Chap. XX. - Comparison of Christ’s Power over Winds and Waves with Moses’ Command of the Waters of the Red Sea and the Jordan. Christ’s Power over Unclean Spirits. The Case of the Legion the Cure of the Issue of Blood. The Mosaic Uncleanness on This Point Explained.
But “what manner of man is this? for He commandeth even the winds and water!” (Luk_8:25) Of course He is the new master and proprietor of the elements, now that the Creator is deposed, and excluded from their possession! Nothing of the kind. But the elements own523 their own Maker, just as they had been accustomed to obey His servants also. Examine well the Exodus, Marcion; look at the rod of Moses, as it waves His command to the Red Sea, ampler than all the lakes of Judaea. How the sea yawns from its very depths, then fixes itself in two solidified masses, and so, out of the interval between them,524 makes a way for the people to pass dry-shod across; again does the same red vibrate, the sea returns in its strength, and in the concourse of its waters the chivalry of Egypt is engulphed! To that consummation the very winds subserved! Read, too, how that the Jordan was as a sword, to hinder the emigrant nation in their passage across its stream; how that its waters from above stood still, and its current below wholly ceased to run at the bidding of Joshua, (Jos_3:9-17) when his priests began to pass over!525 379
What will you say to this? If it be your Christ that is meant above, he will not be more potent than the servants of the Creator. But I should have been content with the examples I have adduced without addition,526 if a prediction of His present passage on the sea had not preceded Christ’s coming. As psalm is, in fact, accomplished by this527 crossing over the lake. “The Lord,” says the psalmist, “is upon many waters.” (Psa_24:3) When He disperses its waves, Habakkuk’s words are fulfilled, where he says, “Scattering the waters in His passage.” (Hab_3:10, LXX) When at His rebuke the sea is calmed, Nahum is also verified: He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry,” (Nah_1:4) including the winds indeed, whereby it was disquieted. With what evidence would you have my Christ vindicated? Shall it come from the examples, or from the prophecies, of the Creator? You suppose that He is predicted as a military and armed warrior, (see above, book iii. chap. xiii.) instead of one who in a figurative and allegorical sense was to wage a spiritual warfare against spiritual enemies, in spiritual campaigns, and with spiritual weapons: come now, when in one man alone you discover a multitude of demons calling itself Legion, (Luk_8:30) of course comprised of spirits, you should learn that Christ also must be understood to be an exterminator of spiritual foes, who wields spiritual arms and fights in spiritual strife; and that it was none other than He,528 who now had to contend with even a legion of demons. Therefore it is of such a war as this that the Psalm may evidently have spoken: “The Lord is strong, The Lord is mighty in battle.” (Psa_24:8) For with the last enemy death did He fight, and through the trophy of the cross He triumphed. Now of what God did the Legion testify that Jesus was the Son? (Luk_8:28) No doubt, of that God whose torments and abyss they knew and dreaded. It seems impossible for them to have remained up to this time in ignorance of what the power of the recent and unknown god was working in the world, because it is very unlikely that the Creator was ignorant thereof. For if He had been at any time ignorant that there was another god above Himself, He had by this time at all events discovered that there was one at work529 below His heaven. Now, what their Lord had discovered had by this time become notorious to His entire family within the same world and the same circuit of heaven, in which the strange deity dwelt and acted.530 As therefore both the Creator and His creatures531 must have had knowledge of him, if he had been in existence, so, inasmuch as he had no existence, the demons really knew none other than the Christ of their own God. They do not ask of the strange god, what they recollected they must beg of the Creator - not to be plunged into the Creator’s abyss. They at last had their request granted. On what ground? Because they had lied? Because they had proclaimed Him to be the Son of a ruthless God? And what sort of god will that be who helped the lying, and upheld his detractors? However, no need of this thought, for,532 inasmuch as they had not lied, inasmuch as they had acknowledged that the God of the abyss was also their God, so did He actually Himself affirm that He was the same whom these demons acknowledged - Jesus, the Judge and Son of the avenging God. Now, behold an inkling533 of the Creator’s failings534 and infirmities in Christ; for I on my side535 mean to impute to Him ignorance. Allow me some indulgence in my effort against the heretic. Jesus is touched by the woman who had an issue of blood, (Luk_8:43-46) He knew not by whom. “Who touched me?” He asks, when His disciples alleged an excuse. He even persists in His assertion of ignorance: “Somebody hath touched me,” He says, and advances some proof: “For I perceive that virtue is gone out of me.” What says our heretic? Could Christ have known the person? And why did He speak as if He were ignorant? Why? Surely it was to challenge her faith, and to try her fear. Precisely as He had once questioned Adam, as if in ignorance: Adam, where art thou?” (see above, book iii. chap. xxiv.) Thus you have both the Creator excused in the same way as Christ, and Christ acting similarly to536 the Creator. But in this case He acted as an adversary of the law; and therefore, as the law forbids contact with a woman with an issue, (Lev_15:19) He desired not only that this woman should touch Him, but that He should heal her.537 Here, 380 then, is a God who is not merciful by nature, but in hostility! Yet, if we find that such was the merit of this woman’s faith, that He said unto her, Thy faith hath saved thee.” (Luk_8:48) what are you, that you should detect an hostility to the law in that act, which the Lord Himself shows us to have been done as a reward of faith? But will you have it that this faith of the woman consisted in