place of generations, although each is composed of several generations.
And since the third age begins from the migration to Babylon, when the captivity of the Jews took place, while in the fourth age — that is, after the coming of our Lord — the Jewish nation was utterly uprooted from its own soil: from this it is given to understand what was said, that God would repay the sins of the parents unto the third and fourth generation, namely, to those who lawfully and deservedly so — those who chose to hold fast perseveringly to the sins of their parents rather than to follow the justice of God. For that a father's sins do not pertain to a son who lives justly, the prophet Ezekiel most plainly shows. But as for what is said in the Gospel: 'Be kind, as your heavenly Father, who makes his sun to rise upon the good and the evil,' it is not contrary to the Old Testament.
For God does this in order to invite men to repentance, as the Apostle says: 'Do you not know that the patience of God invites you to repentance?' Nor, however, is it therefore to be believed that God will not punish those who, as the same Apostle says, 'treasure up for themselves wrath against the day of wrath and of the revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render to each according to his works.' For this patience and goodness of God the prophet too proclaims, saying: 'But you spare all, because all things are yours, O you who love souls' — and countless other passages, by which it is understood that both in goodness and in severity each Testament proclaims the mercy and the justice of God. But if they are troubled by what was said:
'I am a jealous God,' let them also be troubled by that which the Apostle Paul said: 'I am jealous for you with the jealousy of God; for I betrothed you to one husband, to present you a chaste virgin to Christ.' For holy Scripture, speaking with our words, shows even by these words that nothing worthy can be said of God. For why should not these words too be spoken of that Majesty, of which whatever is said is said unworthily, because it surpasses all the riches of all tongues by its ineffable sublimity? For since husbands are wont by jealousy to guard the chastity of their wives, the Scriptures have called that power and discipline of God — by which he does not suffer the soul to commit fornication with impunity — the jealousy of God.
Now the fornication of the soul is its turning away from the fruitfulness of wisdom and its turning toward the conception of temporal enticements and corruptions. But as for what he says — that one must forgive a brother not only seven times but even seventy times seven — he says this, to be sure, of one who repents. God, however, said that he would requite their sins upon those who hate him, not upon those who are reconciled to him through repentance. For in the prophet too the Lord says: 'I do not desire the death of the sinner, so much as that he should turn back and live.' From which it easily appears, both in that patience which invites to repentance, and in that indulgence which pardons the penitent, and in that justice —
— which punishes those who refuse to be corrected — both Testaments agree and are congruent with one another, as though both were written by one God. Concerning what is written in Exodus: 'An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,' and other such things. Against this passage the Manichaeans object, because in the old Law equal retribution is permitted, and it is said that an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth is to be exacted. They slander it thus, as though the Lord himself had set forth these two things in the Gospel as being, so to speak, mutually opposed and contrary. For he himself says: 'You have heard that it was said to the men of old: An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth;'
'but I say to you: do not resist evil; but if anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever wishes to contend with you at law and take away your tunic, let him have your cloak too.' In these two sentences the difference of the two Testaments is indeed shown, yet both were established by one God. For since at first carnal men burned to avenge themselves far more than the injury of which they complained warranted, a first degree of gentleness was established for them: that the pain of the avenger should in no way exceed the measure of the injury received. For thus one who had first learned not to surpass an injury could at length even forgive it.
Hence the Lord, now leading the people through the grace of the Gospel to the highest peace, builds upon this degree another: that he who had already heard he must not render more vengeance than the harm each suffered, should now rejoice, with a mind at peace, to forgive the whole. This too the prophet proclaims in those ancient books, saying: 'O Lord my God, if I have done this, if there is iniquity in my hands, if I have requited with evil those who requited me.' And another prophet says of such a man who suffers injuries and bears them most gently: 'He will give his cheek to the one who strikes him; he will be filled with reproaches.'
From which it is understood both that a measure of avenging was rightly appointed for carnal men, and that the complete remission of injury was not only commanded in the New Testament, but long before foretold in the Old. Concerning what is written, that God spoke with Adam and Eve and with the serpent and with Cain and the other men of old. Among whom he is also written to have appeared to some and to have been seen by them, not in one but in many passages of the Scriptures, in which God is found both to have spoken with men and to have appeared to some. The Manichaeans therefore lie in wait and say that all these things are contrary to the New Testament, since the Lord says: 'No one has ever seen God, except the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father;'
'he has declared him to us'; and again, when he says to the Jews: 'You have neither ever heard his voice nor seen his face, nor do you have his word abiding in you, because you did not believe him whom he sent.' To these we answer that from this very thing which is written in the Gospel — 'No one has ever seen God, except the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father; he has declared him to us' — the whole question can be resolved: because that same Son, who is the Word of God, not only in the latest times, when he deigned to appear in the flesh, but also earlier, from the foundation of the world, declared concerning the Father to whom he willed, whether by speaking or by appearing, whether through some angelic power or through any creature whatsoever:
because he himself is in all things the Truth, and all things hold together in him, and all things serve him at his beck and are subject to him, so that he may even appear to bodily eyes, through a visible creature, to whom he wills, when he deigns; while yet he himself, according to his divinity and according to that which is the Word of the Father, coeternal with the Father and unchangeable, through whom all things were made, is not seen except by a most purified and most simple heart. And therefore in certain passages Scripture itself testifies that an angel was seen, where it says that God was seen; as in that wrestling of Jacob, the one who appeared was called both God and an angel. And when he appeared in the bush to Moses, and likewise in the wilderness, when he had already led the people out of the land of Egypt, God spoke to him when he received the Law.
But whether in the bush, when he sent him, or afterward, when he gave him the Law, Stephen in the Acts of the Apostles says that an angel appeared to him. This we say lest anyone suppose that the Word of God, through whom all things were made, can as it were be confined within places and appear visibly to anyone except through some visible creature. For just as the Word of God is in the prophet, and it is rightly said 'the prophet said,' and rightly also 'the Lord said,' because the Word of God, which is Christ, speaks the truth in the prophet:
so also in the angel he himself speaks, when the angel announces the truth; and it is rightly said 'God said' and 'God appeared,' and likewise it is rightly said 'the angel said' and 'the angel appeared' — the former being said from the person of the indwelling God, the latter from the person of the serving creature. From this rule the Apostle too says: 'Do you wish to receive a proof of him who speaks in me, namely Christ?' But if this troubles anyone, that in the Old Testament God speaks even to sinners — whether to Adam or to Eve or to the serpent — let them also observe in the New what sort of example the Lord set concerning the foolish and greedy man, how the Lord spoke to him when he said: 'Fool, this night your soul will be taken from you; these things which you have prepared, whose will they be?'
For when the truth is spoken even to sinners, through whatever creature it may be spoken, it is spoken by none other than him who alone is truthful. But as for what he says to the Jews, 'You have never heard his voice,' he says this because they did not obey — those, at least, with whom he was speaking. To whom he also says, 'Nor have you seen his face,' because it cannot be seen. And as for what he says, 'Neither do you have his word abiding in you,' this is because Christ, in whom the Word of God abides, abides in him — and these men rejected Christ. For when the Lord himself had said, 'Father, glorify me with that glory which I had with you before the world was made,' a voice sounded from heaven: 'I have both glorified it and will glorify it.'
Many of the Jews who were present heard that voice, and yet they are not to be said to have heard, because they did not obey so as to believe. Wherefore, if it is not to be wondered at that the Word of God — that is, the only-begotten Son of God, who declares concerning the Father — to whom he wills declares through himself, to whom he wills through some creature, whether by sounding or by appearing, while yet he himself is seen through himself by a pure heart, and through him the Father — for 'blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God' — it is not to be wondered at that all these testimonies from both Testaments are in harmony. Concerning what is written, that God spoke to Moses and said to him: 'Speak to the sons of Israel: take firstfruits from every man, which you shall set apart for me, namely gold,
silver, bronze, purple, fine linen, scarlet, goats' hair, red rams' skins, whole timbers, oil for lighting, incense, precious stones — that is, beryls — and set up a tabernacle in which I may dwell among you.' Here too the Manichaeans stir up a question, and they say that this saying in the Gospel is contrary to this passage of the Scriptures, which the Lord says: 'You shall not swear either by heaven, because it is the throne of God, nor by earth, because it is the footstool of his feet.' For they argue, and think they are saying something great, when they say: How does that God, whose throne is heaven and whose footstool is the earth, dwell in a tabernacle
which was constructed out of gold or silver and bronze and purple and the hair and skins of cattle? They also bring in the Apostle Paul as a witness, because he says that God dwells in light inaccessible. To these we bring back a like question, and what they have brought forward from the New Testament, we bring forward from the Old. For there it is found written first: 'Heaven is my throne, the earth is the footstool of my feet: what house will you build for me, or what is the place of my rest? Has not my hand made all these things?' Behold, they have where the books of the Old Testament proclaim that God does not dwell in temples made by hands;
and yet the Son of our God, with a scourge made of cords, drove out of the temple those who were selling oxen and doves, and overturned the tables of the money-changers, and said: 'My Father's house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers.' If therefore anyone, with these two chapters likewise set in opposition, should wish to deceive the untaught and to say that in the Old Testament that God is magnified whose throne is said to be heaven and the earth the footstool of his feet, and who is denied to dwell in a house made by hands, while in the New Testament his house is said to be a temple built by men:
will not the Manichaeans, even if late, confess both that in both Testaments a dwelling-place of God made by the hands of men is understood as having some signification, and that in both Testaments it is proclaimed that God does not dwell in places built by men? Concerning what is written in Exodus: 'You shall not worship strange gods,' and again: 'Your God is called jealous; for being jealous he has been jealous.' When the Manichaeans slander this chapter which is written, 'You shall not worship strange gods,' they sufficiently show that it pleases them to worship many gods. Nor is it any wonder, since in their sect they recount and commend a most numerous family of gods; indeed they have even descended to those visible things which they venerate and worship in place of the very light of truth;
and therefore what is written in Exodus displeases them: 'You shall not worship strange gods.' They add also that this was said for this reason: 'Your God is called jealous; for being jealous he has been jealous,' so that we should not love as God one who is jealous, by whose jealousy we are not allowed to be jealous for strange gods. And therefore they say that these things are contrary to the Gospel, since the Lord says: 'Righteous Father, and the world has not known you' — as though a righteous God ought not to be called one, unless he permits us to worship strange gods. For they argue that a righteous God and a jealous God are, as it were, contrary to each other, and they deceive the wretched who do not understand that the whole hope of our salvation is the jealousy of God.
