Translated from the Greek of the First1KGreek digital edition (tlg2018.tlg023, after Gaisford 1842) by Claude (Fable 5), begun 2026-07-12. No complete English translation of this work has previously existed. The Eclogae are books 6–9 of Eusebius's lost ten-book General Elementary Introduction; the opening of Book 1 is itself damaged — the text begins mid-sentence, and the manuscript's gaps are marked [...]. Bracketed scripture references are the edition's; renderings a specialist should check are flagged in the numbered footnotes. Working translation, not a critical edition.
Section 1 — Proem: the plan of the work
...[the foregoing treatise1], having worked through the matters of both doctrine and life, confirmed the testimonies concerning our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by clear, trustworthy, and true demonstrations and reasonings, employing at its close only very brief testimonies from the divine scriptures believed among both Jews and ourselves — since2 no other argument availed, for those still altogether distrustful of the divine scriptures, than to set before them proofs in abundance drawn from those scriptures themselves.
The work now in hand has been labored to fill up what those books lacked, for readers who, on the strength of that demonstration, now owe belief to the sacred scriptures as divine and God-breathed. It contains, in sum, a collection [...] prophecy concerning our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, which it seemed good to gather into one out of [...] the old covenant [...] and in part also the things spoken of him beforehand through veiled intimations [...] him and the economies concerning him. [...] which are shown to have received fulfillment. And such [prophecies...] — lying scattered not only in prophecies [...] but stored also in the narratives — [I judged3] this gathering would prove useful to not a few, since it is not easy, except by continuous reading of the scriptures, for all of them to come to hand for those who wish to carry them on their lips and bear them in memory.
It should be known that before the present undertaking we composed Chronological Canons, setting beside them an epitome of every kind of history of Greeks and barbarians, and by them we established the antiquity of Moses and the prophets who followed him. Taking the work in hand as their natural sequel, we have fittingly come after that labor to the present treatise — which one might gracefully liken to the natural industry of the wise bee, to whom the sacred word in Proverbs sends us, saying: Go to the bee, and see what a worker she is, and how holy the trade she plies; whose labors kings and commoners take for health; and she is desired of all and held in honor, and though weak in strength, by honoring wisdom she is brought to distinction [Prov 6:8 LXX — the bee-verse stands only in the Greek Bible, not the Hebrew]. For just as that worker is attested to honor wisdom — culling what is serviceable from the flourishing blooms, and out of the gathering and working of them all offering her labors, as the scripture says, wholesome to kings and commoners alike — even so, I think, these Prophetic Extracts concerning the Christ will prove: a culled bouquet4 from the rational meadows of God, preserving in the bare words the well-molded workmanship of the wax, while the thoughts treasured within them husband somewhere in secret the sweet and most wholesome [honey] of that wise creature's begetting.
For who among the faithful would not confess that the saving citations concerning the Word of God surpass, with incomparable superiority, every pleasure and profit of the body — being fit for the recovery of the truly profitable and healthful right faith? This it is necessary to cherish — not only for those advanced in attainment, who are called kings, but also for those beneath them, and for those only now first approaching the divine word. For these last I think the undertaking will be especially serviceable, that from it they may make exact the certainty of the words in which they were catechized [the very phrase of Luke 1:4]; for the simple and innocent faith gets its firmest mooring-cable precisely then, when a man has first laid down by demonstration the foundations — the exact comprehension and knowledge of the things believed [...].
...[for the sake of5...] it seemed necessary [...] after the [setting-out6] of each [prophecy], to append, in the manner of an introduction, a very concise narration [...]: on the one hand a refutation of those who boast of believing the scriptures as divine and yet do not admit [...] Jesus, as being himself the one prophesied — objections addressed to them, I mean those of the circumcision, and those of the heresies [...], and refutations of whatever they might say when they attempt to resolve the divine utterances in too mythical a fashion. There will also be a measured brief exegesis of our own: at times containing demonstration that the sacred predictions of God have been fulfilled in our Savior alone, at times indicating the judgment we hold concerning the passages set forth.
But as we are about to take these matters up, we must first draw the distinction: that in one place the sacred words teach that the Word of God pre-exists not only the incarnation but every begotten existence whatsoever, addressing him as God after the Father, and as Lord — precisely as the church's preaching holds, following the evangelical testimony which says: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; all things came to be through him, and without him not even one thing came to be [John 1:1, 3]. And in another place they proclaim beforehand his two comings: the former, in which they foretold expressly that he would have neither form nor beauty, that he would be led as a sheep to the slaughter [Isa 53:2, 7] — saying thus plainly that by the lawless deeds of the former people he would be condemned to death, exactly as the economies of his first coming in the times of Tiberius prove out; and the second coming, no longer like the former, but more divine and far surpassing it in glory, which shall come to pass with angelic bodyguard and the embattled host of heaven. In all this the fair-minded reader must hold the apostolic preaching as at once his rule and his target, keeping the doctrines of the truth perfect and untampered — that is, what concerns the first and unbegotten nature of the God of all, and what concerns the divine Word's pre-existence and his ministry in the fashioning of all things begotten, as being Word... [the text breaks off]
Section 2 — [fragment] The rule of the ineffable Name
[A long passage is lost.] ...apart from the four letters which among the Hebrews go unpronounced — whose combination yields the signified name that is ineffable, called "Lord" only by an accommodation of speech — [this name] has never once been applied to an angelic power, as you will observe throughout the whole God-breathed scripture, wherever God, or the Lord indicated by the tetragram, is recorded as having given oracles to any: [the question being] whether what is indicated is to be referred to the unbegotten nature of the God of all, or to his Word — whom, being the second cause of all, the divine scripture is accustomed to address both as God and as Lord according to what is signified by that name unutterable among the Hebrews.
And so in the present passage, where the word says that the LORD came down, and the LORD said what stands written [Gen 11:5–6, the tower of Babel], one might reasonably inquire whether the reference is to one of the angels or to the first cause. To angels it cannot be — first, because here too "Lord" is used by way of the unpronounceable appellation; second, because the text shows the words addressed to others subordinate to him. But again, the sense is unfitting for the Father and God of all: for it would not befit him to say, Come, let us go down and confound their tongue [Gen 11:7]; and the LORD came down to see the city could in no way be suitably said of the supreme authority. It remains, then, to understand that the divine Word is indicated by the passage before us. He, entrusted by the Father with the providence and administration of the whole, has never ceased his ministry — now in his own person, now through ministering angels — serving, according to the Father's will, whatever conduces to the benefit and salvation of all. What lies in this place belongs to mystical and secret contemplation, which this is not the moment to unfold.
Section 3 — Chapter 3: Who appeared to Abraham?
The first oracle recorded as coming to Abraham is when the Lord said to him: Go out from your land and from your kindred and from your father's house, into the land that I will show you; and I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you and magnify your name, and you shall be blessed; and I will bless those who bless you [Gen 12:1], and what follows. The second, when the Lord appeared to him and said: To your seed I will give this land [Gen 12:7]. The third, when the Lord spoke to Abraham after Lot was separated from him [Gen 13:14]. The fourth, where it is said: After these words the word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision of the night, saying: Fear not, Abram, I am your shield [Gen 15:1]; and after other things: I am the Lord who brought you out of the country of the Chaldeans [Gen 15:7]. The fifth, when the Lord appeared to Abraham and said to him: I am your God; be well-pleasing before me [Gen 17:1], and the rest. The sixth, in which the Lord appeared to him again at the oak of Mamre, as he sat at the door of his tent at midday: and lifting up his eyes he looked, and behold, three men stood over against him; and seeing them he ran from his tent door to meet them, and bowed down to the earth and said: Lord, if I have found favor before you, do not pass your servant by; let a little water be taken, and let them wash your feet [Gen 18:1ff].
Then, a little further, it is added that rising up from there, they looked toward the face of Sodom; and Abraham went with them, escorting them. And the Lord said: Shall I hide from Abraham my servant what I am doing? Abraham shall surely become a great and numerous nation, and in him shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. For I have known him7, that he will command his sons and his house after him8, and they will keep the ways of the Lord, to do righteousness and judgment, so that the Lord may bring upon Abraham the things he has spoken to him. And the Lord said: The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is multiplied [Gen 18:16–20]. And shortly after: And the men, turning away from there, went to Sodom; but Abraham was still standing before the Lord. And Abraham drew near and said: Do not destroy the righteous with the ungodly, so that the righteous be as the ungodly. If there be fifty righteous in the city, will you destroy them? Will you not spare the whole place for the sake of the fifty righteous, if they be in it? By no means will you do a thing like this word, to slay the righteous with the ungodly, so that the righteous be as the ungodly — by no means! Shall not he who judges all the earth do judgment? [Gen 18:23–25]. And after other things the scripture says: And the Lord departed, when he had ceased speaking with Abraham. And the two angels came to Sodom at evening; and Lot sat by the gate of Sodom [Gen 18:33–19:1].