the contempt which she had acquired for the law? Who can suppose, that a woman who had been hitherto unconscious of any God, uninitiated as yet in any new law, should violently infringe that law by which she was up to this time bound? On what faith, indeed, was such an infringement hazarded? In what God believing? Whom despising? The Creator? Her touch at least was an act of faith. And if of faith in the Creator, how could she have violated His law,538 when she was ignorant of any other God? Whatever her infringement of the law amounted to, it proceeded from and was proportionate to her faith in the Creator. But how can these two things be compatible? That she violated the law, and violated it in faith, which ought to have restrained her from such violation? I will tell you how her faith was this above all:539 it made her believe that her God preferred mercy even to sacrifice; she was certain that her God was working in Christ; she touched Him, therefore, nor as a holy man simply, nor as a prophet, whom she knew to be capable of contamination by reason of his human nature, but as very God, whom she assumed to be beyond all possibility of pollution by any uncleanness.540 She therefore, not without reason,541 interpreted for herself the law, as meaning that such things as are susceptible of defilement become defiled, but not so God, whom she knew for certain to be in Christ. But she recollected this also, that what came under the prohibition of the law542 was that ordinary and usual issue of blood which proceeds from natural functions every month, and in childbirth, not that which was the result of disordered health. Her case, however, was one of long abounding543 ill health, for which she knew that the succour of God’s mercy was needed, and not the natural relief of time. And thus she may: evidently be regarded as having discerned544 the law, instead of breaking it. This will prove to be the faith which was to confer intelligence likewise. “If ye will not believe,” says (the prophet), “ye shall not understand.” (Isa_7:9) When Christ approved of the faith of this woman, which simply rested in the Creator, He declared by His answer to her, (Luk_8:48) that He was Himself the divine object of the faith of which He approved. Nor can I overlook the fact that His garment, by being touched, demonstrated also the truth of His body; for of course”545 it was a body, and not a phantom, which the garment clothed.546 This indeed is not our point now; but the remark has a natural bearing on the question we are discussing. For if it were not a veritable body, but only a fantastic one, it could not for certain have received contamination, as being an unsubstantial thing.547 He therefore, who, by reason of this vacuity of his substance, was incapable of contamination, how could he possibly have desired this touch?548 As an adversary of the law, his conduct was deceitful, for he was not susceptible of a real pollution.
Chap. XXI. - Christ’s Connection with the Creator Shown from Several Incidents in the Old Testament, Compared with St. Luke’s Narrative of the Mission of the Disciples. The Feeding of the Multitude. The Confession of St. Peter. Being Ashamed of Christ. This Shame Is Only Possible of the True Christ. Marcionite Pretensions Absurd.
He sends forth His disciples to preach the kingdom of God. (Luk_9:1-6) Does He here say of what God? He forbids their taking anything for their journey, by way of either food or raiment. Who would have given such a commandment as this, but He who feeds the ravens and clothes549 the flowers of the field? Who anciently enjoined for the treading ox an unmuzzled mouth,550 that he might be at liberty to gather his fodder from his labour, on the principle that the worker is worthy of his hire? (Deu_25:4) Marcion may expunge such precepts, but no matter, provided the sense of them survives. But when He charges them to shake off the dust of their feet against such as should refuse to receive them, He also bids that this be done as a witness. Now no one bears witness except in a case which is decided by judicial process; and whoever orders inhuman conduct to be submitted to the trial by testimony,551 381 does really threaten as a judge. Again, that it was no new god which recommended552 by Christ, was dearly attested by the opinion of all men, because some maintained to Herod that Jesus was the Christ; others, that He was John; some, that He was Elias; and others, that He was one of the old prophetss. (Luk_9:7-8) Now, whosoever of all these He might have been, He certainly was not raised up for the purpose of announcing another god after His resurrection. He feeds the multitude in the desert place; (Luk_9:10-17) this, you must knows553 was after the manner of the Old Testament.554 Or else,555 if there was not the same grandeur, it follows that He is now inferior to the Creator. For He, not for one day, but during forty years, not on the inferior aliment of bread and fish, but with the manna of heaven, supported the lives556 of not five thousand, but of six hundred thousand human beings. However, such was the greatness of His miracle, that He willed the slender supply of food, not only to be enough, but even to prove superabundant;557 and herein He followed the ancient precedent. For in like manner, during the famine in Elijah’s time, the scanty and final meal of the widow of Sarepta was multiplied558 by the blessing of the prophet throughout the period of the famine. You have the third book of the Kings. (1Ki_17:7-16) If you also turn to the fourth book, you will discover all this conduct559 of Christ pursued by that man of God, who ordered ten560 barley loaves which had been given him to be distributed among the people; and when his servitor, after contrasting the large number of the persons with the small supply of the food, answered, “What, shall I set this before a hundred men?” he said again, “Give them, and they shall eat: for thus saith the Lord, They shall eat, and shall leave thereof, according to the word of the Lord.” (2Ki_4:42-44) O Christ, even in Thy novelties Thou art old! Accordingly, when Peter, who had been an eye-witness of the miracle, and had compared it with the ancient precedents, and had discovered in them prophetic intimations of what