Irenaeus of Lyons: Against Heresies
The Plainspoken Classics - Scriptorium Press (First Edition, 2026)
An original AI translation made directly from the source language.
https://openscriptorium.com


======== Book I — Preface ========

PREFACE. Inasmuch as certain men, in refutation of the truth, bring in false words and endless genealogies, which — as the Apostle says — promote controversies rather than the edification of God that is in faith; and by a plausibility deceitfully contrived they lead astray the minds of the less experienced and take them captive, falsifying the words of the Lord and making themselves evil interpreters of things well said; and overturn many, drawing them in under the pretext of a 'knowledge' of him who established and ordered this universe — as though they had something loftier and greater to reveal than he who made heaven and earth and all things in them — persuasively they entice the more simple by their skill in words toward a manner of inquiry, but wickedly destroy them, in that they make their own opinion blasphemous and impious toward the Maker, being unable to distinguish the false from the true.
Error, indeed, is never displayed in its own naked form, lest, once exposed, it be at once seized; but craftily arraying itself in an attractive dress, it contrives, absurd as it is even to say, to appear — through outward semblance — more true than the truth itself to the more simple-minded, who are thus deceived. Of this very thing it has been well said by one better than ourselves: that only a skilled person can judge a precious stone and expose the fraud practiced in it; for when copper is mixed with silver, who, if untrained, could readily detect it? So too, lest by our own negligence some be carried off like sheep by wolves, failing to recognize them because of the sheep's clothing they wear outwardly — men against whom the Lord warned us, who speak things resembling ours but mean things unlike them, and who are, as they themselves acknowledge, disciples of Valentinus — having met with some of them and grasped their teaching, I have set myself to disclose to you, my dearest friend, their most monstrous and deepest mysteries, which not everyone grasps, since not everyone has purified the mind; so that, knowing them, you may make them plain to all who are with you, and urge them to keep themselves from the depths of folly and of blasphemy against God. And to the extent our powers allow, we shall set forth concisely and clearly the doctrine of those who now teach otherwise — I mean the followers of Ptolemaeus, a flower, as it were, of the Valentinian school — and give others, according to our modest ability, the means to overturn it, by showing that what they teach has no stability and does not accord with the truth. We are neither practiced writers nor students of rhetorical art; but love compels us to make plain to you and to all with you what until now lay hidden, but by the grace of God has now come into the open. For nothing is covered that shall not be revealed, and nothing hidden that shall not be known. [A short stretch of the transmitted text is unreadable and is omitted rather than supplied by guess.] Not by persuasive artifice, then, which we do not possess, but simply, truly, and without polish, you will receive what has been written to you in love, and will yourself increase it within you, being more capable than we, taking it as seed and starting-point from us; and in the breadth of your understanding you will make much fruit grow from what we have said only in brief, and will powerfully press upon those with you the things we have set forth but weakly. And just as we labored, when you long ago sought to learn their teaching, not merely to make it known to you but also to give you the resources for exposing its falsity, so you in turn will render the same service effectively to others, according to the grace given you by the Lord, so that no one need any longer be pulled off course by their persuasion, which goes as follows.

======== Book I — Chapter 1 ========

NARRATIVE OF THE WHOLE ARGUMENT OF THE DISCIPLES OF VALENTINUS. 1. They say that there exists, in invisible and indescribable heights, a certain perfect Aeon who existed before all else. Him they call Proarche, and Propator, and Bythos; and they say he is invisible, and such that no thing can grasp him. Since he was grasped by none, and was invisible, eternal, and unbegotten, he remained in profound silence and quiet through immense ages. With him there also existed Ennoea, whom they also call Charis and Sige; and at length he willed to send forth from himself this Bythos as the beginning of all things — wishing this emission to go forth, as it were, as a seed — and he deposited it, as in a womb, in Sige who was with him. She received this seed, and having become pregnant, brought forth Nous, like and equal to him who had emitted him, and alone able to comprehend the Father's greatness. This Nous they also call the Only-begotten, and Father, and Beginning of all things. Together with him was emitted Aletheia (Truth), and this is the first and firstborn Pythagorean tetrad, which they also call the root of all things. For there is Bythos and Sige, then Nous and Aletheia. This Only-begotten, perceiving the purpose for which he had been brought forth, himself emitted Logos and Zoe (Word and Life), progenitor of every being that would follow in his train, and the source and pattern of the entire Pleroma. From Logos and Zoe, joined in marriage, sprang Anthropos and Ecclesia (Man and Church), and this makes up the firstborn Ogdoad, that deep-rooted foundation formed of Bythos, Nous, Logos, Anthropos in turn. Each of these pairs, they claim, is male-and-female at once, in this fashion: Only-begotten — namely Nous — is joined to Aletheia, that is Truth; Logos to Zoe, that is Life; Anthropos to Ecclesia.
These Aeons, brought forth as a tribute to the Father's honor, and desiring on their own account to add further glory to him out of what belonged to them, sent forth still more emissions in married pairs. Logos and Zoe, once Anthropos and Ecclesia had come forth, put out ten additional Aeons [the transmitted text of the names here is corrupt and partly illegible], ending in Macaria. These ten are said to have issued from Logos and Zoe. Anthropos himself, jointly with Ecclesia, likewise put forth twelve Aeons, bearing these names: Paracletus paired with Pistis, Patricos with Elpis, Metricos with Agape, Ainos with Synesis, Ecclesiasticos with Macariotes, Theletos with Sophia.
These are the thirty Aeons of their error, which are kept secret and not acknowledged. This invisible and spiritual Pleroma, according to them, falls into three groupings — an Ogdoad, a Decad, and a Duodecad, taken together. On that account, they claim, the Savior (for they will not call him Lord) revealed nothing of the mystery belonging to these Aeons throughout the thirty years he lived openly among men. And in their reading of the parable about laborers sent into the vineyard, they hold that these thirty Aeons are set forth quite openly: laborers are dispatched at the first hour, others at the third, others at the sixth, others at the ninth, others at the eleventh; sum those hours and the total comes to thirty, since one plus three plus six plus nine plus eleven equals thirty. Through these hours, then, they intend the Aeons to be signified; and they claim that these are the great and marvelous and hidden mysteries which they bring to fruit — and wherever they can adapt anything said in the Scriptures and make it resemble their invention, they do so.

======== Book I — Chapter 2 ========

Their Propator, they say, is known only to him who was born from him, the Only-begotten, that is, Nous; to all the rest he is invisible and incomprehensible. Nous alone, according to them, took delight in beholding the Father and his immense greatness, and rejoiced in sharing the Father's greatness — how vast and how mighty he was, and how he existed without beginning, and was ungraspable, and incomprehensible to sight. [A short stretch of the underlying text is corrupted here and is left untranslated rather than guessed at.] But Sige restrained him, by the will of the Father, because the Father wished to bring all the other Aeons likewise into an understanding and longing to seek after him. And all the rest of the Aeons, in a kind of hushed silence, likewise desired to see the one who had put forth their seed, and to contemplate the root that is without beginning.
But the last and youngest of the Duodecad that had been emitted from Anthropos and Ecclesia, the Aeon Sophia, rushed forward with great eagerness, and suffered a passion apart from the embrace of her consort Theletos. This passion had its origin among those Aeons associated with Nous and Aletheia, but overflowed into this Aeon, Sophia, and threw her into disorder — under the pretext of love, but in truth through rashness, because she had not, like Nous, entered into communion with the perfect Father. The passion was this: a longing to search out the Father, for she wished, as they say, to comprehend his greatness. And when she could not, because she was attempting a thing impossible, she was thrown into great anguish because of the vastness of the depth, and because the Father is beyond investigation, and because of the love she bore toward him; for as she stretched herself ever forward toward him, she would in the end, they say, have been absorbed by his sweetness and dissolved into the universal substance, had she not met with the power that strengthens and preserves all things outside the ineffable greatness. This power they call Horos (Limit); by whom she was held back and strengthened, and, scarcely returning into herself, and now convinced that the Father is incomprehensible, she laid aside her original intent, together with the passion that had come upon her out of that stupefied amazement. Some of them relate this passion and return of Sophia after the manner of a myth: that having attempted a thing impossible and incomprehensible, she brought forth a shapeless substance, of the kind a female by nature would bring forth; and looking upon it, she was first seized with grief, on account of the incompleteness of what had been generated; then with fear, lest this very incompleteness should be the end of it; then with bewilderment and perplexity — that is, confusion — as she sought a way out and a means of hiding what had been born. Caught up in these passions, she underwent a turning, and attempted to return to the Father; and having ventured this for some time, she at last gave up and became a suppliant before the Father. And along with her the rest of the Aeons also made supplication, Nous above all. From this, they say, matter first took its beginning — out of ignorance, and grief, and fear, and bewilderment.
The Father then, over and above this, sent forth the aforesaid Horos through the Only-begotten, in his own image, without a consort, male-female. [The transmitted text here is corrupt for a few words and is left untranslated rather than supplied by conjecture.] This Horos they also call Stauros (Cross), and Lytrotes (Redeemer), and Carpistes (Emancipator), and Horothetes (Boundary-setter), and Metagogeus (Leader-back). By this Horos, they say, Sophia was purified and strengthened, and restored to her consort. For once her intention, together with the passion attached to it, had been separated from her, she herself remained within the Pleroma; but her longing, together with its passion, was set apart by Horos as a spiritual substance — a kind of natural impulse belonging to an Aeon, yet without form or shape, since it had grasped nothing. And for this reason they call its fruit weak and feminine. And after this had been separated outside the Pleroma of the Aeons, and her mother restored to her own conjugal union, the Only-begotten again put forth another pair, according to the providence of the Father — Christ and the Holy Spirit — by whom, they say, the Aeons were brought to completion. For Christ taught them the nature of conjugal union, and that, having come to know the comprehension of the Unbegotten, they were capable of it; and he also made known to them the knowledge of the Father — that he is beyond grasp and beyond comprehension, and can be neither seen nor heard except through the Only-begotten alone. And the cause of the eternal continuance of all these is the incomprehensibility of the Father, while the cause of their generation and shaping is the comprehensible nature of him who is the Son. Such, then, was the work that Christ, now emitted, wrought within them.
The Holy Spirit, in turn, taught them, all now made equal, to render thanks, and brought in true rest. And thus, they say, the Aeons, having become alike in form and in disposition, all became Nous and Logos, and all Anthropos and Christ; and the female Aeons likewise all became Aletheia, and Zoe, and Spirit, and Ecclesia. All things being thus made firm and brought to perfect rest, they say the Aeons, with great joy, sang hymns to the Propator, sharing in his great exultation. And out of gratitude for this benefit, with one will and mind, the whole Pleroma of the Aeons, with the consent of Christ and the Spirit, each Aeon contributing what was best and most flourishing within itself, brought these together fittingly and joined them diligently into one, and sent forth an offering — a most perfect adornment, in the honor and glory of Bythos, a star of the Pleroma, a perfect fruit — Jesus, who is also called Savior, and Christ, and Logos after his father's name, and 'All Things,' since he came from all. And as his attendants, in their honor, they say Angels of the same kind were emitted along with him.

======== Book I — Chapter 3 ========

This, then, is what they call the "business" and the suffering that occurred within their Pleroma among the Aeons, together with the emission of Christ and the Holy Spirit by the Father of all things; this is what they term the "filling-up" (Pleroma) — the ruin of one Aeon, and, as it were in a great quantity of matter, the calamity arising from the search for the Father, and the origin of Horos and of their Cross, and of the Redeemer, and of the first Christ together with the Holy Spirit, produced by the repentance of their Father; and the last generation of the Aeons; and the fashioning, put together out of a collection of all these things, of the second Christ, whom they call the Savior. They say that none of this was spoken of openly, since not everyone grasps their higher knowledge, but that it was shown mysteriously by the Savior, through parables, to those who are able to understand — in this way: the thirty Aeons are signified by the thirty years, as we said before, during which they say the Savior did nothing openly; and by the parable of the laborers in the vineyard. And they say that Paul very plainly names the Aeons again and again, and that he even preserves the six names of Horos together with their proper order, when he says: "unto all the generations of the age of ages." And they say that we ourselves, too, when we say in our thanksgivings, "unto the ages of ages," are unknowingly signifying those same Aeons — and that wherever "age" or "ages" is named, they want it referred to those Aeons of theirs.
They say that the emission of the Duodecad of Aeons is signified by the fact that the Lord, being twelve years old, held discussion among the doctors of the Law, and by his selecting of the apostles, since he picked out twelve apostles. And they say that the remaining eighteen Aeons are made manifest by the fact that, after his resurrection from the dead, he is said to have spent eighteen months in company with his disciples. Moreover, they say that the two letters standing before his name, iota and eta, signify the number eighteen and thus make the Aeons manifest. And in the same way they say that ten Aeons are signified by the letter iota, which likewise stands at the beginning of his name. And for this reason it endures, they say, until all things come to pass.
This suffering, undergone in relation to the twelfth Aeon, they say is signified by the defection of Judas, who ranked twelfth among the apostles, and by the fact that his passion fell within the twelfth month; for they maintain that his preaching lasted a single year following his baptism. They say it is also very plainly signified in the woman who suffered from the flow of blood: for she had suffered for twelve years, and was healed at the coming of the Lord, when she touched the fringe of his garment; and for this reason, they say, the Savior said, "Who touched me?" — teaching his disciples about the mystery that had occurred among the Aeons, and the healing of the Aeon that had suffered. For by that woman who had suffered for twelve years that power is signified, they say, in that it was extended and its substance flowed out into immensity, as they put it. And unless she had touched his garment — that is, the first Tetrad of Truth, which was made manifest through the fringe — the coming would have reached her whole substance. But it stopped and rested from its suffering through the power that had gone forth from the Son. And they hold that it is Horos who healed her and separated the suffering from her. They say this is manifested by the response, "Every male that opens the womb": for he who is all things opened the womb of the reflection of the Aeon that had suffered, and separated it outside the Pleroma — a thing they also term the second Ogdoad, a topic we will discuss below. And they say Paul plainly speaks of this when he states: "And Christ is all things, and in all." Elsewhere: "From him, and through him, and unto him are all things." And again: "In him the whole fullness of divinity makes its dwelling." And further: "that all things might be gathered together anew in Christ through God." This is how they interpret these and all similar sayings. Further, concerning their Horos — whom they also call by many names — they show that he has two activities: one that confirms and one that separates. And according to the one by which he confirms and establishes, he is called the Cross; but according to the one by which he divides and cuts apart, he is called Horos. And they say the Savior manifested these two activities in this way: first the confirming activity, in that he says, "Whoever does not take up his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple," and, again, "Take up your cross and follow after me"; and the dividing activity in his statement: "I have not come to bring peace, but rather a sword." And they say John showed this same thing when he said: "The winnowing-fan is in his hand to cleanse his threshing-floor, and he will gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire." For they interpret this winnowing-fan as the Cross, which consumes all material things just as fire consumes chaff, but which cleanses those who attain salvation, just as a winnowing-fan cleanses wheat. And they say that the apostle Paul himself likewise calls to mind this Cross, saying: "For the message of the cross is folly to those on the path to ruin, but to those being saved, it is God's power." And again: "But may it never happen to me to glory in anything except in the cross of Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world."
Such, then, are the things they say about their Pleroma, and about the shaping of the universe, since they are eager to fit what has been well said to what has been wickedly invented by themselves. And they attempt to produce demonstrations not only from the Gospel and Apostolic writings, twisting their interpretations and corrupting their expositions, but also from the Law and the Prophets, since many parables and allegories have been spoken there, and much can be drawn into ambiguity through interpretation; and by cunningly and readily adapting these to their own fabrication, they lead into captivity, away from the truth, those who do not firmly hold the faith they received — the faith preserved through the Law and the Prophets, and then, from that point, the one faith in the one God, the Father almighty, and in the one Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

======== Book I — Chapter 4 ========

The things they say occurred outside the Pleroma are as follows. They say that the Enthymesis of that higher Wisdom, whom they also call Achamoth, having been separated from the higher Pleroma along with her suffering, wasted away by necessity in the regions of shadow and emptiness: for she had been made outside the light and outside the Pleroma, shapeless and without form, like a miscarriage, because she had grasped nothing. And the higher Christ, taking pity on her, extended himself through the Cross and by his power gave her a form — but a form with respect to substance only, not with respect to true knowledge — and having done this he withdrew again, drawing back his power, and left her, so that, becoming aware of the suffering that had come upon her through her separation from the Pleroma, she might long for the things that are better, still retaining within herself a trace of imperishability that Christ and the Holy Spirit had implanted in her. On account of this she bears two names: Sophia, taken from her father (since her father is likewise named Sophia), and also Holy Spirit, drawn from the Spirit belonging to Christ. And having been given form and made capable of feeling, she was at once abandoned by the Word who had been invisibly with her — that is, by Christ — and she went out in search of that light which had left her, and she was unable to grasp it, because she was held back by Horos. And so Horos soon came to Achamoth — as the office of the anointed Jesus, so to speak — to her who was shapeless and without form, since she had grasped nothing, so that at least a substance might come to be in her, even if he bestowed on her no true knowledge (for this the Paraclete would accomplish, as we said above), restraining her so that she should not press forward any further, and saying to her "Iao" — whence, they say, the name Iao arose. And since she could not get past Horos, because she was gripped by suffering and had been left utterly alone outside, she succumbed to every part of that suffering in its manifold and varied forms; and she suffered grief, because she had not grasped what she sought; and fear, lest, just as the light had left her, so too life should leave her; and, in addition to these, bewilderment; and, over all, ignorance. And, unlike her mother, the first Sophia, an Aeon, she experienced in her sufferings not a change but rather a contrariety of feeling. And beyond these there befell her yet another affection: a turning toward him who had given her life.
They say that this collection was the substance of the matter out of which this world consists. For from her turning, they say, the Demiurge and the whole soul-nature received their origin; but from her fear and grief the rest of things took their beginning. For, they say, out of her tears arose the whole watery substance; out of her laughter, that which gives light; and out of her sorrow and dismay, the bodily elements composing the world. At certain moments, they say, she would weep and grieve, because she had been left alone in darkness and emptiness; and at times, coming to think of the light that had abandoned her, she would brighten and laugh; and at other times again she was afraid; and at other times she was struck with terror and fell into a kind of ecstasy. There is much theatrical invention here, and each of them imagines it a little differently, so that the substance is said to have come into being now one way, now another. And it seems fitting to me that these things are not meant to be taught openly to everyone, but only to those who are able to pay a great price for such mysteries. For they no longer speak in keeping with what our Lord said: "Freely you have received, freely give"; instead they hand out things set apart and strange, and lofty mysteries obtained by their dupes only through great labor. For who would not spend everything he has to learn that from her tears the springs and rivers and the whole moist substance of matter came into being; and from her laughter, light; and from her terror and instability, the corporeal elements of the world?
I too wish to contribute something to their fruitfulness. Since I observe that some waters are sweet, such as springs, rivers, and rain, and so on, while those in the sea are salty, I find it is not the case that all of it came forth from her tears, since tears are salty in quality. It is clear, then, that these salty waters come from her tears. But I suppose that she, being in agony and in great instability, also sweated. Hence, following their own line of argument, one ought to suppose that the springs and rivers, and whatever other fresh waters there are, took their origin from her sweat. For it is not credible that, tears being all of one quality, some waters should be salty and others fresh, the ones coming from tears and the others from sweat. And since there are also some waters in the world that are warm and bitter, you ought to understand — on their own reasoning — what she was doing, and from what member she emitted these. Fruits of this sort suit their argument well.
When, then, their Mother had passed through the whole of this suffering, and had scarcely been raised up out of it, she turned in supplication to that light which had abandoned her — that is, to Christ, they say — who, having returned into the Pleroma, was himself, it seems, reluctant to descend a second time; but he sent the Paraclete to her instead, that is, the Savior, the Father having granted him all power and delivered all things under his authority, and the Aeons likewise granting that in him all things should be created, visible and invisible, thrones, deities, dominions. And he was sent to her together with his angel-companions of the same age. And they say that Achamoth, filled with reverence for him, at first put on a veil out of respect; but afterward, when she saw him together with the whole fruit that accompanied him, she ran to him, gaining strength from the sight of him. And he gave her that formation which is according to true knowledge, and effected the healing of her sufferings, separating them from her — not as before, in the sense that they had already become manageable and possible to deal with — but setting them apart, mixing and consolidating them, and transferring them from being an incorporeal suffering into incorporeal matter; and thus he gave them a fitness and a nature so that they could pass into combinations and bodies, so that two substances should come to be — one bad, arising from the sufferings, and the other capable of turning back — and it was for this reason, they say, that the Savior fashioned things by his power. And they teach that Achamoth, now set free from suffering, conceived, out of joy at the sight of the lights that accompanied him, that is, of the angels who were with him, and, delighting in their presence, brought forth fruits after their image — a spiritual offspring, made in the likeness of the attendants of the Savior.