For by this name is signified that providence of his by which he permits no soul to commit fornication away from himself with impunity, as the prophet says: 'You will destroy all who commit fornication away from you.' For just as that which is called the wrath of God is not a disturbance of mind but a power of avenging, so the jealousy of God is not that torment of soul by which husbands are wont to be tortured against their wives, or wives against their husbands, but a most tranquil and pure justice, by which no soul is allowed to be blessed while corrupted and in a manner made pregnant by false opinions and depraved desires. For those men shudder at these words who have not yet seen that no words are fitting to the ineffable majesty of God. For thus they think one must refrain from these words, as though they were saying something worthy of God
when they do not utter these things. For the Holy Spirit, insinuating this very thing to men of understanding — how ineffable the highest divine things are — willed to use even these words which among men are wont to be reckoned as faults, so that from them they might be admonished that even those things which men think they say with some dignity befitting God are unworthy of his majesty, for which an honouring silence rather befits than any human utterance. I seek out the jealousy of man and I find a disturbance torturing the heart. Yet when I seek the cause, I find nothing else than that he does not endure his spouse's adultery. For especially and properly is jealousy wont to be spoken of among married couples.
Therefore, if a husband were in himself blessed and omnipotent and just, he would avenge his spouse's sin without any torment and with all ease and without any iniquity. And yet I would, according to the human manner of speaking, even if not properly, still by transference and rightly, call that action of his jealousy. For who slandered Tullius (Cicero), who certainly knew how to speak Latin, when he said to Caesar: 'Of your virtues none is more admirable nor more gracious than mercy'? And yet they say that mercy is so named because it makes the heart wretched at another's misery. Does virtue then make the heart wretched? What then would Tullius answer to the slanderers, except that by the name of mercy he wished to call clemency?
since we are rightly wont to speak using not only proper words but also neighbouring ones. I wished to make mention of this author, because the question is not about the matter but about the word. For just as our authors — those, that is, of the divine writings — thought chiefly about things, so almost all the care of worldly authors is about words. But I have the Gospel and all the books of the New Testament, in which the mercy of God is most frequently commended. If therefore these wretches dare, let them from that source too raise a question and deny that God is merciful, lest he be understood to have a wretched heart. As therefore there can be in God mercy without wretchedness of heart,
so also, without decay or torment of soul, let us not disdain to accept the jealousy of God, and let us bear with the condition of human speech, that we may arrive at the divine silence. But if they say that a jealous God and a just God are contraries, what will they say when even in the New Testament I find: 'I am jealous for you with the jealousy of God,' and a testimony applied from the Old in the Gospel: 'The zeal of your house has consumed me'? Again, when in the Old they read: 'The Lord is just and has loved acts of justice; his countenance has beheld equity,' will they not confess that even in this way the two Testaments may seem to the untaught to be contrary — that in the New we find the jealousy of God, and in the Old the justice of God?
But to those who understand well, both are found in both, harmonizing with the great unity and peace of the Holy Spirit. Concerning what is written, that blood must not be eaten, because the blood is the soul of the flesh. Against this sentence of the old Law the Manichaeans set from the Gospel that saying which the Lord speaks: that those are not to be feared who can kill the body but cannot harm the soul; and they argue, saying: If blood is the soul, how is it that men do not have power over it, since they do many things with blood — whether draining it off and setting it before dogs and birds as food, or pouring it out or mixing it with mire and mud? For these things and countless others men can do with blood without difficulty.
Therefore these men ask, insulting, how, if the soul is of blood, a man's slayer cannot harm the soul, since he has so great a power over its blood. They add also what the Apostle Paul says: 'Because flesh and blood shall not possess the kingdom of God,' and they say: If blood is the soul, as Moses says, no soul will be found able to attain the kingdom of God. To this slander it must first be answered thus, that they themselves be compelled to show where it is written in the books of the old Law that the human soul is blood. For nowhere will they find this in that Scripture which the wretches, as long as they attempt to tear it to pieces, are in no way permitted to understand.
But if nothing of the sort is said there about the human soul, what does it matter to us if the soul of a beast either can be harmed by a slayer or cannot possess the kingdom of God? But because these men are exceedingly anxious about the souls of beasts — for since the souls of men are rational, they nonetheless think that these are rolled back into beasts — they suppose that the kingdoms of heaven are closed to them, if they should agree that they are closed to the souls of beasts. What of this? That Adimantus, one of the disciples of Mani — whom they record to have been a great teacher of that sect — even dared to insult the people of Israel. He dared therefore to insult the Jewish people, because according to their understanding, by which they suppose the blood to be the soul,
the souls of their own parents were partly devoured by serpents, partly consumed by fire, partly dried up in deserts and the most rugged places of the mountains. But if anyone should grant that this is true, he would still prove that it was done without any crime of those whom this man wished to insult. For they did not in any part harm the souls of their own parents, to whom he said all those things befell according to their understanding; wherefore they can have grief from it, but not guilt. But what will Adimantus himself do according to his own opinion, by which he believed that even rational souls — that is, the souls of men — can be thrust into the bodies of beasts? What then will he do about so great a crime,
if he ever wearied a slow beast of burden with blows or one urged on by the bridle, in which perhaps his father's soul was? — not to mention that he could even have killed his own parents among lice and fleas, from the killing of which these men do not abstain. For what does it profit them that they sometimes deny that human souls can be rolled back into those most minute creatures? For they deny this lest they be held guilty of so many killings, or be forced to spare fleas and lice and bugs and to endure such great annoyances from them without any license to slay them. For they are vehemently pressed as to why a human soul can be rolled back into a little fox and cannot into a weasel, since the cub of a fox is perhaps even smaller than a large weasel.
Then, if it can into a weasel, why not into a mouse? And if it can into that, why not into a gecko? And if it can into that, why not into a locust? Then into a bee, then into a fly, then into a bug, and thence even down to a flea, and to whatever else is much more minute? For they do not find where to set a limit, and so through this trifling cruelty their consciences are overwhelmed with countless crimes of homicide. Now from what is written, that the blood of a beast is its soul — besides what I said above, that it does not pertain to me what becomes of the soul of a beast — I can also interpret that precept as having been set down in a sign. For the Lord did not hesitate to say:
'This is my body,' when he was giving a sign of his body. But as for what the Apostle says, 'Flesh and blood shall not possess the kingdom of God,' it is also said in the Law: 'My spirit shall not remain in these, because they are flesh.' And so often in the ancient books a future reward is promised to the souls of the just. But nevertheless the Apostle, wishing to intimate what kind of body the just will have through the transformation in the resurrection — since they will neither marry nor be given in marriage, but will be as the angels in heaven — wishing therefore to intimate this future transformation of the bodies of the saints, the Apostle said: 'For I say to you, brethren, that flesh and blood shall not possess the kingdom of God.'
This can be found, not by one sentence taken separately and cited for the sake of fraud, but by the whole passage of the epistle being examined, or rather simply read — for the matter is not obscure. For he says thus: 'This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.' That he says this concerning the body is manifestly found from what precedes, when he says: 'Not all flesh is the same flesh: one indeed of men, another of beasts; one flesh of birds, another of fishes; and there are heavenly bodies and earthly bodies; but the glory of the heavenly is one, and that of the earthly another; one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars. For star differs from star in glory; so also is the resurrection of the dead.'
'The body is sown in corruption, it will rise in incorruption; it is sown in dishonour, it will rise in glory; it is sown in weakness, it will rise in power; it is sown a natural body, it will rise a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual, as it is written: The first man Adam was made into a living soul, the last Adam into a life-giving spirit. But that which is spiritual is not first, but that which is natural, afterward that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is of heaven, heavenly. As is the earthy, such also are the earthy; and as is the heavenly, such also are the heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, let us also bear the image of him who is of heaven.'
'But this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot possess the kingdom of God by inheritance, neither shall corruption possess incorruption by inheritance.' Certainly it is now clear why the Apostle said this. Why then does that man, with such base fraud, cite nothing but this last statement and keep silent about those preceding ones, by which this thing, which he ill interprets, could be well understood? For since the body of our Lord after the resurrection was so raised up into heaven that, for the sake of that heavenly habitation, it received a heavenly change — and we have been commanded to hope for this on the last day — therefore the Apostle said: 'As is the earthy, such also are the earthy,' that is, the mortal; 'and as is the heavenly, such also are the heavenly.'
That is, immortal not only in soul but also in body. Hence he had also said above that the glory of heavenly bodies is one thing and that of earthly bodies another. But when he says that in the resurrection the body will be spiritual, it is not therefore to be supposed that it will not be a body but a spirit; rather, he calls it a spiritual body because it will be in every way subject to the spirit, without any corruption or death. For just as you call the body which we now have an animal body, that is no reason to suppose it is not a body but a soul. Therefore, as it is now called an animal body because it is subject to the soul, but cannot yet be called spiritual because it is not yet fully subject to the spirit, so long as it can still be corrupted:
so also then it will be called spiritual, when it can resist the spirit and eternity with no corruption. But if it still seems to have been too little shown that the Apostle spoke that sentence on account of the transformation which is to come, when he says: 'Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, neither shall corruption inherit incorruption,' attend to what he immediately subjoins and adds: 'Behold, I tell you a mystery: we shall indeed all rise again, yet 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 incorruptible, and we shall be changed.' Then he weaves in and states also that which I mentioned a little before, so as to show
of what sort that very transformation will be. For at once he says: 'For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.' From this, then, it appears why flesh and blood shall not possess the kingdom of God: because, when it shall have put on incorruption and immortality, it will no longer be flesh and blood, but will be changed into a heavenly body. This indeed we have treated by way of the occasion, because those who deny the resurrection of bodies are wont to lie greatly in wait against this sentence too. For that question was proposed not concerning the body but concerning the soul, which they think is so understood in the Law that it is reckoned to be the blood—a thing which we in no way understand thus.