should one day come to pass, answered (as the mouthpiece of them all) the Lord’s inquiry, “Whom say ye that I am?” (Luk_9:20) in the words, “Thou art the Christ,” he could not but have perceived that He was that Christ, beside whom he knew of none else in the Scriptures, and whom he was now surveying561 in His wonderful deeds. This conclusion He even Himself confirms by thus far bearing with it, nay, even enjoining silence respecting it. (Luk_9:21) For if Peter was unable to acknowledge Him to be any other than the Creator’s Christ, while He commanded them “to tell no man that saying,” surely562 He was unwilling to have the conclusion promulged which Peter had drawn. No doubt of that,563 you say; but as Peter’s conclusion was a wrong one, therefore He was unwilling to have a lie disseminated. It was, however, a different reason which He assigned for the silence, even because “the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and scribes, and priests, and be slain, and be raised again the third day.” (Luk_9:22) Now, inasmuch as these sufferings were actually foretold for the Creator’s Christ (as we shall fully show in the proper place (see below, chaps. xl-xliii.)), so by this application of them to His own case564 does He prove that it is He Himself of whom they were predicted. At all events, even if they had not been predicted, the reason which He alleged for imposing silence (on the disciples) was such as made it clear enough that Peter had made no mistake, that reason being the necessity of His undergoing these sufferings. “Whosoever,” says He, “will save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it.” (Luk_9:24) Surely565 it is the Son of man (compare above, chap. x., towards the end) who uttered this sentence. Look carefully, then, along with the king of Babylon, into his burning fiery furnace, and there you will discover one “like the Son of man” (for He was not yet really Son of man, because not yet born of man), even as early as then566 appointing issues such as these. He saved the lives of the three brethren, (Dan_3:25-26) who had agreed to lose them for God’s sake; but He destroyed those of the Chaldaeans, when they had preferred to save them by the means of their idolatry. Where is that novelty, which you pretend567 in a doctrine which possesses these ancient proofs? But all the predictions have been fulfilled568 concerning martydoms which were to happen, and were to receive 382 the recompenses of their reward from God. “See,” says Isaiah, “how the righteous perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart; and just men are taken away, and no man considereth.” (Isa_57:1) When does this more frequently happen than in the persecution of His saints? This, indeed, is no ordinary matter,569 no common casualty of the law of nature; but it is that illustrious devotion, that fighting for the faith, wherein whosoever loses his life for God saves it, so that you may here again recognize the Judge who recompenses the evil gain of life with its destruction, and the good loss thereof with its salvation. It is, however, a jealous God whom He here presents to me one who returns evil for evil. “For whosoever,” says He, “shall be ashamed of me, of him will I also be ashamed.” (Luk_9:26) Now to none but my Christ can be assigned the occasion570 of such a shame as this. His whole course571 was so exposed to shame as to open a way for even the taunts of heretics, declaiming572 with all the bitterness in their power against the utter disgrace573 of His birth and bringing-up, and the unworthiness of His very flesh.574 [Job_10:10] But how can that Christ of yours be liable to a shame, which it is impossible for him to experience? Since he was never condensed575 into human flesh in the womb of a woman, although a virgin; never grew from human seed, although only after the law of corporeal substance, from the fluids576 of a woman; was never deemed flesh before shaped in the womb; never called fœtus577 after such shaping; was never delivered from a ten months’ writhing in the womb;578 was never shed forth upon the ground, amidst the sudden pains of parturition, with the unclean issue which flows at such a time through the sewerage of the body, forthwith to inaugurate the light579 of life with tears, and with that primal wound which severs the child from her who bears him;580 never received the copious ablution, nor the meditation of salt and honey;581 nor did he initiate a shroud with swaddling clothes;582 nor afterwards did he ever wallow583 in his own uncleanness, in his mother’s lap; nibbling at her breast; long an infant; gradually584 a boy; by slow degrees585 a man.586 But he was revealed587 from heaven, full-grown at once, at once complete; immediately Christ; simply spirit, and power, and god. But as withal he was not true, because not visible; therefore he was no object to be ashamed of from the curse of the cross, the real endurance588 of which he escaped, because wanting in bodily substance. Never, therefore, could he have said, “Whosever shall be ashamed of me.” But as for our Christ, He could do no otherwise than make such a declaration;589 “made” by the Father “a little lower than the angels,” (Psa_8:6) “a worm and no man, a reproach of men, and despised of the people;” (Psa_22:6) seeing that it was His will that “with His stripes we should be healed,” (Isa_53:5) that by His humiliation our salvation should be established. And justly did He humble Himself590 for His own creature man, for the image and likeness of Himself, and not of another, in order that man, since he had not felt ashamed when bowing down to a stone or a stock, might with similar courage give satisfaction to God for the shamelessness of his idolatry, by displaying an equal degree of shamelessness in his faith, in not being ashamed of Christ. Now, Marcion, which of these courses is better suited to your Christ, in respect of a meritorious shame?591 Plainly, you ought yourself to blush with shame for having given him a fictitious existence.592
Chap. XXII. - The Same Conclusion Supported by the Transfiguration. Marcion Inconsistent in Associating with Christ in Glory Two Such Eminent Servants of the Creator as Moses and Elijah. St. Peter’s Ignorance Accounted for on Montanist Principle.