======== Book I — Chapter 5 ========

There subsist, then, according to them, these three things: one arising from her suffering, which is matter; another from her turning, which is soul-substance; and a third which she brought forth, which is spiritual — and thus she turned to the shaping of these into their proper forms. But she was unable to give shape to the spiritual, since it was of the same substance as herself; instead, she turned to the shaping of that which had come into being from her own turning, the substance of soul, and she also, drawing on the Savior, put forth teachings. And they say that first, out of the soul-substance, she formed God the Father, and the Savior, and the king of all things of the same substance as himself, that is, of the soul, whom they call the things on the left. For the things that came after him, they say, he formed while unknowingly moved by his mother. Hence they call him Metropator, and Apator, and Demiurge, and Father — for he is called the father of the things below him, but king of all things. For his mother, wishing, through him, to bring the Enthymesis to a shaping — or rather, to bring the Savior himself to expression through her — had learned from the Savior. And they say that she herself, after the likeness of the unseen Father, remained hidden from the Demiurge's knowledge. And they say this Demiurge is the father of the Only-begotten Son; and that the rest of the Aeons are the angels and archangels who were made by him.
They say that the Father and God of the things they call material, or "hylic," is the Fashioner. For by separating the two substances that had been confused, and by making corporeal things out of incorporeal ones, he fabricated the world, becoming the maker of things right and left, light and heavy, of what flies upward and what sinks downward. They say he also made seven heavens, and that above these heavens is the Demiurge. For this reason they call him the Hebdomad, while they call the mother Achamoth the Ogdoad, since she preserves the number of the firstborn and original Ogdoad of the Pleroma. The seven heavens they hold to be intellectual beings; they teach that these, together with the Demiurge himself, are angels, and that the Demiurge is an angel made in the likeness of God. Paradise, likewise, existing above the third heaven as a power, they call a fourth archangel, and they say Adam derived something from it while he dwelt there.
They say that the Demiurge supposed he had fashioned all these things entirely by himself, when in fact Achamoth had made them through him. For he made heaven without knowing what heaven was, and formed man without knowing man, and brought forth the earth without knowing the earth; in all things, they say, he was ignorant of the very forms of what he was making, and ignorant too of his own mother, imagining that nothing existed but himself. They say the cause of this activity on his part was his mother, who wished to bring him forth in this way — as the head and beginning of her own substance, yet as the lord of the whole work. This Mother they also call the Ogdoad, and Sophia, and Earth, and Jerusalem, and the Holy Spirit, and, using the masculine, the Lord. They say she occupies a middle place, being above the Demiurge, but below — or rather outside — the Pleroma, up to its very limit. They say that material substance is composed of three passions: fear, grief, and perplexity. From fear and from turning-about the animal substance received its being; from this turning-about, they hold, the Demiurge had his origin; from fear came the rest of animal substance, that of both dumb animals and of men. And for this reason, being superior to them, he foreknew things spiritual, and, supposing himself the only God, declared by the mouths of the prophets, "It is I who am God; apart from me exists nothing." From grief, they teach, spiritual things of wickedness came to be; hence the devil had his origin, whom they also call the Cosmocrator, and the demons, and every spiritual substance of wickedness. But they say the Demiurge is the psychic son of his mother, while the Cosmocrator is a creature of the Demiurge; and the Cosmocrator understands the things above him, since he is a spiritual wickedness, while the Demiurge is ignorant of them, since he is animal. They say their mother dwells in the place that is heavenly, that is, in the middle region; the Demiurge dwells in the place that is in heaven, that is, the Hebdomad; and the Cosmocrator dwells in the place that is our world. From terror and perplexity, as from something quite deranged, the bodily elements of the world were made, as we said before: earth from the state of terror, water from the movement of fear, air from the fixing of grief; while fire, they teach, was inherent in all of these as death and corruption, just as ignorance too was hidden within all three passions. When he had thus fashioned the world, they say he also made man of earth — not from this dry earth, but taking from an invisible substance, from matter poured out and fluid — and into this man they hold that he breathed the psychic element. This man, they say, was made "according to the image and likeness": according to the image, in that he was of the same substance as God; according to the likeness, in that he was psychic — which is why the substance of that breath was called "the spirit of life," since it came from a spiritual origin. After this, they say, he was clothed with a garment of skin, which they hold to be this sensible flesh.
As for the offspring of their mother Achamoth — whom, according to their view, she brought forth in contemplation of the angels attending the Savior — they say it is of the same substance as its mother, spiritual, and that the Demiurge was ignorant of it as well. It was secretly deposited within him, they say, without his knowledge, so that through him a seed might be sown into that soul which came from him, and carried, as it were, in a womb, in this material body, and there enlarged, so as to be made ready to receive the perfect account. Thus, they say, the spiritual man lay hidden from the Demiurge, sown together by Sophia with his breath, by an indescribable power and providence. For just as his own mother lay hidden from his knowledge, in that same way her seed escaped his notice too. This seed, they say, is itself the Church, the image of the Church above, and it is this man within themselves — for it is precisely the object, or rather the very proposition, of their "knowledge." So that the rational soul might not be empty, they hold that it consists of the psychic element, from the breath; the fleshly element, from matter; and the spiritual man, from the mother Achamoth.

======== Book I — Chapter 6 ========

Since there are, then, these three elements, they say that the material one — which they also call the "left" — must of necessity perish, since it is incapable of receiving any breath of incorruption; that the animal element — which they also call the "right" — being midway between the spiritual and the material, will be brought to whichever side it inclines; while the spiritual element was sent forth so that, once joined here to the animal, it might be formed together with it through its manner of life. This, they say, is what is meant by "salt" and by that which "lights up the world," for the Church is not the principle of election as arising from the fall of Sophia, but derives directly from the Pleroma — so that the likeness of this lower Church to the one above might be complete. For the animal element needed instruction through the senses; and it was for this reason, they say, that the world was fashioned, and that the Savior came to this animal creation, since it is his proper task to save it. What he was to save, they say, he took on as firstfruits: from Achamoth the spiritual element, from the Demiurge he put on the psychic (that is, animal) Christ, and from the divine arrangement he was clothed with a body, having an animal substance, prepared however with indescribable art, so that it might be visible, tangible, and capable of suffering. Of the material, hylic element he took on nothing at all, for the hylic, they say, is not capable of salvation. The consummation, they say, will come when everything spiritual has been formed and made perfect in knowledge — that is, the men who have perfect knowledge of God and who have been initiated by Achamoth into the mysteries. These, they say, are themselves the spiritual; while those who through mere works and bare faith are strengthened, without possessing perfect knowledge, are the animal, or psychic, men — and these, they say, are us, who belong to the Church. Hence they grant that for us a good manner of life is necessary, since otherwise it is impossible to be saved; but they hold that they themselves are saved in every way, not through works, but simply because they are by nature spiritual. For just as it is impossible for the earthly man to obtain salvation — since, they say, he is not capable of it — so again it is impossible for the spiritual (which they claim to be themselves) to undergo corruption, whatever the actions in which they may be involved. Just as gold placed in mud does not lose its beauty but keeps its own nature, mud being unable to harm gold, so too, they say, they themselves — whatever material works they may be involved in — suffer no harm to themselves and lose nothing of their spiritual substance. For this reason those among them who are "perfect" practice without fear all the things that are forbidden, of which the Scriptures warn that "those who commit such deeds will have no share in the kingdom." They think themselves defiled by none of these things, and they are the first to attend every pagan festival held for pleasure in honor of the gods, believing that nothing at all... as they hold that spiritual things are rendered back to spiritual beings. And some of them secretly corrupt the women who are taught this doctrine by them — as many women, persuaded by these men, later confessed, on returning to the Church of God, this offense along with the rest of their error. Others, quite openly and without any shame, have taken for their wives whatever women they desired, luring them away from their own husbands. Still others, at first with great show of modesty, pretending to live together as with sisters, were in time exposed, when the "sister" was made pregnant by the "brother."
And while committing many other hateful and irreligious acts, they mock us — who through fear of God take care not to sin even in thought or word — as ignorant simpletons, calling themselves "the seed of election." For they say that we receive grace only on loan, and that it can therefore be taken away from us again; whereas they possess it as their own property, a grace descended from above from the ineffable and unnameable conjunction, and for that reason it is added to them all the more. Hence, they say, it is fitting for them in every way always... and they say this in these words: "Whoever is in the world and does not love a woman so as to be joined with her is not of the truth, and will not pass into the truth. But whoever, being of the world, has union with a woman, does not pass into the truth either, because he unites with the woman out of lust." Hence, for us — whom they call "psychic," and say belong to the world — they claim that continence and good works are necessary, so that through these we may come to the middle place; but for themselves, who are called spiritual and perfect, none of this is necessary at all. For it is not works that bring one into the Pleroma, but the seed which, though sent forth small from there, is here brought to perfection.

======== Book I — Chapter 7 ========

They say that when the whole seed has been brought to perfection, their mother Achamoth will pass from the middle place and enter within the Pleroma, and receive her spouse, the Savior who was formed out of all the Aeons together, so that a conjunction is made of the Savior and Sophia, who is Achamoth. This, they say, is the bridegroom and the bride, and the whole Pleroma is the bridal chamber. The spiritual ones, stripped of their souls and made into intellectual spirits, will enter the Pleroma imperceptibly and invisibly, and be given as brides to the angels who attend the Savior. The Demiurge himself, they say, will in turn cross over to where his mother Sophia dwells — the intermediate zone; and there too the souls of the righteous will come to rest, since no psychic thing may cross into the Pleroma. Once all this has come to pass, the fire concealed within the world will blaze up, seize hold of everything, consume all matter, and then, being itself consumed along with it, pass into nonexistence. They point out that the Demiurge knew nothing at all of these things before the coming of the Savior.
There are, however, some among them who say that this same being also sent forth Christ as his own son, but an animal one, and that it was of him that the prophets spoke; and that it was this Christ who passed through Mary as water passes through a tube, and that upon him, at the baptism, the Savior descended — he who is composed out of all the Aeons of the Pleroma — in the form of a dove; and that in him also was that spiritual seed from Achamoth. Just as the Demiurge occupies the middle place between the Forefather and the Cosmocrator, they say our Lord was compounded of these four elements: of the animal, which was from the Demiurge; of the spiritual, which was from Achamoth; of that fashioned with indescribable art; and of the Savior, that is, the dove that descended upon him. And this being, they say, remained free from suffering — for it was not possible for him to suffer, since he was incomprehensible and invisible — and for this reason, when he was brought before Pilate, the Christ-spirit that had earlier settled within him withdrew and departed. But not even the seed that came from the mother did they say suffered; for that too was impassible, being spiritual and invisible even to the Demiurge himself. Rather, according to them, it was the animal Christ who suffered, and the one fashioned out of the divine arrangement, in a mystery, so that through him Achamoth might display, in a formation according to substance, that all these things are types of those higher realities.
As for the souls that possessed the seed which comes from Achamoth, they say these were better than the rest, and were therefore more loved by the Demiurge — who did not know the reason, but supposed from himself that they were simply of a superior kind. For this reason, they say, he distributed them among the prophets, the priests, and the kings. And they interpret many sayings uttered by the prophets as referring to this seed, on the ground that it was of a higher nature. They fabricate the birth from the virgin Mary, given in marriage to Joseph, as a mere type, so that redemption, worked out through Horos, that is, the Cross, might be signified concerning the higher realities. They say that the prophets spoke much, some of it uttered by the mother concerning the higher realities, and some through this Christ and through the souls formed from him. And so they further divide the prophecies, teaching that some were spoken by the mother, some by the seed, and some by the Demiurge himself; and likewise that Jesus spoke partly as the Savior, partly as the mother, and partly as the Demiurge — as we shall show as our account proceeds.
The Demiurge, they say, being ignorant of the things above him, was moved indeed by what was spoken through the prophets, yet he despised it, supposing it due to one cause or another — sometimes to the spirit that was prophesying (which itself had a movement of its own), sometimes to mere human perplexity about lower things — and so remained ignorant right up until the coming of the Savior. But when the Savior came, they say, the Demiurge learned everything from him, and received it with joy along with all his power, and that he is the centurion in the Gospel who says to the Savior, "For I too have soldiers and servants under my authority, and what I command they do." He will bring to completion, they say, the creation of the world that is his own work, up to the appointed time — above all on account of his care and concern for the Church, and because of his knowledge of the reward being prepared for him, since he will pass over into the place of his mother. They speak of three kinds of men — spiritual, psychic, and earthly — as typified by Cain, Abel, and Seth, showing by these figures the three natures, no longer in individuals but in whole classes. The earthly, they say, passes away into corruption; the animal, if it chooses the better things, will find rest in the middle place, but if the worse, it too will pass to like things with the earthly. The spiritual seed Achamoth has been sowing from that time until now, on account of which souls are instructed here, while the seeds, though sent forth small, are nourished and afterward, once judged fit for perfection, are given in marriage to the Savior's angels; their souls, of necessity, come to rest with the Demiurge in that middle place. And they say that souls are by nature good or by nature wicked: the good are those capable of receiving the seed, while the others, being by nature worthless, can never receive it at all. Such being the character of their argument — something neither foretold by the prophets, nor taught by the Lord, nor handed down by the apostles, and yet something they boast of knowing more abundantly than anyone else, reading what is not written — they attempt, as the saying goes, to weave ropes out of sand, striving to fit what has been said, whether the Lord's parables, or the sayings of the prophets, or the words of the apostles, to their own fabrication, so that they might overreach the Scriptures and, so far as lies in them, tear apart the very frame of the truth. They transfer and refashion things, making one thing out of another, and deceive many by ill-fitting phantasms patched together out of the Lord's own words. It is as if someone had a fine image of a king skillfully wrought out of precious gems by a master craftsman, and then took it apart, removed the gems that made up the man's figure, and rearranged them to form the shape of a dog or a fox, badly put together — and then insisted and declared that this was the beautiful image of the king that the skilled craftsman had made, pointing to the gems, which had indeed been well arranged by the first artist into the image of the king but had been badly rearranged by the second into the form of a fox, and by this display of gems deceived the ignorant, who had no notion of what the king's true likeness looked like, persuading them that this ugly figure of a fox was that fine image of the king. In just the same way, these men stitch together old wives' tales, and then, dragging in sayings, phrases, and parables from here and there, try to fit the words of God to their own fables. As for how much they attempt to draw in this fashion from what pertains to the realm within the Pleroma, and how much from what lies outside it — to attach to their own followers out of the Scriptures — the following is a sample. They say that the Lord came to his passion in the last times of the world for this reason: to show forth, through this passion, the passion that occurred concerning the last of the Aeons, and by this event to reveal the end of the whole arrangement concerning the Aeons. And the twelve-year-old daughter of the ruler of the synagogue, whom the Lord raised from the dead when he came upon her, they take as a figure for the simple among them, and by this act they say he manifested what Achamoth was, and brought to sensible perception what he had left of her when he departed from her — in that he revealed a part of her to her. And they say that Paul spoke of this in his First Letter to the Corinthians, saying, "and last of all he was seen also by me, as by one born out of due time." And the coming of the Savior to Achamoth, together with those of his own age, they say Paul likewise showed in the same letter, saying, "a woman ought to have a covering on her head, because of the angels"; and that because Achamoth, out of shame at the Savior's coming to her, put on a veil — which, they say, Moses made plain by putting a veil over his own face. And they say the Lord signified, by his own sufferings, the passions she suffered: her grief, in this, that he said, "My soul is sorrowful, even unto death"; her fear, in that he said, "Father, if there is a way, take this cup away from me"; and likewise her perplexity (that is, her utter confusion) in that he said, "nor do I know what I should say."
They teach that he showed forth three kinds of men: the hylic (material) kind, in that he answered the one who said, "I will follow you": "The Son of man has nowhere to lay his head." [A portion of the source text here is corrupted beyond recovery.] The psychic (animate) kind, in that he said to the one who said, "I will follow you, but permit me first to go and tell my household": "Whoever sets a hand to the plow and turns to look behind is not suited for the kingdom of heaven." This man, they say, was of the middle sort. And likewise that other man, who confessed he had fulfilled many parts of righteousness, but afterward was unwilling to follow, being overcome by his riches so that he did not become perfect — him too they wish to have been of the psychic kind. But the spiritual (pneumatic) kind, in that he says, "Leave the dead to bury their own dead, but go and proclaim the kingdom of God," and to Zacchaeus the tax collector, saying, "Make haste and come down, for today I must abide in your house," and in the parable of the leaven, which a woman is said to have hidden in three measures of meal — these, they say, signify the three kinds [of men]. [A run of corrupted text, apparently a marginal note on manuscript readings, is untranslatable here.] They teach that the woman is called Sophia; that the three measures of meal are the three kinds of men, spiritual, psychic, and choic (earthy); and that the leaven itself is said to be the Savior. And they say that Paul plainly spoke of the choic, the psychic, and the spiritual: in one place, "As is the man of earth, such also are they that are earthy"; elsewhere, "The psychic man does not receive the things of the Spirit"; elsewhere, "The spiritual man judges all things." The saying, "The psychic man does not receive the things of the Spirit," they say was spoken of the Demiurge, who, being psychic, knew neither his spiritual mother nor her seed, nor those Aeons who are within the Pleroma. And because the Savior took to himself of those whom he was about to save, they say that Paul said, "If the firstfruit be holy, the lump also is holy" — calling the firstfruit that which is spiritual, and by "the lump" meaning us, that is, the psychic Church, whose substance they say he took upon himself and raised up together with himself, since he himself was the leaven. And because Achamoth erred outside the Pleroma and was given form by Christ and was sought out by the Savior, they say he showed this forth in saying that he himself had come to the sheep that had gone astray; for they take the straying sheep to signify their mother, from whom they hold that the Church here below was sown as seed. And they hand down that her error was her sojourn outside the Pleroma amid all the passions out of which they say matter was made. [A further corrupted fragment intervenes.] And they say that the woman who sweeps the house and finds the drachma signifies the higher Sophia, who, having lost her purpose, afterward, when all things had been cleansed by the Savior's coming, found it again — since this too, according to them, is restored within the Pleroma. And they say that Symeon, who took Christ into his hands and gave thanks to God, saying, "Now you release your servant, O Lord, according to your word, in peace," is a type of the Demiurge, who at the Savior's coming learned of his own transposition and gave thanks to Bythos. And through Anna, who is said to have lived seven years with her husband and to have remained a widow all the rest of her time, until she saw the Savior and recognized him and spoke of him to all — most plainly, they say, Achamoth is signified: [A corrupted note on manuscript variants follows, untranslatable.] she who, having seen the Savior only for a little while together with those of her own age, thereafter persevered for the whole time in the middle state, waiting for him until his return, when he would bring her back to her own consort. And they say his name too is signified by the Savior, in that he said, "Wisdom is justified by her children," and by Paul thus: "We speak wisdom among the perfect." And they say Paul spoke of the conjunctions (syzygies) that are within the Pleroma when, in one place showing this, he writes of that conjunction which pertains to this present life: "This is a profound mystery, and my words concern Christ and the Church." Furthermore they teach that John, the Lord's disciple, indicated the first Ogdoad, calling it the mother of all things that are engendered. [Here follows a badly corrupted passage of Greek text and apparatus notes, untranslatable.] For he laid down a certain Beginning, which was first brought forth by God — this he also calls Mind and Son; and he calls it the Only-begotten of the Lord, in whom the Father sent forth all things as seeds. From this, he says, the Word was sent forth, and in the Word all the substance of the Aeons, which the Word itself afterward gave form. Since, then, he speaks of the first generation, he does well to make his teaching begin "in the Beginning" — that is, from the Son and the Word. He speaks thus: having first distinguished God, and the Beginning, and the Word into three, he then unites them again, so as to display both their emission and how they are joined to each other and to the Father alike. For the Beginning subsists within the Father and issues from the Father; likewise the Word subsists within the Beginning and issues from the Beginning. Fittingly, then, he stated, "The Word existed at the Beginning" — because he dwelt within the Son. "And the Word was present with God" — because the Beginning dwelt with God. "And the Word was God" — appropriately, since what is born of God is itself divine. "This one existed at the beginning with God": this points to the sequence of generation. "Everything came into being through him, and apart from him nothing came into being": for the Word became the source of shaping and generation for all the Aeons who followed after him. But "what came into being within him," he says, "was life": here he reveals a pairing, for he stated that all things came into being through him, yet that life resides within him. This, then, which arose within him, stands nearer to him than those things brought into being through him; for it subsists with him and bears fruit by means of him. Hence he continues, "And that life was the light of mankind." And here by "mankind" he also means "the Church" under a shared name, so that one word might point to both together: man begets the Church. And he called that light "of men" — that is, life — because they were illuminated by it, which is Anthropos, formed and made manifest. This too Paul says: "For everything that is made manifest is light." Since, then, life manifested and begot Anthropos and the Church, it is called their light. Plainly, therefore, did John reveal [several lines are corrupted Greek and cannot be translated]. In a like exegesis the Macedonians later interpreted the "Life" as the Holy Spirit, through these and other sayings — and thereby a second foursome, the Word and the Life, Anthropos and the Church. But he also signified the first tetrad. For in narrating concerning the Savior, and teaching that all things outside the Pleroma were formed through him, he says that he too is a fruit within the Pleroma. And indeed he called him the light that shines in the darkness and is not comprehended by it, since he, forming all things that had come to be out of passion, was unknown to them. And he calls him Son, and Truth, and Life, and the Word become flesh — "whose splendor we gazed upon," he says, "a splendor fitting the Only-begotten, granted him by the Father, replete with grace and truth." (His words run thus: "And the Word took on flesh and made his home among us, and we gazed upon his splendor, a splendor as of the Only-begotten from the Father, replete with grace and truth.") With care, therefore, he has displayed the first foursome, naming the Father, and Grace, and the Only-begotten, and Truth. Thus John spoke of the first — and of Grace, and the Only-begotten, and Truth, and the Word, and Life, and Anthropos, and the Church. Such, then, is the teaching of Ptolemy.