But although we are not concerned about the souls of beasts, with which we have no fellowship of reason, nevertheless as to that which the Law says—that blood is to be poured out and not taken as food, because the blood is the life (soul)—we say that this was set down as a sign, just as many other things, and indeed almost all the sacraments of those Scriptures, are full of signs and figures of the future proclamation which has now been made manifest through our Lord Jesus Christ. For the blood is the soul in the same manner as the rock was Christ, as the Apostle says: 'For they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ.' Now it is well known that the children of Israel, when the rock was struck, drank water in the desert—of whom the Apostle was speaking when he said this. And yet he did not say:
'The rock signified Christ,' but he says: 'The rock was Christ.' And again, lest this be taken carnally, he calls that rock spiritual, that is, he teaches that it is to be understood spiritually. It would be long, and is not now necessary, to expound the sacraments of that same Law, except in so far as they can be briefly set forth. But it is enough that those who slander these things should know that we do not understand them in the way they are wont to mock, but as the Apostles, understanding all things, expounded a few, so as to leave the rest to be understood by posterity according to the same rules. Concerning that which is written in Deuteronomy: 'See that you do not forget the covenant of your God which he has written, and that you make for yourselves figures and images,' he further added, saying:
'Your God is a consuming fire and a jealous God.' These words that Adimantus proposed from the Scriptures in this manner; for we have undertaken to refute and confute his slanders. But even above, when he was slandering the jealousy of God, I think a sufficient answer has been given. Let us nevertheless remember that not only there, but also here, he thus charged the Scriptures concerning the jealousy of God, so as to add also that which, in those books, is commanded by the Lord our God about not worshipping graven images—as though he found fault with God's jealousy for no other reason than that by that very jealousy we are forbidden the worship of idols. He therefore wishes to appear to favour idols. And this they do for the purpose of winning even the goodwill of the pagans for their most wretched and insane sect.
Against this chapter of the Law they also set that passage where a certain man came to the Lord and said to him: 'Good Master, what shall I do to possess eternal life?' To whom Jesus answered: 'Why do you ask me about what is good? No one is good but God alone.' So that from this, forsooth, we might judge these to be contradictory: because in the Law it is said, 'God is a consuming fire,' and 'God is jealous,' but in the Gospel, 'No one is good but God alone.' And concerning jealousy indeed it has already been answered that these words are not so set down in the Scriptures as to signify any perturbation or torment of God, but because nothing worthy can be said of God, therefore recourse has been had even to such expressions—which, when men have judged them unworthy,
they may be compelled to learn that even those things which they think they say fittingly concerning the ineffable divine excellence are unworthy of the majesty of God—whose Wisdom, since it was to descend even to the human body, first descended even to human words. And when I begin to examine that word, I do not see that I have spoken properly: for nothing can descend except what can also be moved from place to place. For he who descends seems to leave a higher place and to seek a lower. But the Wisdom of God, since it is wholly present everywhere, can in no way migrate from place to place. Of it John in the Gospel speaks better, as one who shared the Lord's bosom. For he says:
'He was in this world, and the world was made through him, and the world knew him not'; and yet he himself also adds and says: 'He came unto his own, and his own received him not.' How was he here, and how did he come, unless because that ineffable sublimity, in order to be suited to men, must be signified by human sounds? But in order that it may make men gods, it must be understood by a divine silence. A reason therefore can be given why it was so said; yet nothing can be said worthily of God, which for that very reason is now unworthy, because it could be said. Take away from jealousy error and grief, and what else will remain but a will guarding chastity and vindicating conjugal purity from corruption? By what word, then, could this be better intimated than by the jealousy of God—
that we are called to wedlock with God, and he does not wish us to be corrupted by base love, and he punishes our unchastity and loves chastity? For not without reason is it commonly said even among the people: 'He who is not jealous does not love.' To this also pertains that which was said: 'a consuming fire'—about which I ought not to dispute, but rather to question the men themselves: what fire the Lord said he had come to send into this world. For this was said in the Gospel, which they cannot accuse—not to honour Christ, but to deceive Christians. And when this has been recalled to them, how the Lord said, 'I came to send fire into this world,' the wretches say: 'But that is a different thing.' To whom we reply: 'And this too is a different thing: do not be afraid.'
For Christ himself speaks also in the Old Testament when he says: 'I am a consuming fire'—the same who speaks in the Gospel that he had come to send fire into this world, that is, the Word of God, which is himself. For after his resurrection he expounded the ancient Scriptures to his disciples, beginning from Moses and all the prophets, when those very disciples confessed that they had received fire, saying: 'Was not our heart burning within us on the way, while he opened to us the Scriptures?' He himself is the consuming fire: for divine love consumes the old life and renews the man, so that from the fact that God is a consuming fire, he brings it about that we love him, and from the fact that he is jealous, he himself loves us.
Therefore do not fear the fire which is God, but fear the fire which God has prepared for heretics. Now as to that passage which Adimantus chose from the Gospel, which he might set before the unlearned as though contrary to this chapter of the Law, where the Lord says, 'No one is good but God alone'—how often the goodness of God is found in the Old Testament, who could suffice to count? Yet I will set down one. That which is daily sung in the churches: 'Give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures forever.' Surely this too, according to the Manichaeans' opinion, seems contrary to a jealous God, and yet it is sung in the books of the Old Testament. Likewise that king,
who, when he was making a wedding for his son, found among those reclining at table a man not having a wedding garment, and at first addressing him by the name of friend, commanded him, bound hand and foot, to be cast into the outer darkness—to those who understand ill he does not seem good. And if anyone were to propose this very chapter of the Gospel and, just as Adimantus does with the Old Testament, so slanderously accuse the Gospel, praising rather the books of the Old Testament, where it is written, 'Give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures forever,' and finding fault in the New Testament because a guest who was invited is cast into so great a torment on account of a garment—and were to do this persistently with fraudulent perversity,
so as to gather all the passages of gentleness from the Old Testament and the passages of severity from the New, and to contend that these are contrary to each other, praising the Old and censuring the New: he would likewise find unlearned men and wretchedly ignorant of the divine Scriptures, whom he might persuade that the Old Testament rather than the New is to be retained. And since these men do this from the other side—that is, censuring the Old as though contrary to the New—I marvel that they do not consider that someone might at some time read both, and, by divine help understanding both, praise both, and either grieve over the fraud and malice of these men as men, or beware of it as of heretics, or deride it as of the unlearned and proud. Concerning that which is written in Deuteronomy:
'According to the desire of your soul slay and eat all flesh according to the pleasure which the Lord has given you; but beware that you do not eat the blood, but pour it out like water upon the earth.' With these words of the Law Adimantus thinks contrary that which the Lord says in the Gospel: 'Let not your hearts be weighed down with surfeiting and drunkenness and the cares of this world'; and that which the Apostle says: 'It is good not to eat flesh nor to drink wine'; and again: 'You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.' But we say of all these things—whether those written in the Old or those written in the New Testament—both that they were set down as their proper occasions required, and we show that they are not contrary to one another.
Although even he himself, in those words which he cited from the Old Testament, could have observed that what was said—'according to the desire of your soul slay and eat all flesh'—does not pertain to immoderate gluttony, since there follows: 'according to the pleasure which the Lord has given you.' For the Lord has not given you immoderate pleasure, but only so much as suffices for the sustenance and health of nature. But whoever pursues immoderate voracity pursues his own vice, not that pleasure which the Lord has given: and therefore that which is set down in the Gospel is not contrary: 'Let not your hearts be weighed down with surfeiting and drunkenness and the cares of this world.'
For when anyone fills himself only with that pleasure which the Lord has given—that is, with moderate and natural pleasure—his heart is not weighed down with surfeiting and drunkenness and the cares of this world. But as to what the Apostle says about not eating flesh and not drinking wine, he did not command this because he judged those things unclean, as these men suppose and, erring, hurl into error those whom they have persuaded of such things. But since he himself set down the reason why he said this, this sentence need not be interpreted or expounded by us. For it is enough to weave into this discourse the whole passage from the Apostle's epistle, so that both the reason why the Apostle said this may plainly appear, and the fraud of these men, who select certain little scraps from the Scriptures,
by which they deceive the unlearned, not connecting what is written above and below, from which the will and intention of the writer might be understood. Thus, then, the Apostle says: 'Him that is weak in faith receive, not in disputes over thoughts. For one believes he may eat all things; but he who is weak eats vegetables. Let not him who eats despise him who does not eat, and let not him who does not eat judge him who eats: for God has received him. Who are you to judge another's servant? To his own lord he stands or falls. But he shall stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand. One indeed judges between day and day; another judges every day alike. Let each one abound in his own understanding.'
'He who regards the day, regards it unto the Lord; and he who eats, eats unto the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who does not eat, does not eat unto the Lord and gives thanks to God. For none of us lives to himself, and none dies to himself. For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Whether therefore we live or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ died and rose again, that he might have dominion over both the dead and the living. But you, why do you judge your brother? Or why do you despise your brother? For we shall all stand before the tribunal of the Lord. For it is written: As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then each of us shall render account of himself.'
'Let us not therefore judge one another any more; but judge this rather, that you put not a stumbling-block or occasion of falling before your brothers. I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is common of itself; save that to him who thinks anything to be common, to him it is common. For if because of food your brother is grieved, you no longer walk according to love. Do not by your food destroy him for whom Christ died. Let not then our good be blasphemed. For the kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. For he who in this serves Christ pleases God and is approved by men. Let us therefore follow after the things that make for peace, and the things that are for mutual edification. Do not for the sake of food destroy the work of God.'
'All things indeed are clean; but it is evil for the man who eats with offence. It is good not to eat flesh nor to drink wine, nor anything by which your brother is offended. The faith which you have, keep to yourself before God. Blessed is he who does not condemn himself in that which he approves. But he who doubts, if he eats, is condemned, because it is not of faith; and whatever is not of faith is sin.' Is there any need of anyone's interpretation for it to be understood, both why the Apostle said this, and with how great malice these men pluck certain sure passages from the Scriptures, by which they may circumvent the unlearned?
For the Apostle also said that all things are clean according to faith, and that to him who thinks them unclean they are unclean, and that then one must abstain from them, when they are received with offence—that is, when some weak person thinks he must abstain from all flesh, lest he fall upon flesh that has been sacrificed to idols; and therefore he who eats it can be judged to do so in honour of idols, and from this be gravely offended—whereas that sacrificial flesh itself, if it be received in faith by one who is ignorant of it, defiles no one. Wherefore in another place the same Apostle forbids that inquiry be made,
when something is bought from the market, or when someone invited to the table of an unbeliever sees flesh set before him which these men reckon unclean—not on account of its being sacrificed, but because it is flesh—although the Apostle cries out that all things are clean, and that every creature of God is good, and that all things are sanctified through the word and prayer, and yet that one must abstain from them if perchance some weak person is offended. And in a certain place he most plainly designated these men, when he says that in the last times there shall be certain ones forbidding to marry, abstaining from the foods which God has created.