You ought to be very much ashamed of 383 yourself on this account too, for permitting him to appear on the retired mountain in the company of Moses and Elias, (Luk_9:28-36) whom he had come to destroy. This, to be sure,593 was what he wished to be understood as the meaning of that voice from heaven: “This is my beloved Son, hear Him” (Luk_9:35) - Him, that is, not Moses or Elias any longer. The voice alone, therefore, was enough, without the display of Moses and Elias; for, by expressly mentioning whom they were to hear, he must have forbidden all594 others from being heard. Or else, did he mean that Isaiah and Jeremiah and the others whom he did not exhibit were to be heard, since he prohibited those whom he did display? Now, even if their presence was necessary, they surely should not be represented as conversing together, which is a sign of familiarity; nor as associated in glory with him, for this indicates respect and graciousness; but they should be shown in some slough595 as a sure token of their ruin, or even in that darkness of the Creator which Christ was sent to disperse, far removed from the glory of Him who was about to sever their words and writings from His gospel. This, then, is the way596 how he demonstrates them to be aliens,597 even by keeping them in his own company! This is how he shows they ought to be relinquished: he associates them with himself instead! This is how he destroys them: he irradiates them with his glory! How would their own Christ act? I suppose He would have imitated the frowardness (of heresy),598 and revealed them just as Marcion’s Christ was bound to do, or at least as having with Him any others rather than His own prophets! But what could so well befit the Creator’s Christ, as to manifest Him in the company of His own fore-announcers?599 - to let Him be seen with those to whom He had appeared in revelations? - to let Him be speaking with those who had spoken of Him? - to share His glory with those by whom He used to be called the Lord of glory; even with those chief servants of His, one of whom was once the moulder600 of His people, the other afterwards the reformer601 thereof; one the initiator of the Old Testament, the other the consummator602 of the New? Well therefore does Peter, when recognizing the companions of his Christ in their indissoluble connection with Him, suggest an expedient: “It is good for us to be here” (good: that evidently means to be where Moses and Elias are); “and let us make three tabernacles, one for Thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias. But he knew not what he said.” (Luk_9:33) How knew not? Was his ignorance the result of simple error? Or was it on the principle which we maintain603 in the cause of the new prophecy, [Elucidation VII.] that to grace ecstasy or rapture604 is incident. For when a man is rapt in the Spirit, especially when he beholds the glory of God, or when God speaks through him, he necessarily loses his sensation,605 because he is overshadowed with the power of God, - a point concerning which there is a question between us and the carnally-minded.606 Now, it is no difficult matter to prove the rapture607 of Peter. For how could he have known Moses and Elias, except (by being) in the Spirit? People could not have had their images, or statues, or likenesses; for that the law forbade. How, if it were not that he had seen them in the Spirit? And therefore, because it was in the Spirit that he had now spoken, and not in his natural senses, he could not know what he had said. But if, on the other hand,608 he was thus ignorant, because he erroneously supposed that (Jesus) was their Christ, it is then evident that Peter, when previously asked by Christ, “Whom they thought Him to be,” meant the Creator’s Christ, when he answered, “Thou art the Christ;” because if he had been then aware that He belonged to the rival god, he would not have made a mistake here. But if he was in error here because of his previous erroneous opinion,609 then you may be sure that up to that very day no new divinity had been revealed by Christ, and that Peter had so far made no mistake, because hitherto Christ had revealed nothing of the kind; and that Christ accordingly was not to be regarded as belonging to any other 384 than the Creator, whose entire dispensation610 he, in fact, here described. He selects from His disciples three witnesses of the impending vision and voice. And this is just the way of the Creator. “In the mouth of three witnesses,” says He, “shall every word be established.” (compare Deu_19:15; Luk_9:28) He withdraws to a mountain. In the nature of the place I see much meaning. For the Creator had originally formed His ancient people on a mountain both with visible glory and His voice. It was only tight that the New Testament should be attested611 on such an elevated spot612 as that whereon the Old Testament had been composed;613 under a like covering of cloud also, which nobody will doubt, was condensed out of the Creator’s air. Unless, indeed, he614 had brought down his own clouds thither, because he had himself forced his way through the Creator’s heaven; (compare above, book i. chap. 15, and book iv. chap. 7) or else it was only a precarious cloud,615 as it were, of the Creator which he used. On the present (as also on the former)616 