======== Book I — Chapter 9 ========

You see, then, most beloved, the contrivance by which they deceive themselves, wresting the Scriptures and striving to make their fiction stand upon them. For this reason I have set down their own artifices and expressions, so that from these you may weigh the malice behind their invention and the depth of their error. To begin with, had it been John's aim to display that Ogdoad above, he would certainly have preserved the sequence of the emission, and would have set down the first foursome — since it is, as they say, the more honorable — in the very first place among the names, and would then have added the second, so that the order of the Ogdoad might be shown through the order of the names; and he would not, after so long an interval, as though he had forgotten and only afterward remembered, have named the first foursome last of all. Then again, wishing to indicate the conjunctions, he would not have passed over the name of the Church; rather, either in the other conjunctions he would have been content with naming only the males, since the females could equally be understood along with them, so as to preserve a single consistency throughout — or, if he was enumerating the conjunctions of the rest, he would certainly have made known the consort of Anthropos (that is, of Man), and would not have left us to guess at her name by divination.
Manifest, then, is the perversion of their exposition. For John, proclaiming one almighty God and one only-begotten Christ Jesus, through whom, he says, all things came to be, means by these titles the Word of God — he the Only-begotten, he the maker of all things, he the true light enlightening every man, he the fashioner of the world, he the one who came to his own, he the very one who took on flesh and made his dwelling among us. But these men, twisting the exposition to suit their own plausibility, will have it that one being was the Only-begotten by way of emission, whom indeed they also call the Beginning; another, they hold, was the Savior; another was the Word, son of the Only-begotten; and another was the Christ sent forth for the correction of the Pleroma. Each of these sayings they wrench away from the truth, and abusing the names, they turn them to serve their own argument — so that, according to them, John, in speaking of such great matters, gave no mention at all of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now if he spoke of the Father, and Grace, and the Only-begotten, and Truth, and the Word, and Life, and Anthropos, and the Church, then according to their argument he spoke of the first Ogdoad, in which there was not yet a Jesus, not yet a Christ, John's own master. But that the apostle spoke not of their syzygies but of our Lord Jesus Christ, whom he also knows to be the Word of God, he himself makes plain. For, recapitulating concerning that Word which had been spoken of in the beginning, he goes on to explain: "And the Word took on flesh, and made his home among us." Yet according to their argument it was not the Word that took on flesh — for the Word, they say, never even came outside the Pleroma — but rather one formed out of all the Aeons together, one later than the Word, namely the Savior. Learn, then, you senseless men, that Jesus, who suffered for us, who dwelt among us, is himself the very Word of God. For if some other of the Aeons had been made flesh for our salvation, one would have to suppose the apostle spoke of that other. But if it is the Word of the Father who descended, the very one who also ascended, the only-begotten Son from the one God, made flesh for men according to the Father's good pleasure — then John spoke not of some other being, nor of the Ogdoad, but of the Lord Jesus Christ. For, according to them, it was not the Word that was principally made flesh at all. For they say that the Savior put on an animate body, fitted for this by an arrangement of ineffable providence, so that it might become visible and tangible. But that flesh is the old formation made by God from clay, according to Adam — which John showed to be truly the Word of God made flesh. And so their first and firstborn Ogdoad is dissolved. For when it is shown that the Word, and the Only-begotten, and Life, and Light, and Savior, and Christ, the Son of God, are one and the same, and that this same one was made flesh for us, then the framework of their Ogdoad is destroyed. And once this is undone, their whole argument collapses — for it is under a false name that they, dreaming, slander the Scriptures in order to fabricate their own system.
After this they string together words and names taken here and there, according to their own reckoning, into that which is against nature — doing just as those who set themselves any controversial theme they please and then try to piece it together out of verses of Homer, so that the simple suppose that Homer composed those verses for that improvised declamation, and many are led astray by the artful stringing together of the verses, wondering whether perhaps Homer really did compose them so. For example — nothing hinders our recalling this case too, since the method in both instances is the same — as when someone, writing of Hercules sent by Eurystheus, strings verses together thus: "When he had spoken thus, he sent forth from the threshold, weeping, unconquered Hercules, no stranger to great deeds, son of Eurystheus, of the line of Sthenelus and Perseus, to fetch from Erebus the hound of dark Dis to the light. And he went, like a lion reared fierce in the mountains, through the midst of the city; and all his friends departed together, both old men, and boys, and maidens not yet wed, weeping greatly, as though he were going to his very death. Hermes and gray-eyed Pallas sped him on his way; for they knew how grief would drive his brother." Who among the simple would not be carried away by such verses, and suppose that Homer really composed them for this subject? But one who knows his Homer will recognize the verses, yet will not recognize the story — knowing that some of these lines were spoken of Ulysses, others of Hercules, others of Priam, and others still of Menelaus and Agamemnon. And if one takes them and restores each to its own book, he will do away with the story now before us. So too, once a man has received, through baptism, these names and expressions and parables that are drawn from the Scriptures, he will recognize the words, but he will not recognize their blasphemous argument. For even if he recognizes the gems, he will not accept a fox in place of the royal image. But by returning each saying to its proper place and setting it back within the body of truth, he shall expose their fiction and show it to be without substance. Since, then, this drama lacks redemption, so that one who unravels their play may bring in a word of destruction, we thought it well first to show the points on which the very fathers of this fable disagree among themselves — as men who spring from a variety of spirits of error. For from this too one may carefully learn both the firm truth proclaimed by the Church, from the Showing itself, and the falsehood invented by these others.

======== Book I — Chapter 10 ========

EXPOSITION OF THE PREACHING OF THE FAITH. — The Church, though dispersed across the entire world, all the way out to earth's furthest bounds, received from the apostles and from their disciples this single faith: in God the Father, ruler of all, who fashioned heaven and earth and sea and all things held within them; and in one Christ Jesus, God's Son, who took on flesh for the sake of our deliverance; and in the Holy Spirit, who through the prophets proclaimed the dispensations of God, and the coming, and the birth from the Virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the bodily ascension into the heavens of the beloved Jesus Christ our Lord, and his coming from the heavens in the glory of the Father to sum up all things and to raise again all the flesh of the whole human race [an editorial note here compares this passage to a fuller, more explicit creedal formula used elsewhere against the Gnostic fictions, running: "I believe in God the Father almighty, and in Christ Jesus his only Son our Lord, who was born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, who under Pontius Pilate was crucified and buried, rose again the third day from the dead, ascended into the heavens, sits at the right hand of the Father, whence he will come to judge the living and the dead; and in the Holy Spirit, the holy Church, the remission of sins, the resurrection of the flesh"] — so that before Christ Jesus, our Lord and God and Savior and King, in keeping with the invisible Father's good pleasure, every knee should bend — of beings in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth — and every tongue confess him, and that he should execute righteous judgment upon all: sending the spiritual forces of wickedness, and the angels who transgressed and became apostates, and the impious and unjust and lawless and blasphemous among men, into everlasting fire; but to the just and equitable, who have kept his commandments and remained steadfast in his love — a few from the very outset, others from when they turned back — granting life as a gift, bestowing incorruption in place of a reward, and clothing them with everlasting glory. AN ANSWER TO THOSE WHO SAY THAT ONE CAN SPEAK OF THIS FAITH WITH MORE OR LESS PRECISION. Having received this preaching and this faith, as we said before, the Church, though dispersed across the whole world, carefully guards it, as though dwelling in one house; and believes these things alike, as though having one soul and one heart, and preaches, teaches, and hands them down harmoniously, as though speaking with a single voice. Though the tongues spoken across the world differ from one another, still the substance of what is handed down remains one and the same. And the churches founded in Germany believe and hand down nothing different, nor do those established among the Iberians, nor among the Celtic peoples, nor in the eastern lands, nor within Egypt's borders, nor across Libya, nor those established in the middle regions of the world; but just as the sun, God's creature, is a single thing found the world over, so too the light — the preaching of the truth — shines everywhere and illumines all men who wish to arrive at recognition of what is true. And no one among those who preside over the churches, however greatly gifted he may be in eloquence, will say anything different from this — for no one is above his master — nor will one weak in speech diminish the tradition. For since the faith is one and the same, he who can say much about it does not add to it, nor does he who can say little diminish it. IN WHAT SENSE IT MAY BE SUPPOSED THAT SOME HAVE MORE, AND OTHERS LESS, KNOWLEDGE. Now that some know more or less, according to their capacity for understanding, does not mean that the substance of the faith itself is thereby changed, so that another God is imagined besides the Maker and Fashioner and Nourisher of this universe (as though he were not sufficient for us), or another Christ, or another Only-begotten; but it means this: that one may search out more fully the things spoken in parables and bring them into agreement with the substance of the truth; and may set forth the instrument and dispensation of God enacted for the human race; and may explain why God showed himself long-suffering both toward the apostasy of the transgressing angels and toward the disobedience of men; and why the one and the same God made some things temporal and others eternal, some heavenly and some earthly; and why, though invisible, he appeared to the prophets of God not in one form but variously to different ones; and why many covenants were given to the human race, and may teach what is the character of each of the covenants; and why God shut up all things in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all; and may give thanks for the reason God's own Word took on flesh and underwent suffering; and may proclaim why the Son of God's arrival happened in the last times, that is, at the end, and not at the beginning; and may unfold whatever is set down in the Scriptures concerning the end and the things to come; and may not be silent as to how God made the despaired-of nations joint heirs, sharers of the one body, and participants together with the saints; and may proclaim how this mortal flesh will put on immortality, and the corruptible incorruption; and how he who was not a people became a people, and she who was not beloved became beloved; and how there are more children of her who was desolate than of her who has a husband. [Here the apparatus notes variant readings among the manuscript witnesses.] But it is not in these and similar matters that anyone, going beyond the Creator and Maker — who is the mother of these and of those [i.e., of things visible and things invisible] — would discover an Enthymesis of an erring Aeon, and arrive at such blasphemy; nor in the notion that above this again there is a Pleroma, at one time of thirty, at another of countless multitudes of Aeons — as those say who are truly, by the divine sentence, deserted, calling themselves teachers — since the Church, being one and universal throughout the world, holds one and the same faith.

======== Book I — Chapter 11 ========

WHAT THE FOLLOWERS OF VALENTINUS SAY. — Let us now look also at the inconsistent teaching of these men — for there are two or three schools among them — how they do not say the same things about the same subjects, but contradict one another both in the names and in the substance of things. For the first of them, coming from what is called the Gnostic heresy and transferring the old teachings into a system of his own, Valentinus defined it thus: there is a certain unnameable Duality, one part of which is called Ineffable, and the other Silence. Then from this Duality a second Duality was put forth, one part of which he calls Father, the other Truth. From this Tetrad, he says, sprang Word and Life, Man and Church. This is the first Ogdoad. And from Word and Life, he says, ten powers were put forth, as we said before; and from Man and Church, twelve — of which one, falling away and being left destitute, made the remaining arrangement of things. He posits two Limits: one between the Depth and the Pleroma, marking off the Aeons that were begotten from the unbegotten Father; the other separating their Mother from the Pleroma. And Christ, he says, was not put forth by the Aeons who are within the Pleroma, but was brought forth outside by the Mother, who had been made external, in accordance with a memory of better things, together with a certain shadow. And this one, being masculine, cut off the shadow from himself and returned into the Pleroma; but the Mother, left behind under the shadow and emptied of spiritual substance, put forth another son. And this is the Demiurge, whom he also calls the omnipotent ruler of the things subject to him. Along with him, he says, a ruler of the left was also put forth, similar to those spoken of elsewhere: at one time he says he was put forth by the one who was separated from their Mother and reunited with the rest, that is, by Thelesis (Will); at another, by the one who ran back up into the Pleroma, that is, by Christ; at another, by Man and Church. And the Holy Spirit, he says, was put forth by Truth for the examination and fruit-bearing of the Aeons, [an apparatus note here reports Tertullian's testimony that Valentinus said Jesus was put forth by the Father, or by the Depth, and passed through Mary as water passes through a tube] entering into them invisibly and more simply, so that through him the Aeons might bring forth the leaves of truth. So much for him. But the second of them handed down the first Ogdoad in this way: he speaks of a right-hand Tetrad and a left-hand Tetrad, and of Light and Darkness; and says that the power which fell away and was left destitute came not from the thirty Aeons but from their fruits.
But another of them, a famous teacher among them, striving to reach something loftier and, as it were, to a greater knowledge, sets before all things a Pre-Beginning, unthinkable and ineffable and unnameable, which I call Onefoldness; and with this Onefoldness there is a power which I also call Oneness. This Oneness and Onefoldness, though they are one, put forth — without putting forth — the beginning of all things, thinkable, unbegotten, and invisible, which reason calls Monad; and with this Monad there is a power of the same substance as itself, which I likewise call One. These powers, then — Onefoldness, Oneness, Monad, and One — put forth the remaining emissions of the Aeons.
"Alas, alas! and woe, woe!" — for it is truly right to speak in tragic style over such men, who under the pretense of a knowledge that surpasses all others invent names of their own devising, and who, without a blush, have coined lies as though they were names. [The apparatus here discusses parallels and manuscript variants at length, noting the passage's difficulty and its relation to other testimonies, without altering the sense of what follows.] For in saying, "before all things there is a Pre-Beginning, unthinkable, which I call Onefoldness," and again, "with this Onefoldness there is a power which I also call Oneness," it is plain that these are fictions of his own making, and he has himself confessed that he has imposed names upon his own fabrication, names given by no one before him. And if he had not dared to do this, the truth, according to him, would to this day have no name. Nothing, therefore, prevents anyone else from likewise inventing names for a similar system, saying: There is a certain regal Pre-Beginning before all things; and with it there is a power which I call Gourd; and with this Gourd there is a power which I also call Utter-Emptiness. This Gourd and Utter-Emptiness, being one, put forth — without putting forth — a fruit, everywhere visible, edible, and sweet, which reason calls Cucumber. And with this Cucumber there is a power of the same rank as itself, which I likewise call Melon. These powers — Gourd, and Utter-Emptiness, and Cucumber, and Melon — put forth all that remains of the crazed melon-crowd belonging to Valentinus. For if it is fitting to carry over into a first Tetrad the same kind of reasoning applied to the universe, and if, as one of these men prefers, a person may simply invent names for himself, who is going to object to using names that are far more believable, ordinary, and familiar to everyone? Others, again, among them have named their first and originating Ogdoad with these names: first, Pre-Beginning; then, Unthinkable; third, Unspeakable; and fourth, Invisible. And from Pre-Beginning, in the first and fifth place, Beginning was put forth; from Unthinkable, in the second and sixth place, Incomprehensible; from Unspeakable, in the third and seventh place, Unnameable; and from Invisible, in the fourth and eighth place, Unbegotten. This is the Pleroma of the first Ogdoad. They wish these powers to have existed before Depth and Silence, so that they might seem more finished than the finished, and more expert in gnosis than the Gnostics themselves; to whom one might justly say: O melons — sophists deserving blame, and no true ones! For concerning Depth itself they say it is nothing at all. Others again call it both male and female, giving it the birth of a hermaphrodite; and some again add Silence to it as a consort, so that it becomes the first conjunction.

======== Book I — Chapter 12 ========

THINGS WHICH ARE NOT COMMON TO ALL OF THEM. — Those around Ptolemy, however, being more learned, say that he had two consorts, whom they also call dispositions: Thought and Will. For first, they say, he conceived in mind what he would put forth, and then he willed it. Wherefore, when these two affections and powers — that is, Thought and Will — had, as it were, been mingled together, the emission of the Only-begotten and of Truth took place according to conjunction. These they suppose to be the types and visible images of the two invisible affections of the Father: of Will, Mind; of Thought, Truth. And for this reason the image of the derivative Will is masculine, while that of the innate Thought is feminine, since Will became, as it were, a power of Thought. For Thought was always thinking of the emission, but was not able by herself to put forth what she was thinking; but when the power of Will came upon her, then she put forth what she had been thinking.
Does it not seem to you, most beloved, that these people have conceived a notion of the Homeric Zeus greater than that of the God of all things -- Zeus, who because of his anxious care, not sleeping but full of concern, wondered when he might honor Achilles and destroy many of the Greeks? For that God, as soon as he thought, accomplished what he thought; and as soon as he willed, he also thinks what he has willed: he thinks when he wills, and he wills when he thinks, since he is wholly thought, and wholly sense, and wholly eye, and wholly hearing, and wholly the fountain of all good things.

Concerning the teaching of the Colarbasians and of Mark: Those of them who are considered more learned say that the primal Ogdoad did not come into being by gradual stages, with one Aeon emitted from another, but that all the Aeons were emitted at once and together from the Forefather and his Thought (Ennoea) -- for, they affirm, they themselves served as midwives when the Aeons were being brought forth. And they no longer say that Man and the Church were generated from Word (Logos) and Life (Zoe), but rather that Word and Life were generated from Man and the Church, speaking in this way: When the Forefather thought to emit something, this was called Father; but when what he emitted proved true, this was called Truth. And when he willed to manifest himself, this was called Man. And those whom he had foreknown, after he emitted them, this was called the Church. Man spoke the Word (Logos); this is the firstborn son. Life follows upon the Word, and thus the first Ogdoad was completed.

Some, however, say that the Decad comes from the ten Aeons alone, who were emitted from Word and Life, and that for this reason he is called Word and Life, since he keeps the names of his parents. Others say it comes from the twelve Aeons, those made from Man and the Church, and that for this reason he confesses himself Son of Man, as one born after Man. Others again say he was made from Christ and the Holy Spirit, those who were emitted for the establishing of the Pleroma, and that for this reason he is called Christ, keeping the title of his Father, from whom he was emitted. And there are still others who say that the Forefather of all is himself called the First Beginning, the Pre-Beginning, and the Pre-unthinkable Man, and that this is the great and hidden mystery: that the power which is above all things, and which contains all things, is called Man; and for this reason the Savior calls himself the Son of Man.

======== Book I — Chapter 13 ========

On his manner of life, and on the shape his life takes: There is another of these men, most skilled, who by these means has led astray many men and not a few women, drawing them to himself as to one supremely learned and possessed of the greatest power from the invisible and unspeakable regions -- mixing juggling tricks together with the wickedness of those called magicians, and by these means claiming to perform wonders.

What Mark does, and the things done by him: Taking a cup mixed with wine, pretending to give thanks over it, and drawing out at great length the words of invocation, he makes it appear purple and red, so that it is thought that Grace, from the powers that are above all things, drips her own blood into that cup through his invocation, and that those present greatly desire to taste of that cup, so that the Grace which is invoked through this magician may drip into them as well. Again, handing cups he has mixed over to the women, he directs them to offer the thanksgiving themselves in his presence. And when this has been done, he brings out another cup, much larger than the one over which the deceived woman herself had made the eucharist, and pours across from the smaller one -- the one over which the eucharist was made by the woman -- into that larger one, saying as he pours: May Grace, who is before all things, inconceivable and unspeakable, fill your inner man, and multiply in you her own knowledge, sowing the mustard seed in good soil. And saying certain things of this sort, and driving the poor woman into a kind of frenzy, he would appear to work wonders, when the larger cup was filled from the smaller, so that it even overflowed from it.
It is also to be understood that he has a certain demon as his familiar spirit, through whom he himself appears to prophesy, and through whom he makes as many as he judges worthy to be sharers of his Grace prophesy as well. He devotes himself chiefly to women, and especially to those who are well-born, richly clothed in purple, and very wealthy, whom he often tries to draw away, saying to them flatteringly: I wish you to share in my grace, since the Father of all continually beholds your angel before his face. The place of your greatness is among us: we must come together into one. Receive grace first from me and through me. Adorn yourself as a bride awaiting her bridegroom, that you may be what I am, and I what you are. Establish the seed of light in your bridal chamber. Receive a bridegroom from me, and take him to yourself, and be taken up in him. Behold, grace has descended upon you: open your mouth and prophesy. And when the woman answers, I have never prophesied, and I do not know how to prophesy, he, uttering certain invocations again, says to the astonishment of the woman being seduced -- for why, one might ask, should this higher order of things be entrusted only to the richer and more noble women, as we have seen these portions and images of the angels being handed to them -- Open your mouth and speak whatever comes, and you will prophesy. And she, deceived and elated by these words, her soul growing heated with the expectation that she is about to prophesy, and her heart beating far more than it ought, grows bold and speaks delirious things, whatever happens to come, vainly and rashly, since she is inflamed by this spirit -- as one better than we would say of such matters -- and she thinks the thing has actually happened to her, and gives thanks to Mark for having shared his grace with her; and she is eager to reward him, not only by giving him a share of her substance -- whereby he has amassed a great store of wealth -- but also by union of her body, desiring to be joined to him in every way, that she may descend with him into the one.

Now some of the most faithful women, who have the fear of God and are not to be seduced, whom he likewise attempted to lead astray as he did the rest, bidding them prophesy -- these, blowing upon him and pronouncing curses against him, separated themselves from this madman, who pretended to breathe forth something divine, knowing for certain that prophecy is not put into men by Mark the magician, but that those into whom God from above has sent his grace have received prophecy given by God, and speak then, and there, when and where God wills -- not when Mark commands. For that which commands is greater and more masterful than that which is commanded, since the one rules, while the other is subject. If, then, Mark commands, or anyone else -- as is customary at their banquets, where they all cast lots and command one another in turn to prophesy -- and they prophesy according to their own desires, then the one who commands will be greater and more masterful than the prophetic spirit itself, though he is merely human -- an impossibility. Rather, whatever spirits take orders from these men, and speak only when it pleases them to speak, are earthbound and feeble; while the reckless and shameless ones are dispatched by Satan for the seduction and destruction of those who do not keep the firm faith which they received from the beginning through the Church.

Moreover, he also works love-charms and philters, so as to do outrage to the very bodies of these women -- this same Mark, with certain women, though not with all. And these, having very often turned back to the Church of God, have confessed, and declared that they were violated in body by him, and that, inflamed as it were with desire, they loved him greatly -- so much so that a certain deacon of ours in Asia, who had received him into his house, fell into this very calamity. For his wife, a woman of beauty, was corrupted in mind and body by this magician, and followed him for a long time; and afterward, when the brethren with great labor had converted her back, she spent her whole life in confession, weeping and lamenting over the corruption she had suffered from this magician.

And certain of his disciples too, going about in these same circles, seducing many foolish women, have corrupted them, accounting themselves so perfect that no one, they think, could possibly equal the greatness of their own knowledge -- not even were one to invoke the name of Paul,
or Peter, or indeed any other of the apostles. Rather they hold that they themselves have come to know more than all, and that they alone have drunk deep of the greatness of that knowledge which is the unspeakable power. And they say that they themselves exist in a height above every power, and therefore act with complete freedom, having no fear in anything at all. For, they say, it is through the redemption that they become incomprehensible and invisible to the judge. And if he should nevertheless seize them, they, standing before him armed with this redemption, are to say: O assessor of God, and of that mystic Silence, you greatnesses whom I ever behold, using you as guide and leader they draw their forms upward -- for that bold Silence, led on by a phantasm, for the good of the Forefather sent us forth as images of those on high, so that now the intention of those above may, as it were, stand in attendance upon a dream in their defense. But do you, as one who knows the reckoning of both our natures, present yourself as sole judge before the assessor. And the Mother, hearing this at once, places upon them the Homeric helmet of Hades, so that they slip past the judge unseen and undetected; and immediately, snatching them away, she leads them into the bridal chamber and restores them to their own bridegrooms.

Saying and doing such things, they have led astray many women even in these regions of ours around the Rhône -- women who, having their consciences seared as if with a hot iron, react in various ways: some indeed make open confession of what befell them, while others, ashamed of this very thing, quietly withdraw into silence, having despaired altogether of the life of God; some have abandoned the faith completely, while still others waver between the two courses and, as the proverb has it, exist neither within nor without, having this alone as the fruit of that seed sown by the so-called sons of knowledge.