It is worth pausing to ask whether it is some chance angel who is indicated in these places as having given the oracles to Abraham, or the God of all himself, or some third besides these — the Word of God, whom it is the custom of sacred scripture to call Lord and God after the most high Father and God of all. And further, to ask who it was, of the three men seen by Abraham, to whom he said, Lord, if I have found favor before you, and again, By no means! Shall not he who judges all the earth do judgment? — concerning whom the divine scripture, narrating not once only but a second time and a third, says the Lord appeared to him, with the title "Lord" standing for the unpronounceable name set down in the Hebrew — a name never once applied to an angelic power. Thus when Lot is recorded as saying to the angels who came to Sodom, I pray, lord, since your servant has found mercy before you [Gen 19:18–19], the word "lord" stands in the Hebrew — but not by the four letters which the Hebrews reserve for the ineffable name of God; it is written with other syllables, those by which one names the "lord" that exists in relation to something, as a servant's lord. Nothing of that kind resembles the name taken up by the four letters for the sovereign authority of God, which is what appears in the recorded appearances of God to Abraham — plainly establishing that it was no angel, nor some divine power a little above the angels, that gave him the oracles, but God himself; whose ineffable utterance, the very one conveyed in these places by the four letters, the high priest alone bore upon his forehead, carrying on the golden plate what is called the engraving of the seal, "Holiness of the LORD" [Exod 28:36]. And that the divine scripture does not use this appellation indifferently of angels is evident from its extreme care: at times it relates that God himself, or the Lord indicated by the tetragram, appeared and gave oracles to the righteous; at other times it expressly writes that those who were seen were angels. So the one who appeared to Hagar in her wandering was, clearly, an angel: for it was fitting that to her — falling as far short of Abraham as she did, and able to behold nothing more than an angelic vision — the vision should be proportioned, coming through an angel's presence; but to Abraham, through the greater manifestation of God himself.
And the rest of God's utterances to him would not fit, should anyone try to refer them to angels; to God alone would it be proper to say them — such as, I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you, and the like; above all, I am the Lord who brought you out of the country of the Chaldeans, and, I am your God; be well-pleasing before me, and what follows. And no one could ever be so silly9 as to suppose an angel said these things.
And when the three men stood by Abraham as he sat at the oak, Abraham indeed goes to meet them — but it is not to the three that he says Lord, if I have found favor before you, but to one only. And of the others, not one is introduced as conversing with Abraham — for it stood not to reason that the servants should speak in the master's presence — but the Lord alone gives the oracle, he who also says, Shall I hide from Abraham my servant what I am doing?, and the rest. Then the men who were with the Lord — that is, plainly, the angels — turning away, went down alone to Sodom, the Lord not accompanying them (for how could the kindly and gracious God have sojourned among the impious?); but he, remaining in converse and company with the righteous man whom God loved, delights in his discourse and champions10 his most humane prayer — in which Abraham, by saying By no means! Shall not he who judges all the earth do judgment?, shows most vividly that he knew well and exactly that he was conversing neither with an angel nor with some subordinate divine power, but with God himself. Then, dividing the matters precisely, the scripture in what follows expressly names those who went up to Sodom angels, adding that the two angels came to Sodom at evening; and in the sequel it records that neither Lord nor God was seen by Lot or spoke with him, but the angels — so that it is altogether plain that it was the Lord and God, and not one of the angels, who is attested by scripture to have been seen by Abraham.
Now all those who wish to cut apart the concord of the old covenant with the new [the Marcionite front], pouncing on these passages as on a windfall, imagine they clearly establish from them that the Father of Christ — confessed by the voice of the Gospel to be invisible — is other than the God of Moses and the prophets who was variously seen: now by Abraham, now by Isaac (to whom, giving oracles, he foretells things closely resembling those spoken over Abraham), and likewise by Jacob; and perhaps also by Isaiah, who said, I saw the Lord of hosts [Isa 6:5], and by the remaining prophets similarly. But we — since among God's ancient prophets themselves there is carried a divine oracle speaking from the person of God, For I am the Lord your God, and I am not changed [Mal 3:6], and, Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the Lord [Jer 23:24], and giving oracles to Moses he says, No one shall see my face and live [Exod 33:20] — we shall put this difficulty both to those just mentioned and to those of the circumcision, and further to those who will not admit that a second deity, the Son's, pre-exists after the unbegotten nature: how is it that the God who by these same prophecies is unalterable and unchangeable, who alone says he fills heaven and earth, who even by the law itself is shown to be all but invisible — no one shall see my face and live — is on the other hand altered, and, as if overturning his own essence, became containable in certain small portions of the earth, and was seen now by Abraham, now by the other prophets? For if these things be referred to the God of all, they would seem to clash not only with the voice of the Gospel but with the prophetic voices themselves, which declare him uncontainable, unalterable, and invisible to men. Unless indeed someone should say that God himself was not really seen by those recorded, but that they merely imagined it — seeming to see and to hear, yet not truly beholding anything of what they supposed appeared, nor hearing in truth, but deceived even in this, thinking and seeming to hear: which is foreign and alien to the truthful and undeceiving nature of the God of all. And it is shown incoherent besides, from the fact that God himself is related to say concerning Abraham: For I have known him, that he will command his sons and his house after him, and they will keep the ways of the LORD, to do righteousness and judgment, so that the LORD may bring upon Abraham the things he has spoken to him [Gen 18:19]. Beyond all dispute, then, the Lord here discourses of these things as concerning another Lord. How, then, is it possible to suppose that the God of all spoke them? Of what other Lord besides himself could the words in question be spoken? From all this it is clear that what is indicated seems proper neither to the God of all — and it has been shown, neither to the nature of angels; for the scripture, as I said, knows how to speak truly where angels appear, expressly marking the visions that come through them. If, then, these things fit neither the angelic nature nor the supreme and unbegotten nature of the God of all, one solution alone remains: that we preserve unchangeability, immutability, and invisibility for the unbegotten essence, while transferring the recorded oracles-from-God to the Word of God — who, we have believed, was variously seen even before the incarnation for the salvation of men, and accomplished the economies conveyed in the divine scriptures; upon him alone, after the God of all, we have found even the four-lettered appellation laid — this divine designation, too, befitting the only-begotten and heir of the Father.
Abraham, then, knowing well — wise as he was, and attested a prophet by God himself — that he has given all judgment to the Son [the sentence of John 5:22], both worships him and says to him alone, beyond the others: By no means! Shall not he who judges all the earth do judgment? — which to suppose spoken to an angel, subordinate to the divine Word, is unfitting and utterly implausible; but it would be most proper to the divine Word to say, along with the rest, both Shall I hide from Abraham my servant what I am doing? and For I have known him, that he will command his sons and his house after him, and they will keep the ways of the Lord, to do righteousness and judgment, so that the Lord may bring upon Abraham the things he has spoken to him. And it befits him to say these things as one instructing us that all that men do in holiness it is right to refer to the sole piety of the God and Father of all, from whom11 — being upon the earth — all good things are supplied to the godly for benefit and salvation. But these things the divine Word speaks as teaching concerning another Lord — his own Father; for he confesses him his own Lord and God before his own disciples, saying: I ascend to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God [John 20:17]. And the law, and all scripture, is full of this character of "the Lord" — that is, of the divine Word — discoursing as about another Lord, namely the Father. And since what lies in this place demands much and very deep contemplation, this much suffices for the present purpose.
End of first installment (Book 1, sections 1–3 of 25). Next: sections 4 and following — the theophanies to Isaac and Jacob.
Section 4 — Chapter 4: Hagar — why an angel, and whose Name she called
And Hagar fled from her face [Gen 16:6] — plainly, Sarah's; and an angel of the Lord found her by the spring of water; and in what follows it is said a second time, and the angel of the Lord said to her; and a third time, the angel of the Lord said to her: Multiplying I will multiply your seed, and it shall not be numbered for multitude; and again, the angel of the Lord said to her: Behold, you are with child, and shall bear a son, and shall call his name Ishmael, for the Lord has hearkened to your humiliation. And after all these words it is said: And she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her: You are the God who looked upon me. Had not the one who appeared to Hagar in her wandering been named "Lord" from the mouth of sacred scripture itself — in the words, she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her — one might have supposed that Hagar mistakenly took the angel for God. But as it stands, the scripture bears witness that it was the Lord who gave the oracles through the angel just named; through whom, being Lord and God, he fittingly said in his own person, Multiplying I will multiply your seed — for this would be proper for God alone to say, and no longer for an angel as well. And it is likely that Hagar, fixing on this very word and perceiving that such a voice could belong to God alone, said, You are the God who looked upon me. Moreover, a second time, when she runs away taking her son with her, it is written: an angel of God called Hagar out of heaven and said to her the things recorded — among which stands, for I will make him into a nation (plainly, the child); which it would no longer be credible to attribute to the angel, for again the promise is God's. Whose "Lord's" name, then, did Hagar call — You are the God who looked upon me — the scripture here too carrying, upon the word "Lord," the four-lettered name of the Hebrews? It is clear from what has already been rendered: the name of the Word who was in the beginning with God — who, being present alongside, and from the beginning overseeing and administering the affairs of men, supplied to men advanced and perfect, such as Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, the visions himself in his own person; but to those falling short of their virtue — such as Lot, and in Judges Gideon and Manoah, and all who resemble them — employing as ministers and servants the divine angels under him, in many parts and in many ways [the phrase of Heb 1:1] he furnished the promises through them. So too to Hagar, as not yet capable of containing the vision of the divine Word himself, he prophesies the things recorded through the angel. And if he appears to Jacob also through angels — yet observe that this too was at the beginning, while Jacob was still, as it were, a beginner under instruction; but when he had advanced and given himself over to perfection, he grants him his own converse naked and unveiled — no longer through angels and interpreters, but himself, in his own person: the Lord and God the Word, who holds the second rank of the paternal deity12, counting him worthy of his own vision.