For he properly designates those who abstain from such foods not in order to curb their own concupiscence or to spare the weakness of another, but because they think that the flesh itself is unclean and deny that God is its creator. But let us hold to the apostolic teaching which says that all things are clean to the clean, keeping the evangelical moderation, so that our hearts be not weighed down with surfeiting and drunkenness and the cares of this world. Now as to that which the same Apostle says: 'You cannot communicate with the table of the Lord and the table of demons,' I do not see why they should have believed it must be set against, and as it were contrary to, this passage of the Law. For the Law does not speak of things sacrificed, when it is said in Deuteronomy:
'According to the desire of your soul slay and eat all flesh according to the pleasure which the Lord has given you,' but it speaks of the foods that pertain to man's nourishment. But since the Manichaeans, even when any animals are prepared for a man's dinner, call it a sacrifice, according to their own understanding they have thought these things contrary. For this reason they also cited that passage where the Apostle says: 'The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God'—although the Apostle was most plainly speaking of victims which are offered in the temple to demons, not of those foods which men prepare for themselves. For thus he says: 'What then? Do I say that anything is sacrificed to idols, or that an idol is anything?'
'But because the things which they sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God, I do not wish you to become partners with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he? All things are lawful, but not all things are expedient; all things are lawful, but not all things edify. Let no one seek what is his own, but what is another's. Whatever is sold in the market, eat, asking no question for conscience' sake; for the earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof. If any of the unbelievers invites you, and you are willing to go, eat whatever is set before you, judging nothing for conscience' sake. But if anyone says to you,
"This is a thing sacrificed to idols," do not eat, for the sake of him who showed it, and for conscience' sake; conscience, I say, not your own, but the other's. For why is my liberty judged by another's conscience? If I partake with thanksgiving (grace), why am I blasphemed for that for which I give thanks?' 'Whether therefore you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.' Let the Manichaeans attend to these things and see how it was said in Deuteronomy: 'According to the desire of your soul slay and eat all flesh according to the pleasure which the Lord has given you.' Now as to what was commanded the Jews about not eating certain flesh, and which was called unclean,
it has value as a signification of unclean men, who are signified through figures in the old Scriptures. For just as that ox, whose mouth is forbidden to be muzzled while it treads out the grain, signifies the evangelist, as the Apostle most plainly expounds, so also those things which were prohibited signify certain uncleannesses of men, which are not received into the fellowship of the body of Christ, that is, into the stable and everlasting Church. For as regards food, it most manifestly appears that nothing at all is unclean, but that it is evil for the man who eats with offence. Concerning that which is written in Leviticus: 'Separate the unclean from the clean, and let no one eat the flesh of the camel, the ass, the hare, the pig, the eagle, the kite, the raven, the vulture, and the rest.'
Nowhere can the soul of this man, most full of guiles and frauds, be caught more manifestly—who, as though contrary and opposed to himself, cast up chapters from both Testaments—than in this passage, where he mentioned that it is written in Leviticus that one should abstain from the flesh of certain animals. For to this sentence he thought that passage from the Gospel should be opposed, where the Lord says: 'Nothing that enters into a man defiles him, but the things which proceed from him defile him.' If he did this unwittingly, nothing is blinder; but if knowingly, nothing is more wicked. Had he not himself a little before set down the Apostle's testimony saying, 'It is good, brothers, not to eat flesh nor to drink wine,' while he desires to set the New Testament against the Old,
where it is said, 'According to the desire of your soul slay and eat all flesh'? How then does the Lord's sentence now please him, in which he says that nothing entering into a man defiles him, but that those things defile which proceed from a man? Where will this fellow hide himself from this sentence? Whither will he flee? Let him tell me, when by perverse and superstitious imagination of continence he commands that the uncleanness of flesh is to be shunned and separated from the foods of the saints. For surely, if it is true that those things which enter into a man do not defile, the Manichaeans, with great error, call foods unclean when men feed on flesh. But if such foods are unclean, what will they do with that testimony,
which was brought forth by evangelical and divine authority, where the Lord says that a man is not defiled by those things which enter into him, but by those things which proceed from him? Or will they perhaps say, as they are wont to say when the authority of the Scriptures presses them, that this chapter was inserted into the Gospel by the corrupters of the Scriptures? Why then does Adimantus use this chapter as a witness, and from it attempt to assail the Old Testament—from which he himself is overthrown? For when any catholic Christian, a venerator and understander of both Scriptures, shall have answered him that these things are not contrary,
namely that those things about the flesh of certain animals, which the people, still carnal, were commanded not to eat, were set down to signify human characters, which the Church, which is the body of the Lord, cannot receive into the stable and everlasting bond of its unity, rejecting them as unclean foods and not converting them into its own inward parts—so that all those precepts imposed on the carnal people might prophesy the future discipline of the spiritual people; and therefore that they do not conflict with the Lord's sentence, in which he most truly says that a man is not defiled by those things which through food enter into him. For that sentence imposes burdens on servants; this one now shakes off from free men the yoke of servitude.
And yet that was so said that the burdens of servants might foretell the faith of the free. For all these things, as the Apostle says, happened to them in a figure for our sake, upon whom the end of the ages has come. If therefore the things they suffered happened in a figure, the things of which they were admonished they received in a figure. When therefore I shall have answered these things, and shall have shown in this manner that these two chapters, compared from the several Testaments, are not contrary, what will this fellow do—against whom the most weighty testimony of the witness whom he himself produced against his adversary speaks? For he himself cited from the Gospel the testimony, with the Lord saying that a man is not defiled by those foods which enter into him;
and yet he does not cease to admonish and teach that one must abstain from flesh as from unclean foods. And nevertheless he felt how great a blow he inflicted on himself, and with how great a stroke, struck back, he wounded himself. For lest anyone should question him and say: 'How then do you forbid the eating of flesh, if the Lord says, as you yourself relate, that nothing entering into a man defiles him, but the things which proceed from him defile?'—he wished, as it were, to apply a medicine without cause to a deadly wound. For thus he set down that very evangelical testimony: 'In the Gospel,' he says, 'the Lord says to the crowd: Hear and understand, nothing entering into a man defiles him,' and so forth. In that, therefore, he mentioned that the Lord said this to the crowd,
shows nothing else than that he did what he did not out of ignorance but out of malice, so that afterward he might say to his hearers that the Lord spoke these things to the crowd, not to the few saints—such as they themselves wish to appear—so that, since they permit their own hearers, as though still unclean, to feed on flesh, but for themselves, as though now clean, they reckon it wicked and abominable, it might also seem that the Lord thought thus, because he taught these things not to a few saints but to the crowds. O most wicked man, confident in the negligence of the human race for concealing his deceptions!
For he did not believe that anyone would exist who would take up the Gospel and read what follows and find the man in those very meadows, in which the Lord feeds his flocks, hiding snares for the incautious and less provident. For the disciples, moved by these words and not believing that the Lord had spoken properly but rather figuratively when he said that a man is not defiled by those things which through foods enter into him—since the disciples themselves were also Jews, who from childhood had received it as an ingrained thing that the foods of certain flesh were to be shunned—came to him and said to him: 'Do you know that the Pharisees, having heard the word, were scandalized?' But he answering said: 'Every plant which my heavenly Father has not planted shall be rooted up. Leave them:
they are blind and leaders of the blind. But if a blind man gives leadership to a blind man, both fall into a pit.' When therefore he called the unbelief of the Jews a planting which the heavenly Father had not planted, yet Peter, still thinking it to be a parable and that the Jews were on that account rebuked and called blind because they could not understand it, answering said to him: 'Explain to us this parable.' And he, most manifestly showing that it was not a parable but proper speech, said to them: 'Are you also still without understanding? Do you not understand that everything which enters into the mouth goes into the belly and is cast out into the privy? But the things which proceed from the mouth come out of the heart, and these defile a man.'
'For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies; these are the things which defile a man. But to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.' Now the Jews had raised a question about unwashed hands, on the occasion of which the Lord spoke his sentence generally about those things which enter into the mouth and go into the belly and are cast out into the privy—that is, about our foods. Although, therefore, it is written that, when the crowds had been called together to him, he said that not what enters into the mouth defiles a man, but what proceeds from the mouth, yet with what fear this fellow added this to his own words, by which he cited a testimony of this kind, sufficiently appears, as was said a little before,
so that he might have something to answer to those who should raise a question to him, why the chief men of the Manichaeans hold it wicked for themselves to feed on flesh—namely so that what the Lord said might seem to have been conceded only to the crowds, not to the elect. But since from what follows it has been declared that the Lord answered thus even to Peter questioning apart, and with the disciples hearing him—whom indeed he was bringing forward to the summit of the Church—so that he both attested that he had not said those things by a parable and showed that they pertain to all: these men have nothing whence they may take away foods from the throats of men and bind them with the noose of superstition. Perhaps some one of them may say:
'Explain then what the flesh of the pig and the camel and the hare and the kite and the raven and the rest signify, from which the Law commands abstinence.' I will not, because it is long. But suppose I cannot: is anyone therefore unable? And there are already innumerable volumes in which these things have been expounded. Yet for us, to refute these men, it is enough that those observances are a shadow of things to come—not I, but the Apostle, says so, since he also forbids them to be observed in a servile manner, but nevertheless declares that they signify something, saying: 'Let no one therefore judge you in food or in drink, or in respect of a feast day or a new moon or Sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come.'
Those future things, therefore, which were signified in those observances, were, after they came through Christ the Lord of the laws, taken away as servile observances; yet their interpretations are still held by the free. For whatever signified the Church that was to be is prophecy. And you have the same Apostle saying: 'Quench not the Spirit; despise not prophecy; but prove all things: hold fast that which is good.' The divine Scripture, then, must be read, the dispensation of the Holy Spirit must be understood, and prophecy must be regarded; and carnal bondage must be cast off, while the understanding proper to free men must be retained. Concerning that which is written in Deuteronomy: 'Observe and sanctify the day which the Lord thy God hath commanded thee.'
'Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy work; but on the seventh day, the sabbath, thou shalt feast unto the Lord thy God, doing no work — neither thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, thine ox and thine ass and all thy cattle, and the stranger that sojourneth with thee. So let thy servant and thy handmaid rest even as thou. Remember that thou wast a servant in Egypt, and the Lord thy God brought thee out with a mighty hand and a stretched-out arm; therefore the Lord commanded thee to keep the seventh day.' And again in Genesis it is written, as He speaks to Abraham concerning circumcision: 'Keep my covenant,' He says, 'thou and thy seed after thee. This is my covenant which thou shalt keep between me and thee and thy seed:'
'Every male among you shall be circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, and it shall be a token of the covenant between me and you. And on the eighth day ye shall circumcise every male in your nation, so that ye circumcise also the servant born in the house and the one bought with money, besides the stranger; and this shall be my covenant in your nation. And every male who shall not circumcise his foreskin, his soul shall perish from the midst of the people, because he hath broken my covenant.' All these words of the Old Testament Adimantus sets forth so that he may oppose them by the New Testament, and he affirms that those things are contrary which the Lord says in the Gospel concerning the proselyte: 'Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte;'
'and when he is made so, ye make him twofold more a child of hell than yourselves.' As though, forsooth, the Lord calls the proselyte a child of hell because he is circumcised and keeps the sabbath, and not rather because he is compelled to imitate the depraved ways of the Jews and their perverse manner of living — not in that they observe the precepts of the Law, but in that they act against the Law. This the Lord says most plainly of them in another place, where He says that they reject the commandment of God to establish their own ordinance; for whereas the Law had commanded that father and mother be honoured, they themselves devised how parents might be dishonoured. And likewise when He says to them: 'Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, who hold the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and neither enter yourselves, nor suffer others to enter.'
Or when in another place He commands His hearers to obey the sayings of the scribes and Pharisees, but not to imitate their deeds. For He says: 'They sit in Moses' seat; what they say, do; but what they do, do not; for they say and do not.' In which place the Lord both confirms the authority of the Law which was given through Moses, and yet shows most plainly that the ways of those who did not obey the Law which they had received are to be guarded against and shunned. But by these their own perversities they brought it about that when some Gentile passed over to their Law — that is, was made a proselyte — he took on their ways and became a child of hell twofold more than they themselves were.
For they took great pains that someone from among the Gentiles should become a Jew, and having made him a Jew, they compelled him to imitate their most wicked ways. Nor was Adimantus at all able to notice that what he cites from the Apostle as though contrary is in no way contrary, because his whole eye was intent not upon inquiry into Scripture but upon its reproach. For he cites the Apostle saying: 'Is any called being circumcised? let him not become uncircumcised. Is any called in uncircumcision? let him not be circumcised, for circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God.' For what is more manifest than that the Apostle here enjoins that each one remain as he was called?
For when the realities came, of which those observances were the shadows, this was brought about: that it might be shown that hope is not to be placed in the shadows themselves, but in the very realities which those shadows signified were to come — that is, in Christ and the Church. And therefore all those things were now empty; yet the Apostle enjoins that they be not removed as though harmful, but despised as superfluous — so that if any Jew had believed in Christ, he should not, because of the offence of his own people, be forbidden to remain in those superfluous things, and yet should not suppose his salvation to be established in them; for it is not those signs, but the things which are signified by them, that lead unto salvation. And therefore circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God.
And as for what he says in another place: 'I would that they were even cut off who trouble you' — the Apostle does not say this because circumcision is contrary to the Gospel, as the Manichaeans suppose; but this is what is contrary to the Gospel: that anyone, forsaking the reality which is figured by that shadow, should follow the emptiness of the shadow itself. This is what those men wanted who imposed the yoke of circumcision upon Gentiles believing in Christ, as though it were necessary unto salvation, when now no shadow was to be figured in the body, but the reality itself was to be borne in the heart. And as for what he says: 'Ye observe days, and sabbaths, and solemnities; I am afraid of you, lest I have laboured over you in vain' — it is not in fact written as Adimantus puts it, for the Apostle does not there name the sabbath. For he says:
'Ye observe days, and years, and seasons; I am afraid of you, lest I have laboured over you in vain.' But suppose it were said of the sabbath. Do not we too say that these things are not to be observed, but rather those which are signified by them? For they observed them in a servile manner, not understanding to the signification and foreannouncement of what realities they pertained. And this the Apostle blames in them, and in all who serve the creature rather than the Creator. For we too solemnly observe both the Lord's day and Easter and whatever other Christian festivals of days there are; but because we understand to what they pertain, we do not observe the seasons, but the things which are signified by those seasons.
The Manichaeans, however, reprehend these things as though they observed no days and seasons. But when they are questioned about these matters according to the opinion of their sect, they attempt to explain everything so that they may seem to observe not the seasons themselves, but the realities of which those are the signs. And that these realities are indeed fabulous and utterly false is shown in other places. For the present it has been said thus, that they may be compelled by their own mouth to confess that such things can be reasonably celebrated. And therefore it is manifest that the circumcision of the flesh was both rightly imposed upon servants and rightly understood by the free. We reject it, then, as carnal with the Apostle, and we approve it as spiritual with the Apostle;
and we do not observe the rest of the sabbath in time, but we understand the temporal sign, and toward the eternal rest which is signified by that sign we direct the gaze of the heart. We reject, therefore, the observance of seasons with the Apostle, and we hold the understanding of the temporal signs with the Apostle; and we approve the difference of the two Testaments in such wise that in the one there are the burdens of servants, in the other the joys of the free — in the one is recognized the prefiguring of our possession, in the other is held the possession itself. The Apostle interprets the sabbath in the Epistle to the Hebrews, when he says: 'There remaineth therefore a keeping of sabbath to the people of God.' He interprets circumcision also, when he says of Abraham: 'And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of faith.'
I hold, therefore, the apostolic interpretation spiritually, and I despise in liberty the carnal observance of bondage, venerating God the author of both Testaments — who both set before the old man fleeing away, as a Lord, what he might fear, and opened to the new man returning, as a Father, what he might love. Concerning that which is written in Exodus: 'If thou wilt hearken with thine ear to my voice and do whatsoever I command thee, I will hate them that hate thee and afflict them that afflict thee; my angel shall go before thee and bring thee to the Amorites and Perizzites and Canaanites and Jebusites and Girgashites; and ye shall slay them. Ye shall not worship their gods nor do their works, but with overthrowing shalt thou overthrow them and blot out their memory.'
To these words thus cited from the old books Adimantus opposes, as though contrary, that which is written in the Gospel, the Lord saying: 'But I say unto you, love your enemies; bless them that curse you, and do good to them that hate you; and pray for them that persecute you.' In which place it must first be observed that it ought to have been enough for a man wishing to show things as it were contrary, that he pointed out that concerning the slaying of enemies it is written in the old Law. For the Lord assuredly gave His precept concerning loving enemies with regard to men, whom, through our patience and charity, anyone understands can be converted to salvation, and which has very often been demonstrated by examples.
What then does he mean by that which he thought ought to be added as a consequence, where it is written: 'Ye shall not worship their gods, nor do their works, but with overthrowing overthrow them and blot out their memory' — unless it be that the Manichaeans compel us to love even the gods of the nations? And do they judge that what the Lord says in the Gospel, 'Love your enemies,' pertains not only to men, but also to demons or even to idols? If it is so, who would not detest that madness? But if they do not so judge, then this man erred greatly, who wished to cite that the superstitions of the nations were commanded to be overthrown in the Old Testament, when he wanted to oppose, as though contrary, what is written in the New concerning loving enemies.
But we, for our part, do not say that even that which was said to that people in the old books concerning slaying hostile men is contrary to this Gospel precept, by which the Lord bids us love our enemies — seeing that that slaying of enemies was fitting for a people still carnal, to whom the Law had been given as a schoolmaster, as the Apostle says. But those who at that time among that people were holy and spiritual men — very few, such as Moses, such as the prophets — with what mind they carried out that slaying of enemies, whether they loved those whom they slew, lies much hidden from the unlearned and impious who love their own blindness; and since they are not fit to see these things, they must rather be pressed by the weight of authority.
For what is it that the Apostle says: 'I indeed, absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged, as though present, him who has so done — in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus'? For what does that slaying, which these men greatly exaggerate and invidiously bandy about, contain, except the destruction of the flesh? But because the Apostle set forth with what mind he did it, he sufficiently declared that vengeance can proceed against some enemy together with charity. And yet here too perhaps the destruction of the flesh may be understood in another way, namely that which comes about through penance.
They themselves, moreover, read apocryphal Scriptures, which they even say are utterly uncorrupted, where it is written that the apostle Thomas cursed a man by whom, out of imprudence, he had been struck with the palm of the hand — one who did not know who he was — and that that curse forthwith came to effect. For when that man, since he was a servant of the banquet, had gone out to the fountain to fetch water, he was killed and torn to pieces by a lion; and, that this might be made manifest to the terror of others, a dog brought his hand to the tables where the apostle was feasting. And so, when the cause was inquired after by those who did not know it and was disclosed to them, they were converted to great fear and great honour of the apostle; and hence, they say, arose the beginning of commending the Gospel.
If anyone wished to turn the teeth of the Manichaeans against themselves, how bitingly would he reprove these things! But because there too it is not left unsaid with what mind it was done, the love of the avenger is seen. For thus it is read in that Scripture, that the apostle prayed for the one against whom vengeance was temporally taken, that he might be spared in the judgment to come. If, therefore, in the time of the New Testament, when charity is above all commended, a fear of visible punishments was divinely instilled into carnal men, how much more is it to be understood that this was fitting, in the time of the Old Testament, for that people whom the fear of the Law, as of a schoolmaster, kept in check? For this is the briefest and plainest difference of the two Testaments: fear and love.
The one pertains to the old man, the other to the new man; yet both are brought forth and joined together by the most merciful dispensation of the one God. And in the old Scripture the mind of those who avenge is passed over in silence, because very few spiritual men knew, by divine revelations, what they were doing, so that the people, for whom terror was useful, might be tamed by a most severe rule — that, just as they saw their impious enemies and worshippers of idols given into their hands to be slain, so they themselves might dread being given into the hands of their enemies, if they should despise the commands of the true God and slip into the worship of idols and the impieties of the nations. For upon those who sinned in like manner, vengeance was taken in like manner. But all this temporal vengeance terrifies weak souls,
in order that it may instruct those nurtured under discipline and may be able to turn them away from everlasting and unspeakable torments, because carnal men fear more what God avenges in the present than what He threatens for the future. There can be love, therefore, in the avenger — which each man proves in his own son, when he restrains him, as he slides into the worst ways, with a most severe correction, and the more so the more he loves him, and judges that in this way he can be set right. But men do not slay the sons whom they love when they wish to correct them, because many hold this life to be a great good, and place all their reason for wishing to educate their sons in this life.