======== Book I — Chapter 14 ========

How a certain person, whom no one who bore witness ever perceived, though he himself saw all -- as we have shown above (cf. his letter to Theodore). His fabrication: This Mark, then, saying that he alone was the womb and receptacle of the Silence of Colarbasus (since he was, he claims, only-begotten), thus brought forth the seed which had been deposited in him. He says that the Quaternity, from the highest and invisible and unnameable places, descended to him in a woman's form (because, he says, the world could not bear its masculine form), and showed also herself, who she was, and the origin of all things, which she had never revealed to any god or man, but told to him alone, speaking thus: When first the Father, whose father is no one, who is inconceivable and without substance, who is neither male nor female, willed that his ineffable should become expressible, and that his invisible self should be given form, he opened his mouth and brought forth a Word like to himself, which, standing by, showed him what he himself was, when the invisible form had become manifest. Now the utterance of the name came about thus: he spoke the first word of four letters. He joined to it a second, and this was of four letters likewise. Afterward he spoke a third, and this was of ten letters. And that which comes after these he spoke, and it was of twelve letters. Thus the utterance of the whole name came to be of thirty letters, and of four syllables. And each of the elements has its own letters, and its own character, and its own utterance, and its shapes and images; and none of them sees the form of that one, nor is any of them itself above the element. Nor indeed does it know him; nor does even the nearest element know the utterance of its neighbor, but only what it itself utters; and thus each thinks that what it utters is the whole, and names it accordingly. For each of them, being a part of the whole, imagines its particular sound to constitute the entire name, and keeps sounding without pause until, once the final letter of the final element has been pronounced on its own, they all converge together. Then, he says, the restoration of all things will take place, when everything, condensing down into a single letter, shall sound forth one identical tone in unison -- the picture of which utterance he has handed down to be the Amen we speak together. And he says that these sounds are what give form to the unsubstantial and unbegotten Aeon, and that these are the forms which the Lord called angels, who without ceasing behold the face of the Father.
He called the names of the elements — common and expressible — by these titles: Aeons, Words, Roots, Seeds, Fulnesses, Fruits. Each of these, he says, and everything proper to each, is contained and understood in the name of the Church. Among these elements, it was the final letter of the final element that sent forth its own sound, and this sound, going out, generated elements proper to itself according to the image of the elements; from these he says are arranged both the things that are here, and the things that came before these [the text is corrupt here] — the sound following downward, received back upward by its own syllable, unto the filling-up of the universe; but the sound remains below, as though cast outside. Now the element itself, from which the letter along with its utterance descended, has in itself other letters, through which the name of the letter is named. And again, other letters are named through others, and others through others, so that the multitude of letters falls away into infinity. But you will learn more plainly what is meant this way: the element Delta has in itself five letters, namely Delta itself, and E, and L, and T, and A, and these letters again are written by means of other letters, and those by still others. If, then, the whole substance of Delta falls away into infinity, with letters endlessly generating and succeeding one another, how much greater must be the sea of letters belonging to that [larger] element? And if a single letter is thus immense, consider the depth of letters in the whole name, from which Marcus taught that the Forefather of Silence consists. Wherefore also the Father, knowing his own incomprehensibility, gave to the elements — which he also calls Aeons — that each one of them should cry out its own utterance, since the whole could not utter that One which is the totality.

Expounding this Quaternity to her, he is said to have spoken thus: "I wish to show you Truth herself as well. For I have brought her down from the dwellings above, so that you may behold her naked, and gaze upon her beauty; indeed, that you may hear her speaking, and marvel at her wisdom. See then: upon her head, above, is Alpha and Omega; her neck holds Beta and Psi; on her shoulders, together with her hands, rest Gamma and Chi; her breast is Delta and Phi; her waist is Epsilon and Upsilon; her belly is Zeta and Tau; her private parts are Eta and Sigma; her thighs are Theta and Rho; her knees are Iota and Pi [text corrupt: 'the depths of the sensible things, which now the Forefather...']; her calves are Kappa and Xi; her feet are Lambda and Nu. This is her body — that of Truth, according to the magician; this is the shape belonging to the element, and this the outward form of the letter." He gives this element the name "Man," and says it is the source of every word, and the beginning of all utterance, and the exposition of everything inexpressible, and the mouth of Silence itself. This, then, is her body. "But do you," he says, "lift your understanding higher, and hear the Word, the Self-begotten and the Father-begotten, from the mouth of Truth" — Truth approaching him, opening her mouth, and speaking a word; and this word became a name, and this name is what we know and speak: Christ Jesus. When she had named this, she immediately fell silent. But when Marcus supposed that
she was going to say something more, the Quaternity, coming forward again, said: "You have thought the word you heard from the mouth of Truth to be something contemptible. This is not, as you suppose and think, merely a name; you have only its sound, but you are ignorant of its power. Now Jesus is a name of note, having six letters, known to all who are of the calling; but that which is understood by those who are akin to it, whose portion is above, is the number of the elements. For the mute letters, nine in number, you must reckon to be of the Father and of Truth, since they are without voice — that is, both inexpressible and unspeakable. The semivowels, again, being eight, belong to the Logos and to Zoe, occupying, so to speak, a middle position between the mute letters and the vowels, and receive the emanation of those above them, and the elevation of those below them. The vowels, in turn, are also seven, and belong to Anthropos and Ecclesia, since it was through Anthropos that the voice, going forth, gave them form — for the sound of the voice bestowed shape upon them. Thus Logos and Zoe have six letters; Anthropos and Ecclesia have six; Father and Truth have nine — [the text is here corrupt and disordered] — descending, sent forth to that place from which it had been separated, for the amendment of the things that had been made, so that the unity of the Pleromas, possessing equality, might bring forth one fruit in all things, the power that comes from all things. And thus the one who is of the number seven received the power of those who are eight, and there were made three places corresponding to these numbers, though the ogdoads are eight — which, coming together three times, showed forth the number twenty-four. And of the three elements he says there exist three pairs of powers in conjunction, which make six, from which the twenty-four letters emanated, the fourfold reckoning of the ineffable Quaternity producing the same number. And these are clothed by the three powers in the likeness of that which is invisible; and the images of these elements, when reckoned together with the thirty-four letters, together with the power that corresponds by analogy, make the number thirty. The fruit of this reasoning and arrangement, he says, appeared in the likeness of an image in him who, after four days, went up onto the mountain and became the sixth, who came down and was detained in the week — though he was the notable Ogdoad, and had in himself the whole number of the elements, which he made manifest when he himself came to baptism: the descent of the dove, which is Omega and Alpha. The number thirty consisted of letters [three further pairs are then reckoned], which likewise consist of double letters, so that the whole reckoning of the letters together comes to eight hundred. And for this reason he says that Moses declared man was made on the sixth day; and that the ordering belonging to the sixth day, which is the pure supper, consists in this: the final man came forth so that the first man might be regenerated. The beginning and the end of this arrangement is the sixth hour, in which he was fastened to the wood. For, having a perfect understanding, and knowing the number six to be the power of formation and regeneration, he manifested to the sons of light that generation which was accomplished through him who was made manifest according to that notable number. Hence too he says that the double letters possess the notable number, for the notable number is a composite one. Now the deacon made use of the magnitude of the number seven, as Marcus's Silence says, so that the fruit of the thought conceived by himself might be made manifest. And this notable number, he says, in the present case, must be understood as the one who was figured by the note, understood as him who was, as it were, divided into parts, or cut off, and remained outside — who, by his own power and prudence, through the emission that came from him, animated with the imitation of the power of the hebdomad this world, which is of the seven powers, and appointed it to be the soul of this visible universe. And he himself makes use of this work as though it came about spontaneously and of its own accord; but the rest serve as ministers, being imitations of things that cannot be imitated — the Enthymesis of the Mother. And the first heaven sounds Alpha; the one after it, Epsilon; the third, Eta; the fourth and middle one — the corrupted text does not permit certainty here — Upsilon; and the seventh, from the middle, cries out the element Omega, as Marcus's Silence says — who indeed pursues many things at great length, but affirms nothing true. These powers, he says, all embracing one another at once, sound out and glorify him from whom they were sent forth, and the glory of the sound is sent up to the Forefather. The sound of this glorification, borne down to earth, he says, became the fashioner and begetter of the things that are on earth. [A passage here is too corrupt to render; it concerned the Demiurge's ignorance of these matters, and how he emits each in turn in its revolution.] And he offers as proof the case of infants now being born, whose soul, as soon as it has come forth from the womb, cries out the sound belonging to each element. "Just as," he says, "the seven powers give glory to the Word, in this same way the soul within infants, through weeping and wailing, gives glory to Marcus" — glorifies him! For this reason, too, David said [a further corrupt citation follows], and again, in that same passage: "It is the heavens that proclaim God's glory." And for this reason, when the soul is in pains and calamities, for its own relief it says "Omega," as a sign of praise, so that the soul above, recognizing that this is akin to itself, may send help down to it. And concerning the whole name composed of these letters, and further concerning the body of Truth, which has twelve members, each member consisting of two letters; and concerning her voice, which spoke without speaking; and concerning the resolution of that name, which has not been declared; and concerning the soul belonging to the world, and to man, in keeping with the ordering they possess "after the image" — thus has he raved. Henceforth we shall relate how their Quaternity shows the corresponding power derived from names, so that nothing may be hidden from you, most beloved, of the things that have come to us from what is said by these men, as you have often asked of us.

======== Book I — Chapter 15 ========

[The opening lines of this passage are corrupted beyond recovery in the source.] Thus their exceedingly wise Silence announces the generation of the twenty-four elements: that from the Unity there is a Oneness, from which come two emissions, as has been said before — the Monad and the One — which came to be: for twice two is four. And again, two and four, put together in the same reckoning, made manifest the number six. These six, multiplied fourfold, generated twenty-four figures. And the names of the first Quaternity are understood as holy of holies, which cannot be uttered; they are understood by the Son alone, who knows what things the Father knows. But the other names — [text corrupt] — for the name has in itself seven letters, Arrhetos five, and Sige five, which, put together, twice five and twice seven, complete the number twenty-four. Likewise the second Quaternity, Logos and Zoe, Anthropos and Ecclesia, showed forth the same number of elements. And the expressible name of the Savior also has six letters, but his inexpressible name has twenty-four letters, and his nameable name has thirty letters. And for this reason he says that he is called Alpha and Omega, so as to signify the dove, since this bird has this number. But Jesus, he says, was generated in this ineffable way: proceeding out of the Mother of all things — which is to say, out of the first Quaternity — he came into the place belonging to a daughter; a second Quaternity was formed, and there came to be an Ogdoad, from which proceeded a Decad; thus was made sixteen [text corrupt]. The Decad, then, joined to the Ogdoad and multiplying it tenfold, made the number eighty; and eighty again multiplied ten times made eight hundred, so that the whole number, proceeding from the Ogdoad into the Decad, is eight, and eighty, and eight hundred, which is Jesus. For the name Jesus, according to the reckoning of Greek letters, has the value eight hundred and eighty-eight [Greek numerals: I=10, H=8, S=200, O=70, U=400, S=200]. You have clearly, then, the generation of the supercelestial Jesus, according to them. Wherefore the Greek letter Episemon also has eight units, eighty tens, and eight hundreds, showing the number eight hundred eighty-eight, that is, Jesus, who consists of all the numbers; and for this reason he is called Alpha and Omega, since this signifies his generation from all things. And again in this way: the numbers of the first Quaternity, according to their own progression, when multiplied into themselves, produce ten times ten, which is a hundred, and this they wish to be Jesus. But Christ also, he says, has eight letters, by which the first Ogdoad is signified; and these, with Iota added, generated the number 888. It is said, moreover, that the Son is also called Christ, that is, twelve: for the name "Son" has four letters, and "Christ" eight, which, put together, showed forth the greatness of the Dodecad. But before this notable name — that is, of Jesus, the Son — appeared, humanity lay in profound error and not-knowing. But when this letter-name was made manifest — which was clothed with flesh so as to descend to the perceptible sense of man, having in itself Christ himself, and being itself both twelve and twenty-four — then, recognizing him, they ceased from ignorance, and ascended from death to life, this name having been made for them a guide to the Father of Truth. For the Father of all things had willed to dissolve ignorance and destroy death; and the dissolution of ignorance was the knowledge of him. And for this reason he chose, according to his will, that man who is according to his image, the power that is above, and appointed him. For from the Quaternity the Aeons proceeded. Now in the Quaternity were Anthropos and Ecclesia, Logos and Zoe. From these, then, powers emanated and generated him who was made manifest on earth, Jesus. And the place of the Logos was filled by the angel Gabriel, that of Zoe by the Holy Spirit, that of Anthropos by the power of the Most High, and the place of Ecclesia is shown by the Virgin. And thus he who is according to the arrangement was begotten through Mary's womb, chosen through the Word unto his own recognition. And when he came to the water, there descended upon him, as a dove, the one who runs back upward and fulfilled the number twelve, in whom was the seed of those who were sown together with him, and who came down together and went up together with him. And this power that descended he calls the seed of the Father, holding within it the Father together with the Son, and that unnameable power of Silence which is known through them, and all the Aeons. And this, he says, is the Spirit who spoke through the mouth of Jesus, who confessed himself to be the Son of Man, and made manifest the Father; descending upon Jesus, he was united to him. And he destroyed death, he says, ... Christ Jesus. So then Jesus is a name belonging to the likeness and figure of that Man into whom he began to descend, who is said to have in himself both Man himself, and the Logos, and the Father, and the Unspeakable, and Silence, and Truth, and the Church, and Life.

These things are indeed beyond every "alas" and "woe," beyond all tragic exclamation and cry of grief. For who would not hate this man, so wicked a poet, the composer of such great lies, when he sees Truth made an idol by Marcus, and branded with the letters of the alphabet? Only lately — as one might say, "yesterday and the day before" — it is admitted among the Greeks that sixteen letters came to them at first from Cadmus; afterward, with the passage of time, further letters were devised on their own account, some aspirated, some doubled; and finally, so the account goes, Palamedes contributed the long vowels. So then, this discovery is later than even those who came before him, and later than those who added the remaining letters, and later in time even than you yourself, Marcus. But you alone have degraded into an idol that Truth which you claim to preach.

Who could endure your much-babbling Silence, who names the Unnameable, expounds the Inexpressible, and utters him who is beyond investigation, and says that he opened his mouth — he whom you call incorporeal and formless — and sent forth a Word, as though one of the composite living creatures; a Word, too, that is like him who sent it forth, and has become the form of the Invisible, made up of thirty elements distributed across four syllables? Then, following that same likeness you assign to the Word, the Father of all will, on your own account, likewise consist of thirty elements across four syllables! Again, who could put up with you, when you confine the maker and demiurge and fashioner of all things, the Word of God, now to thirty figures and numbers, now to twenty-four, now to six only, and diminish him into syllables — [a portion of the text is here missing] — into four syllables, and thirty elements; and bring down the Lord of all, who established the heavens, to the number 888, just as you do the alphabet; and subject the Father, who contains all things and is contained by none, to a Quaternity, an Ogdoad, and a Dodecad, and, through such multiplications, actually expound — as you claim — that which is ineffable and unknowable of the Father? And him whom you name incorporeal and without substance, you fashion, out of many letters generated one from another, into matter and substance — you yourself proving to be a false Daedalus and an evil craftsman of that most sublime power; and the substance you call indivisible you subdivide into mute, and vocal, and semivocal sounds, lying against the Father of all things and his purpose in all this — and so you have plunged into the utmost blasphemy and great impiety all who believe in you.

Wherefore, justly and fittingly, an elder, a herald of truth inspired by the divine, inveighed against such rashness of yours, speaking thus:

"Marcus, fashioner of idols, inspector of portents,
Skilled in astrology and in the magic art,
By which you confirm the doctrines of error,
Showing signs to those whom you seduce,
The workings of an apostate power,
Which your father Satan supplies to you,
Enabling you, through angelic power, to do these things,
Making you a forerunner of the wickedness opposed to God."

Such were the words of this elder, beloved of God. As for us, we return to the remaining matters.

======== Book I — Chapter 16 ========

HOW THEY EXPLAIN THE PARABLES

Thus, joining together into one the generation of the Aeons, the straying of the sheep, and its recovery, those who reduce everything to numbers dare to proclaim it mystically, saying that all things consist of the monad and the duad; and counting upward from the monad through four, they thereby produce the decad. For one, two, three, and four, taken together, yield the number ten, the number of the Aeons. Again, the duad, proceeding from itself up to the episemon (the numeral-sign for six) -- that is, two, four, and six -- points to the duodecad. And again in like manner from the duad there arises that in which are the ogdoad, the decad, and the duodecad. They call the duodecad, because it has the episemon following upon it, "the passion," on account of the episemon. And for this reason, they say, when a certain defect occurred with respect to the number twelve, the wanton sheep went astray, since an apostasy took place from the duodecad. In like manner they declare that one power, departing from the duodecad, perished; and that this is the woman who lost the drachma, lit the lamp, and found it. So too the remaining numbers in the parable of the drachma generate the number ninety-nine, since nine times eleven makes ninety-nine. For which reason they also say that the word "Amen" contains this same number.
I shall not be too weary to relate to you also their other interpretation, so that you may see the fruit of their teaching from every side. For they hold that the letter Eta, together with the episemon, is the ogdoad, since it stands in the eighth place from Alpha; and again, reckoning the number of the letters themselves without the episemon, and adding them up as far as Eta, they show the triacontad, thirty. For if one begins from Alpha and ends at Eta, reckoning the number of the letters but removing the episemon, and then adding together the increasing value of the letters, he will find the number thirty. For up to the letter Epsilon the sum is fifteen; then, when the value belonging to the seventh letter is added to these, it makes twenty. And when Eta, which is the eighth, is added to these, it completes the wonderful triacontad. From this, they claim, it follows that the ogdoad mothers the whole company of thirty Aeons. Since, then, the number thirty is composed as a unity out of three powers, this same number multiplied three times makes ninety -- and here they bring in their sacred names and letter-symbols for God (the divine names rendered in Hebrew characters, now largely illegible in this copy). And this triad, multiplied by itself, produced nine. Thus the ogdoad produced the number ninety-nine. And because the twelfth Aeon, departing, left the region above, they say that, accordingly, the type of this is set forth in the shape of the letters of the Word: for the eleventh letter (that is, Lambda) has the value thirty, and is set forth as an image of the arrangement above; since, reckoning from Alpha without the episemon, the number of the letters, added together with their increasing values as far as this letter, makes the number ninety-nine. And that Lambda, standing eleventh in order, went down in search of its like, so as to complete the number one hundred, and, having found it, was made complete -- this, they say, is evident from the very shape of the letter. For Lambda, as it were coming in search of its like, finding it, and drawing it into itself, filled up the twelfth place, since the letter Mu is made up of two Lambdas. For this reason too, they say, in escaping by means of this knowledge to the ninety-ninth place -- that is, to the place of diminishment, the type of the left hand -- it was carried across into the right hand.
As you go through all this, my dearest friend, I know very well that you will laugh a great deal at such foolishness of theirs, so puffed up with its own supposed wisdom. Yet they deserve to be mourned, who set forth so great a religion of God, and the greatness of his truly ineffable power, and such great dispensations of God, by means of Alpha and Beta and numbers so cold and so violently forced. And as many as fall away from the Church and give their assent to these old wives' fables are truly condemned by their own selves -- the very ones whom Paul bids us to regard, marking off, as it were, the merely natural ("psychic") by the left hand and the spiritual by the right, as we have noted the usage elsewhere in both profane and sacred writers -- to avoid after a first and second admonition. For John, the Lord's disciple, extended condemnation of them even further, refusing to let us so much as say "Hail" to them: "For whoever bids them hail," he says, "shares in their most wicked works." And rightly so: for the Lord says, "There is no rejoicing for the ungodly." And these are impious beyond all impiety, who claim that he who fashioned sky and earth, the sole all-powerful God beside whom no other God exists, was himself produced out of a defect, a defect which in turn sprang from a prior defect -- with the result, on their account, that he now stands forth as the offspring of a third defect. This opinion we must justly spit upon and utterly condemn, and we ought to flee far away from such people; and the more they insist upon these things and delight in their own inventions, the more we should recognize that they are all the more agitated by the most wicked spirits of the ogdoad. (Here the manuscript preserves, badly damaged, a Greek phrase repeating the same charge: that he who made sky and earth, God alone and all-powerful, grants the impious "no peace" -- interpreted by them as sprung from Enthymesis and from Sophia, whom they also call "she who is to be called neither peace nor salvation": this very defect, they say, belongs to the Pleroma.) Just as those who have fallen into a fit of frenzy sometimes laugh all the more, and think themselves well, and do everything as though they were sane -- indeed, as though more than sane -- the worse off they in fact are; so too these men: the more they are thought to be wise, the more, in enervating themselves and shooting beyond the mark, they show that they are not wise at all. For the unclean spirit of ignorance, going out, and then finding them empty -- given over not to God but to worldly questions -- takes to itself seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and, making their thinking foolish, as though they could discover the things that are above God, has fittingly, in a scheme designed for their exclusion, deposited in them an ogdoad of the most wicked spirits of ignorance.

======== Book I — Chapter 17 ========

HOW THEY EXPOUND CREATION AS HAVING BEEN MADE

I want to relate to you also how they say that creation itself was fashioned by the Demiurge -- while he himself was unaware of it -- after the image of the invisible things, through the agency of the Mother. First, they say that the four elements -- fire, water, earth, air -- stand forth as an image of the Quaternion above; and they carefully enumerate the properties associated with them, that is, hot and cold, moist and dry. They say there are seven bodies, which they also call heavens; and after these, the circle containing them, which they call the eighth heaven; and after that, the sun and the moon. Since these are ten in number, they say these picture that unseen decad brought forth by Logos and Zoe. And they display the duodecad through the circle called the zodiac. For they hold that the twelve signs quite openly picture, as if through a sort of shadow, the duodecad, offspring of Anthropos and Ecclesia. And, on the other hand, they say that the heaven set above, which bears down upon that concave sphere, and, though itself the swiftest, moderates the velocity of the lower spheres by its own contrary slowness -- so that it completes its circuit from sign to sign in thirty years -- is an image of their Horos, who encompasses the Mother of their Thirty. And the moon, again, they say, traces out its own circuit in its proper measure. And the sun, going around in twelve months and completing its circular restoration, manifests the duodecad through its twelve months. And the days themselves, having a measure of twelve hours, are the type of the duodecad which does not appear. And the hour too, they say, which is a twelfth part of the day, is adorned with thirty parts, as an image of the triacontad. And the entire circumference of the zodiacal circle measures three hundred and sixty parts, since each of the signs has thirty parts. Thus too, they say, through the circle is preserved the image of the conjunction of these twelve with the thirty. Further, they say the earth is divided into twelve climatic zones, and that in each zone the days themselves diminish accordingly; indeed, they maintain that this whole arrangement, receiving power from the heavens by way of descent, and producing offspring like to the power that sent down that distillation, is a most manifest type of the duodecad and its children.
Besides this, they say that the Demiurge, wishing to imitate the boundless, eternal, infinite, and timeless nature of the ogdoad above, but being unable -- since he is the fruit of a defect -- to reproduce its abiding and perpetual character, deposited its eternity instead into spans of time, and times, and numbers of many years, supposing that by a multitude of times he could imitate its boundlessness. Here, they say, truth escaped him and falsehood followed after; and for this reason his work, when its times are fulfilled, will meet with destruction.