Section 5 — Chapter 5: "The LORD rained fire from the LORD" — two Persons under one Name
The sun went forth upon the earth, and Lot entered Zoar. And the LORD rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven [Gen 19:23–24]. I do not think that anyone who has once believed the holy scriptures to be sacred and God-breathed will quibble at this passage, attempting to contradict what has been handed down concerning the Word of God — both that he pre-existed, possessing his own hypostasis, and that before the incarnation he carried out the economies toward men. For the scripture here plainly presents two Lords: if indeed "the LORD rained... from the LORD." And the like may be found in the holy apostle, who said, May the Lord grant mercy to the house of Onesiphorus [2 Tim 1:16], and, may the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord in that day [2 Tim 1:18]. In these places one must articulate the words as concerning Father and Son: ascribing to the unbegotten Father of all the lordship and authority over all things and over the Son himself, while allotting to the Word the second rank, after the Father, of rule and dominion over all things that have come to be. And "Lord" being named twice here — the LORD rained from the LORD — twice, according to the Hebrew, the tetragram also is carried, so that it is most clearly acknowledged that this ineffable designation is taken up upon two persons — namely, the God and Father of all, and his Word; so that there remains no ambiguity: wherever such an appellation of God is carried, it is applied not only to the unbegotten nature, but also to the Word who was in the beginning with God.
Section 6 — Chapter 6: Isaac's blessing — spoken over Jacob, fitting the Christ
In the blessing upon Jacob, Isaac, after some other things, says also this: And let nations serve you, and rulers shall bow down to you; and become lord of your brother, and the sons of your father shall bow down to you [Gen 27:29]. What is said, as though to Jacob, does not at all appear capable of being referred to him — nor indeed to the people of the circumcision descended from him. For what nations ever served him, and when? Or what rulers bowed down to him — and as what, indeed, would they have been worshipping him13? And when did he become lord of his brother? Or who are "the sons of your father," in the plural, who are said to be going to bow down to him? For Isaac is nowhere found to have had any other son besides Jacob except Esau alone — how then is it said in the plural, the sons of your father shall bow down to you? We have noted these things because "Jacob" frequently designates the Christ in the prophecies, as shall be shown in the proper places — suspecting that this passage too may accord with the testimonies concerning him. Just so, at any rate, the holy apostle transferred to Christ what concerns the seed of Abraham14, saying: To Abraham were the promises spoken, and to his seed. He does not say "and to seeds," as of many, but as of one — "and to your seed" — which is Christ [Gal 3:16]. Consider whether, in the same manner, the things said here as though of Jacob would rather fit the Christ; and if it be so, the lover of learning will find it out, examining each expression by the laws of allegory15.
Section 7 — Chapter 7: The wrestler at Peniel — and the setting and rising sun
And Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until morning [Gen 32:24]. Then, shortly after Jacob has said, I will not let you go unless you bless me, he says to him: What is your name? And he said, Jacob. And he said to him: No longer shall your name be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name; for you have prevailed with God, and with men you are mighty. And again, a little after: Jacob called the name of that place "Form of God" [Peniel, as the LXX renders it]; for I have seen God face to face, and my soul was saved. To which the scripture adds, saying: And the sun rose upon him when the Form of God passed by.
To Abraham, from the first, the Lord gives his oracles in waking life16, and converses with him often, and is recorded as seen by him three times — and not at night, but seen at midday; the third time, indeed, at very noon he is received as his guest. But to Jacob he appears first with the sun set, in the middle of the night, in dreams, as he goes down17 into Mesopotamia — when, beholding in the vision the heaven-ladder, and the angels ascending and descending upon it, and the Lord leaning upon it, he hears the Lord saying to him, I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father [Gen 28:13], and the rest — which the sequel establishes he spoke to him through an angel. And a second time in Mesopotamia, when the Lord indicated by the tetragram, standing by him again, said to him: Return to the land of your fathers and to your generation, and I will be with you [Gen 31:3]. This too he spoke to him in sleep and through an angel — as Jacob himself teaches when, at the divine voice, he called Leah and Rachel and among other things reported to them the oracle that had come to him, saying: and the angel of God said to me in sleep, "Jacob"..., in which he says, I am the God who appeared to you in the place of God, where you anointed a pillar to me and vowed to me a vow; now therefore arise, go out from this land, and depart into the land of your birth [Gen 31:11–13]. After this, as he returned from Mesopotamia, first — morning now being come — the angels of God met him, of whom he also said, This is the camp of God; and these were likely the same whom he had earlier seen upon the ladder. And then there rises upon him that sun which above had set — after the passage set forth before, in which the one who wrestles with him in sleep18 appears, who said to him, no longer shall your name be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name, for you have prevailed with God and with men you are mighty. After the vision, then, the sun rose upon him; and now — advanced and perfected — no longer in dreams, no longer at night, neither through an angel nor yet through human form, but in the middle of the day and in full light, God, giving him oracles, says: Arise, go up to the place Bethel, and dwell there [Gen 35:1]; and upon all these things, then for the first time the divine scripture testifies that God appeared to him, in Luza, and blessed him, saying what stands written. (We shall inquire at leisure how it is that after this, when he was about to go down into Egypt, God spoke to him again in a vision and by night: Fear not to go down into Egypt [Gen 46:3].)
These things we have set out of necessity, for they show that the divine scripture does not lightly, nor in the case of ordinary men, relate that God was seen. Not of Adam, not of Enoch who was translated, no, nor of Noah, nor even of Moses himself has it been kept on record that God was seen by any of them — though they are recorded as having been conversed with often; nor of any other single man does the divine word introduce God as having been seen, save of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob alone. And in Abraham's case he was not seen at the first oracle, but at the second, and the fifth, and the sixth; in Jacob's, after all the things recorded; while to Isaac, who received oracles twice only, the Lord is twice recorded to have been seen — though the second time at night. And it is evident, from what we said before concerning Abraham, that one must refer the visions not to the first cause but to the divine Word — whom not even they, the blessed and godly men, were yet able to contain: even those very men of whom it is said that he was seen, saw him only after very many preliminary trainings19. Who else, then, could he be — the one in the passage before us who wrestles with Jacob, contends with him, and as it were fights at his side20 — but he who in many parts and in many ways spoke to the fathers [Heb 1:1], the holy Word of God, who alone, after the Father, gives oracles as Lord and God; who also, blessing Jacob, named him Israel, adding, for you have prevailed with God? And thus did the godly men see the Word of God — even as the apostles of our Savior said: That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we gazed upon and our hands handled, concerning the Word of life [1 John 1:1]; which Word and Life Jacob, having beheld, declares, saying: for I have seen God face to face, and my soul was saved.
Section 8 — Chapter 8: Judah's blessing — Shiloh, the lion, and the failed scepter
Judah, may your brothers praise you; your hands shall be on the back of your enemies; the sons of your father shall bow down to you. A lion's whelp is Judah; from a shoot, my son, you went up; lying down you slept as a lion and as a whelp — who shall rouse him? A ruler shall not fail from Judah, nor a leader from his thighs, until the things stored up for him come; and he is the expectation of nations [Gen 49:8–10], and what follows. One must hear this word as of the Holy Spirit, prophesying through Jacob the things concerning the Christ and addressing them to his person, from Judah, may your brothers praise you onward. For that the patriarch was not making these words to that one of his sons is plain to those who attend to the scripture, which says by way of narrative: And Jacob called his sons and said: Gather, that I may announce to you what shall meet you at the last of the days. He undertakes, therefore, to prophesy to them of things to come. And it is clear on other grounds too that the voices of the prophecy do not suit the patriarch Judah. For when did his brothers bow down to him, and why? For what achievement, and when, did they praise him? And how shall anyone expound the rest of the prophecy as fitting him? But neither could one with good reason refer it to the tribe, since rulers of the people were not appointed from the tribe of Judah alone: the judges after Moses, drawn from various tribes, continued as leaders for something near five hundred years; after whom Saul, of the tribe of Benjamin, is the first of all to reign; and thus after these the kings of the tribe of Judah reign not even five hundred whole years; then, after the captivity into Babylon, men of the tribe of Levi presided over affairs for above five hundred years, down to the coming of the Christ. Why then does the prophecy say what was quoted of the tribe of Judah rather than of the rest? The things indicated, therefore, fit the tribe no better. But the true Judah, appearing at the last of the days, we know to be our Savior and Lord, Jesus the Christ of God — steward21 of the conceptions concerning himself and named "Judah," just as in another place "Israel," in another "Jacob," and "David," and differently at different times. Him the holy apostles, and all who were counted worthy of the spirit of adoption, both praised and worshipped; and his hands — which we take symbolically to be his deeds — came to be on the back of his enemies, that is, of the intelligible foes as they fled him.
He is called a lion's whelp either on account of his birth according to flesh from the royal tribe and the root of David, a birth in the likeness of sinful flesh [Rom 8:3]; or on account of the deity, which he emptied himself of and became man — for which cause the words from a shoot, my son, you went up are aptly uttered by Jacob. When indicating the Savior's birth from the shoot and from his root, he named him a lion's whelp — a lion's whelp is Judah; from a shoot, my son, you went up; but when he prophesies his lying down and the sleep of his passion, he calls him both — as a lion and as a whelp — in lying down, he slept as a lion and as a whelp. For then he was exalted not only as one of royal stock but as being himself king, the nations confessing — even if those of the circumcision would not — that he is indeed the King of Israel. And it might be said in yet another way: since, as he raised war against the opposing powers and was about to destroy him who held the power of death — that is, the devil — the deity of the Word had to be present with the one born according to flesh from the shoot of Jacob: the deity is fittingly compared to a lion, because it mastered and conquered all the savage and untamed powers; and the poor flesh22 he assumed, to a lion's whelp, being of the royal tribe of Judah. But further: if our adversary the devil goes about as a roaring lion, consider whether every sinner might be called his whelp, since everyone who commits sin has been begotten of the devil. Since, then, the Savior both came in the likeness of sinful flesh and became a curse for us, and him who knew no sin he made sin for our sake [2 Cor 5:21], consider whether for these reasons, by some deeper account, the prophecy declares that at the season of the passion he became neither lion nor whelp, but as a lion and as a whelp — since he himself compares his own passion to the serpent, saying: as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be lifted up [John 3:14]. Upon this, the mystery of his resurrection is silently intimated in who shall rouse him? And it has become clear to us from the outcome who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead: plainly, God his Father.