But faithful and wise men, who believe that there is another and better life and have come to know it as far as they can, do not themselves take vengeance by killing when they wish to correct their sons, because they believe that in this life they can be corrected. God, however, who knows what He assigns to each, takes vengeance by killing upon whom He wills, whether through men or by a hidden order of things — not because He hates them insofar as they are men, but insofar as they are sinners. For in those very old books we read it said to God: 'And thou hatest nothing of the things which thou hast made,' but He orders all things, whether through punishments or through rewards, justice governing. Was not the Apostle Paul speaking to faithful Christians when he said:
'But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. But if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened by the Lord, that we should not be condemned with this world.' Behold, it is manifest that God with love corrects, not only by infirmities and sicknesses but even by temporal deaths, those whom He does not will to condemn with the world. Let these men attend to these things and see how even impious nations could be given into the hands of a people, though still carnal, yet worshipping one God, that they might be slain by it;
while nevertheless in that people, if there were any spiritual men, they understood the dispensation of God without hatred of anyone. And let them see how it is not contrary that the Lord commanded us in the Gospel to love our enemies, concerning whom He nevertheless Himself promises vengeance, when He brings in the similitude of that judge who, though he was unjust, neither fearing God nor reverencing men, yet could not endure the daily importunities of the widow woman asking that he avenge her, and heard her, lest he should suffer weariness any further — from which comparison He said that God, who is most kind and most just, much more avenges His sons upon their enemies. Against Him let these men dare to raise a question, and let them say, if they can:
'What is this, that thou hast commanded that we love our enemies, and yet dost purpose to avenge us upon them? Or wilt thou perhaps act against the will of thy saints, by punishing and condemning those whom they love?' Nay rather, let them themselves be converted from this slanderous blindness to God, and in both His Testaments understand His will, lest they be found on the left-hand side among those to whom the Lord will say: 'Go into everlasting fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and ye gave me not to eat,' and other such things. For it displeases these wretched men that God delivered enemies to be slain to His people; and they themselves forbid bread to be given to one begging — not an enemy, but a suppliant.
Let them rather understand that there can be vengeance without hatred — which few understand; and yet, as long as it is not understood, so long is it necessary that the reader in the books of both Testaments be tossed about with great labour or error, and suppose the Scriptures to be contrary to one another. This vengeance without hatred the apostles had not yet conceived in their minds, when, angered at those by whom they were not received into hospitality, they inquired of the Lord whether He would have them ask for fire from heaven, as Elijah had done, by which fire the inhospitable men might be consumed. Then the Lord answered them, saying that they knew not of what spirit they were sons, and that He Himself had come to liberate, not to destroy — since they, with a hostile mind, desired to destroy those whom they wished to be consumed by fire.
But afterward, when they had been filled with the Holy Spirit and had been made perfect, so that they could now love even their enemies, they received the power of avenging, because now they could avenge without hatred. This power the apostle Peter also used, in that book which these men do not accept, since it manifestly contains the coming of the Paraclete — that is, of the Comforter, the Holy Spirit — whom He sent to those who mourned, when He Himself had ascended from their eyes into heaven. For the Comforter is sent to the sorrowful, according to that saying of the same Lord: 'Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted.' He Himself also said: 'Then shall the children of the bridegroom mourn, when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them.'
In that book, then, where it is most plainly declared that the Holy Spirit, whom the Lord had promised as Comforter, had come, we read that at the sentence of Peter men fell down and died — a man and his wife — who had dared to lie to the Holy Spirit. This these men blame with great blindness, whereas in the apocrypha they read, as a great work, both that which I have recounted concerning the apostle Thomas, and that Peter's own daughter was made paralytic by her father's prayers, and that the gardener's daughter died at Peter's own prayer; and they answer that it was expedient for these — that the one should be released from that paralysis, and that the other should die for her. Yet they do not deny that it was done at the apostle's prayers. But who told them, 'It was not expedient that impious nations should be slain'?
Deriding these as delivered by God into the hands of the people of the Jews, they feign to marvel; but since those deeds were done by the apostles not out of hatred but out of a good mind, how do these men convict the souls of the spiritual men who were among that people, of hating those whom, through them, divine justice bade to be taken from this life? Let them rather restrain their rashness, and not deceive the inexperienced who either have no leisure to read, or are unwilling to read, or read with a perverse mind and do not attend that both the mercy and the severity of God are commended in the letters of both Testaments. For as to the love of an enemy, that evil be not rendered for evil, is it not read in the old books:
'O Lord my God, if I have done this, if there be iniquity in my hands, if I have rendered evil to them that requited me evil, let me deservedly fall empty from before my enemies.' Who would say this, save one who knew that it pleases God that no one render evil for evil? But this belongs to the perfect: that they should hate in sinners nothing but sins, and love the men themselves; and when they avenge, that they avenge not with the harshness of cruelty, but with the moderation of justice, lest the very relaxing of the sin should harm the sinner more than the punishment of vengeance. Yet just men did not do this except by divine authority, lest anyone suppose it to be permitted him at random to kill whom he will, or to prosecute by judgment, or to afflict with any punishments whatsoever.
But sometimes the divine authority itself is openly set down in the Scriptures, and sometimes it is hidden, so that the reader may both be instructed by the manifest things and exercised by the obscure. Assuredly David received his enemy and persecutor, king Saul — most ungrateful and most hostile — into his power, so that he might do to him what he willed; and he chose rather to spare than to slay. For he had not been commanded to slay, but neither had he been forbidden; nay, he had even divinely heard that he might do with impunity whatever he willed to his enemy. And yet he turned so great a power to gentleness. Let it be told me whom he feared, when he was unwilling to slay. We cannot say that he feared the man whom he had received into his power, nor God, who had given him over.
Where, then, there was neither difficulty in slaying nor fear, love spared the enemy. Behold, David that warrior fulfilled the precept of Christ which we have received, that we should love our enemies. And would that these men would imitate this, who have twisted the human affection of mercy into I know not what cruel ravings! For while they believe that bread weeps — which cannot be — they do not hold it out to the man whom they see weeping. Perhaps they may say, as the blind are wont to hurl insane reproaches, that David was better, who spared his enemy, than the God who had given him the power of slaying — as though, forsooth, God did not know to whom He had given this power.
He knew assuredly the will of His servant; but that to other men also there might become known, for their imitation, that love of the enemy which was in David's heart, already known to God, He gave into his power the enemy whom He did not yet will to be slain, on account of a certain disposition of things which had to be fulfilled through him. Thus both David's goodness was commended, so that men might have what to love, and Saul's malice was deferred to a more worthy end, so that men might have what to fear. Concerning that which is written in Deuteronomy:
'If thou wilt hearken with thine ear to the voice of the Lord thy God, blessed art thou in thy field, blessed art thou in thy meadow, blessed is the fruit of thy womb and the fruit of thy land and the offspring of thy cattle and the herds of thine oxen and the flocks of thy sheep; blessed art thou in thy coming in and in thy going out.' To this chapter they say that this in the Gospel is contrary: 'If any man will follow me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For what does it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, but suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?'
But by that rule it is shown that it is not contrary, by which it ought now to be known that to a people as yet carnal, carnal and temporal rewards were fittingly promised — yet by the one God, whose is every creature, both the higher and the lower. For assuredly Adimantus himself set down a testimony from the Gospel, where the Lord says: 'Swear not at all; neither by heaven, for it is His throne; nor by the earth, for it is His footstool' — which indeed is written also in the old books: 'Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool.'
What wonder is it, then, if He gives the goods of His throne spiritually to those who serve Him spiritually, and the goods of His footstool carnally to those who serve Him carnally, since the spirit is higher and the flesh lower, just as things heavenly are higher and things earthly lower? Although all those things — that is, field and meadow and fruit of the womb and fruit of the land and of cattle and herd of oxen and flock of sheep — can also be understood spiritually. But this discussion does not now pertain to the matter.
But if in the New Testament itself, whose reward and inheritance pertain to the new man, the Lord nevertheless promises to these very ones — whom He wills to be despisers of temporal things, that they may serve Him in the Gospel — a multiplication of those same things in this world, saying that they shall receive in this world a hundredfold, and in the world to come life eternal (just as it is said also in the old Scripture: 'To the faithful man the whole world of riches belongs'), whence the Apostle exults, saying: 'As having nothing, and yet possessing all things':
If, then, in the New Testament, besides the eternal possession which is promised to the saints, the multiplication of this possession also — which is to pass away — is not withdrawn, and becomes the more abundant the more contemptuously it is possessed, how much more, in the Old Testament, ought the rewards of a carnal people to have been such — yet with that one and true God, the governor of all times, moderating and administering all things according to the time? But lest they judge these things to be despised only in the books of the New Testament, let them hear a prophet casting away such felicity and singing that one must flee for refuge to the one Lord God. For thus he says:
'Deliver me from the malignant sword, and rescue me out of the hand of the children of strangers, whose mouth hath spoken vanity, and their right hand is a right hand of iniquity: whose sons are as new plants established in their youth; their daughters set in order and adorned like the likeness of a temple; their storehouses full, overflowing from this into that; their sheep fruitful, multiplying in their outgoings; their oxen fat. There is no ruin of the fence, nor outgoing, nor crying in their streets. They called that people blessed which hath these things; but blessed is the people whose God is the Lord.' Let them attend, then, how this felicity is derided in impious men, and all blessedness is fixed unshaken in God alone. For those men say the people is blessed which has these things:
but blessed is the people whose God is the Lord Himself. But as to that also which they supposed to be contrary to this passage of the Old Testament — that which the Lord says: 'Whosoever shall be ashamed of me or of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when He cometh in the glory of His Father and with the praise of His holy angels' — I do not see what it has to do with the contempt of temporal things. But if it does pertain, lest anyone, terrified by the losses of such things, should either blush or fear to confess Christ, what have they to say? Since we too say that these are gifts of God, yet such that they are the lowest, and, in comparison with the saving confession, are not only to be given up,
but even to be cast away of one's own accord — yet to those who love these carnal things and do not yet grasp the heavenly promises, they were usefully pledged by the Lord God, lest they should seek these things from idols and demons. Concerning that which is written in the Law: 'I am He who giveth riches to my friends and poverty to my enemies.' To this sentence they oppose that which the Lord says: 'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,' and: 'Woe unto you rich, for ye have received your consolation.' But why are they unwilling to consider also other things in the Gospel? For where it is written: 'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,' there follows: 'Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the earth by inheritance.'