======== Book I — Chapter 18 ========

HOW THE THINGS FOUND IN SCRIPTURE ARE MADE TO FIT THEIR SYSTEM

Having said such things about creation, each one of them daily invents, as best he can, something new to bring forward beyond this. For Moses, they say, beginning the work concerning creation, immediately at the outset shows forth the Mother of all, saying: "In the beginning God made heaven and earth." By naming these four things -- God, the beginning, heaven, and earth -- he depicted, as they themselves say, their own Quaternion. And, manifesting its invisible and hidden character, he says: "And the earth was invisible and without form." And they hold that he thus spoke of the second Quaternion, the offspring of the first, by naming the abyss and darkness, in which are also the waters, and the spirit that was borne over the waters. After this, calling to mind the decad, he speaks of light, and day, and night, and the firmament, and evening, and what is called morning, and the dry land, and the sea, and further, vegetation, and, in the tenth place, the tree -- thus, through these ten names, they say, he manifests the ten Aeons. For he mentions the sun, moon, and stars, seasons and years, sea-monsters, and further fish, creeping things, birds, four-footed beasts, and wild animals too, and, twelfth and above all of these, man. In this way, they teach, the triacontad was uttered by the Spirit speaking through Moses. They further teach that man, formed according to the image of the power above, has in himself that power which derives from the one source. This power, they say, is established as a Monad and resides in the brain, and flows out from there into a tetrad of senses -- for only four senses are counted -- whose organs are situated in the head, corresponding to the four rivers of Paradise. Touch, too, they say, has its seat in that same place in the brain, from which flow the four powers, after the image of the Tetrad above, which are called: sight, the first; hearing, the second; smell, the third; and taste, the fourth. And they say the ogdoad is signified through man in this way: he has two ears, and likewise two eyes, and further two organs of smell, and a double taste, of bitter and of sweet. They teach that man as a whole bears the entire image of the triacontad in this way: in his hands he carries the decad through his fingers, and in his whole body, when it is divided into members, the duodecad. And the rest of the body, as we have already noted, they divide accordingly. The ogdoad, being ineffable and invisible, is understood to be hidden away in the inward parts.
Again, they say that the sun, the great light, was made on the fourth day, on account of the number of the Quaternion. And of the tabernacle too, which was constructed by Moses, they say that its courts of fine linen, blue, purple, and scarlet -- and indeed whatever else of this kind is found set down in the Scriptures wherever the number four can be discerned -- were made on account of their Quaternion. And again the ogdoad, they say, is shown in this way: man came into being on the eighth day. At times, though, they would rather say he was made on the sixth day, at other times the eighth -- unless what they mean is that the earthly man took shape on the sixth day, while the fleshly man came on the eighth; for here they draw a distinction: the man fashioned "in the image and after the likeness of God," male and female, they call the spiritual man, whereas the other is the one molded from the earth.
And they say that the arrangement of the ark in the flood, in which eight persons were saved, most plainly shows forth the ogdoad. And they say David signifies this same thing, since he was the eighth born among his brothers. Further, they say that circumcision, which takes place on the eighth day, manifests the circumcision of the ogdoad above. And, in general, they say that whatever is found in the Scriptures that can be drawn out to the number eight fulfills the mystery of the ogdoad. And they say the decad is signified by the ten nations which God promised to give Abraham for a possession; and that the arrangement concerning Sarah -- how, after ten years, she gave him her handmaid Hagar to have a son by her -- signifies the same thing. And also Abraham's servant, sent to Rebecca, who at the well gave her ten golden bracelets, and her brothers who kept her back for ten days; and further Jeroboam, who received ten scepters; and the tabernacle's ten courts, and its pillars of ten cubits, and the ten sons of Jacob sent the first time into Egypt to buy grain, and the ten apostles before whom the Lord appeared after rising, at the moment Thomas was absent -- all these, they claim, foreshadowed the unseen decad. As for the duodecad, to which they say all this corresponds, it is, in their view, set forth pointedly and quite plainly everywhere: take, for example, the twelve sons of Jacob, source in turn of the twelve tribes; and the varicolored breastplate, having twelve stones, and twelve bells; and the twelve stones set up by Moses under the mountain, and likewise those set up by Joshua in the river, and the others set up on the far side, carried by those who bore the ark of the covenant; and the twelve stones set up by Elijah for the burnt offering of the calf; and the number of the apostles too, and absolutely everything that keeps to the number twelve -- all these, they hold, signify their duodecad. And the unity of all these, which is called the triacontad, they show through the ark, whose height under Noah was thirty cubits; and through Samuel, and Saul, who hid in the field for thirty days, and through those who entered the cave with him; and because the holy tabernacle measured thirty cubits in length. And whatever else is found equal in number to these, they likewise put forward through such assertions to demonstrate their triacontad.

======== Book I — Chapter 19 ========

HOW THEY TRY TO INTRODUCE A FATHER UNKNOWN TO ALL. I have thought it necessary to add, further, how great an effort they make to persuade people, choosing texts out of the Scriptures, concerning their Forefather who, they say, was unknown to everyone before the coming of Christ — so as to show that our Lord proclaimed a Father who differs from the Craftsman of this cosmos — a figure whom, as noted earlier, they slander with impious contempt, naming him the offspring of a flaw. So they twist the prophet Isaiah's words, "But Israel has not known me, and the people has not understood me," to this same purpose. And what is said in Hosea, "Faithfulness is nowhere among them, nor is there any knowledge of God" — this too they try to bend to their meaning. And "there is none that understands or seeks after God: they have all turned aside, they have together become useless," they credit to the ignorance of their Bythos. And what was said through Moses, "No one shall see God and live," they urge as referring to their Bythos.
And they say that it was the Maker who was indeed seen by the prophets, but that the text "no one shall see God and live" was spoken of the invisible Greatness unknown to all. Now, that this saying "no one shall see God" was indeed spoken of the invisible Father who made all things is plain to all of us; but that it was not spoken of him — as it is in the catholic understanding, and by the plain sense of the word — but of the Demiurge, as if he too were the invisible God, is something they claim will be shown as the argument proceeds. They say that Daniel signifies the same thing when he asks the angel for the interpretation of the visions, as though not knowing it himself. And that the angel, concealing from him the vast secret of Bythos, says to him, "Go your way, Daniel, for these words are shut up until the wise understand, and the white ones are made white" — and they boast that they themselves are the "white ones" and the "wise ones.

======== Book I — Chapter 20 ========

BY WHAT SCRIPTURAL TESTIMONIES THEY MAKE USE OF. Besides all this, they have also invented an unspeakable [number of apocryphal and spurious writings], which they bring forward to the amazement of the foolish, and of those who do not know the writings of truth. Among these they also use that falsehood, that when the Lord was a child and was learning his letters, when his teacher said to him, as is customary, "Say Alpha," he answered, "Alpha." Then, when the teacher told him to say "Beta," the Lord is said to have replied, "Explain to me first what Alpha itself signifies, and only afterward shall I disclose Beta to you." And they explain this as though he alone knew the Unknown, which he showed forth under the type of Alpha.
Certain other things found in the Gospel they twist into this same character. Such as his answer to his mother, when he was twelve years old: "Did you not realize that I am bound to occupy myself with what belongs to my Father?" — this "Father," whom they [his parents] did not know, they say he was announcing to them. And that for this reason he sent out his disciples to the twelve tribes, to announce to them the God they did not know. And to the one who said to him, "Good Master," they say he confessed that he who is truly good is God, by answering, "Why do you call me good? There is none good but the Father who is in heaven" — for they now say the heavens are called Aeons. And for this reason, they say, he did not answer those who said to him, "By what authority do you do this?" but by his own counter-question rather confounded them, thereby, they interpret, showing forth the unspeakable nature of the Father, in that he did not tell them. And also in his saying, "Many times have I longed to hear this very word, yet had no one who could tell it to me," they say he shows that there is one who is truly the one God, whom they [his hearers] did not know. Further, in that when he came close to Jerusalem, he mourned over the city and declared, "If only you, even you, had recognized on this day what belongs to your peace — but it is now concealed from your eyes," they say he made manifest [the unknown Father]. And again, in saying, "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, learn from me," they say he was announcing the Father of truth. For what they did not know, they say, this he promised to teach them.
And as the crown of the above, and as it were the culmination of their rule, they bring forward this: "I confess to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding, and have revealed them to little children. Even so, Father, for so it was well-pleasing in your sight. Everything has been handed over to me by my Father; and none recognizes the Father but the Son, nor does anyone recognize the Son but the Father, together with whomever the Son chooses to reveal him." In these words, they say, he most plainly showed that before his coming no one had openly known the Father of truth; and they wish to adapt this to mean that, whereas the Maker and Fashioner [of the world] has always been known by all, it is of the Father unknown to all — whom they themselves proclaim — that the Lord said these things.

======== Book I — Chapter 21 ========

HOW MUCH THEY SAY AND DO CONCERNING THEIR "REDEMPTION." Now their teaching about redemption turns out to be as invisible and incomprehensible as their mother [Achamoth] herself is [said to be] of things incomprehensible and invisible. And because it is unstable, it cannot be reported simply, or in a single account, since every one of them transmits it exactly as suits his own fancy. For there are as many "redemptions" as there are mystic priests of this kind of teaching. And since this form of teaching amounts to a denial of the baptism which is unto regeneration in God, and to the destruction of the whole of the faith — a thing remitted [in effect] by Satan — we shall refute them and treat of it in a more suitable place.
They say that this redemption is necessary for those who have received the perfect knowledge, so that they may be regenerated into that power which is above all things. For otherwise, they say, it is impossible for us to enter within the Pleroma, since this is what leads down into the depth of Bythos. And they hold that the baptism of the visible Jesus served to release sin, but that the redemption brought by the Christ who came down upon him leads unto perfection; the one, they say, is animal (psychic), the other spiritual. And the baptism proclaimed by John was unto repentance, but the redemption of the Christ who is in him was appointed unto perfection; and this is what he means when he says, "I have another baptism to be baptized with, and I am greatly pressed until it is accomplished." They also say that the Lord applied this "redemption" to Zebedee's two sons, at the moment their mother requested seats for them, one at his right and one at his left within his kingdom, saying to them, "Are you able to undergo the same baptism I myself must undergo?" And they say that Paul very often plainly showed forth this redemption which is in Christ Jesus; and that this is the one which is handed down among them in various and inconsistent ways.

[The text here becomes badly garbled in the source and cannot be reliably reconstructed; a passage concerning the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan by John, and his being redeemed by the Spirit descending on him like a dove, is indicated but not translatable with confidence.]

CONCERNING THEIR RITES OF REDEMPTION AMONG THEM. Some of them prepare a kind of bridal chamber, and perform a mystic rite with certain set formulas over those who are being initiated, and call what is done by them "spiritual marriage," after the likeness of the unions above. Others bring the candidates to water, and baptizing them, say: "In the name of the Father unknown to all, in Truth who is mother of all, in him who came down upon Jesus, unto union, fellowship, and the powers." Others again pronounce certain Hebrew names over them, so as to astonish or terrify those being initiated, in words such as: [Hebrew-sounding formula, garbled beyond safe translation] — the sense of which is: "I call upon what stands above all the power belonging to the Father, that which bears the name light, spirit, and life, for you have held sway within the body." Others again pronounce the redemption thus: "The name that is hidden from every deity and lordship and truth, which Jesus of Nazareth put on in the zones of light, Christ, Lord of the living, through the Holy Spirit, unto the redemption of the angels." [A further name is given, badly corrupted in the source; it cannot be safely reconstructed.] They and those who stand by then pronounce over the one being initiated: "May peace rest on everyone bearing this name." Following this they anoint the initiate with the oil called opobalsam, for they say this ointment is a type of that sweet savor which is above all things. Some of them again say that bringing candidates to water is superfluous; instead, mixing oil and water together, along with certain profane formulas like those mentioned, they pour it over the heads of those being initiated, and this, they hold, is the redemption. These too anoint with opobalsam.

But others reject all of this, saying that the rite of the ineffable and unseen power ought not to be carried out through visible, perishable, created matter, nor things that cannot be conceived by the mind, and are incorporeal and imperceptible, be effected through things perceptible and corporeal. Rather, they say, the perfect redemption is simply the knowledge itself of the unspeakable Greatness; for since all things — the defect and the passion — arose from ignorance, the whole condition that sprang from ignorance is dissolved through knowledge; and so this knowledge redeems the man within. And this redemption is neither bodily, since the body is corruptible, nor animal (psychic), since the soul too arises from the defect and is only, as it were, a dwelling place for the spirit: redemption, therefore, must be spiritual. For the inner, spiritual man is redeemed through knowledge, and the knowledge of the universe is sufficient for them; and this is the true redemption.

HOW THEY INSTRUCT THOSE WHO BELIEVE THEM, AND WHAT WORDS THEY USE. There are others who "redeem" the dying at the very point of death, pouring oil and water, or the aforesaid ointment mixed with water, upon their heads, together with the invocations already mentioned, so that they may pass beyond the grasp and sight of the ruling princes and powers, and so their inner self may rise above the unseen realms — as their body remains behind within the created order, while the soul is delivered over to the Demiurge. And they instruct them to say this to the powers, once they have died: "I belong to the Father as offspring — the Father who existed beforehand — and I am a child within him who existed beforehand. I have come to see all things, both my own and those foreign to me — not wholly foreign, however, for they belong to Achamoth, who is female, and who made these things for herself, deriving her race from him who pre-existed, and returning again into that from which I came." And by saying this, they claim, the soul escapes and evades the powers. Then it comes to those who are about the Demiurge, and says to them: "I am a costly vessel, costlier than the female who fashioned you. Your mother does not perceive the root she springs from, but I, for my part, know who I am, and I know my origin, and I appeal to the imperishable Sophia dwelling within the Father, who is mother to your mother — one who has no father and takes no male partner; rather a female born of a female shaped you, unaware of her own mother, supposing herself solitary — but I appeal to her mother." And they say that those who are about the Demiurge, hearing this, are thrown into great confusion, and reproach their own root and the race of their mother, while the soul itself strips off its bonds, that is, [escapes] into its own things.

Such, then, is what has come to us concerning their "redemption." But since they disagree with one another both in doctrine and in tradition, and since the more recent among them are known to strive, day after day, to invent something new, and to bring forth what has never before crossed anyone's mind, it is a hard task to set out all of their opinions.

======== Book I — Chapter 22 ========

WHAT IS SET BEFORE ALL HERETICS, AND WHITHER THEY TEND. Since we hold the standard of truth — namely, that a single all-powerful God exists, who fashioned everything through his Word, shaping and producing all that exists out of what did not exist, so that it might come to be — as Scripture puts it: "The heavens were fixed in place by the utterance of the Lord, and their whole array by the breath issuing from his mouth"; and again, "Through him everything came into being, and apart from him nothing came into being" — of that entire "everything," the Father produced it all through him, whether visible or invisible, whether perceptible or intelligible, whether temporal, on account of a certain arrangement, or eternal and everlasting — and that he made these not by means of angels, nor by any powers cut off from his own thought, for God stands in need of nothing, but through his own Word and Spirit he makes and arranges and governs all things, and grants existence to all things; it is he who made the world (the world too falling under "all things"), he who formed mankind, he who is God to Abraham, God to Isaac, and God to Jacob — beyond whom exists no further deity, no origin, no dominion, no Pleroma; this one is Father to our Lord Jesus Christ, as we intend to demonstrate. Holding fast, then, to this rule, we shall easily refute them as having strayed from the truth, however much they may say and however varied it may be. For almost all the heresies, while professing to say there is one God, corrupt this by their evil opinion, showing themselves ungrateful to him who made them, just as the Gentiles do through idolatry. They despise God, and set themselves against their own salvation, becoming their own bitterest accusers, and false witnesses against themselves. They will indeed be raised bodily, even unwillingly, so as to recognize the might of the one who brings them back from death; yet on account of their unbelief they shall have no place counted with the righteous.
Since, then, the exposure and refutation of all the heretics is varied and manifold, and it is our purpose to contradict every one of them according to their own particular character, we have judged it necessary first to set forth their source and root, so that, coming to know their most sublime Bythos (Depth), you may understand the tree from which such fruits have flowed down. [A further fragment survives only in ruin: "...is established as a dwelling."]

======== Book I — Chapter 23 ========

1. WHAT IS THE DOCTRINE OF SIMON, THE SAMARITAN MAGICIAN.

1. Simon the Samaritan was that sorcerer of whom Luke, companion and disciple of the apostles, tells, recording: "Now a certain man by the name of Simon had, prior to this, been resident in the city, working sorcery and throwing the Samaritan populace into amazement, claiming to be someone of great importance; and everyone paid him attention, humble and prominent alike, declaring, This fellow is the power of God, the one styled Great. To him they paid attention, since for a considerable time his sorceries had left them spellbound."

This Simon, accordingly, put on a show of belief, imagining that the apostles effected their healings through sorcery rather than through God's power, and that their bestowal of the Holy Spirit by laying on of hands was likewise some superior form of magical craft. Holding this suspicion, and proffering the apostles payment so that he too might obtain the ability to grant the Holy Spirit to anyone he chose, he was answered by Peter: "May your silver go to ruin along with you, since you supposed God's gift could be bought with money. You hold no share, no portion, in this affair, for your heart stands crooked before God. I perceive that bitter venom fills you and that you are bound in wickedness's chains."

Since even then he would not put his trust in God, and, driven by greed, sought to rival the apostles in order that he too might win renown, he pursued the craft of sorcery still further, to a degree that left crowds bewildered—this during the reign of the emperor Claudius, under whom, it is even reported, he was honored with a statue for his magical feats.

Many accordingly hailed him as divine, and he claimed that it was he himself who had shown himself to the Jews in the character of the Son, had come down among the Samaritans as the Father, and had arrived among the remaining nations under the character of the Holy Spirit. He proclaimed himself the loftiest of powers, namely the Father set above everything, and permitted men to address him by any title at all that they pleased.
Concerning Simon the Samaritan, from whom all the heresies took their rise, and concerning the period at which he flourished, the earliest historians bear him out; compare, word for word, Justin in the passage cited (though whether Flavius Josephus, Antiquities XX, is also to be joined to this witness is not certain). As for his having been honored with a statue, many scholars in fact deny this, and suppose it a mistake of Justin's, who misread an inscription reading "To Semo Sancus, the god Fidius," a god dedicated among the Sabines—an inscription which nevertheless furnishes ample material for a sect of this kind.

This man traveled about accompanied by a certain Helen, a woman he had ransomed from prostitution in the Phoenician city of Tyre, declaring that she was Ennoia, the initial thought his intellect had produced, mother of the universe, the one by means of whom, at the outset, it had entered his intellect to fashion angels and archangels; and that she, willingly obeying her father, went down into the regions below and there generated angels and powers, the makers, he claimed, of this present world.

After she had begotten them, she was held captive by them out of envy, because they did not wish to be thought the offspring of anyone else—for he himself was wholly unknown to them. This Thought of hers was kept prisoner by the very powers and angels she had brought forth, and endured at their hands abuse of every description, unable to make her way back up to her father—so much so that she was confined even within a mortal frame, passing, age after age, from body to body, as though shifted from container to container, entering one female form after another.

Among these she had dwelt too in the person of that Helen for whose sake the war at Troy was waged; on which account Stesichorus, having reviled her in verse, was blinded, and later, relenting and composing the poems called the Palinodes, in which he praised her instead, regained his sight. Passing thus from one body into the next, and bearing continual disgrace throughout, she came at last to stand for hire in a house of prostitution; this, so they claim, was 'the sheep that had strayed.'
Wherefore he himself had come to take up this first conception and free her from her bonds, and to grant salvation to mankind through the knowledge of himself. For since the angels governed the world badly, each of them coveting the first place, he had come to set matters right. [The apparatus at this point cites Plato's Republic on the tradition that the Greeks did not truly fight over the real Helen, since—so a badly damaged fragment of Greek asserts—it was not she herself but her image (eidolon) that the combatants contended for, a notion that suits Simon's system well; it further cites Stesichorus (or Tisias) of Himera in Sicily and his poems against Helen as the 'torch' of the Trojan War, referring for the fragments to Bergk, Poetae Lyrici Graeci; and it notes that Socrates the church historian and Eustathius, in his commentary on Homer's Odyssey IV, relate the same tale.]

He came, then, descending transformed, and made like to the virtues, powers, and angels, so that he himself appeared as a man among men, though he was not a man, and was thought to have suffered in Judea, though he did not suffer. As for the prophets, no further heed need be paid to them by those who place their hope in him and in his Helen, and such people may act freely, doing whatever they wish; for men are saved by his grace, and not according to righteous deeds. Righteous actions, he taught, are not so by nature but only by convention, just as the angels who made the world laid down, by such precepts leading men into servitude. Wherefore he also promised that the world would be dissolved, and that those who are his would be freed from the dominion of those who made it.

2. The mystic priests of this sect, accordingly, live licentiously and practice magic, each according to his own ability. They make use of exorcisms and incantations; of love-charms too and spells for compelling, and of those called familiar spirits and dream-senders, and whatever images are fashioned after the likeness of Minerva; these they worship. They also bear a name taken from Simon, the founder of this most impious teaching, being called after him—it being from them that 'knowledge falsely so called' takes its beginning, as one may learn from their own assertions.

2. WHAT IS THE TEACHING OF MENANDER, AND WHAT ARE THEIR PRACTICES.

Simon's successor was Menander, a Samaritan by birth, who himself likewise attained the summit of the magic art. He said that the first power is unknown to all, but that he himself was the one sent by the invisible powers as Savior for the salvation of mankind. The world, he taught, was made by angels, whom he too, like Simon, said were sent forth from Ennoia. He further taught that through the magical knowledge imparted by him one could overcome even the angels who made the world; for his disciples, he said, receive resurrection through the baptism administered by him, and can no longer die, but remain, without growing old, immortal.

======== Book I — Chapter 24 ========

3. ACCOUNT OF THE TEACHING ACCORDING TO SATURNINUS.

1. Among the successors of these is Saturninus, who taught that the world, and everything in it, was made by angels. Man, however, is a creation of the angels: when a shining image appeared from above, from the highest power, and they were unable to hold it fast because it immediately sped back upward, they exhorted one another, saying, "Let us make man according to the image and likeness." When man had been formed, and the mold could not stand upright because of the weakness of the angels, but wriggled about like a worm, the power above, moved to compassion because man bore its own likeness, dispatched a fiery spark of life, and this it was that lifted the man upright, furnished him with joints, and brought him to life. This spark of life, he says, returns after death to those things of the same kind as itself, while the rest, out of which he was made, is dissolved back into its elements.
He showed the Savior to be unbegotten, incorporeal, and without form, and to have appeared as a man only in seeming. The God of the Jews, he taught, is one of the angels; and because all the other rulers wished to destroy his Father, Christ arrived to bring down the God of the Jews and to rescue everyone who puts faith in him, namely those bearing that spark of life within them. He taught further that mankind, as molded by the angels, falls into two kinds, one base and one upright; and because demons lent their aid to the baser sort, the Savior arrived to bring ruin upon wicked men and demons alike, while rescuing the upright. Marriage and procreation, they say, are of Satan. Many of those belonging to this sect also abstain from animal food, leading many astray through such a feigned continence. Some prophecies, he taught, were spoken by the angels who fashioned the world, others by Satan himself, whom he represents as an angel opposed to the makers of the world, and above all to the God of the Jews.