Next comes a ruler shall not fail from Judah, nor a leader from his thighs. If we read this as a fresh beginning, it would be said of all who governed the people from the race of the Jews, and on that sense the meaning of the words before us would run thus: the rulers and leaders appointed from the Jews over the Jewish people shall not cease until he come who is the cause of the nations' expectation — that is, the Christ — at whose arrival the aforesaid must fail. This being so, let us examine our own times, whether kings and leaders are now to be found. But it is plain to all that, along with the rest, the nation of the Jews has been subjected to the Roman governors set over the provinces, with not one of their own entrusted with the authority to rule. And this began precisely from the times of our Savior's birth: for down to Herod the king we find in the histories Hebrews of Hebrews ruling their whole nation — from Moses himself in succession, first those called judges, then in order the kings down to the captivity into Babylon, after which the high priests received the rule in succession and continued to the reign of Augustus; under whom Herod — the first of foreign stock23 — was entrusted by the Romans with the kingship over them, and our Savior and Lord Jesus Christ was born. From that time, then, to the present, ruler and leader among the Jews is demonstrably extinct — plain proof that the prophesied one, our Savior, has come; from whose times not only have the rulers of the Jews failed, but likewise the whole worship performed by them in Jerusalem according to the law of Moses. And clearly the expectation of the nations who through him have taken refuge with the God of all began to be fulfilled in fact from the times of his coming, according to Jacob's prophecy.
So much, if we read a ruler shall not fail from Judah as from its own beginning. But if we join what is in hand to the sense preceding it — "Judah" being understood as the Christ, according to what was rendered above — then a ruler shall not fail from Judah would next be taken of the rulers and leaders of the church after the Christ, whom the prophecy declares shall not fail until the things stored up for him come — as if it said more plainly: until, at the consummation's arrival, he receive the kingdom over all things. And that the divine Spirit calls the disciples of Christ "leaders" is clear from what is said to the traitor: But you, O man of like soul, my leader and my acquaintance [Ps 54:13 LXX].
And attending to these things, those who have believed the sacred words to be divine and true must in no way be alarmed, nor have their faith shaken, by the persecutions that come in their seasons — and above all the present one, which has blown against us more violently than any that ever was, and has displayed such things against the churches and all the people as no one has recorded either from scripture or from the tradition of the ancients. We say this because it might perhaps seem that in the present persecution the very opposite of what has been said has come to pass, since no assembly now appears to stand, nor the order of the church's rulers. But since the God-breathed scripture cannot lie, we must be persuaded that the aforesaid have not utterly failed, even if to some they seem to have failed. For the God who said to the prophet, I have left for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal [1 Kgs 19:18, as at Rom 11:4] — said it to one supposing that he alone was left, the rest having been destroyed — the same God even now watches over those worthy of his providence, preserving for us too a remnant according to the election of grace, guarded by him and beheld by him alone. Of whom we ourselves too might say: Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we should have become as Sodom, and been made like unto Gomorrah [Isa 1:9, as at Rom 9:29]. For to suppose that those who preside over the word — named rulers and leaders by the prophecy — have failed utterly and forever is a thing impossible, because a limit has been set to their not failing: until the things stored up for him come — that is, the things promised by the Father to the Christ, when he said to him: Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet [Ps 110:1, as at Acts 2:35]; when also every knee shall bow, of things in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord [Phil 2:10–11]. For then the expectation of the nations who in the present season have believed in him shall receive the promises awaited, in the awaited kingdom of the heavens. So much for this; what follows, from binding his colt to the vine, hanging as it does on allegorical under-meaning, we shall leave to the studious to search out — having already exceeded measure even in what has been said, not according to the aim proposed, yet of necessity, for a clear exposition of the passage.
Section 9 — Chapter 9 (from Exodus): The bush — the angel seen, the Lord speaking
And Moses was shepherding the sheep of Jethro his father-in-law [Exod 3:1]. And shortly after: and he came to Horeb, the mountain of God; and an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire. And after other things: And when the Lord saw that he drew near to see, he called him out of the midst of the bush, saying... And again: And the Lord said to him: I am HE WHO IS. And much later: And God spoke to Moses and said to him: I am the LORD; and I appeared to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, being their God, and my name "Lord" I did not make plain to them; and I established my covenant with them [Exod 6:2–4], and the rest.
With utmost care, in these passages it is not the Lord but the angel that is recorded as having been seen by Moses; through whom the Lord, giving his oracles as through an interpreter, teaches that the one speaking is no subordinate power, but He Who Is himself. And who He Who Is is, he presents more plainly in saying, I am the LORD, and I appeared to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, being their God, and my name "Lord" I did not make plain to them — which seems to me to carry a sense such as this: "To you, for the present, I say only this much, disclosing my name: I am the LORD; but to your fathers I did not [merely] disclose my name — for they stood worthy of a greater knowledge than that — rather, I myself was seen by them, and through my own self I established my covenant with them." And it is evident from what has already been rendered who it was that was seen by the fathers: for our argument, examined in that manner, proved him to be the God-Word who was in the beginning with God. The same one, therefore, appears now also — yet not in the same way as to the forefathers. To them, as greater and more perfect, he was seen himself, and through himself established his covenant with them; but in Moses' case the one seen was not the Lord but the angel, while the one who called was no longer the angel but the Lord: for the Lord was the one giving the ordinances, and the angel the one ministering the divine words. Whence, among the holy apostle's other wonderful utterances, stand these: ordained through angels in the hand of a mediator [Gal 3:19], and, for if the word spoken through angels proved firm [Heb 2:2]. Plainly, then, an angel is introduced, with the Lord giving oracles through him; and not even once, through the whole legislation, will you find the scripture noting that God, or the Lord, was seen by Moses — a thing manifestly said of the three patriarchs alone. From which it is clear that the whole legislation was delivered to the people of that time — infants in their souls, and beginners — as through tutors and stewards24, the divine things being intimated to them typically and in images, through symbols, because they were not able to receive the more mystical and spiritual teaching — being children, reared in Egyptian ways and still in need of much correction: God is fire, according to our God is a consuming fire [Deut 4:24] — which is nowhere said in the case of the patriarchs. And when he commands them to purify themselves that they may see the glory of the Lord, it is not said simply, as with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, that God was seen by them; rather these things are recorded with great terror and spectacle: And it came to pass on the third day, toward dawn, there came voices and lightnings and a dark cloud upon the mountain, and the voice of the trumpet sounded greatly; and all the people in the camp were terrified. And Moses led the people out of the camp to meet God, and they stood beneath the mountain. And mount Sinai smoked all over, because God had come down upon it in fire; and the smoke of it went up as the smoke of a furnace, and all the people were greatly amazed. And the voices of the trumpet grew stronger and stronger. Moses spoke, and God answered him with a voice. And the Lord came down upon mount Sinai, upon the peak of the mountain; and the Lord called Moses [Exod 19:16–20], and the rest. That the Lord came down, then, is attested in these words; that he was also seen is no longer said — the thing kept for the patriarchs alone. There was, then, a presence of the Lord; but a vision — not of him, but plainly of the spear-bearing angels about him, through whom he made the vision fearful and overwhelming to the people, usefully — providing to strengthen in them reverence and fear and faith toward himself, for the guarding and keeping of the laws about to be delivered to them. And that the angels ministering to the Lord at the lawgiving were many, Moses himself presents in the Blessings, saying: The Lord has come from Sinai, and shone forth upon us from Seir, and hastened from mount Paran with the myriads of Kadesh; at his right hand, angels with him [Deut 33:2], and the rest. For which cause Stephen too, in the Acts, stretching out his words against the people, says: you who received the law as ordinances of angels, and did not keep it [Acts 7:53].
Section 10 — Chapter 10 (from Exodus): The pillar of cloud — the Word's bodily instrument
And the angel of God who went before the sons of Israel removed, and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud also removed from before their face, and went and stood behind them, and came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of the sons of Israel [Exod 14:19]. Then in what follows the divine scripture teaches what the cloud was, saying: And the Lord said to Moses: Behold, I come to you in a pillar of cloud, that the people may hear me speaking to you, and may believe you [Exod 19:9]; and again: And God led them by day in a pillar of cloud, to show them the way, and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light [Exod 13:21]; and again: and the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud. Through these, then, the angel going before the sons of Israel was plainly other than the cloud; and the cloud, for its part, was something distinct from the angel — it was, as it were, a bodily instrument of the Lord himself, through which — being in his own nature bodiless, and beyond all sensible and material essence — by a sensible voice he deigned to hold converse with his servant. And of this economy the Lord himself renders the reason to Moses: that the people may hear me speaking with you, and may believe you. With the people, as being more corporeal25, he conversed through sensible voice; with the patriarchs, who needed neither cloud nor pillar of fire, the manner both of the vision and of the converse with them was different. And that it was no angelic power that gave the oracles through the cloud, but God himself, is shown — beyond what has already been demonstrated — by the scripture that runs thus: And the Lord said to Moses: Go, and lead the people to the place of which I told you; behold, my angel shall go before your face [Exod 32:34]; and again: And the Lord said to Moses: Depart, and go up from here, you and the people... and, and I will send my angel with you before your face [Exod 33:1]. For these things it in no way befits an angel to say, but God alone — the Lord indicated through the whole history by the tetragram.