occasion, therefore, the cloud was not silent; but there was the accustomed voice from heaven, and the Father’s testimony to the Son; precisely as in the first Psalm He had said, “Thou art my Son, today have I begotten thee.” (Psa_2:7) By the mouth of Isaiah also He had asked concerning Him, “Who is there among you that feareth God? Let him hear the voice of His Son.” (Isaiah 50:10, LXX) When therefore He here presents Him with the words, “This is my (beloved) Son,” this clause is of course understood, “whom I have promised.” For if He once promised, and then afterwards says, “This is He,” it is suitable conduct for one who accomplishes His purpose617 that He should utter His voice in proof of the promise which He had formerly made; but unsuitable in one who is amenable to the retort, Can you, indeed, have a right to say, “This is my son,” concerning whom you have given us no previous information,618 any more than you have favoured us with a revelation about your own prior existence? “Hear ye Him,” therefore, whom from the beginning (the Creator) had declared entitled to be heard in the name of a prophet, since it was as a prophet that He had to be regarded by the people. “A prophet,” says Moses, “shall the Lord your God raise up unto you, of your sons” (that is, of course, after a carnal descent;619 “unto Him shall ye hearken, as unto me.” (Deu_18:15) “Every one who will not hearken unto Him, his soul620 shall be cut off from amongst his people.” (Deu_18:19), So also Isaiah: “Who is there among you that feareth God? Let him hear the voice of His Son.” (Isa_50:10) This voice the Father was going Himself to recommend. For, says he,621 He establishes the words of His Son, when He says, “This is my beloved Son, hear ye Him.” Therefore, even if there be made a transfer of the obedient “heating” from Moses and Elias to622 Christ, it is still not from623 another God, or to another Christ; but from” the Creator to His Christ, in consequence of the departure of the old covenant and the supervening of the new. “Not an ambassador, nor an angel, but He Himself,” says Isaiah, “shall save them;”624 for it is He Himself who is now declaring and fulfilling the law and the prophets. The Father gave to the Son new disciples,625 after that Moses and Elias had been exhibited along with Him in the honour of His glory, and had then been dismissed as having fully discharged their duty and office, for the express purpose of affirming for Marcion’s information the fact that Moses and Elias had a share in even the glory of Christ. But we have the entire structure626 of this same vision in Habakkuk also, where the Spirit in the person of some627 of the apostles says, “O Lord, I have heard Thy speech, and was afraid.” What speech was this, other than the words of the voice from heaven, This is my beloved Son, hear ye, Him? “I considered thy works, and was astonished.” When could this have better happened than when Peter, on seeing His glory, knew not what he was saying? “In the midst of the two Thou shalt be known” - even Moses and 385 Elias.628 These likewise did Zechariah see under the figure of the two olive trees and olive branches. (Zec_4:3, Zec_4:14) For these are they of whom he says, “They are the two anointed ones, that stand by the Lord of the whole earth.” And again Habakkuk says, “His glory covered the heavens” (that is, with that cloud), “and His splendour shall be like the light - even the light, wherewith His very raiment glistened.” And if we would make mention of629 the promise to Moses, we shall find it accomplished here. For when Moses desired to see the Lord, saying, “If therefore I have found grace in Thy sight, manifest Thyself to me, that I may see Thee distinctly,”630 the sight which he desired to have was of that condition which he was to assume as man, and which as a prophet he knew was to occur. Respecting the face of God, however, he had already heard, “No man shall see me, and live.” “This thing,” said He, “which thou hast spoken, will I do unto thee.” Then Moses said, “Show me Thy glory.” And the Lord, with like reference to the future, replied, “I will pass before thee in my glory,” etc. Then at the last He says, “And then thou shall see my back.” (see Exo_33:13-23) Not loins, or calves of the legs, did he want to behold, but the glory which was to be revealed in the latter days.631 He had promised that He would make Himself thus face to face visible to him, when He said to Aaron, “If there shall be a prophet among you, I will make myself known to him by vision, and by vision will I speak with him; but not so is my manner to Moses; with him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently” (that is to say, in the form of man which He was to assume), “and not in dark speeches.” (Num_12:6-8) Now, although Marcion has denied632 that he is here represented as speaking with the Lord, but only as standing, yet, inasmuch as he stood “mouth to mouth,” he must also have stood “face to face” with him, to use his words,633 not far from him, in His very glory - not to say,634 in His presence. And with this glory he went away enlightened from Christ, just as he used to do from the Creator; as then to dazzle the eyes of the children of Israel, so now to smite those of the blinded Marcion, who has failed to see how this argument also makes against him.