4. WHAT IS THE ARGUMENT OF BASILIDES.

Basilides, however, in order that his teaching might seem loftier and more plausible, extended his doctrine to an immense degree, showing that Nous (Mind) was first born of the unbegotten Father, and that from him was born Logos (Word); then from Logos, Phronesis (Understanding); and from Phronesis, Sophia (Wisdom) and Dynamis (Power) — the principalities, authorities, and angels, whom he calls the first, and by whom the first heaven was made. Then, by derivation from these, others were made, who shaped a second heaven modeled upon the first; and by that same process, others yet again arose from these, patterned after those preceding them, who fashioned a third heaven; [the record of what stood between is broken off, mentioning only that the sect possessed a commentary on the Gospel and that its founder produced books upon the prophet "Parchor," perhaps Bar Kochba, and that its teachers handed down odes and incantations which Irenaeus likewise records, fragments of which survive in Clement's Stromateis] — and from the third, others descending downward made a fourth, and so on in the same manner; other rulers and angels, they say, were made one after another, and heavens to the number of three hundred and sixty-five. For this reason, too, the year has that many days, corresponding to the number of the heavens.

Those angels, however, who made the last heaven — the one visible to us — established everything that is in the world, and divided among themselves the parts of the earth and of the nations upon it. Their ruler is reckoned to be none other than the God of the Jews. And since this god desired to bring the remaining nations under the dominion of his own people—that is, of the Jews—every other ruling power set itself against him in resistance. That is why the nations, in turn, rose against his people as well. The unbegotten, unnamed Father, however, beholding their destruction, dispatched his firstborn Nous—the one termed Christ—to liberate believers from the dominion of the world's makers. [A damaged clause in the apparatus appears to number the heavens differently and to relocate a phrase about "their prince having numberless powers in himself" to the end of the chapter; Harvey judges that this clause, out of place in the manuscripts, belongs there instead, though the sense remains uncertain. Here too belongs the dualism of darkness and light of which Hegemonius expressly speaks; what follows about the origin of mankind is merely an episode arising from it.]

To their nations he appeared on earth as a man, and performed miracles. Therefore he himself did not suffer, but a certain Simon of Cyrene was compelled to carry his cross in his place; and it was this man who, through ignorance and error, was transfigured by him and crucified, so that everyone would take him for Jesus, while Jesus adopted Simon's appearance and stood nearby, mocking their error. Being an incorporeal power, the very Nous of the unbegotten Father, he could reshape himself however he pleased, and thus rose back up to the one who had sent him, mocking them all the while, since nothing could seize him and he escaped notice entirely.

Those, then, who possess this knowledge are liberated from the rulers responsible for the world; and no one should profess the crucified one, but rather the one who took a man's shape, was mistaken for the crucified one, bore the name Jesus, and was dispatched by the Father, so that by this device he might overturn the handiwork of those who made the world. Whoever, he says, professes the crucified one remains enslaved and subject to the dominion of those who fashioned bodies; but whoever refuses to profess him escapes their grip, and comes to know the design of the unbegotten Father.

5. It is only the souls of these men, he holds, that are to be saved; the bodies, he says, were themselves also made by the rulers who fashioned the world. [The apparatus debates at length here whether Basilides himself, or rather his disciples, pushed this doctrine to the point of a full opposition between matter and spirit — that is, between what is to be understood merely as "soul" in the ordinary sense and what belongs properly to gnosis; several scholars rightly express doubt on this point, since Basilides elsewhere speaks of the soul in his own proper sense.] Properly speaking, the law, they hold, was given by their own chief, the very one who brought the people up out of Egyptian territory.

They teach that meats offered to idols should be despised and counted as nothing, and used without any anxiety; and that the use of all other practices, and of every indulgence, is a matter of indifference. These men also employ magic, images, incantations, invocations, and every other such curious art; they likewise invent certain names, as of angels, declaring that some belong to the first heaven, others to the second, and so on through the rest, and they set forth the names, first principles, angels, and powers belonging to each of these many heavens. And they say that the world itself has a name — the one in which they say the Savior descended and ascended — namely, Caulacau. [Harvey would place the period differently here: for if one removes the clause asserting that the law comes from the God of the Jews, one fails to understand why the followers of Basilides invoked the practices forbidden in that law to justify their own desires.]
So then, whoever has learned these things and has come to know all the angels and their causes becomes invisible and incomprehensible to the angels and to all the powers, just as Caulacau also was. And just as the Son is unknown to all, so they themselves ought to be known by no one; yet while they themselves know all things and pass through all things, they remain invisible and unknown to everyone. 'You,' they say, 'must come to know everyone, but let no one come to know you.' For this reason such people are also ready to deny the faith — or rather, they cannot even suffer for the Name, since they are indistinguishable from everyone else. They say that not many can know these things, but one in a thousand, and two in ten thousand. They say, moreover, that they are no longer Jews, but not yet Christians, and that their mysteries ought not to be spoken at all, but kept hidden in silence. They also assign local positions to the three hundred and sixty-five heavens, just as astrologers do [gloss: 'mortal' — in Hebrew, 'precept upon precept,' since it is the creature of the Demiurge, the lawgiver; Zeesar; 'the Jordan flowing upward' — in Hebrew, 'yet a little while,' since, as will soon be said, the spirit is hidden from very many]. These, then, are the three names, insofar as they signify what is divine, what is human, and what belongs to gnosis. Caulacau is above all things, because he belongs to the Savior, as is made clearer from what follows... They have transferred the character of this teaching [to themselves], saying that the ruler [is] within himself. [The text breaks off here.]

======== Book I — Chapter 25 ========

WHAT CARPOCRATES TEACHES CONCERNING ALL THINGS. Carpocrates and his followers say that the world and the things in it were made by angels far inferior to the unbegotten Father. Jesus, they say, was born from Joseph, and although he was like other men in every way, he differed from the rest in this: that because his soul was firm and pure, it remembered the things it had seen while in that revolution which took place in the presence of the unbegotten God. And for this reason a power was sent to him from that God, so that through it he might escape the makers of the world, and passing through all of them and being freed from all, might ascend to that God — and that the same would happen to those souls who embraced things similar to it. They say that the soul of Jesus, though reared in Jewish custom, despised the Jews, and for this reason received powers by which it did away with the passions that were in men as a punishment.
Any soul, then, that likewise despises the makers of this world, the archons, as the soul of Jesus did, can likewise receive powers to do the same works. Hence they have been carried to such a pitch of arrogance that some of them claim to be equal to Jesus, while others claim to be even stronger than he in some respect — more advanced, in fact, than his very own disciples — men like Peter and Paul, and the others besides — these, they claim, fall short of Jesus in nothing. For their souls, coming from the same revolution and therefore likewise despising the makers of the world, are held worthy of the same power, and will return again to the same place. And if anyone should despise the things of this world more than Jesus did, he could become greater than Jesus himself. [Note: these things pertain, in their essence, to spirits joined to the rational soul through a certain primeval disturbance and confusion, etc. — Observe that Clement attributes to Basilides many things which more properly belong to Carpocrates. Compare: the hypothesis of Basilides says that the soul which had sinned previously in another life suffers punishment here, etc.] They themselves also practice the magic arts, and incantations, love-philtres and charm-potions, and the sending of familiar spirits and dream-senders, and the rest of such wicked devices, claiming that they already have power to rule over the princes and makers of this world — and not only over them, but over everything that has been made in it. And these men have been sent forth by Satan, just as the pagans have, to bring the divine name of the Church into disrepute — some, by hearing what such men do and supposing that all of us are like them, turn their ears away from the proclamation of the truth; others, seeing what these men do, blaspheme all of us, sharing with them nothing in common — not in teaching, not in conduct, not in the manner of everyday life. But while they lead a licentious life, they use an impious doctrine as a cloak for their wickedness — men whose judgment is just, as they will receive from God a recompense worthy of their deeds.
And they have been carried away by such unbridled madness that they claim to have the power and ability to do absolutely anything, however irreligious and impious. For they say that things are called good or evil solely by human opinion. And they hold that souls must, in the course of transmigrations into successive bodies, pass through every kind of life and every kind of act — unless one, anticipating this in a single lifetime, does all these things at once and together, all at the same time — deeds which it is not lawful for us even to speak or hear, let alone allow to enter our minds, but which their own writings say must be accomplished by the soul in the whole range of life's experience — so that it will not be compelled, for lack of something still owed to its freedom, to be sent back once more into a body. For this reason they say that Jesus spoke this parable: 'While you are on the way with your adversary, make an effort to be freed from him, lest he hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer, and he throw you into prison. Truly I say to you, you will not come out from there until you have paid the last penny.' And they say the 'adversary' is one among the angels present within this world, the one they name the devil, saying he was made for the purpose of leading the souls that have perished from the world to the ruler. And they say this one is the chief of the makers of the world, and that he hands such souls over to another angel who serves him, so that he may enclose them in other bodies — for they say the body is a prison. And the saying, 'You will not come out from there until you have paid the last penny,' they interpret to mean that no one escapes the power of those angels who made the world, but is transferred from body to body continually, until he has fulfilled every kind of activity that exists in the world; and when nothing more is lacking to him, then his soul, having been set free, is released upward to that God who stands beyond the angels who made the world; and thus all souls are saved in like manner — whether by anticipating everything in a single lifetime and mingling with every kind of activity, or by transmigrating from body to body, or by being sent into [an obscure and corrupt fragment of text follows, untranslatable] — fulfilling the requirements proper to each kind of life and paying their debts, they are set free, so that they are no longer put into a body. [As for whether they may lawfully do] things that are irreligious, and unjust, and forbidden — I for my part will never believe it. Yet in their own writings it is recorded that the Lord spoke to his own apostles privately, and that they asked him to hand these things down separately to those who were worthy and consenting. For, they say, salvation comes through faith and love; all else, being indifferent, is called good or evil merely according to human opinion, since nothing is by nature evil. [Note: some of them, moreover, brand their disciples with a mark, cauterizing them on the back of the right earlobe. Hence also Marcellina, who came to Rome under Anicetus, being of this teaching, led many astray.] They call themselves Gnostics. They also possess images — some painted, others fashioned from other materials — claiming that Pilate had commissioned a portrait resembling Christ during the time Jesus dwelt among men. These they crown with garlands and set up alongside the images of the pagan philosophers — that is, alongside the images of Pythagoras, Plato, and Aristotle, and the rest — and they pay them the same sort of honor that the pagans do.

======== Book I — Chapter 26 ========

WHAT IS THE DOCTRINE OF CERINTHUS. A certain Cerinthus, moreover, taught in Asia that the world was made not by the first God, but by a power quite separate and distant from that Sovereignty which is above all things, and ignorant of the God who is above all. He held that Jesus was not born of a virgin, since this seemed impossible to him, but that he was the son of Joseph and Mary, just like all other men, though he surpassed all in righteousness, prudence, and wisdom. And after his baptism, Christ descended upon him from that Sovereignty which is above all things, in the form of a dove; and then he proclaimed the unknown Father and performed miracles; but at the end Christ flew away again from Jesus; Jesus then underwent suffering and rose up again, [while Christ, being spiritual, remained incapable of suffering]. WHAT IS THE DOCTRINE OF THE EBIONITES. Those known as Ebionites concur that the world was fashioned by God, yet they hold views concerning the Lord unlike those of Cerinthus and Carpocrates. They use only the Gospel according to Matthew and reject the apostle Paul, calling him an apostate from the Law. As for the prophetic writings, they labor to expound them with excessive curiosity; and they practice circumcision and persevere in those customs that belong to the Law and to the Jewish way of life, so much so that they even worship toward Jerusalem as though it were the house of God. WHAT ARE THE WORKS OF THE NICOLAITANS. The Nicolaitans, moreover, have as their teacher Nicolaus, one of the seven whom the apostles were the first to appoint to the diaconate; these live without restraint. Their true character is most fully shown in the Apocalypse of John, which teaches that there is no distinction between committing adultery and eating food sacrificed to idols. For this reason the word was also spoken concerning them: 'But this you have, that you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.' [Note: other testimony traces their origin to a certain Thebutis, from among the Essenes, who arose after the death of St. James and was the father of this sect, the first sect bearing the Christian name. They are certainly Judaizers; all their writings, then, concern the Law and Judaism — hence also the well-known question about the Gospel according to the Hebrews...]

======== Book I — Chapter 27 ========

WHAT IS THE OPINION OF CERDO. A certain Cerdo, moreover, taking his starting point from the followers of Simon, came to Rome during the time of Hyginus, the ninth in line of bishops counting down from the apostles, and he taught that the God announced through the Law and the Prophets is a being distinct from him who fathered our Lord Jesus Christ. The one, he said, can be known; the other cannot. The one is righteous, the other benevolent. [Note on Nicolaus: they cite a certain saying of that man, misunderstanding it — but that distinguished man meant that one ought to hold the pleasures in check, and thereby subdue the appetites of the flesh; whereas these men, like goats let loose, give themselves over to pleasures and pass their lives in luxury and self-indulgence, their souls sunk in the mire of vice — for they follow their own decree of pleasure, not that of the apostolic man, etc. Compare also Book III: their writings circulate under the name of Ialdabaoth, a 'Gospel of Perfection,' and prophetic books of Barnoria (see Epiphanius, Panarion 26); these belong rather to the Ophites and Barbelognostics. Hence, although Irenaeus does not mention their doctrines, we may conjecture from Tertullian, Prescription against Heretics, that they are the same as those professed by these Gnostics — see chapter 30.] WHAT MARCION TAUGHT. Succeeding him, Marcion of Pontus expanded upon this teaching, reviling without restraint the God announced through the Law and the Prophets, calling him the source of evils, a lover of warfare, unsteady in his verdicts, and at odds even with himself. He taught that Jesus descended from that Father who exists above the God who fashioned the world; that he appeared in Judea during the days of the governor Pontius Pilate, procurator under Tiberius Caesar, wearing human shape, to those dwelling in Judea; and that he abolished the prophets, the Law, and every deed of that God who fashioned the world — the one Marcion also styles the Cosmocrator. Beyond this, having cut up the Gospel according to Luke, stripping out everything written concerning the Lord's birth, and excising much from the record of the Lord's own words where he is quite openly shown acknowledging the framer of this universe as his own Father — Marcion convinced his followers that he was more trustworthy than the apostles who had transmitted the Gospel, handing them not the Gospel itself but a mutilated remnant of it. In the same fashion he also cut up the letters of the apostle Paul, stripping out whatever the Apostle had plainly stated about the God who fashioned the world — namely, that this same God fathered our Lord Jesus Christ — together with whatever the Apostle drew from the prophetic writings...
He taught that salvation belongs only to souls — to those, that is, who had learned his doctrine — while the body, since it is taken from the earth, is, he said, incapable of sharing in salvation. And to this blasphemy against God he added yet another, truly speaking as the mouthpiece of the devil and saying everything contrary to the truth: that Cain, along with men of his stamp, the Sodomites, the Egyptians, and others resembling them — indeed every nation that had gone about in wickedness of every sort — were rescued by the Lord upon his descent into the underworld, for they ran to him and he took them up into his kingdom; but that Abel, and Enoch, and Noah, and the rest of the righteous, and the patriarchs who belonged to Abraham, together with all the prophets and those who had pleased God, did not share in salvation — as that serpent who was in Marcion proclaimed. For, he said, because they knew that their God was always testing them, and supposed on this occasion too that he was testing them, they did not run to Jesus nor believe his proclamation; and for this reason, he said, their souls remained [below].
But against this man — since he alone has openly dared to mutilate the Scriptures, and shamelessly, beyond all others, to revile God — we shall reply separately, and, God helping us, we shall overturn him from his own writings, the words of the Lord and the Apostles which he himself employs. For now we have of necessity called him to mind, so that you may know that all who in any way adulterate the truth and injure the Church's proclamation are disciples and successors of Simon the Samaritan magician. Though they never openly confess whose pupils they are, out of fear of leading others astray, they nevertheless teach his doctrine: putting forward the name of Christ Jesus as a bait, while variously introducing the impiety of Simon, they kill many, wickedly scattering their opinion abroad under a good name, and through the sweetness and comeliness of that name offering men the bitter and malignant poison of the serpent, the prince of apostasy.

======== Book I — Chapter 28 ========

[What the sect of the Continentes is.] From those already mentioned, many offshoots of many heresies have now sprung up, because many of them — indeed nearly all — wish to be teachers, and to depart from the heresy in which they had been; and, joining one dogma to another opinion, and then another to yet another, they insist on teaching something new, each recounting himself as the inventor of whatever view he has patched together — a practice he undoubtedly drew from the Antitheses of Marcion. To give an example: proceeding from Saturninus and Marcion, those called the Continentes (the Abstinent) proclaimed abstinence from marriage, thereby frustrating God's ancient creation and obliquely accusing him who made male and female for the generation of mankind; they likewise deny the salvation of him who was first formed. It is Tatian who has now introduced this blasphemy: he had been a hearer of Justin, but after the latter's martyrdom he fell away from the Church, and, puffed up and inflated by the presumption of being a teacher, as though superior to the rest, he established his own peculiar character of doctrine, telling of certain invisible Aeons like those of the followers of Valentinus, as if it were a fable, and declaring, like Marcion and Saturninus, that marriage is corruption and fornication, while on his own authority contradicting the salvation of Adam.
Others again, taking occasion from Basilides and Carpocrates, have introduced indiscriminate intercourse and many marriages, and carelessness about eating things offered to idols, saying that God does not much concern himself with such matters. And indeed, why should I say more? It is impossible to count all those who, by this route or that, have drifted away and abandoned the truth.

======== Book I — Chapter 29 ========

[What the kinds of the Gnostics are, and what their opinions are, according to them.] Beyond these, out of the Simonians already mentioned, a multitude of Gnostics has arisen, springing up as if from the earth [the text is defective at this point]. For some of them posit a certain Aeon that never grows old, within a virginal spirit, whom they name Barbelo. There, they say, is a certain unnameable Father, who wished to reveal himself to this very Barbelo. And this Ennoia (Thought), having come forth, stood before him and asked for Prognosis (Foreknowledge) [several words are illegible in the source] ...Barbelo, and gazing upon his greatness and conceiving, was delighted in it, and brought forth a light like to him. This, they say, marks the origin both of light-giving and of the coming-into-being of everything; and the Father, upon seeing this light, anointed it with his own goodness, that it might be made perfect. This they say is Christ, who in turn asked, as they say, that Nous (Mind) be given him as a helper, and he came forth. After this: Prognosis washed herself and stood with Ennoia, that is, Pronoia, and glorified the Invisible One and the perfect Power, Barbelo, because it was through them that she had come forth. And again this Power asked that Aphtharsia (Incorruptibility) be given to her; he consented, and having consented, revealed Aphtharsia, who stood with Ennoia and Prognosis, glorifying the Invisible One and Barbelo, because she too had come forth. And again she asked that Eternal Life be given to her. He consented, and having consented, revealed Eternal Life; and they stood and glorified him and Barbelo, because she too had come forth in the revelation of the invisible God. All these four Aeons — Thought, Foreknowledge, Incorruptibility, Eternal Life — complete the revelation of the Invisible God from whom they proceed. [There follows the first generation of Barbelo, that is, of the first Thought, which the other Aeons then imitate.] And Barbelo looked upon him, and she brought forth a happy Ray of Light. This was not different in greatness from him. For this is the Only-Begotten, the begotten son of the Universe, or Spirit of pure light. And the Invisible Spirit rejoiced over the light that had come forth, which had first revealed itself in the first Power, that is, in his Pronoia, in Barbelo. And he anointed it with his goodness, that it might be made perfect. Father of the Logos. Now pairings are made: of Ennoia and Logos, of Aphtharsia and Christ; and the Aeon Eternal Life is paired with Will (Thelema), and Nous with Prognosis. And these glorified the great Light and Barbelo.
Next, they say that from Ennoia and Logos, Autogenes (the Self-Begotten) was sent forth as a representation of the great Light, and they say he is greatly honored, with all things made subject to him. Aletheia (Truth) was entrusted to him, and there is a pairing of Autogenes and Aletheia. Out of the light that is Christ, together with Incorruptibility, four luminaries, they say, were put forth to attend Autogenes; and again out of Thelema and the Aeon Zoe (Life), four emanations were fashioned to wait upon the four luminaries — these they call Charis (Grace), Thelesis (Volition), Synesis (Understanding), and Phronesis (Prudence). Charis was paired with the great, foremost luminary; this one they reckon the Savior, and they name him Harmogenes. Thelesis was paired with the second — his name is illegible in the source — ...while Phronesis was set beside the fourth, whom they call by the name Eleleth.
With all these things thus established, Autogenes next puts forth the true, perfect man, whom they likewise name Adamas, because neither he nor those from whom he came had been mastered by anything; and he was set apart, together with the first light, from Harmogenes. They say that Perfect Knowledge (Gnosis) was sent forth together with the man from Autogenes and joined to him, and that through her the man came to know him who is above all things; and that unconquerable power was given to him from the virginal spirit, and that in him all things rest and sing hymns to the great Aeon. From this, they say, Mother, Father, and Son were made manifest; and from Anthropos and Gnosis was born a tree, which they also call Gnosis. Then from the first angel who stands beside the Only-Begotten, they say the Holy Spirit was sent forth, whom they also call Sophia and Prunicus (the Lewd One). She, seeing that all the rest had a partner while she alone was without one, sought someone to be joined to; and not finding one, she strained and stretched herself and gazed toward the lower regions, thinking to find a partner there, and, not finding one, she leapt forth in frustration, because she had made this venture without the good will of the Father. Afterward, acting out of simplicity and goodness, she brought forth a work in which there was ignorance and boldness. This work of hers, they say, is the Proarchon (First Ruler), the maker of this created world. They relate that a great power was taken from her by the Mother, and that having been separated from it he fell to the lower regions and made the firmament of heaven, in which they say he dwells. And since he is ignorance itself, he made the powers, angels, firmaments, and all earthly things that are under him. Then, they say, being joined to Self-Will (Authadia), he begot Wickedness and Jealousy; at these things the mother Sophia, grieved, withdrew and retired to the higher regions, and so an Ogdoad came to be counted from below. She, then, having withdrawn, he supposed himself to be alone, and for this reason said: I am a jealous God, and beside me there is none other. Such, then, are the fictions these men tell.