Did, then, the Maker of the universe and God of all descend so far as to ride upon a bodily mountain26, and to walk along with men after the manner of a tutor — he who fills heaven and earth? No: this is neither possible nor holy to conceive. It is at once more pious and possible to suppose it the divine Word, the minister of the paternal will — since, he being Lord27, Jacob became his portion, Israel the allotment of his inheritance [Deut 32:9] — caring for them as for a portion and an inheritance, emptying himself, and making himself small from his connatural greatness, to accommodate himself to the salvation of men even before the incarnation. If, then, we attend fair-mindedly, we shall find him at times referring the commands to his own person — as when he says, you shall not appear before me empty, and, you shall make me an altar of earth... and I will come to you and bless you [Exod 23:15; 20:24] — and at times discoursing as about another Lord, namely God his Father: as in the decalogue, when he says, You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain; and, the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God — for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth... and the LORD blessed the seventh day; and again, Honor your father and your mother, that it may be well with you, and you may be long-lived upon the land which the LORD your God gives you. For that the Lord spoke these things in the decalogue not through an angel, but himself through himself, as is faithfully held28 — how should it not be evident? — training the people in piety toward his own most high Father, the God of all.
Section 11 — Chapter 11: "My Name is upon him" — Joshua, the first bearer of the name Jesus
Behold, I send my angel before your face, to guard you in the way, that he may bring you into the land which I have prepared for you. Attend to him and hearken to him; do not disobey him, for he will not hold back from you29; for my name is upon him [Exod 23:20–21]. These things, with the rest of the ordinances, the Lord enjoins upon the people. Now if, after the death of Moses, the same Lord who gave the oracles in the wilderness had not remained present with the people, but some one of the angels had led them, there would be nothing in this passage to inquire after. But since it appears from the history that after Moses' death the same Lord gave oracles to Joshua30, saying plainly in the responses to him, As I was with Moses, so will I be with you, and I will not forsake you nor overlook you. Be strong and act the man: for you shall divide to this people the land which I swore to your fathers to give them [Josh 1:5–6]; and since through the whole of that scripture no angel appears attending or giving oracles to Joshua, but the Lord himself, the one indicated in Moses by the tetragram — who seems to me, moreover, to be the same as the one who appeared just once to Joshua in the form of a man (for as he is recorded appearing to Abraham and to Jacob, so now also, to teach his servant not to suppose that he himself was the first and unbegotten God, he declares himself commander-in-chief of that One's host) — if, then, through the whole book of Joshua no angel at all is named as present, but the Lord himself who is indicated through the whole legislation of Moses (for the scripture testifies plainly, And the Lord was with Joshua [Josh 6:27]) — of whom could it be said, Behold, I send my angel before your face, that he may lead you into the land which I have prepared for you? It seems, then, that these words indicate none other than Joshua-Jesus31 himself: for it was he who led the people into the land of promise, as the voices of God to him show: Be strong and act the man; for you shall divide to this people the land which I swore to your fathers. Accordingly he instructs the people in advance, saying, Attend to him, and hearken to him; do not disobey him. Nor should one wonder that he named him "angel" — messenger — since the prophecy calls John by this same title: Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who shall prepare my way before you [Mal 3:1, as at Matt 11:10].
And if what was set out above is to be referred to Joshua the son of Nun at all, observe how the Lord says of him: for my name is called upon him. What name, indeed, if not the very name Jesus? For the name Jesus did not belong to the man as he then appeared: he was called Hoshea formerly, and Moses first, borne by God — moved, plainly, by a more divine spirit — proclaims him Jesus [Num 13:16], so that the oracle which said my name is upon him might be fulfilled — the name of the Lord giving the oracle, whom we have many times shown to be the pre-existent Word of God. Jesus was the name Moses laid upon Hoshea, as the divine scripture attests, having kept the record with utmost exactness: at no other moment than when, in accordance with the oracle, he was sending him out as his messenger to spy out the land of promise before the face of the people, did he call him by this name. Through these things, then, Moses appears to have known plainly the appellation of our Savior Jesus; and just as the name Jesus is found first with him, according to the passages under examination, so too he appears as the first to proclaim the name Christ: for before his times no one from all eternity had ever yet been addressed among any people either as Jesus or as Christ. And he appears to have honored these appellations with inspired reasoning: upon the two men most eminent beyond all the people and distinguished before God — men who had other, proper names of their own — he conferred these two titles: his own brother Aaron he addressed as Christ [the anointed], for the image he bore of the true High Priest of the universe, the God-Word who was in the beginning with God; and his own successor he proclaimed Jesus, for the type he too preserved of our Savior Jesus — who, when the worship delivered symbolically through Moses had ceased (Moses having in this manner32 come to his end), succeeded to the true piety toward God, conquered in war and subdued all the invisible powers that resist his word, and, having made the whole earth tyrannized by them — the earth among all the nations — his own possession, distributed it as an inheritance to his own people through the churches in all the world.
Section 12 — Chapter 12: "Show me yourself" — the Word invokes his own Lord
And whenever Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud came down and stood at the doors of the tent; and the people, standing, worshipped, each from his own tent. And the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as one might speak to his own friend; and he departed into the camp; but his attendant Jesus son of Nun did not go out from the tent. And Moses said to the Lord: Behold, you say to me, Bring up this people; but you have not shown me whom you will send with me; yet you have said to me, I know you above all, and you have favor with me. If then I have found favor before you, manifest yourself to me — let me see you knowably33 — that I may have found favor before you, and that I may know that this nation is your people. And he says: I myself will go before, and I will give you rest. And he says to him: If you yourself do not go with us, do not bring me up from here... And the Lord said to Moses: This word also which you have spoken, I will do; for you have found favor before me, and I know you above all. And he said: Show me your glory. And he said: I will pass by before you in my glory, and I will call on the name of the Lord before you; and I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. And he said: You shall not be able to see my face; for no man shall see my face and live. And the Lord said: Behold, a place by me: and you shall stand upon the rock; and I will cover you with my hand until I pass by; and I will take away my hand, and then you shall see my back parts; but my face shall not be seen by you [Exod 33:8–23], to which it adds: And the Lord came down in a cloud, and stood by him there; and he called on the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed before his face, and called: LORD, LORD God, compassionate and merciful, long-suffering and abundant in mercy and true, keeping righteousness, doing mercy unto thousands, taking away lawlessnesses and unrighteousnesses and sins; and he will not clear the guilty, bringing the lawlessnesses of fathers upon children and upon children's children, unto the third and fourth generation. And Moses, making haste, bowed to the earth and worshipped, and said: If I have found favor before you, Lord, let my Lord go together with us [Exod 34:5–9].
Moses is recorded speaking to God with such courage and boldness as a man who is a friend might bring to converse with his own friend. And through these things no ordinary advancement of the prophet is displayed. But observe: the Lord spoke with him face to face — yet he had not yet been seen by him as by Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. It is for just this reason that he petitions: If I have found favor before you, manifest yourself to me — let me see you knowably. By this he establishes that God did not make his appearances to him in the same manner as his speaking with him. For if, as one might suppose, God's having spoken with him face to face is the same thing as his having been seen by him, as one might say, person to person — what room would remain for the petition that says, manifest yourself to me, let me see you knowably? And how, if he had already been seen by him face to face, as one might imagine, does the Lord go on to say to him, You shall not be able to see my face; for no man shall see my face and live? Let him who will say why — for not even once does the word testify that the Lord was seen by him, as it has been observed to say of the patriarchs. From all this it is quite plain that, though the Lord spoke with him face to face, nevertheless he spoke with him through the cloud — for the scripture establishes this in advance, saying: the pillar of cloud came down and stood at the doors of the tent, and he spoke to Moses. Through the cloud, then, he spoke; but he was not seen by him as by Abraham or Isaac or Jacob: for to them he is recorded to have been seen nakedly and distinctly, without any form34; but to this man through the aforesaid form and the cloud — which the word also names the glory of the Lord, saying: And while Moses was speaking to the whole congregation of the sons of Israel, they turned toward the wilderness, and behold, the glory of the Lord was seen in a cloud, and the Lord spoke to Moses [Exod 16:10]. And again: Moses went up into the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain; and the glory of the Lord came down upon the mountain, and the cloud covered it six days; and the Lord called Moses on the seventh day out of the midst of the cloud. And the appearance of the glory of the Lord was as flaming fire upon the brow of the mountain [Exod 24:15–17]. Plainly, then, what Moses beheld is said to be not the Lord himself but a form of the Lord — cloud and fire, which the word also names the glory of the Lord. He saw, then, the form of the Lord and his glory, but in no way the Lord himself; and he heard the Word of the Lord himself speaking — yet speaking through the cloud. Wherefore it is said, and the Lord spoke to Moses face to face; but that he was also seen face to face has nowhere been kept on record — for Moses asks for this as a thing not yet come to pass: manifest yourself to me, let me see you knowably. And in another place the word teaches that God spoke to him mouth [to mouth], yet correspondingly was not seen, but [appeared] in a form, and through his glory already described. It says: And the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud and stood at the door of the tent of witness; and Aaron and Miriam were called, and they both went out. And he said to them: Hear now my words. If there be a prophet of you for the Lord, I will be known to him in a vision, and in sleep I will speak to him. Not so my attendant Moses: he is faithful in all my house. Mouth to mouth I will speak to him, in a form, and not through riddles; and he saw the glory of the Lord. And why did you not fear to speak against my attendant Moses? [Num 12:5–8]. He saw, then, the glory of the Lord, who dealt with him in a form; and he heard him speaking mouth to mouth; yet he had not yet seen the Lord himself as the fathers had. Nor is it any wonder that God is recorded speaking to Moses mouth to mouth, seeing that Moses teaches in Deuteronomy that he spoke to the whole people face to face, saying: Not with your fathers did the Lord make this covenant, but with you: you yourselves are all here alive today. Face to face the Lord spoke to you on the mountain, out of the midst of the fire [Deut 5:3–4]. Only observe: though he dealt in this manner with Moses and with the whole people, it is said that he spoke with them mouth to mouth and face to face; not that he was seen by them, as by the fathers, without the fire or the cloud — for to those men the Lord is recorded to have been seen nakedly, without the covering of cloud or fire. It is of the perfect, then, whose understanding has been purified to the summit, that seeing God consists35 — as our Savior and Lord also teaches: Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God [Matt 5:8]. Wherefore also, as God of such men, the Lord proclaims himself, saying to Moses: Thus shall you say to the sons of Israel: The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is my everlasting name, and a memorial unto generations of generations [Exod 3:15].