Chap. XXIII. - Impossible that Marcion’s Christ Should Reprove the Faithless Generation. Such Loving Consideration for Infants as the True Christ Was Apt to Shew, also Impossible for the Other. On the Three Different Characters Confronted and Instructed by Christ Samaria.
I take on myself the character635 of Israel. Let Marcion’s Christ stand forth, and exclaim, “O faithless generation!636 how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you?” (Luk_9:41) He will immediately have to submit to this remonstrance from me: “Whoever you are, O stranger,637 first tell us who you are, from whom you come, and what right you have over us. Thus far, all you possess638 belongs to the Creator. Of course, if you come from Him, and are acting for Him, we will bear your reproof. But if you come from some other god, I should wish you to tell us what you have ever committed to us belonging to yourself,639 which it was our duty to believe, seeing that you are upbraiding us with ‘faithlessness,’ who have never yet revealed to us your own self. How long ago640 did you begin to treat with us, that you should be complaining of the delay? On what points have you borne with us, that you should adduce641 your patience? Like Aesop’s ass, you are just come from the well,642 and are filling every place with your braying.” I assume, besides,643 the person of the disciple, against whom he has inveighed:644 “O perverse nation! how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you?” This outburst of his I might, of course, retort upon him most justly in such words as these: “Whoever you are, O stranger, first tell us who you are, from whom you come, what right you have over us. Thus far, I suppose, you belong to the Creator, and so we have followed you, recognising in you all things which are His. Now, if you come from Him, we will bear your reproof. If, however, you are acting for another, prythee tell us what you have ever conferred upon us that is simply your own, which it had become our duty to believe, seeing that you reproach us with ‘faithlessness,’ although up to this moment you show us no credentials. How long since did you begin to plead with us, that you are 386 charging us with delay? Wherein have you borne with us, that you should even boast of your patience? The ass has only just arrived from Aesop’s well, and he is already braying.” Now who would not thus have rebutted the unfairness of the rebuke, if he had supposed its author to belong to him who had had no right as yet to complain? Except that not even He645 would have inveighed against them, if He had not dwelt among them of old in the law and by the prophets, and with mighty deeds and many mercies, and had always experienced them to be “faithless.” But, behold, Christ takes646 infants, and teaches how all ought to be like them, if they ever wish to be greater. (Luk_9:47-48) The Creator, on the contrary,647 let loose bears against children, in order to avenge His prophet Elisha, who had been mocked by them. (2Ki_2:23-24) This antithesis is impudent enough, since it throws together648 things so different as infants649 and children,650 - an age still innocent, and one already capable of discretion - able to mock, if not to blaspheme. As therefore God is a just God, He spared not impious children, exacting as He does honour for every time of life, and especially, of course, from youth. And as God is good, He so loves infants as to have blessed the midwives in Egypt, when they protected the infants of the Hebrews651 which were in peril from Pharaoh’s command. (Exo_2:15-21) Christ therefore shares this kindness with the Creator. As indeed for Marcion’s god, who is an enemy to marriage, how can he possibly seem to be a lover of little children, which are simply the issue of marriage? He who hates the seed must needs also detest the fruit. Yea, he ought to be deemed more ruthless than the king of Egypt. (see a like comparison in book i. chap. xxix. p. 294.) For whereas Pharaoh forbade infants to be brought up, he will not allow them even to be born, depriving them of their ten months’ existence in the womb. And how much more credible it is, that kindness to little children should be attributed to Him who blessed matrimony for the procreation of mankind, and in such benediction included also the promise of connubial fruit itself, the first of which is that of infancy!652 [see Elucidation VIII.] The Creator, at the request of Elias, inflicts the blow653 of fire from heaven in the case of that false prophet (of Baalzebub). (2Ki_1:9-12) I recognise herein the severity of the Judge. And I, on the contrary, the severe rebuke654 of Christ on His disciples, when they were for inflicting655 a like visitation on that obscure village of the Samaritans. (Luk_9:51-56) The heretic, too, may discover that this gentleness of Christ was promised by the selfsame severest Judge. “He shall not contend,” says He, “nor shall His voice be heard in the street; a bruised reed shall He not crush, and smoking flax shall He not quench.” (Isa_62:2-3) Being of such a character, He was of course much the less disposed to burn men. For even at that time the Lord said to Elias, (compare De Patientia, chap. xv.) “He was not in the fire, but in the still small voice.” (1Ki_19:12) Well, but why does this most humane and merciful God reject the man who offers himself to Him as an inseparable companion? (Luk_9:57-58) If it were from pride or from hypocrisy that he had said, “I will follow Thee whithersoever Thou goest,’ then, by judicially reproving an act of either pride or hypocrisy as worthy of rejection, He performed the office of a Judge. And, of course, him whom He rejected He condemned to the loss of not following the Saviour.656 For as He calls to salvation him whom He does not reject, or him whom He voluntarily invites, so does He consign to perdition him whom He rejects. When, however, He answers the man, who