======== Book I — Chapter 30 ========

[Concerning the writings of others, according to their own account.] Others again tell monstrous tales: that there is a certain first light in the power of Bythos (the Deep), blessed, incorruptible, and boundless; and that here is the Father of everything, styled the First Man. His Ennoia (Thought), once put forth, is, they say, the offspring of the one who sent it out, and this one they call Son of Man, that is, the Second Man. Positioned under these two figures stands the Holy Spirit, and beneath that Spirit lie separate elements — water, darkness, the deep, and chaos — over which, they claim, the Spirit hovered, and this they name the first Woman. Afterward, the First Man, they say, rejoicing with his son at the loveliness of the Spirit — namely, the Woman — and shedding light upon her, fathered from her an incorruptible radiance, a third male figure, whom they term Christ: offspring of the First and Second Man and of the Holy Spirit, that first Woman; father and son both uniting with the woman whom they also style Mother of All Living.
But since she could not bear or contain the greatness of the lights, she is said to have become overfull and to have overflowed toward the more leftward parts. And so their son, Christ alone, being as it were the right-hand one, was caught up immediately with his mother into the incorruptible Aeon and carried to the regions above. This, they say, is the true and holy Church, which arose as the naming, the gathering, and the joining together of the Father of everything — the First Man — and of the Son, the Second Man, and of Christ their son, and of the aforementioned Woman.
The power that overflowed from the Woman, possessing the moisture of light, they teach fell downward away from the fathers, having of its own will this moisture of light; and this they call the left-hand power, Prunicus, Sophia, and the male-female. It descended simply into the waters, which had been motionless, and set them in motion, giving them a body. For they say that all things ran to and clung to the moisture of her light, and surrounded it; and had she not had this, the whole would perhaps have been swallowed up and submerged by matter. This power, then, bound by the body that came from matter, and greatly weighed down, at length came to herself and tried to flee the waters and ascend to her mother, but was unable, on account of the heaviness of the body surrounding her. Being in very ill case, she contrived to hide the light that was above her, fearing that it too might be harmed by the lower elements, as she herself had been. And when she had received power from the moisture of the light that was with her, she sprang back and was raised on high, and, spreading out above, she covered over and made this visible heaven out of her own body; and she remained beneath the heaven she had made, still bearing the impress of a watery body. When she had received desire for the light above, and had taken power throughout, she is said to have laid aside her body and been freed from it. This body they say she put off, and they call it woman from woman.
They say that her son also had a certain inbreathing of incorruption left in him by his mother, by which he works; and having become powerful he too, they say, put forth out of the waters a motherless son — for they claim he had no knowledge of his own mother. And his son, in imitation of his father, sent forth another son in turn; this third begot a fourth, and the fourth himself begot a son; and so also in dignities and powers they proceed one from another. And they have given these lying names: the one who is first from the mother they call Ialdabaoth; the one from him, Iao; the one from him, Sabaoth (the Great); fourth in line Adoneus; fifth Eloeus; sixth Oreus; and, last of the seven, Astaphaeus. These heavens, powers, angels, and makers they set in order, seated in heaven according to their generation, unseen, ruling also over heavenly and earthly things — the first of them, Ialdabaoth, despising his mother because he had made sons and grandsons without anyone's permission, and further angels, archangels, powers, authorities, and dominions. When these had been made, his own sons turned against him in strife and contention over the rulership; at which Ialdabaoth, grieved and in despair, gazed downward into the sediment of matter lying beneath and set his craving on it, and from this, they say, a son was brought forth. This, they say, is Nous himself, in the twisted form of a serpent; and from him, in turn, spirit, soul, and all worldly things; and from these were generated all forgetfulness, malice, jealousy, envy, and death. This serpent-shaped and twisted Nous of theirs, they say, further perverted the Father by his crookedness, while he was still with their Father in heaven and in paradise.
Hence Ialdabaoth, swelling with pride and glorying over all that lay beneath him, declared: I am father and deity, and beyond me exists no one else. But his mother, on hearing this, called out against him: Do not speak falsely, Ialdabaoth; for beyond you stands the Father of everything, the First Man, and Anthropos, offspring of Anthropos. When all were thrown into turmoil at this unfamiliar voice and its sudden announcement, and inquired whence the cry had issued, Ialdabaoth, they say, seeking to draw them away and win them to himself, said: Come, let us fashion man in our likeness. On hearing this the six powers — their mother having planted in them the notion of man, in order that through him she might drain from them the primal power — came together and formed a man immense in breadth and length; but since he could only wriggle upon the ground, they brought him to their father, Sophia so working that she might likewise drain from him the moisture of light, so that he could not be raised up against those who possess power above. But when that one breathed into the man the spirit of life, they say he was secretly drained of that power; and that the man thereby came to have Nous and Enthymesis (Reflection); and these, they say, are what is saved; and that he at once gave thanks to the First Man, forsaking his makers.
They say that Ialdabaoth, in his jealousy, wanted to devise a way of emptying man of power through a woman, and that he drew a woman out of his own Enthymesis (his own "thought"); but that Prunicos, taking hold of her, invisibly emptied her of that power. The rest of the rulers, coming and marveling at her beauty, called her Eve, and, desiring her, begat sons by her, whom they say are also called angels. Their mother, they say, contrived through the serpent to seduce Eve and Adam into transgressing Ialdabaoth's commandment. Eve, hearing this as though it came from the Son of God, believed it readily, and persuaded Adam to eat from the tree of which God had said they should not eat. And they say that when they had eaten, they came to know the power that is above all things, and withdrew from those who had made them. Prunicos, seeing that even through her own creation they had gotten the better of the powers, greatly rejoiced, and cried out again that, whereas the Father is incorruptible, this ruler here, calling himself Father, had lied — since there had once existed a Man and a First Woman, and this ruler, adulterating what was not his, had sinned. She declares that God is to be recognized — having now also her own Enthymesis restored to her — and for that reason turns at once toward God; and at this Ialdabaoth is seized with jealousy and tries to diminish the power in the woman, making her, after the pattern of the First Woman, herself an instrument of the Mother (Prunicos, that is, Sophia).
But Ialdabaoth, because of the forgetfulness that had come over him — not even attending to any of this — cast Adam and Eve out of paradise, on the ground that they had broken his command. Since he had longed for sons to be begotten to him from Eve, but did not obtain this, since his own Mother worked against him in everything, secretly emptying Adam and Eve of the moisture of the light, so that the one who came from the higher principality might have no share either in the curse or in the reproach. Thus they teach that Adam and Eve, having in this way been emptied of the divine substance, were cursed by him, and cast down out of heaven into this world. And they say that the serpent too, for opposing the Father, was hurled by him down to the lower world, but that he brought the angels who are here under his own power, and himself begat six sons, he himself existing as the seventh, in imitation of the hebdomad that surrounds the Father. And these seven, they say, are the world-ruling demons, forever hostile to and warring against the human race, since it was on account of humanity that their father was cast down below.
They say that Adam and Eve at first had light, luminous, and, so to speak, spiritual bodies, such as they had when they were first fashioned; but that on coming here, these bodies were changed into something darker, grosser, and more sluggish, and their soul likewise dissolved and languid — since from their maker they had received only the world's own breath of life — until Prunicos, taking pity on them, restored to them the sweet fragrance of the moisture of the light; through which they were brought back to remembrance of themselves, and recognized themselves as naked and as consisting of bodily matter [an editorial note is interposed here in the source at this point and is too corrupted to render], and they recognized that they bore death within them. They discovered, they say, being led by Sophia, that a body had been placed around them only for a time; and they found food as well, again with Sophia going before them, and, once satisfied, they came together with one another in the flesh, and begat Cain — whom the fallen serpent, together with his own sons, seized upon at once and corrupted, filling him with the world's forgetfulness, driving him into folly and boldness, so that when he killed his brother Abel he was the very first to display jealousy and to bring about death. After these, they say, Seth was begotten according to the providence of Prunicos, and after him Norea; and from these they say the rest of the multitude of mankind was begotten, and driven, from this lower hebdomad, into every kind of wickedness, and into apostasy from the holy hebdomad above, and into idolatry and every other contempt of it — the Mother always secretly working against them, in order to save what was properly her own, that is, the moisture of the light. They hold that the holy hebdomad consists of the seven stars they call the planets; and they say that the fallen serpent has two names, Michael and Samael. Ialdabaoth, angry at mankind because they did not worship him or honor him as Father and God, sent a flood upon them to destroy them all together. [Here the source text carries an interpolated editorial comment, obscure in the manuscript, to the effect that from this one may fairly conclude that the true Gnostics could not deny Adam salvation.] But Sophia, being present, saved those who were with Noah in the ark, on account of the moisture of that light which was from her, through which the world was again filled with human beings; and from these they say Ialdabaoth himself chose a certain Abraham, and made a covenant with him, promising that should his offspring remain in service to him, he would grant them the land as an inheritance; and he gave them the Law, and made them Jews; and from among these he singled out seven days, which they also term the sacred hebdomad. And each of the rulers takes his own herald to glorify him and proclaim him as God, so that the rest, hearing of these glories, might likewise serve those who are proclaimed as gods by the prophets. And this is how they distribute the prophets: they say that Moses, Joshua the son of Nun, Amos, and Habakkuk belonged to Ialdabaoth; that Samuel, Nathan, Jonah, and Micah belonged to Iao; that Elijah, Joel, and Zechariah belonged to Sabaoth; that Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Daniel belonged to Adonai; that Tobit and Haggai belonged to Eloi; that Micah and Nahum belonged to Orei; and that Ezra and Zephaniah belonged to Astaphaeus. Each of these, then, glorifying his own father and god, they say that Sophia herself also spoke much through them concerning the First Man and the incorruptible Aeon, and concerning that Christ who is above, forewarning and reminding men of the incorruptible light, of the First Man, and of the descent of Christ; and that when the rulers were terrified at this, and marveled at the novelty of what was being proclaimed through the prophets, Prunicos brought it about, through Ialdabaoth (who did not know what he was doing), that two further emissions to mankind should occur — one from the barren Elizabeth, the other from the virgin Mary.
And since Sophia herself could find no rest, neither in heaven nor on earth, she was grieved, and called upon her mother for help. Her mother, the Prior one, took pity on her daughter's repentance, and asked the First Man that Christ be sent to help her; and he descended, sent to his sister, to the moisture of the light. When Sophia who is below became aware that her brother was descending, she made known his coming by way of John, and made ready the repentance-baptism, preparing Jesus in advance, so that Christ, upon his descent, might find a clean vessel, and that, through her son Ialdabaoth, Christ might make the woman known. It is said that he passed down through the seven heavens, taking on a likeness to their sons, and by degrees stripped them of their power. For, they say, the whole moisture of the light ran together to him, and Christ, descending into this world, first put on his sister Sophia, and the two of them rejoiced, refreshing one another; and this is what they define as the bridegroom and the bride. Jesus, being begotten of the Virgin through the working of God, was, they say, wiser, more pure, and more upright than every other man; and Christ, joined to Sophia, descended into him, and so Jesus Christ came to be.
They say that many of his disciples did not recognize the descent of Christ into him; but when Christ had descended into Jesus, then he began to work miracles, and to heal, and to make known the Father who was unknown, and to declare openly that he himself was the Son of the First Man. At this the rulers, and the father of Jesus, grew angry, and worked to have him killed; and when he was led away, they say that Christ himself, together with Sophia, withdrew into the incorruptible Aeon, while Jesus was crucified — Christ not having forgotten his own, but having sent down upon him from above a certain power, which raised him up in that body which they also call the animal and spiritual body — for he sent back the worldly elements into the world. But when the disciples saw him risen, they did not recognize him, nor did they even recognize Jesus himself, for whose sake he had risen from the dead. [The source text here carries a corrupted editorial note that cannot be reliably rendered.] They say that this was the greatest error among his disciples, that they supposed he had risen in a worldly body, not knowing that flesh and blood are unable to inherit the kingdom of God.
They also want to confirm the descent of Christ and his ascent from this: that the disciples say Jesus did nothing of great note either before his baptism or after his resurrection from the dead, not knowing that Christ had been united to Jesus, and to the incorruptible Aeon of the hebdomad — for they call the worldly body the animal body. They say he remained after the resurrection for eighteen months, and that, as perception descended upon him, he learned clear truths, and passed these on to the few of his disciples whom he judged fit to receive such great mysteries; and thus he was received up into heaven, with Christ seated at the right hand of the father Ialdabaoth, so that into himself he might gather the souls of those acquainted with them, once their worldly flesh had been laid aside, enriching himself — his father not knowing this, nor even seeing him — so that just as Jesus enriches himself with holy souls, his father is correspondingly diminished, being lessened and emptied of his own power through those souls. For he will no longer have holy souls to send back down again into the world, but only those that are of his own substance, that is, of his own breath. And the consummation will come when the whole moisture [the text breaks off in the manuscript at this point, and resumes with a separate note:] — and this is why they say the serpent is called the wisest of all creatures, and also on account of the arrangement of our intestines, through which food is carried, and which have such a shape as to display, hidden within us, the generative substance of the serpent's form.

======== Book I — Chapter 31 ========

Others again say that Cain came from the higher principality, and confess Esau, Korah, the men of Sodom, and all such people to be their own kin; and that, on this account, they were assailed by the maker but that none of them was harmed by it — for Sophia would snatch back to herself whatever belonged properly to her out of them. They say that Judas the traitor knew all this thoroughly, and that he alone, knowing the truth beyond all the rest, accomplished the mystery of the betrayal; through which, they say, all things, both earthly and heavenly, were dissolved. And they produce a fabrication of this kind, which they call the Gospel of Judas.
I have also gathered together their own writings, in which they call the maker of heaven and earth — for they hold that people cannot be saved otherwise than by going through everything, just as Carpocrates also taught. And they hold that an angel stands by at each of their sins and shameful acts, and that the one performing the act should dare the deed and commit the impurity, declaring, in the name of the angel to whom that particular act belongs: "O angel, I make use of your work! O such-and-such power, I perform your operation!" And this, they say, is perfect knowledge — to go into such acts, which are not even lawful to name, without trembling. [The text here carries a lengthy modern editorial footnote, comparing this to a passage of Hippolytus, which is not part of Irenaeus's own text and is not translated.] Since it was necessary to expose clearly those who come from Valentinus — given such mothers and such forebears as their own doctrines and rules show them to have — and to bring their teachings out into the open, so that, if any of them should perhaps repent of this and turn to the one sole Founder and God, the Maker of the universe, they might be saved; while the rest might no longer be dragged away by their plausible-seeming, wicked persuasion, thinking they will learn from them some greater or deeper mystery, but rather, having learned well from us what is being badly taught by them, might laugh at their teaching, while pitying those who, still caught up in such wretched and unstable fables, have grown so arrogant as to consider themselves better than everyone else on account of such "knowledge" — or rather ignorance. And this is their delight — as though the mere exposure of their opinion were already a victory over them.
For this reason we have undertaken to bring out into the open, and to make plainly manifest, this whole ill-constructed little body of this fox. There will be no further need of many words to overturn their teaching, now that it has been made plain to everyone. It is like some wild beast hidden in a forest, which springs out from there and ravages many — the man who clears and strips away the forest, bringing the beast itself into full view, no longer has to labor to capture it, once people see that it is indeed a beast: for it is now within reach to watch and guard against its attacks, and to strike it from every side, and wound it, and kill that ravaging beast. So it is with us also: once we have brought their hidden things out into the open, we destroy their opinion. This is a task, then, for you, and for all who are with you, to be trained in what has already been said, and to overturn their worthless and disordered teachings, and to display the doctrines that suit the truth. Since this, then, is how matters stand, we shall, as I have promised, bring forward, according to our ability, their overthrow, refuting them all point by point in the following book (for the account, as you see, goes on at length); and we shall also supply the means for their overthrow, meeting every one of their opinions in the order of their own narrative, so that we may be found not merely exposing, but wounding the beast from every side.

[At this point the source carries an editor's note of corrections to earlier pages, followed by a chapter-by-chapter analytical summary (a table of contents) for Book Two, evidently supplied by a modern editor rather than by Irenaeus himself. That summary, translated as it stands, reads as follows.]

RECAPITULATION of Book One, and the plan of Book Two, in which the reasoning of "knowledge" (gnosis) is crushed point by point.

A) THE FOUNDATION OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD THE FATHER IS TORN AWAY FROM THE DEMIURGE (chapters I-XI). The duality of God and the Demiurge is rejected. I. There can be no other principle, independent of him, either above or below God — still less another God. II. The angels, too, could not have been independent of God in the making of the world; still less its principal makers, since God made all things through his own Word. III. Therefore God and the Creator are one, and no Bythus or Pleroma is to be set above him. IV. It is even more absurd to imagine an emptiness or shadow outside God, and most absurd of all within the very fullness of God. B) The emanation of the Demiurge and of creatures from God is likewise overturned. V. This does not square with the perfection of God, from whom nothing imperfect could emanate, whether directly or through angels. VI. It is false, further, that angels could have been ignorant of God, who is known even naturally by human beings. VII. It is false, too, that created things reflect the glory of the Pleroma. VIII. Nor do they reflect the image of the Aeons. C) How great the heretics' error is in these matters. IX. The Gnostics are supported by the authority of no witness, not even a pagan one. X. They wrongly twist the Scriptures; they do not resolve the questions but entangle them in still greater absurdities. XI. In pursuing lofty things they have abandoned the truth for a shadow.

By Irenaeus. II. ON THE AEONS IN PARTICULAR (chapters XII-XXI). Preliminary objections. XII. Their Thirty (the Triacontad) both falls short and overflows. If Sophia produces offspring without a consort, why do not the others? The Ogdoad is made up of incompatible members (Logos-Sige). XIII. Even the order of their processions (e.g., Mind from Thought) is wrongly devised, nor can the psychological stages of understanding, which exist only in man, really be distinguished within the utterly simple God. All the more, then, whence comes the inequality of the Aeons within the one God? By what life do those live who exist before the emission of Life? Why is Man from the Word, and not rather... B) The philosophy of the Greeks is the source and origin of this system. XIV. On the theogony of the comic poet Antiphanes, very similar to that of Valentinus. What Thales, Homer, Anaximander, Democritus and Epicurus, Plato, and Anaxagoras contributed to the errors of the Gnostics. Yet none of these ever knew the truth, or could teach it. Still, they applied their names more fittingly to their own falsehood than the Gnostics have. C) On the emission of the Aeons. XV. Whence do the Aeons come at all, since they are not created? Why a tetrad, an ogdoad, and so on, and not some other number? XVI. Why is the world an image of the Pleroma, and the Pleroma not the image of some other Pleroma, and so on without end? XVII. If the emission of the Aeons is a begetting, what then is the shaping of each one? And if it is an emanation, like light from light, why does the last one suffer while the others are impassible? But if it is a budding-forth, like the branches of a tree, whence comes the imperfection of certain Aeons? And if, finally, it is an emission like a ray from the sun, how is it that they are ignorant of the Father from whom they were sent forth? What is so absurd, after all, in a blind word being sent forth from a most perfect Mind? XVIII. On Sophia in particular: why is she the most foolish of all? How does the passion of a spiritual Aeon become the matter of bodies? And above all: how can the Father's wish to be known become the cause of ignorance and imperfection? XIX. On the Demiurge, finally: is it not utterly unreasonable that he, who received the whole spiritual seed, should himself be merely animal and ignorant of everything, when the Gnostics themselves, who boast of having only a tiny particle of that seed, are spiritual and understand everything? III. ON THE ARGUMENTS BY WHICH THE GNOSTICS [DEFEND THEIR DOCTRINE OF] THE AEONS. Arguments from Scripture. XX. The trouble of the twelfth Aeon has nothing whatever to do with the fall of Judas, still less with the Passion of the Lord. XXI. Nor are the twelve Apostles a type of the twelve Aeons: for what would be set up as corresponding to the ten Aeons that are their elders? What Aeon corresponds to the seventy disciples? What Aeon to Paul? XXII. The thirty Aeons are not signified by the thirty years of Christ's life, for Christ underwent his passion not in the twelfth month following his baptism, but was at least thirty years of age, or older, when he suffered — as he attempts to show. XXIII. It is likewise absurd that the woman with the flow of blood should be a type of the disturbed Aeon; for she did not begin to suffer in her twelfth year, but was healed then, after twelve years of suffering; besides, Christ restored others to health at other ages entirely. B) Arguments from numbers. XXIV. These rest on mere arbitrary choice: what of the number five? Besides, why is attention paid to the Greek letters, and not to the Hebrew ones, which are the original? Why are so many other "types" neglected (for instance, the measurements of the ark of the covenant)? Why that particular fifth number of which the holy Scriptures are full? XXV. Numbers are indeed set within things not without great wisdom, but this must be weighed by the rule of truth. For God is not to be measured by numbers and the other things that were made; rather, these are, and ought to be, subject to human investigation, not the reverse. XXVI. Knowledge puffs up, love builds up; it does no good to know more than is fitting. C) Practical conclusions. XXVII. By the example of the heretics, Irenaeus shows that obscure parables ought not to be used to explain what is already clearly preached. XXVIII. The rule of faith is to be held above all else: matters that exceed the grasp of our minds are to be humbly left to God, not rashly investigated in every direction, as the heretics think proper. XXIX. It is contradictory that some souls should go into the Pleroma, others into the middle region, while bodies have no share at all in salvation. XXX. It is contradictory for souls to be spiritual if the Demiurge himself, from whom they come, is merely animal. XXXI. What has been argued so far against Valentinus is extended to the other heretics; the true fate awaiting all of them is shown. XXXII. The impious and horrifying things they say about the moral indifference of actions, about the supposed necessity of committing every kind of shameful act, and about their claimed likeness to and superiority over Jesus. XXXIII. It is absurd that souls should migrate from bodies into other bodies. XXXIV. Souls will remain unmoving forever after death, retaining the memory of their deeds. XXXV. On the souls of the prophets in particular, and on the origin of prophecy.

======== Book II — Preface ========

PREFACE. In the first book, which precedes this one, we exposed for you, dearest friend, refuting the falsely-named knowledge, that the whole lying doctrine devised by the followers of Valentinus was invented by many contrary methods — even as they expose themselves and each other, and far more so expose themselves before the truth itself. We also gave a careful account of the sorcerer Marcus's opinion, seeing that he too counts among their number, in that they try to bend the writings toward their own concocted fable, picking out passages that suit whatever they please; and we traced in detail how they attempt, and even presume, to build up their 'truth' through arithmetic and through the four-and-twenty letters making up the alphabet. We likewise made plain the teaching of Simon the Samaritan magician, and of all who succeeded him. We also stated the great number of those who from him are called Gnostics, and we noted their differences, their doctrines, and their successions, and set forth all the heresies established out of them. And since all these heretics, taking their beginning from Simon, produced impious and irreligious teachings, we set forth their account of redemption, and how they initiate those who are being brought to perfection — teaching that a single God, the maker of all, exists, and that no further fruit lies beyond this last one, with nothing whatsoever standing over him or coming after.
In this book, however, we shall set forth what is fitting for us and what the time allows, and by great chapters we shall overturn their whole system. For this reason we have given this composition the title: 'The Detection and Overthrow of Their Opinion.' For it is necessary, by pointing out and overturning their visible pairings, to dissolve their hidden pairings, and even their Bythus itself, and to receive proof that it neither ever was, nor is.