Being zealous, then, for the greater gifts, and reaching after an advancement like theirs, Moses petitions the Lord, saying: Manifest yourself to me — let me see you knowably. For he formed an impression36, as the God-Word gave him oracles, of his greatness and height and his ineffable, unattainable transcendence; but he saw that the visions made toward him came through ministering angels. Therefore he entreats him to manifest himself more distinctly and more purely — no longer through coverings nor by other servants, but nakedly, and nearly as to Abraham and his line, without the form of fire and cloud. This, at least, the phrase seems to me to signify: Manifest yourself to me, let me see you knowably. And in the same spirit, having heard the Lord say to him, Behold, my angel shall go before your face, he respectfully declines it, reaching for the greater, and says: If you yourself do not go with us, do not bring me up from here. And when the Lord nodded assent to the petition and said, This word also which you have spoken, I will do, Moses — perceiving how ready the divine munificence was, the benefaction outrunning those who reach for great things — then made himself small, and reckoning himself not yet worthy of the greater, puts forward another request, lesser by comparison with the first, saying: Show me your glory. And the Lord, fulfilling his word: I will pass by before you first37 in my glory, and I will call on the name of the Lord before you, and the rest — teaching that greater than all the vision he had beheld before is the knowledge of the Father and God of all, which he promises to deliver to him: saying of himself, I will pass by before you in my glory, and of the initiation into the Father38, and I will call on the name of the Lord. On the name of what "Lord" — he himself being the Lord indicated by the tetragram — unless it is the Father he promises to invoke? And truly, unless the Word of God should first pass through39 a man, and unless he himself should call upon the Father, there is no other way to receive the knowledge of the Father of all — since no one knows the Father except the Son, and he to whom the Son may reveal him [Matt 11:27]. He, then, is the door, and he is the way, through whom alone it is possible to see the cause of all things, beyond and above all — the Father himself. For even though the divine Word, like a forerunner of himself40, comes to dwell beforehand in the souls of the blessed, sharing his own glory with them, yet he does not stand to the end taking the sovereignty upon himself: having prepared and made ready the dwelling in advance, he withdraws, and hands over the kingdom to God the Father. And this he himself confesses, saying: I will pass by before you first in my glory, and I will call on the name of the Lord. Now, then, he promises in word to do this; and next he brings the deed as well, where it is said: And the Lord came down in a cloud, and stood by him there, and called on the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed before his face and called: LORD, LORD God, compassionate and merciful, long-suffering and abundant in mercy and true... For these things he himself says — the Lord indicated by the tetragram — having come down in the cloud and stood by Moses; who, according to the promise he had made, passing before his face, invokes his own Lord and Father, the one who truly is LORD, LORD — carried twice in the tetragram — saying: LORD, LORD God, compassionate and merciful, and the rest. And if anyone, doing violence to the text, should claim that not the Lord but Moses spoke these words, let him take firm assurance from Moses' own voice confessing that the phrases set out belong to the Lord: for praying in another place he says, And now let your strength be exalted, Lord, according as you spoke, saying: The Lord is long-suffering and abundant in mercy and true, taking away lawlessnesses and unrighteousnesses and sins; and he will by no means clear the guilty, repaying the sins of fathers upon children unto the third and fourth generation [Num 14:17–18]. Most vividly and most plainly, then, by these words the Lord himself is shown to have spoken the phrases set out above, invoking as the greater Lord the one who is truly Lord — plainly, his own Father. Or, if one remains hard to persuade on this, let him say what other exposition he is able to lay upon the passage — while preserving these facts: that the one giving the oracles is no angel, but the very Lord indicated by the tetragram, who is recorded to have spoken with Moses face to face; the very one whom Moses petitions, begging off the guardianship of angels, saying: If you yourself do not go with us, do not bring me up from here [Exod 33:15]. It is impossible to refer all this to any other than solely the God-Word who was in the beginning with God; who, to Moses in his longing for great things, holds out the knowledge of the Greater — training him41 to know the only true God, and the God-Word whom he sent, himself being also, in the second place after the Father, both Lord and God. And this is the first and most necessary benefit he furnishes him: that he might never, on account of the surpassing glory of the things beheld, mistake his conceptions about the God of all for the Word who was giving him oracles; he teaches him, therefore, to regard as first and only true God the one whom he himself invoked, saying: LORD, LORD God, compassionate and merciful, long-suffering and abundant in mercy and true. And attend carefully to that word true, spoken so nearly like the Savior's own words in the Gospels: that they may know you, the only true God [John 17:3]. These things the whole people could not have contained — to whom, as to a people under first instruction, it was said by the one giving the oracles: I AM, and there is none besides me [Deut 32:39]; for they still needed the elementary introduction concerning the monarchy of God, being not yet able to articulate the doctrines concerning Father and Son, as men lately withdrawn from the polytheist error of the Egyptians. And I AM, and there is none besides me may well be spoken from the person of the God-Word, just like: I and the Father are one, and, I am in the Father and the Father in me [John 10:30; 14:10]. Just as, then, he who has seen him has seen the Father — according to, he who has seen me has seen the Father who sent me [John 14:9] — in the same manner he who heard him heard the Father in him, saying, I AM, and there is none besides me.
These things we have said, in matters of such magnitude, wishing to establish that beyond dispute it was neither the God of all nor any angelic power that gave the oracles to Moses, but the divine Word himself — whom we have believed with exactness to be, after the Father and Lord of all, second Lord and God of all things; as indeed the evangelist John instructs us more plainly, saying: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God [John 1:1]. And it would take much leisure — not the present occasion — to clarify what the place might be, and the rock, of which the Lord said, Behold, a place by me, and you shall stand upon the rock. But the apostle has disclosed the rock, saying: and the rock was Christ [1 Cor 10:4]. And the place, I take it, being no other than the rock, is the same as that which met Jacob, where it is written: And Jacob went out from the Well of the Oath and journeyed to Haran; and he met a place [Gen 28:10–11] — where, having seen in the vision the ladder and the Lord fixed upon it, on waking he says: the Lord is in this place; and again he said: How fearful is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this the gate of heaven. And further: what the face of the God-Word is, which Moses — the law, being human and rather corporeal42 — cannot behold; and what his back parts are, which alone the typical law, symbolic43 of the intelligibles, was able to contain; and how it is said, I will cover you with my hand — a veil and covering being laid upon the law, so that on account of this veil it could see the things behind, but no longer the things leading and surpassing — he who cares for the search of these things, attending to them privately at the proper season, will find out.
Section 13 — Chapter 13 (from Numbers, Balaam's third prophecy)
A man shall come forth from his seed, and shall be lord of many nations; and the kingdom of Gog shall be exalted, and his kingdom shall be increased. God led him out of Egypt; as the glory of a unicorn44 is he to him. He shall devour the nations of his enemies, and suck the marrow of their fatness, and with his darts shoot down the enemy. Lying down he rested as a lion and as a whelp — who shall raise him up? Those who bless you are blessed, and those who curse you are cursed [Num 24:7–9].
The Christ is the one born of the seed of Israel according to flesh, and made lord of many nations: for what nation has there been that has not known servitude under him, now that the word of his disciples has gone out into all the earth, and their sayings to the ends45 of the world? Among very many even of the barbarians themselves one may see multitudes who through faith in him have come to the knowledge of the one God, and for piety toward him have endured punishments of every kind, even unto death. This prophecy also, then, is plainly shown to have its fulfillment in our Savior — or let someone come forward and show to whom else it might be referred. On our reading it is evident how the intelligible kingdom and dominion of our Savior also increases day by day among the souls that have received his word. And the kingdom of Gog was exalted at his coming — which some have taken to be the empire of the Romans, while others have understood it figuratively of the heavenly citizenship according to the gospel and the contemplation of the intelligible doctrines, "Gog" being interpreted housetops46. Moreover, God led him out of Egypt: literally, when Joseph, receiving the oracle, took Mary together with the child Jesus out of Egypt and returned to the land of Israel — fulfilling both the present prophecy and the one in Hosea, according to the Hebrew and Aquila's translation, which says, Out of Egypt I called my son [Hos 11:1]; and according to the deeper sense, when the Father, taking him up from the intelligible Egypt and the regions here below, led him to the heavens. And the so-called glory of unicorns47 in the Savior intimates the deity in him, of the Father's sole sovereignty. After this it is said, he shall devour the nations of his enemies: for all the nations that have come under his teaching — being formerly the portion of his enemies — after faith in him he made ready and fit, as it were, for his own eating: refining and tracing out48 their fatness — that is, all the material and earthy grown into their nature — and working nourishing fruits in them by his own husbandry. And these things he wrought with intelligible and rational darts, having shot down the ancient ruler of the nations, his enemy — that is, the devil. As for the words from lying down he rested as a lion, they are spoken almost in the very words used by Jacob in the prophecies concerning Judah; and having set out what sense they carry, so far as occurred to us, we shall not repeat ourselves. And it is plain how we who bless the Christ have been blessed by God; for though they abominate us, as the Egyptians did the ancient people of God, yet in us too is fulfilled: the more they humbled them, so much the more they multiplied, and grew exceedingly strong [Exod 1:12]. And it is clear in what manner those who cursed him from the beginning — with the cry, Crucify, crucify him — received the curse; for the cross was of the curse, according to: Cursed is everyone who hangs upon a tree [Deut 21:23, as at Gal 3:13]. But he who endured their curse has been highly exalted by the Father; while they, cursed by God himself, have received a destruction abiding unto the age — which, should one go through it with exactness, he will behold therein the greatness of the power of God, pursuing even now those once cursed by him. So much for those who bless you are blessed, and those who curse you are cursed.