alleged as an excuse his father’s burial, “Let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God,” (Luk_9:59-60) He gave a clear confirmation to those two laws of the Creator - that in Leviticus, which concerns the sacerdotal office, and forbids the priests to be present at the funerals even of their parents. “The priest,” says He, “shall not enter where there is any dead person;657 and for his father he shall not be defiled” (Lev_21:1, according to our author’s reading); as well as that in Numbers, which relates to the (Nazarite) vow of separation; for there he who devotes himself to God, among other things, is bidden “not to come at any dead body,” not even of his father, or his mother, or his brother. (Num_6:6-7) Now it was, I suppose, for the Nazarite and the priestly office that He intended this man whom 387 He had been inspiring658 to preach the kingdom of God. Or else, if it be not so, he must be pronounced impious enough who, without the intervention of any precept of the law, commanded that burials of parents should be neglected by their sons. When, indeed, in the third case before us, (Christ) forbids the man “to look back” who wanted first “to bid his family farewell,” He only follows out the rule659 of the Creator. For this (retrospection) He had been against their making, whom He had rescued out of Sodom. (Gen_19:17)
Chap. XXIV. - On the Mission of the Seventy Disciples, and Christ’s Charge to Them. Precedents Drawn from the Old Testament. Absurdity of Supposing that Marcion’s Christ Could Have Given the Power of Treading on Serpents and Scorpions.
He chose also seventy other missionaries660 besides the twelve. Now why, if the twelve followed the number of the twelve fountains of Elim, (compare above, book iv. chap. xiii. p. 364) should not the seventy correspond to the like number of the palms of that place? (Exo_15:27 and Num_33:9) Whatever be the Antitheses of the comparison, it is a diversity in the causes, not in the powers, which has mainly produced them. But if one does not keep in view the diversity of the causes,661 he is very apt to infer a difference of powers.662 When the children of Israel went out of Egypt, the Creator brought them forth laden with their spoils of gold and silver vessels, and with loads besides of raiment and unleavened dough;663 whereas Christ commanded His disciples not to carry even a staff664 for their journey. The former were thrust forth into a desert, but the latter were sent into cities. Consider the difference presented in the occasions,665 and you will understand how it was one and the same power which arranged the mission666 of His people according to their poverty in the one case, and their plenty in the other. He cut down667 their supplies when they could be replenished through the cities, just as He had accumulated668 them when exposed to the scantiness of the desert. Even shoes He forbade them to carry. For it was He under whose very protection the people wore not out a shoe, (Deu_29:5) even in the wilderness for the space of so many years. “No one,” says He, “shall ye salute by the way.” (Luk_10:4) What a destroyer of the prophets, forsooth, is Christ, seeing it is from them that He received his precept also! When Elisha sent on his servant Gehazi before him to raise the Shunammite’s son from death, I rather think he gave him these instructions: (see 2Ki_4:29) “Gird up thy loins, and take my staff in thine hand, and go thy way: if thou meet any man, salute him not;669 and if any salute thee, answer him not again.”670 For what is a wayside blessing but a mutual salutation as men meet? So also the Lord commands: “Into whatsoever house they enter, let them say, Peace be to it.” (Luk_10:5) Herein He follows the very same example. For Elisha enjoined upon his servant the same salutation when he met the Shunammite; he was to say to her: “Peace to thine husband, peace to thy child.”671 Such will be rather our Antitheses; they compare Christ with, instead of sundering Him from, the Creator. “The labourer is worthy of his hire.” (Luk_10:7) Who could better pronounce such a sentence than the Judge? For to decide that the workman deserves his wages, is in itself a judicial act. There is no award which consists not in process of judgment. The law of the Creator on this point also presents us with a corroboration, for He judges that labouring oxen are as labourers worthy of their hire: “Thou shall not muzzle,” says He. “the ox when he treadeth out the corn.” (Deu_25:4) Now, who so good to man (compare above, book ii. chap. 17, p. 311) as He who is also merciful to cattle? Now, when Christ pronounced labourers to be worthy of their hire, He, in fact, exonerated from blame that precept of the Creator about depriving the Egyptians of their gold and silver vessels. (see this argued at length above, in book ii. chap 17, p. 311) For they who had built for the Egyptians their houses and cities, were surely workmen worthy of their hire, and were not instructed in a fraudulent act, but only set to claim compensation for their hire, which they were unable in any other way to exact from their masters.672 That the kingdom of God was neither new nor unheard of, He in this way affirmed, whilst at the same time He bids them announce that it was near at hand. (Luk_10:9) Now it is that which 388 was once far off, which can be properly said to have become near. If, however, a thing had never existed previous to its becoming near, it could never have been said to have approached, because it had never existed at a distance. Everything which is new and unknown is also sudden.673 Everything which is sudden, then, first receives the accident of time674 when it is announced, for it then first puts on appearance of form.675 Besides it will be impossible for a thing either to have been tardy676 all the while it remained unannounced,677 or to have approached678 from the time it shall begin to be announced.