Behold, they have God's friends becoming rich by an inheritance of the earth. But when that rich man is reduced to such destitution that he begs to have a drop of moisture dripped upon his parched tongue by the very poor man whom he had scorned, from a finger briefly dipped in water, let them understand how God's enemies become poor, and let them recognize that this is what is written in the law: 'I am he who gives riches to my friends and poverty to my enemies.' For that these temporal riches were held in contempt even in the Old Testament I have already shown above, and in countless passages whoever wishes to read will find it. Hence too is that saying: 'Better is a little to the just man than the many riches of sinners'; and this: 'The law of thy mouth is good to me, above thousands of gold and silver'; and this:
'The judgments of God are true and justified in themselves, more desirable than gold and much precious stone'; and this: 'Blessed is the man who has found wisdom, and immortal is he who beholds prudence. For it is better to acquire her than treasures of gold and silver; she is more precious than the finest stones, no evil resists her; she is well known to all who draw near to her, and to those who consider her diligently. Nothing precious is worthy of her'; and this: 'For this cause I made my choice, and understanding was given to me; and I called upon God, and the spirit of wisdom came into me. And I set her above kingdoms and thrones, and I esteemed high estate as nothing in comparison with her.
Nor did I compare precious stone to her, for all gold in comparison with her is but a little sand, and silver beside her shall be reckoned as clay.' If these men either read these things, or read them without impiety, they would see that all things in the Scriptures of both Testaments — whether for seeking or for shunning, for taking up or for casting off — agree with one another and are set in order according to their proper degrees. Concerning that which is written in the law: 'If you walk in my law and keep my commandments, I will give rains in their season, and the earth shall bring forth its fruits, and the trees their apples, and your vintages shall follow upon your harvests, and your sowing upon the vintages: and you shall be filled and shall sit in peace in your land, and you shall sleep, and there shall be none to terrify you;
and I will destroy every wild beast from your land, and you shall pursue your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword; five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall pursue ten thousand, and your enemies shall be cut down before you by the sword; and I will come and bless you and multiply you and establish you. You shall eat of the old store that has grown old, and you shall cast out the old before the new.' There is now no need for anyone to demand of us that we show how fittingly God promised these things to that people, for we have said much on this matter. And to one for whom these things are too little, he is far too slow of understanding. Yet as to what they say is contrary even in this place, drawn from the New Testament — namely that which the Lord says:
'Carry neither gold nor silver nor coins in your belts, no wallet for the journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor staff; for the labourer is worthy of his hire' — what wonder if he granted these things to the evangelists? Was the Jewish people called to this ministry? Yet all these things are to be searched out spiritually, lest the Lord himself seem to have acted against his own precepts toward impious men — he who even had money-bags in which cash was carried for necessary sustenance. Unless perhaps they will say that to have money in belts is a sin, but to have it in money-bags is not a sin.
But that these were not commands, but permissions granted to the apostles, is understood from this: that the apostle Paul, working with his own hands, sought his sustenance, not abusing that power which — as he himself says — the Lord gave to the evangelists. For what is permitted by the Lord one may also refrain from doing; but what is commanded, unless it be done, is sin. They add also the case of that rich man to whom God had said: 'Fool, this night shall thy soul be required of thee; whose then shall be the things which thou hast prepared?' And they say that this passage too is no less contrary to the law, since in the former the emptiness of vain gladness is mocked, because it held uncertain things for certain; whereas to the people of Israel the omnipotence of the one promising made that promise certain.
Whence too the apostle Paul, writing to Timothy concerning the rich of this world — whom he knew to have their place among the members of the Church — speaks thus: 'Charge the rich of this world not to be high-minded, nor to hope in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God, who gives us all things abundantly to enjoy: let them do good, let them be rich in good works, let them give readily, share, and lay up for themselves a good foundation for the time to come, that they may lay hold of true life.'
Who here does not understand that it is not blameworthy to possess these things, but to love them and to place one's hope in them, to prefer them or even to equate them with truth, justice, wisdom, faith, a good conscience, love of God and neighbour — by which every devout soul is rich in its inmost being before the eyes of God? But in order that God may be loved — he who bestows on those who love him all these invisible and eternal things, that is, gives himself, full of all these gifts, to those who love him — in order therefore that he himself may be loved, even in that time when the carnal soul, entangled indeed in the affections of the flesh, knows how to desire nothing but earthly and temporal things, it must be persuaded of him that God gives these things too to man, since this is both true and most usefully believed.
This was done for the people of Israel through those promises which the wretched men most ignorantly deride, so that even in the lowest things, in whatever way they could, they might grow accustomed to loving God — although fear worked there more. Yet all these temporal gifts are figures of eternal gifts, and that victory over enemies prefigures the victory over the devil and his angels. And as for what these men added as if contrary to the Old Testament — that the apostle says God delights not in strife and dissension, but in peace — let them know that in those Scriptures such a God is proclaimed as one from whom no one can take away his peace, not such as they themselves proclaim;
who, fearing lest war should break in upon his religious domains, sent his own members far away to bear foreign wars, and afterward, once vanquished and defiled, they could not be set free or purified. But in human nature, which by sin has flowed down into lower things, God so delights in peace that he does not abandon the balances of justice, nor does he wish the peace that he loves to be trampled by sinners, but to be loved by those who strive, and laid hold of by those who conquer — and to promise these things figured under carnal forms, while displaying them openly to the spiritual. Concerning that which is written in Deuteronomy: 'Cursed is everyone who has hung upon a tree.' Although this question has often been ventilated by the Manichaeans, I do not however see
what it has that is contrary to this sentence, which Adimantus thought should be set against it from the Gospel, where the Lord says: 'If you wish to be perfect, sell all that you possess and distribute to the poor, and take up your cross and follow me.' Here, apart from the fact that he names the cross, he notices nothing contrary to what was said: 'Cursed is everyone who has hung upon a tree.' As though indeed anyone can take up such a cross and follow the Lord; but that cross is taken up when we follow the Lord, of which the apostle speaks: 'Now they who are of Jesus Christ have crucified their flesh with its passions and desires.'
For by such a cross the old man — that is, the old life which we have drawn from Adam — is put to death, so that what in him was voluntary might in us become natural. This the apostle shows when he says: 'We too were once by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.' If therefore the old life is from Adam — whence also by the name of the old man the old life is signified — what absurdity is there in that a curse was pronounced upon the old man, whom the Lord hung upon a tree, since from that very succession he bore mortality, having been born mortal of the Virgin Mary, having flesh not sinful, yet bearing the likeness of sinful flesh, because he was able to die, and death is from sin? Hence too is that saying:
'Knowing that our old man was crucified together with him, that the body of sin might be done away.' Not therefore did the Lord, through the tongue of Moses the servant of God, but death itself deserved the curse — that death which our Lord did away with by taking it upon himself. That death, then, hung upon the tree, which came to man through the woman by the serpent's persuasion. Wherefore Moses too, as a sign of that very death, lifted up the serpent upon a tree in the wilderness. And because we are healed from deadly desires through faith in the Lord's cross, by which cross death was hung upon the tree, therefore those who were poisoned by the serpents' bites, once they beheld the serpent that had been fixed and lifted up upon the tree, were immediately healed. To this sacrament the Lord himself bore witness, saying:
'For as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.' Now by taking upon himself the most ignominious kind of death among men — that is, the death of the cross — our Lord Jesus Christ commended to us his love, so that the apostle might rightly say, kindling us to love of him: 'Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. For it is written: Cursed is everyone who hangs upon a tree' — so that Christian liberty might dread not only no death, but not even any kind of death, as Jewish servitude did. Concerning the man whom God commanded to be stoned because he was found gathering wood on the Sabbath.
The Lord in the Gospel, where he healed the man's withered hand on the Sabbath day, did a divine work, not a human one; nor did he depart from rest, he who commanded and it was done. And therefore this deed is not like that of the man gathering wood, for which — when the man was found doing it on the Sabbath day — he was stoned by God's command. But concerning the servile observance of the Sabbath and the punishment of temporal death, many things have already been said. For just as in the time of love the goodness of God, so in the time of fear the severity of God is chiefly commended. And since, before the Lord's coming, it was not yet fitting to lay bare to the people the mysteries of the lawful figures, those men were not invited to understand the things signified, but were compelled to fulfil what was commanded;
for they did not yet cleave to God through the spirit, but served the law through the flesh. But I marvel that these men bewail the man stoned by God's command because he gathered wood against the law's injunction, yet do not bewail the tree withered by Christ's word, which had done nothing against any precept — since they believe the soul of a tree to be such as that of a man. Concerning that which is written: 'May your wife be as a fruitful vine, and your sons as young olive-shoots around your table, and you shall see your children's children; and you shall know that thus is the man blessed who fears the Lord.'
That this was said figuratively through the prophet and pertains to signifying the Church, the Manichaeans do not understand, and they think it contrary to what the Lord says in the Gospel about eunuchs who make themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. But we have already discoursed sufficiently, in the third chapter, both about husband and wife and about eunuchs. Concerning that which is written in Solomon: 'Imitate the ant, and behold her diligence, for from the time of summer until winter she gathers food for herself.' Neither do the Manichaeans understand that this too is to be taken spiritually, and they think it a precept that we should lay up treasure on earth or even take care of these barns, which without any precept men hasten greatly to fill.
And therefore Adimantus says that saying from the Gospel is opposed to this sentence, where the Lord says: 'Do not be anxious about tomorrow.' But neither do they understand that this pertains to our not loving temporal things, nor fearing that necessities may fail us, and for the sake of acquiring these very things serving either God or men.
For if this was said in order that bread should not be kept for the morrow, then the vagrants of the Romans, whom they call 'pasgivi,' fulfil it more — those who, having filled their bellies with the daily dole, either at once give away what is left or throw it away — than the Lord's own disciples, who, walking on earth even with the very Lord of heaven and earth, had money-bags; or than the apostle Paul, who, though a despiser of all earthly things, yet so governed the things necessary for the present life that he even gave a precept concerning widows, saying: 'If any of the faithful has widows, let him provide sufficiently for them, that the Church be not burdened, so that it may suffice for the true widows.'
Yet that saying about the ant is so set down that, just as she gathers in summer whence she may feed in winter, so let each Christian, in the tranquillity of affairs — which summer signifies — gather the word of God, that in adversity and tribulations — which are signified by the name of winter — he may have whence to live spiritually. For man does not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. But if this moves them, that the ant stores in the earth what she gathers, let them be angry too with that treasure which the Lord says was found in a field. Concerning that which is written in Hosea: 'Give them a barren womb and dry breasts; make dead the seed of their womb, that they bring not forth.' And this prophetic utterance too is certainly figurative.