Section 14 — Chapter 14 (Balaam's fourth prophecy): the star out of Jacob
A star shall rise out of Jacob, and a man shall stand up out of Israel, and shall crush the princes of Moab, and plunder all the sons of Seth [Num 24:17]. The Word of God, having emptied himself and taken the form of a slave, and being found in fashion as a man [Phil 2:7], rose — no small star — not upon Jacob but out of Jacob: for beginning from the bodily people of the circumcision, he shone forth upon all the nations; and removing from them, he carried through no small wars, bringing down the opposing powers and the spiritual forces of wickedness [Eph 6:12]; and having overcome them, he made plunder of them for his own inheritance, taking back all the nations that formerly lay under them — concerning which the Father made him the promise, saying: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession [Ps 2:8].
Section 15 — Chapter 15 (from Deuteronomy): the prophet like Moses
Moses is the speaker: A prophet from among your brothers, like me, shall the Lord your God raise up for you; him shall you hear — according to all that you asked from the Lord your God in Horeb on the day of the assembly, saying: We will not again hear the voice of the Lord our God, and this great fire we will see no more, lest we die. And the Lord said to me: Rightly have they spoken all things. A prophet I will raise up for them from the midst of their brothers, like you; and I will put my word in his mouth, and he shall speak to them according to whatever I command him. And the man who will not hear whatever the prophet shall speak in my name — I will exact vengeance from him [Deut 18:15–19]. And whom could one show to have been raised up out of Israel as a prophet like Moses — that is, a lawgiver for the race of men — but Jesus our Savior and Lord alone, who has been manifested to all the nations as lawgiver of the new covenant of the life according to the gospel? — as the prophetic prayer in the Psalm says: Appoint, O Lord, a lawgiver over them; let the nations know that they are men [Ps 9:20 LXX]. He also ransomed from the intelligible Egypt, and the brick-making in it, and the bitter slavery under the intelligible Pharaoh, those who through him have come to the God of all; and, simply, all the things recorded as done bodily by Moses, our Savior and Lord accomplished according to the spiritual law. So then, he has come — the prophet still even now famous among both Samaritans and Jews, whom Moses foretold, concerning whom God testified beforehand: and the man who will not hear all that the prophet shall speak in my name, I will exact vengeance from him. Vengeance, indeed, has been exacted — the blood of all, from Abel to Zechariah who was murdered between the temple and the altar — from the generation that conspired against the Savior, and above all from those who dared to let fly against him the cry Crucify, crucify him; away with such a one from the earth; his blood be upon us and upon our children — which came to pass forthwith, God, as he foretold, avenging the blood of the Christ upon those very men and upon their children; justice pursuing them so closely that from that time to this day the whole nation has been utterly unable to lift its head — another prophecy also being fulfilled, that of Amos, which says: The house of Israel has fallen; it shall no more rise up [Amos 5:1–2]; which the apostle also, foreseeing in the spirit, cried out, saying: But the wrath has come upon them to the uttermost [1 Thess 2:16].
Section 16 — Chapter 16 (from the Song of Moses): "Let all the angels of God worship him"
Rejoice, you heavens, together with him, and let all the angels of God worship him; rejoice, you nations, with his people, and let all the sons of God be strong in him [Deut 32:43 LXX]. And to whom else would the divine Spirit command his angels to bow in worship than to the Christ? — at whose coming the nations plainly rejoiced together with his people, the choir of the righteous patriarchs and prophets. Concerning which nations again, in the same Song, God says, directing his words as against another people: They have provoked me to jealousy with what is no god; they have angered me with their idols: and I will provoke them to jealousy with what is no nation; with a nation void of understanding I will anger them [Deut 32:21]. And it is quite plain that after their casting-away God chose the foolish things of the world, that he might shame the wise among them; and the weak things of the world he chose, and the base things, and the things despised, and the things that are not, that he might bring to nothing the things that formerly were among them [1 Cor 1:27–28]: because, having from the very times of Moses served idols, angering God and provoking him to jealousy, when his Christ came they did not receive him. But the nations, having through him come to know the Father and God of all, shall rejoice — according to the prophecy in hand — together with his people of the saints; and all the sons of God strengthened49 the Christ: both those who beforehand prophesied the things concerning him, and all who after his coming, having received the spirit of adoption, proclaimed him to the whole inhabited world. So much, then, from the Pentateuch; let us pass on to the scriptures that follow.
Section 17 — Chapter 17 (from the book of Joshua): the Commander-in-chief at Jericho
And it came to pass, while Joshua was at Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and saw a man standing over against him, with his sword drawn in his hand. And Joshua approached and said: Are you ours, or of our adversaries? And he said to him: I am Commander-in-chief of the host of the Lord; now have I come. And Joshua fell on his face upon the earth, and said to him: Master, what do you command your servant? And the Commander-in-chief of the Lord said to Joshua: Loose the sandal from your feet, for the place on which you stand is a holy place [Josh 5:13–15]. And who else could the Commander-in-chief of the host of the Lord be, but the Christ of God, ruler of all God's holy and spiritual army? And observe whether the very one who gave oracles to Moses through the angel on the mountain is not disclosed by the words spoken to Joshua: for what is said to this man now was said likewise to Moses, when he was beginning his contemplation50, by the Lord through the angel: loose the sandal from your feet, and the rest. The Christ of God, being one of many names51, is here styled Commander-in-chief of the host of the Lord; as in Isaiah, Angel of Great Counsel — in the passage: ...and they shall wish they had been burned with fire: for a child is born to us, a son is also given to us, whose government is upon his shoulder; and his name is called Angel of Great Counsel [Isa 9:5 LXX]. And in Malachi you would find him named angel of the covenant, where it is said: And suddenly the Lord whom you seek shall come into his temple, and the angel of the covenant, whom you desire [Mal 3:1].
Section 18 — Chapter 18 (from 1 Kingdoms, the prayer of Hannah)
The Lord has gone up to the heavens, and has thundered: he shall judge the ends of the earth, and gives strength to our kings, and shall exalt the horn of his anointed [1 Kgdms 2:10 LXX]. The Lord who came down from the heavens, the Word of God, himself has gone up again to the heavens; and having gone up, he thundered by his own divine power the proclamation of the gospel, so that it became audible in the whole world. And he shall judge the ends of the earth, and those who dwell even at them, as having received all judgment from the Father. And he gave strength to his own disciples, the apostles and prophets — but our kings — and exalted the horn of his anointed: whether of the people, so named by participation in the Anointed; or of the humanity he assumed, whose horn was the deity, exalted according to the holy apostle52. And in the eighty-eighth Psalm God says plainly something close to what stands here, concerning the Christ: And in my name shall his horn be exalted [Ps 88:24 LXX].
Section 19 — Chapter 19: The faithful priest promised to Eli
And a man of God came to Eli and said: Thus says the LORD, LORD... [1 Kgdms 2:27]; and in what follows: And I will raise up for myself a faithful priest, who shall do all the things in my heart and in my soul; and I will build him a faithful house, and he shall go about before my anointed all the days. And it shall be that everyone left over in the house shall come to bow before him for an obol of silver and for one loaf, saying: Cast me upon one of your priesthoods, to eat bread [1 Kgdms 2:35–36]. No other than solely the priest of God Most High after the order of Melchizedek — Jesus Christ our Savior, whom, according to the apostle, we have as a great high priest, having passed through the heavens [Heb 4:14] — has done all the things in the heart of the Father, having become obedient to him even unto death [Phil 2:8]; whence the Father, having raised him, built him a faithful house — the church, composed of rational and living and faithful stones in truth. And to him come, bowing in worship, those who have believed in him — he turning away neither the obol of silver (neither, bodily, the widow contributing her farthing53 toward the relief of the needy; nor, in the deeper sense, the soul stayed upon faith alone), nor54 whatever each contributes, according to capacity, of her intelligible possessions toward the building-up and profit of the rest. For he chose the foolish things of the world, and the weak and poor, and the despised, and the things that are not [1 Cor 1:27–28], not disdaining even such souls as these; but, as the man-loving Word of God, receiving even these for their eagerness — souls whom by divine judgment he ranks according to worth in the different abodes55 of his priesthoods, counting them worthy of the bread, from himself, of everlasting life. And the words he shall go about before my anointed all the days are spoken of the saints in the church — they too being styled "anointed ones," according to: Touch not my anointed ones [Ps 104:15 LXX]. For to these it was said by the Savior in the Gospel as well: Behold, I am with you all the days, even to the consummation of the age [Matt 28:20]. The passage needs fuller clarification, but we shall content ourselves with what has been said as briefly as possible.
Section 20 — Chapter 20 (from 2 Kingdoms): Nathan's oracle — the seed and the everlasting throne
The Lord, through Nathan, says to David — after much else — this also: And it shall be, when your days are fulfilled and you sleep with your fathers, that I will raise up your seed after you, who shall be from your belly, and I will prepare his kingdom. He shall build me a house for my name, and I will set up his throne even unto the age. I will be to him for a father, and he shall be to me for a son. And if his iniquity come, I will chasten him with a rod of men and with touches of the sons of men; but my mercy I will not remove from them, as I removed it from those whom I removed from before my face. And his house shall be made faithful, and his kingdom unto the age before me; and his throne shall be set up unto the age [2 Kgdms 7:12–16].