He likewise adds, that they should say to such as would not receive them: “Notwithstanding be ye sure of this, that the kingdom of God is come nigh unto you.” (Luk_10:11) If He does not enjoin this by way of a commination, the injunction is a most useless one. For what mattered it to them that the kingdom was at hand, unless its approach was accompanied with judgment? - even for the salvation of such as received the announcement thereof. How, if there can be a threat without its accomplishment, can you have in a threatening god, one that executes also, and in both, one that is a judicial being?679 So, again, He commands that the dust be shaken off against them, as a testimony, - the very particles of their ground which might cleave680 to the sandal, not to mention681 any other sort of communication with them. (Luk_10:11) But if their churlishness682 and inhospitality were to receive no vengeance from Him, for what purpose does He premise a testimony, which surely forbodes some threats? Furthermore, when the Creator also, in the book of Deuteronomy, forbids the reception of the Ammonites and the Moabites into the church,683 because, when His people came from Egypt, they fraudulently withheld provisions from them with inhumanity and inhospitality, (Deu_23:3) it will be manifest that the prohibition of intercourse descended to Christ from Him. The form of it which He uses - “He that despiseth you, despiseth me” (Luk_10:16) - the Creator had also addressed to Moses: “Not against thee have they murmured, but against me.” (Num_14:27) Moses, indeed, was as much an apostle as the apostles were prophets. The authority of both offices will have to be equally divided, as it proceeds from one and the same Lord, (the God) of apostles and prophets. Who is He that shall bestow “the power of treading on serpents and scorpions?” (Luk_10:19) Shall it be He who is the Lord of all living creatures or he who is not god over a single lizard? Happily the Creator has promised by Isaiah to give this power even to little children, of putting their hand in the cockatrice den and on the hole of the young asps without at all receiving hurt. (Isa_11:8-9) And, indeed, we are aware (without doing violence to the literal sense of the passage, since even these noxious animals have actually been unable to do hurt where there has been faith) that under the figure of scorpions and serpents are portended evil spirits, whose very prince is described684 by the name of serpent, dragon, and every other most conspicuous beast in the power of the Creator.685 This power the Creator conferred first of all upon His Christ, even as the ninetieth Psalm says to Him: “Upon the asp and the basilisk shall Thou tread; the lion and the dragon shall Thou trample under foot.” (Psa_91:13) So also Isaiah: “In that day the Lord God shall draw His sacred, great, and strong sword” (even His Christ) “against that dragon, that great and tortuous serpent; and He shall slay him in that day.” (Isaiah 27:1, LXX) But when the same prophet says, “The way shall be called a clean and holy way; over it the unclean thing shall not pass, nor shall be there any unclean way; but the dispersed shall pass over it, and they shall not err therein; no lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon; it shall not be found there,” (Isaiah 35:1, LXX) he points out the way of faith, by which we shall reach to God; and then to this way of faith he promises this utter crippling686 and subjugation of all noxious animals. Lastly, you may discover the suitable times of the promise, if you read what precedes the passage: “Be strong, ye weak hands and ye feeble knees: then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall hear; then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb shall be articulate.” (Isaiah 35:3, 5-6, LXX) When, therefore, He proclaimed the benefits of His cures, then also did He put the scorpions and the 389 serpents under the feet of His saints - even He who had first received this power from the Father, in order to bestow it upon others and then manfested it forth conformably to the order of prophecy.687
FOOTNOTES
523 Agnorant.
524 Et pari utrinque stupore discriminis fixum.
525 This obscure passage is thus read by Oehler, from whom we have translated: “Lege extorri familiæ dirimendæ in transitu ejus Jordanis machæram fuisse, cujus impetum atque decursum plane et Jesus docuerat prophetis transmeantibus stare.” The machæram (“sword”) is a metaphor for the river. Rigaltius refers to Virgil’s figure, Æneid, viii. 62, 64, for a justification of the simile. Oehler has altered the reading from the “ex sorte familiæ,” etc., of the mss to “extorri f