For they understand the belly as not fleshly in the Gospel, when they read: 'Rivers of living water shall flow from his belly.' And the apostle had certain breasts, when he said: 'I gave you milk to drink, not meat'; and again: 'I became a little one in the midst of you, as if a nurse cherishing her children.' And he travails in birth again over the Galatians, who were turning aside to other things, until Christ be formed in them. And therefore this prophetic sentence is not opposed by what Adimantus set down from the Gospel, that in the resurrection from the dead they neither marry nor take wives nor die, but are as the angels of God. For this indeed is what the eunuchs also receive, of whom Isaiah speaks:
'A named place far better than that of sons and daughters, an everlasting name, I will give them,' he says. Let not these men therefore suppose that such a reward is promised to the saints in the Gospel alone; and as for the barren womb and dry breasts and the deadened seed that it bring not forth, let them understand that it was said concerning these men, of whom the apostle says: 'For as Jannes and Mambres withstood Moses, so these also withstand the truth, men corrupt in mind, reprobate concerning the faith; but they shall proceed no further, for their folly shall be manifest to all, as also theirs was.' When therefore they shall proceed no further, then shall they have a barren womb and dry breasts and a deadened seed. In which sentence let these men deign to inspect themselves as in a mirror.
Concerning that which is written in the prophet Amos: 'Is it possible that two walking on the way should not know each other, and that a lion should return to his cub without prey? Shall a bird fall to the ground without a fowler? Do they set a snare without cause, that they take nothing? Shall a trumpet give a sound in the city, so that the people be not terrified? Thus also shall no evil be perpetrated in a city which the Lord will not do.' Evil in this place is to be understood not as sin, but as punishment. For evil is called by two names: the one that a man does, the other that he suffers; what he does is sin, what he suffers is punishment. Of punishments, therefore, the prophet was speaking when he said this. For, with divine providence moderating and governing all things, so does a man do the evil that he wills,
so that he suffers the evil that he does not will. But these men accuse the prophet who says these things, as though they had not read in the Gospel: 'Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing, and not one of them falls to the ground without the will of your Father?' So then God does the evil which is not evil to God himself, but to those on whom he takes vengeance. And so he himself, as far as concerns himself, does good, because everything just is good, and that vengeance is just. And therefore it is not contrary — what Adimantus objects that the Lord said: 'A good tree bears good fruits; but a bad tree bears bad fruits.' For although hell is evil to the damned, yet the justice of God is good, and it is itself a fruit from a good tree.
But that man, by the evils of his sins, laid up for himself wrath in the day of wrath and of the revelation of the just judgment of God, who will render to each according to his works. Although these two trees are most plainly set down in the likeness of two men — that is, of the just and the unjust — because unless a man change his will, he cannot work good. That this lies within our power he teaches in another place, where he says: 'Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad.' For he says this to those who thought they could speak good things while they were evil — that is, bear good fruits while they were bad trees. For thus he subjoins: 'Hypocrites, how can you speak good things, when you are evil?'
A bad tree therefore cannot bear good fruits; but from bad it can become good, so that it may bear good fruits. 'For you were once darkness,' he says, 'but now light in the Lord.' As though he said: You were once bad trees, and therefore then you could bear nothing but bad fruits; but now light in the Lord — that is, now made good trees, give good fruits — which he follows up by saying: 'Walk as children of light — for the fruit of light is in all justice and truth — proving what is well-pleasing to the Lord.' For in that very chapter of the Gospel, if Adimantus were not raging with zeal of malevolence, he could have noticed how God is said to do evil. For there the Lord says what this man too has mentioned:
'Every tree that does not bear good fruits shall be cut down and cast into the fire.' These are the evils which God does — that is, punishments for sinners, in that he will cast into the fire the trees which, persevering in wickedness, refused to become good, since this is an evil to those very trees. But God, as I have often said, does not give bad fruits, because the fruit of justice is the punishment of sin. Concerning that which is written in the prophet Isaiah: 'I am God, who make peace and create evils.' This too is resolved by the same rule. For Adimantus does not reprehend that God said: 'I make peace,' but that he said: 'I create evils.' Whereas the apostle Paul has treated these two similarly, even more at length, in one place, saying: 'See therefore the goodness and the severity of God:
toward them indeed who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in goodness; otherwise you too shall be cut off. And they, if they do not continue in unbelief, shall be grafted in. For God is able to graft them in again.' In this apostolic discourse the goodness of God sufficiently appears, according to which Isaiah said: 'I am God, who make peace,' and the severity, according to which he said: 'I create evils.' At the same time he also shows that it is within our power, that we may deserve either to be grafted in by his goodness or to be cut off by his severity. The Gospel therefore is not contrary to Isaiah, as Adimantus thinks — or rather desires it to be thought — where the Lord says: 'Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.'
For even from this very part he ought to have recognized that Isaiah too knew the children of God to be peacemakers, since through him God said: 'I am he who makes peace.' But while in one part he fixes his eye on understanding evilly, in the other he has blinded himself. But if another, similarly blind, should wish to say that the Old Testament is good, where the Lord says: 'I will not the death of the sinner, so much as that he turn back and live,' but that the New Testament is evil, where Christ says: 'Go into the eternal fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels' — would he not, falling into the pit, with doubled malice hurl down together with himself into the blindness of ignorance all who followed him, unlearned and ignorant of the Scriptures?
But he who reads with a devout eye finds in the New Testament also what these men accuse in the Old, and in the Old what they praise in the New. Concerning that which is written in Isaiah: 'And it came to pass in that year in which King Uzziah died: I saw the Lord sitting on a most lofty throne; and the house was full of his glory, and round about stood the Seraphim, having six wings each, and with two indeed they covered his face, and with two his feet.' To this passage Adimantus opposes that which the apostle says: 'But to the King of the ages, the invisible, honour and praise unto the ages.' In which question it must be asked what seemed good to him — either in that vision of Isaiah to pass over the two wings with which the Seraphim were flying as they said:
'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts,' or in the apostle's words not to say the whole. For thus said the apostle: 'But to the King of the ages, the invisible, the incorruptible, the only God, be honour and glory unto the ages of ages.' Or did he perhaps fear lest the mention of the Trinity should commend the prophet to the reader, and he suspect that something great lay hidden there? For it is said thrice: 'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts.' But in the apostle he perhaps saw that, if he had said 'to the incorruptible God,' it would be answered him what we now say to these men: What then was the race of darkness going to do to the incorruptible God, if he had not wished to fight with it? Or, if perhaps he had read faulty manuscripts, or this man is himself faulty.
Since we ourselves read Adimantus himself, there is no need to discourse longer on a doubtful matter, but it must now be asked how both the prophet said he saw God on a most lofty throne, and the apostle Paul truly called God invisible. I ask these men, therefore, whether invisible things can be beheld. They say they can. Why then do they slander, if the prophet beheld the invisible God? But if they say they cannot, let them rather slander the apostle himself, if they dare, who says: 'For the invisible things of God, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood through the things that are made.' For he himself said they are invisible, and he himself again said: 'they are clearly seen.' Are they not here compelled to confess that things invisible to the bodily eyes are visible to the mind?
Thus therefore the prophet also saw God — who is bodily invisible — not bodily, but spiritually. For many kinds of vision are found in the holy Scriptures: one according to the eyes of the body, as Abraham saw three men under the oak of Mambre, and Moses the fire in the bush, and the disciples the Lord transfigured on the mountain between Moses and Elijah, and other things of this kind. Another according to the spirit, by which we imagine those things which we perceive through the body; for that very part of us also, when it is divinely taken up, has many things revealed to it, not through the eyes of the body or the ears or any other carnal sense, yet things similar to these: as Peter saw that vessel let down from heaven with various animals.
Of this kind is also that vision of Isaiah, which the impious most ignorantly reprehend. For a bodily form does not circumscribe God, but just as figuratively — not properly — many things are said, so also figuratively many things are shown. But the third kind of vision is according to the mind's intuition, by which understood truth and wisdom are beheld; without which kind, those two which I have previously set forth are either fruitless or even lead into error. For when those things which are divinely shown, whether to the bodily senses or to that part of the soul which receives the images of corporeal things, are not only perceived in these ways but also understood by the mind, then is the revelation perfect.
Of this third kind is that vision which I mentioned, the apostle saying: 'For the invisible things of God, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood through the things that are made.' By this vision, that God may be seen, hearts are cleansed through the piety of faith and through the practice of the best morals in the working of God. For what did it profit King Belshazzar that he beheld the hand writing before his eyes upon the wall? To which vision, because he could not join the mind's gaze, he still sought to see what he had seen. But with such a keenness of light, by which these things are understood, Daniel, being endowed, saw with the mind what that man had seen with the body. Again, with that part of the soul which receives the images of bodies, King Nebuchadnezzar saw a dream:
and because he did not have a suitable eye of the mind for seeing better what he had seen — that is, for understanding what he had seen — therefore, to interpret it, he sought another's gaze upon his vision, namely that of the same Daniel; to whom, however, as he opened it, in order that he might attach sure faith, he demanded that the dream itself also be told to him. But Daniel, by the revelation of the Holy Spirit, both saw with that part by which the images of bodies are received what that man had seen in his dreams, and beheld with the mind what it signified. But he is not a prophet of the true and most high God who sees the visions divinely offered either with the body alone, or even with that part of the spirit by which the images of bodies are received, and does not see with the mind.
But for the most part in the Scriptures things are found set down just as they were seen, not also as they were understood, so that the vision of the mind — in which the whole fruit lies — might be reserved for the exercising of readers. But from many things which are plainly written, it is made manifest to us how those men understood the things which they set down in this way, as they were figuratively shown to them. For figurative demonstrations pertain to the two kinds of vision; but to the mind — that is, to the vision of the understanding — pertains the simple and proper revelation of things understood and certain. Yet all these kinds the Holy Spirit of the highest and unchangeable wisdom exhibits and moderates by marvellous and ineffable dispensations.
But these men are wretched, who slander the prophet who says that he saw God, objecting the apostolic sentence where he called him invisible. For if another should object to this apostolic word the evangelical word, since the Lord says: 'Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God,' how will they answer that the invisible can be seen? For with a word they press the unlearned, and to what extent God was called invisible, even if they know, they fear to know. So great is the ruin of minds which, when they wish to conquer a man, are conquered by error.