Things closely resembling these are said also in the eighty-eighth Psalm. And it would be worth the Jews' perplexity here, on what ground they will claim God said this either of David or of Solomon who reigned from him — of whom, likely enough, they will suppose the prophecy promises to appoint a firstborn son, since in the Psalm it says: He shall call upon me: You are my Father, my God, and the upholder of my salvation; and I will make him firstborn, high above the kings of the earth [Ps 88:27–28 LXX], and in the chapter in hand: I will be to him for a father, and he shall be to me for a son. Yet one might say David differed in nothing from the rest of the prophets — David, who needed even to make confession over the matter of Uriah, saying: Against you only have I sinned, and done the evil before you; or Solomon — whom the bare narrative of scripture teaches to have turned aside from God and been moved toward idols through the lust of women. And how did the kingdom of David or of Solomon stand unto the age before God, and the throne stand set up unto the age, according to the prophecy speaking here — and according to the Psalm, which runs somewhat thus: I swore to David my servant: unto the age will I prepare your seed, and build up your throne to generation and generation; and after other things: Once have I sworn by my holiness: I will not lie to David; his seed shall abide unto the age, and his throne as the sun before me [Ps 88:4–5, 36–37]; and again: And I will establish his seed unto the age of the age, and his throne as the days of heaven [Ps 88:30]. The like you would find in Jeremiah also, where it is said: Thus says the Lord: There shall not be cut off from David a man sitting upon the throne of the house of Israel; and from the priests and the Levites there shall not be cut off a man from before my face, offering whole burnt-offerings and sacrificing sacrifice and making incense all the days [Jer 33:17–18].
If one examines these things against the present condition of the Jews, and against their own histories — from the reigns of Hezekiah56 and Jeconiah, under whom the kingdom of the Jews descending from David was circumscribed at the season of the captivity into Babylon, after which they were never again ruled or reigned over by those deriving their line from David — [it follows] that what was spoken in no way fits either David or Solomon; else of necessity God's prediction, made with oaths, would be convicted of falsehood — which is not lawful even to think. But if we refer the seed of David here spoken of to the Christ born of him according to flesh, it is plain how this seed — that is, the Christ — abides unto the age, and how his throne and his spiritual kingdom stand unto the age before the Father, set upright by him and built up, generation by generation, in the souls of those who believe on him. Of this seed of David, as we have rendered it, the throne shall abide as the sun of righteousness before the Father, and as the days of heaven; wherefore to him it is said by the Holy Spirit in another Psalm: Your throne, O God, is unto the age of the age; a scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom. You loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; therefore God, your God, anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows [Ps 44:7–8 LXX]. And the Christ also built the church as a house for the Father, out of living and intelligent stones, holy and virtuous souls — raising a temple far better than, and surpassing, the temporary building of Solomon which exists no more. And the apostle bears witness that the utterance I will be to him for a father, and he shall be to me for a son belongs to him, having taken it from this place in the epistle to the Hebrews, where he says: For to which of the angels did he ever say: You are my son, today I have begotten you? And again: I will be to him for a father, and he shall be to me for a son [Heb 1:5].
The words from and if his iniquity come, and I will chasten him with a rod of men are spoken of the people that has believed on Christ — since his church is styled the body of Christ, according to the apostle. And that the matters of this visitation are spoken of those who have believed on him, attend carefully to the plural: but my mercy I will not remove from THEM. Plainly in the Psalm too the like is said of the sons of the one prophesied: If his sons forsake my law and walk not in my judgments; if they profane my statutes and keep not my commandments, I will visit their lawlessnesses with a rod, and their unrighteousnesses with scourges; but my mercy I will not scatter from them [Ps 88:31–34]. And observe how the word named the persecutions that come in their seasons "rods of men" and "touches of the sons of men." Yet many are God's encouragements, and the consolations through the scriptures, charging us not to lose heart at the persecutions wrought against us season by season: for as he foretold that he would visit the people of Christ with the rod when they sinned, so too he promised beforehand not to remove his mercy, saying: my mercy I will not remove from them, as I removed it from those whom I removed. And one will inquire upon whom, before the people from the nations, God's mercy rested — the mercy which you57 removed from them utterly; the like of which he promises to do toward the people of the Christ.
Section 21 — Chapter 21 (from 2 Kingdoms): David's song
And David spoke to the Lord the words of this song [2 Kgdms 22:1]. Then, in what follows: And he bowed the heavens and came down, and thick darkness was under his feet [22:10]. And again after this: Deliver me from the contradictions of the people; you shall set me at the head of nations: a people whom I knew not served me; at the hearing of the ear it obeyed me. The strange sons lied to me; the strange sons shall be cast off, and shall stumble out of their enclosures [22:44–46]. These things are said, in almost the same words, in the seventeenth Psalm as well, and would be more seasonably examined when we come to gather the extracts from the Psalms. For now we note only this much: that he bowed the heavens and came down would be understood of the descent of the Christ from the heavens; that deliver me from the contradiction of the people is spoken from his person concerning those of the circumcision who did not believe on him — of whom he says in Isaiah too: All the day long I stretched out my hands to a disobedient and contradicting people [Isa 65:2]; that you shall set me at the head of nations, and a people whom I knew not served me; at the hearing of the ear it obeyed me, is prophesied of the church from the nations; and that the strange sons lied to me concerns the godless heresies, who have woven falsehoods about the Savior himself and the God of all — whom the word declares shall be cast off, having stumbled out of their own enclosures — that is, fallen away from58 their insidious and hidden false opinions.
Section 22 — Chapter 22 (from 3 Kingdoms): "Will God indeed dwell with men on the earth?"
And now, Lord God of Israel, let your word be confirmed which you spoke to your servant David my father [3 Kgdms 8:26]: that God will truly dwell with men upon the earth — if the heaven of heaven will not suffice you [2 Chr 6:17–18]. Things closely resembling these are said by Solomon also in the second book of Chronicles59, in his prayer to God. Plainly, then, here too it is prophesied that God will dwell with men upon the earth; and this very thing has received its fulfillment in our time, at the coming to pass of the advent of Christ, in which the God-Word, having become man, lived among the race of men.
Section 23 — Chapter 23 (from 1 Chronicles)
The Lord, through Nathan, says to David, among other things, this also: And it shall be, when your days are fulfilled and you sleep with your fathers, that I will raise up your seed after you, who shall be from your belly, and I will prepare your kingdom. He shall build me a house, and I will set up his throne; I will be to him for a father, and he shall be to me for a son; and my mercy I will not remove from him, as I removed it from those before you; and I will make him faithful in my house and in his kingdom unto the age; and his throne shall be set up unto the age [1 Chr 17:11–14]. Having noted these words, which are like those set out above from the second book of Kingdoms, and since the variation between them is not great, we shall be content with what was said upon those.
Section 24 — Chapter 24 (from 2 Chronicles)
And now, Lord God of Israel, let your word be confirmed which you spoke to your servant David: that God will truly dwell with men upon the earth — if the heaven of heaven will not suffice you [2 Chr 6:17–18]. Having spoken to this once, when we set out the passage from the third book of Kingdoms, we shall not repeat it now.
Section 25 — Chapter 25 (from Esdras): Zerubbabel's praise of Truth
Zerubbabel, in his public speech, says this: Men! Are not women strong? Great is the earth, and high is the heaven, and swift in its course the sun, for it turns in the circle of heaven and runs back again to its own place in one day. Is he not great who makes these things? And the truth is great, and stronger than all things. All the earth calls upon the truth, and the heaven blesses her; and all the works shake and tremble; and with him60 there is not one unjust thing. Unjust is wine, unjust is the king, unjust are women, unjust are the sons of men, and unjust are all their works — all such things — and there is no truth in them, and in their injustice they shall perish. But the truth abides, and is strong unto the age, and lives and prevails unto the age of the age; and with her there is no accepting of persons, nor making of differences; but she does the things that are just, and abstains from61 all that is unjust and wicked; and all approve her works62, and in her judgment there is nothing unjust. And hers is the strength, and the kingship, and the authority, and the majesty of all the ages. Blessed be the God of truth! [1 Esdras 4:32–40].
Since our Savior and Lord, being the Word of God, is recorded to have said, I am the truth [John 14:6], we have with good reason set out the foregoing, disclosing as it does concerning the Truth that she possesses a certain hypostasis of her own, beside the Father: for the truth abides, it says, and is strong unto the age, and lives and prevails; and with her there is no accepting of persons, and the rest; to which it adds — concerning the Father, who is God even of the God-Word himself and of the Truth — Blessed be the God of truth; to which we too shall add the Amen. And these things, then, from the writing of Esdras. From Esther we have found nothing bearing on the matter in hand. And now, after the extracts from the historical scriptures, let us pass to the books in verse63, since in their times they precede the remaining prophecies; and of these let us look first at the extracts from the Psalms.
END OF BOOK 1 — 25 sections complete. Book 2 (the Psalms) follows in the Greek source at
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"stewards" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"corporeal" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"mountain" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"Lord" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"held" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"you" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"Joshua" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"Joshua-Jesus" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"manner" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"knowably" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"form" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"consists" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"impression" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"first" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"Father" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"through" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"himself" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"him" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"corporeal" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"symbolic" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"unicorn" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"ends" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"housetops" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"unicorns" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"out" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"strengthened" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"contemplation" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"names" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"apostle" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"farthing" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"nor" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"abodes" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"Hezekiah" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"you" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"from" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"Chronicles" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"him" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"from" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"works" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩
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"verse" — rendering uncertain; a specialist should check this against the original. ↩