======== Book II — Chapter 1 ========

A DEMONSTRATION THAT HE IS NOT IGNORANT OF ANYTHING OUTSIDE THE PLEROMA. 1. It is good, then, to begin from the first and greatest chapter — from the Demiurge, the God who made heaven and earth and all things in them, whom these men blasphemously call the 'fruit of the outermost region' — and to show that nothing stands over him and nothing succeeds him; that no one else set him in motion, but by his own resolve and freely made all things, since he alone is God, and alone Lord, and alone Creator, and alone Father, and alone contains all things, and himself supplies existence to all.
For how could there be, above this God, another fullness, or a beginning, or a power, or another God — since it belongs to God to encompass all these things within his immensity, and to be encompassed by none? But if there is something outside him, then he is no longer the Pleroma of all things, nor does he contain all things. For that God who is above all will then lack that which they say is outside him. And what is lacking, and has been diminished by something, is not the fullness of all things. Such a God will also have a boundary, a middle point, and a limit in relation to the things that are outside him. And if there is a limit toward the things below, there is also a beginning toward the things above. In the same way, and by the same necessity, this must hold true for the remaining parts as well — that each be bounded, defined, and enclosed by whatever lies outside it. For that which forms the boundary below necessarily circumscribes and encloses whatever is bounded within it. And again, according to them, the Father of all — whom indeed they also call the Pre-Existent and the Pre-Beginning — together with their Pleroma, and Marcion's good God as well, is founded, shut up within some region, and encompassed from outside by another sovereignty, which of necessity must be greater; for whatever encloses something is by that very fact greater than what lies enclosed within it, and the greater thing is also mightier and more properly lord, and whatever is greater, mightier, and more properly lord — that will be God.
For since, according to them, there is also something else which they say is outside the Pleroma — into which they suppose the higher, erring power descended — then of necessity one of two things must be true. Either the Pleroma contains what is outside it, so that what they call 'outside the Pleroma' is really within it, and God himself is encompassed by what is outside him — for where this 'outside' begins, God ends; and if he is bounded, he is not immense, but is measured and encompassed by something else greater than he, and this very thing they say is outside the Pleroma will itself turn out to be the Pleroma, and their Pleroma (within which the first God himself must then be understood to be) will be contained by what is outside it. Or else, on the other hand, the Pleroma and what is outside it are separated from one another by an immense distance. But if they say this, then there will be some third thing which separates the Pleroma and what is outside it by that immense distance, and this third thing will bound and contain them both, and will itself be greater than both the Pleroma and what is outside it, containing both within its own bosom — and the argument concerning what contains and what is contained will run on into infinity. For if this third thing has a beginning above and an end below, it too will of necessity be bounded on its sides, either beginning or ending at yet other things; and those things in turn, both the ones above and the ones below, will have their beginnings in still other things, and so on into infinity — so that their reasoning never comes to rest in one God, but constantly, in seeking for something beyond what exists, falls away into what does not exist, and departs from the true God.
These same arguments tell equally against Marcion's disciples. For his pair of deities, likewise, will be enclosed and bounded by the vast gap that keeps them apart from each other. And so it becomes necessary to imagine, throughout every part, many gods separated by immense distances, each beginning where another leaves off and ending where another begins; and by the very reasoning with which they strive to teach that above the maker of heaven and earth there is some Pleroma or God, anyone, using that same reasoning, will build above that Pleroma yet another Pleroma, and above that again another, and above the Depth yet another sea of Deity, and likewise on every side the same thing will hold. And so, as their notion runs off into infinity, it will of necessity never come to rest, but will always go on seeking other beings besides those already named. And it will remain uncertain whether the things that are, according to us, below are really the ones that are above, and whether what they call 'above' is really above or below; and no fixed standing or stability will hold our understanding, but we shall be forced to pass out into immense worlds and undetermined gods.
And since this is so, each god will be content with what is his own, and will not busy himself curiously with what belongs to another; otherwise he would be unjust and grasping, and would cease to be what a god is. And each created thing will give praise to whoever fashioned it, and will find its satisfaction in him alone, and will know none besides; otherwise, most justly judged an apostate by all, it would receive a most fitting punishment. For it is necessary either that there be one who contains all things and made each of the things that were made within his own domain just as he willed, or else that there be many indeterminate makers and gods, each beginning where another ends, throughout every region — all of them enclosed from outside by some other, greater being, so that each of them must be confessed to be shut in and confined within his own limits, and none of all these to be God. For each of them, holding only the smallest fraction in comparison with all the rest, will lack something, and the title 'Almighty' will be dissolved, and such a notion will of necessity fall into impiety.

======== Book II — Chapter 2 ========

THAT THE WORLD WAS NOT MADE AMONG THE THINGS CONTAINED BY ANOTHER, BUT THAT HE WHO IS ABOVE ALL IS HIMSELF ITS MAKER, GOD, AND IS HIMSELF THE FATHER OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. 1. Now those who say that the world was fabricated by angels, or by some other maker of the world, apart from the will of him who is the Father over all, err from the very outset in this: they say that the angels made so great and so grand a creation apart from the will of the first God — as though the angels were more capable than God, or else as though God were negligent, or in some way inferior, or took no care over what happens within his own domain, whether it happens well or badly, so as to stop and prevent the one and approve and rejoice in the other. No one would attribute such negligence even to a competent man, much less to God. Let them then tell us: were these things made within the region contained by him, within his own domain, or within what belongs to another and lies outside him? If they say they were made within his own domain, then all the same absurdities already stated will confront them, and the first God will find himself shut in by whatever lies outside him, hemmed by a limit at which he too must terminate. But if these things were made within his own domain, it will be quite absurd to say that, apart from his will, within what belongs to him, the world was fabricated by angels or by powers subject to him, or by someone else — as though he himself did not foresee everything within his own domain, so that he did not know beforehand what the angels would do.
But if it was not without his consent, but rather with him willing and understanding it, as some suppose, then the cause of this fabrication will no longer lie with the angels or the maker of the world, but with what God wills. For if he himself made the maker of the world and the angels, or was even himself the cause of their creation, then he himself will be seen to have made the world, since he prepared the causes of its fabrication. Even if they say that the angels, or the maker of the world, were produced through a long downward succession from the first Father, as Basilides says, nevertheless the responsibility for what was made will still return to the one who set that succession in motion — just as credit for a military victory is referred back to the king who prepared the causes of it, and the founding of a city, or of some work, is credited to the one who prepared the causes for the completion of what was made below him. For this reason we do not say that the axe cuts the wood, or that the saw does the sawing, but rather, and most correctly, that it is the man who cuts and saws — the one who made the axe and the saw for this very purpose, and, prior even to that, fashioned all the tooling that went into producing the axe and saw in the first place. So too, then, by their own reasoning, it is the Father of all who must justly be called the maker of this world — not the angels, nor any other world-fabricator, but rather the one who set that succession going and stood as the prior cause of everything — not as those suppose who, being ignorant of God, liken him to poor men, and to those who cannot make anything at once out of what lies ready to hand, but need many tools for their work. Rather, God himself gave and made all things; he needed no angels to help him in what was made, nor any power far beneath his own and without knowledge of the Father, nor any defect, nor any ignorance, as if someone who was beginning to come to know him had to become man for that reason. Instead, he himself, in himself, according to what is ineffable and inconceivable, foreordaining all things, made them just as he willed, granting to all things their harmony, their own order, and the beginning of their creation — to spiritual beings a spiritual nature, to invisible beings an invisible nature, to what is above the heavens a heavenly nature, to angels an angelic nature, to animals an animal nature, to swimming creatures an aquatic nature, to earthborn creatures an earthly nature — to all things a substance fitted to their proper measure. And all the things that were made, he made by his untiring Word. For this is proper to God's supreme excellence: that he needs no other instruments for the making of what is made, and that his own Word is fit and sufficient for the forming of all things — just as John, the Lord's disciple, says of him: 'All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made.' Now among all things is also included this world of ours. This world, then, too was made by his Word, just as the Scripture of Genesis says, that God made through his Word all the things that concern us: at his speaking they came into being, at his command they were brought forth. Whom, then, ought we rather to trust regarding the world's making — these heretics just mentioned, prattling such foolish and self-contradicting notions, or, on the other side, the Lord's own disciples together with Moses, God's faithful servant and prophet? He was the first to narrate the origin of the world, saying: 'In the beginning God made heaven and earth,' and then all the rest that follows — but not gods, nor angels.
This, then, is the very God who fathers our Lord Jesus Christ, and it is of him that the apostle Paul spoke: "one God and Father, ruling over the universe, working through the universe, dwelling within the universe." [The source text here is disturbed by an interleaved editorial apparatus and cannot be fully restored.] ..."At the world's first origin, God fashioned heaven and earth": so we take it that all things exist through the Word's own power. We have already demonstrated that there is a single God; and we shall go on demonstrating it, drawing on the apostles' own witness and the Lord's own sayings. For what sense could there be in forsaking the testimony given by the prophets, given by the Lord himself, given by his apostles too, merely to heed these men, whose talk amounts to nothing sound?

======== Book II — Chapter 3 ========

How Unstable Is the Pleroma of the Disciples of Valentinus. 1. Unstable, then, is their Bythus, and unstable is his Pleroma, and the God of Marcion. For, as they say, he has outside himself something lying beneath, which they call the Void and the Shadow, and this Void is shown to be greater than their own Pleroma. And it is equally unstable to say this — that even though everything is held within him, this created order was nevertheless fashioned by someone else. For they must necessarily admit some void and formless thing, within which this universe was fashioned, inside the spiritual Pleroma; and they must say of this formless thing either that the Forefather, foreknowing what would come to be in it, deliberately left it so, or that he did not know. If he did not know, then God will no longer be the foreknower of all things; nor will they be able to give any reason why he left this place idle for so long a time. But if he did foreknow it, and beheld in his mind the condition that would come to be in that place, then he himself made it — he who also pre-formed it within himself.
Let them, then, cease to say that the world was made by another; for as soon as God conceived it in mind, that which he had conceived in mind came to be. For it was not possible for one to conceive a thing in mind and another to make what had been conceived by him. But according to these heretics, God conceived the world in mind either as eternal or as temporal, and both suppositions are incredible. For if he conceived it as eternal, both spiritual and visible, then it would also have been made such. But if it is such as it now is, and he who made it had conceived it in mind as such — willing it to exist, in the Father's own presence, according to that mental conception, as composite, changeable, and passing away — then, since it is the Father's own workmanship, and since what was conceived and pre-formed in this way by the Father of all was made just as it was conceived, to call it the fruit of a defect and the offspring of ignorance amounts to blasphemy of the worst sort. For on their own reckoning, the universal Father must then be shown producing, from a thought conceived within his own bosom, emissions born of defect and fruits born of ignorance — given that whatever he had conceived in thought is precisely what resulted.

======== Book II — Chapter 4 ========

A cause, then, must be sought for a dispensation of God of this kind, but the fashioning of the world must not be assigned to another; and it must be said that all things were prepared beforehand by God so that they might come to be just as they did come to be — but no shadow and void is to be invented. But then one will ask: whence comes this void? Is it, according to them, itself an emission from the Father and Producer of all, and so of equal honor and kin to the rest of the Aeons — perhaps even older than they? But if it was emitted by the same one, it is like him who emitted it, and like those along with whom it was emitted. It will then be altogether necessary that their Bythus, together with the void Sige, should likewise be void, and that the rest of the Aeons, being brothers of the void, should have a void substance as well. But if it was not emitted, it is self-born and self-generated, equal in time to him who is, according to them, Bythus, the Father of all — and thus the void will be of the same nature and the same honor as him whom they call the Father of all. For it must necessarily be either that it was emitted by someone, or that it was self-generated and self-born. But if the void was indeed emitted, then the emitter is void, Valentinus is void, and his followers are void. And if it was not emitted but self-generated, then this void thing is alike, kindred, and of equal honor with that Father spoken of by Valentinus — indeed older, existing long before, and more honorable than the rest of the Aeons of Ptolemy, of Heracleon, and of all the others who hold the same opinions.
Furthermore, even in their perplexity over this, let them admit that the Father of all contains all things, and that there is nothing outside the Pleroma (for it is altogether necessary that he be bounded and circumscribed by something greater); and let them say that "outside" and "inside" are spoken of in terms of knowledge and ignorance, not of local distance. But within the Pleroma, or among the things the Father holds, whatever the Demiurge or the angels brought into being, whatever we recognize as having been made, we recognize as held within his ineffable vastness, as a center is held within a circle, or a stain within a garment. Such, then, would Bythus be — sustaining in his own bosom the coming-to-be of a defect, and permitting some other to found or bring forth, within his own domain, something apart from his own mind. What manner of absurdity would this begin to bring upon the whole Pleroma? Since he could, from the beginning, have cut off the defect and those emissions that took their origin from it, and not have allowed the constitution of that creation to arise in ignorance, in passion, and in defect. For one who afterward corrects a defect, and cleanses away, as it were, a stain, could far more easily have taken care from the start that no such stain should arise at all among his own. Or if he permitted it at the beginning, on the ground that what was made could not have come to be otherwise, then it ought always to go on coming to be in the same way. For how can things that could not receive correction at the beginning receive it afterward? Or how do they say that men are called to perfection, when the very causes from which men were made — whether the Demiurge himself or the angels — are said to exist in defect? And if, because he is kind, he has in these last times had mercy on men and grants them perfection, he ought first to have had mercy on those who were the makers of man, and to have given perfection to them. For thus, indeed, would men also have received mercy, being made perfect from those who were already perfect. For if he had mercy on the work of their hands, he ought to have had mercy on them far sooner, and not have allowed them to fall into such great blindness.
Their account of the shadow and void, moreover — by which they say that this created order of ours came to be — will likewise be dissolved, if these things were made among those contained by the Father. For if they suppose their paternal light to be such that it can fill all things within it and illuminate all things, how could a void and a shadow exist among the things contained by the Pleroma and by the paternal light? For they must show a place within the Forefather, or within the Pleroma, that is not illuminated or held fast by anyone — a place where the angels, or perhaps the Demiurge instead, made whatever they wished. For it is no small place in which so great and such a creation was made. It will therefore be altogether necessary that, within the Pleroma or within their Father, something void, formless, and dark should come to be locally, in which what was fashioned was fashioned. Their paternal light, too, will incur reproach, as being unable to illuminate and fill the things within itself. And further, by calling these things the fruit of a defect and the work of error, they will be introducing defect and error within the Pleroma itself, and into the very bosom of the Father.

======== Book II — Chapter 5 ========

[Title fragment, corrupt: "...that he is indeed invisible to them..."] 1. Against those, then, who say that this world was made outside the Pleroma, or under a good God, what we have said a little above is fitting, and such persons will be shut up together with their own Father by him who is outside the Pleroma, in whom too they must necessarily come to an end. But against those who say that this world was made, among the things contained by the Father, by certain others, everything we have now said will prove absurd and unfitting; and they will be compelled either to confess that all things within the Father are luminous, full, and well-ordered, or to accuse the paternal light of being unable to illuminate everything — or else, just as with the part, so also to confess that their whole Pleroma is void, disordered, and dark. And whatever else they accuse the lower creation of, as though it were temporal instead of eternal, and material, must either be beyond reproach, since it is within the Pleroma and in the bosom of the Father, or else similar reproaches will fall upon the whole Pleroma as well. And their Christ will be found to be the cause of ignorance. For, as they say, after he had formed their Mother according to her substance, he cast her out beyond the Pleroma — that is, he separated her from knowledge. He, therefore, is the one who produced ignorance in her, since it was he who separated her from knowledge. How, then, could this same one impart knowledge to the rest of the Aeons who were before him, and yet be the cause of ignorance to his own mother? For he made her to be outside of knowledge.
Further still, if they say that "within the Pleroma" and "outside the Pleroma" correspond to knowledge and ignorance — as some of them indeed say, since whoever is in knowledge is "within," that is, within what he knows — then they must necessarily agree that the Savior himself (whom they say is "the All") was in ignorance. For they say that when he came forth outside the Pleroma, he formed their Mother. If, then, they say that whatever lies outside is the ignorance belonging to all things, and the Savior went forth and became what she was — meaning, he found himself in ignorance — then by what means could he impart knowledge to her, seeing that he himself stood outside knowledge? For we too, since we are outside their knowledge, they say, are outside the Pleroma. And again: if the Pleroma is knowledge, and he was made outside knowledge, that is, in ignorance, then they must necessarily agree either that this is meant locally, that he was outside the Pleroma — and all the things stated above will come round upon them as contradictions — or, if they say that what is within corresponds to knowledge and what is without to ignorance, then their Savior, and long before him their Christ, will be found to have been made in ignorance, having gone forth outside the Pleroma to form their Mother, who is outside of knowledge.
These arguments, moreover, will apply equally against all who, in whatever way, say that the world was made either by angels or by some other being besides the true God. For whatever accusation they bring against the Demiurge, and against the things that were made material and temporal, will recoil upon the Father himself. For if these things were made within the womb of the Pleroma, and were destined soon afterward to be dissolved, was this not by the permission and according to the will of the Father? The Fashioner, then, is not the cause of this working, as though he thought himself to be fashioning very well; rather, it is he who, among his own, permits and approves that the emissions of defect and the works of error should come to be, and that temporal things should exist among eternal ones, corruptible things among incorruptible ones, and things of error among things of truth. But if these things were made without the permission or approval of the Father of all, then he who made these things — which are properly the Father's own — without his permission, is more powerful, stronger, and more sovereign than the Father. And if their Father permitted it without approving, as some of them say, then he permitted it either because, though able to prevent it, he was compelled by some necessity, or because he was not able to prevent it. But if he was not able, he is weak and powerless; and if he was able, he is a deceiver, a hypocrite, and a slave of necessity — not truly consenting, but permitting as though he consented. And having at the beginning permitted error to arise and grow, he now, in later times, tries to dissolve it, when already many have wickedly perished on account of the defect.
But it is not fitting to say that he who is God over all, being free and his own master, was a slave to necessity, so that anything should exist by his mere permission apart from his own decision; otherwise they will be making necessity greater and more sovereign than God, since that which has more power is prior to all things. And from the very outset he ought to have severed whatever gave rise to such a necessity, rather than entangling himself in subjection to it by permitting something so unfitting for him. For it would have been far better, more proper, and more godlike for him to have severed, right from the outset, the source of such a necessity, than to attempt afterward, as though in repentance, to uproot so vast a growth of necessity. And if the Father of all shall be found a slave to necessity, and shall fall under fate, chafing at the things that come to pass, and able to do nothing apart from necessity and fate — then their Bythus, by this same reasoning of necessity and fate, will be found to be a slave, just like the Jupiter of Homer, who says under compulsion: "For I too gave it to you, as though willing, though my heart was unwilling."

======== Book II — Chapter 6 ========

[Title fragment, corrupt.] How, then, could either the angels or the world's fashioner have remained ignorant of the primal God, given that they stood within his own domain, existed as things he had made, and were held fast by him? Granted, his transcendence may indeed have kept him unseen by them, but his providence made it impossible for him to be altogether unknown to them. For even granting, as they claim, that they were set very far apart from him through their descent, still, since his rule reaches over everything, they should have recognized their own Sovereign, and grasped this much: that their own maker is Lord over everything. For his very invisibility, mighty as it is, grants everyone a deep awareness and sensitivity of mind toward his supremely mighty and almighty transcendence. And so, granted that only the Son truly knows the Father, and only the Father together with those to whom the Son chooses to disclose him truly knows the Son, still everyone grasps this much — because the reasoning planted within their minds stirs them and discloses to them that a single God exists, sovereign over everything.
And on this account every creature bows beneath the name belonging to the Most High and Almighty; and by calling upon this name, in the ages prior to our Lord's arrival, men were rescued from the most wicked spirits, and from every demon, and from falling away — not because earthly spirits or demons had themselves beheld him, but because they understood that there exists one who rules as God above all, at whose bare summons they shuddered, along with the whole of creation, and every principality and power and every subordinate force besides. Do not those living under Roman authority, despite never having set eyes on their Emperor and lying far off from him across land and sea, still acknowledge, by virtue of his rule, the one who wields supreme power of command — while the angels stationed over us, or the one they term the Maker of the world, would somehow fail to acknowledge the Almighty, seeing that even mute beasts shudder and give way before such a summons? Those subjects of Rome have truly never beheld him, and still every creature bows beneath our Lord's name; likewise before the name of him who fashioned and established the universe, since none exists apart from that very one who made the world. And for this cause the Jews, down to the present day, cast out demons through this very address, since everything dreads the summons of him who brought it into being.
If, then, they refuse to grant that the angels are more senseless than mute beasts, they will discover it was needful — even granting that these angels had never beheld the one who rules as God above the universe — that they should still acknowledge his power and dominion. For it would indeed seem absurd if they maintain that earth-dwellers acknowledge the one ruling as God above the universe, though they have laid eyes on him not at all, and yet refuse to grant that he who fashioned them, and the whole world according to their own account, though he dwells in the highest places above the heavens, should recognize the things that they themselves, though dwelling in lowly places, know well. Unless perhaps they say that their Bythos dwells under the earth, in Tartarus, and that for this reason they came to know him before the angels who dwell on high — falling into such madness as to declare the Maker of the world demented. Such men truly deserve pity, since in such madness they say that he did not even recognize his own mother, nor her offspring, nor the Pleroma of the Aeons, nor the Forefather, nor what the things were that he himself had made; and that the images of the things within the Pleroma came to exist secretly, through the Savior's working, in honor of those who are above.

======== Book II — Chapter 7 ========

[Heading, badly damaged in the source: a demonstration concerning the Demiurge and the Only-begotten.] Since, then, the Demiurge is ignorant of all these things, they say that the Savior honored the Pleroma in the act of creation through the mother, sending forth likenesses and images of the things that are above. But that it was impossible for anything to exist outside the Pleroma — in which they say images were made of the things within the Pleroma — or for this world to have been fashioned by anyone other than the first God, we have already shown. But since it is worthwhile to overturn them from every side and convict them of falsehood, we say further against them: if these things were made after the image of the things above, in honor of the things above, by the Savior, then they ought always to endure, so that what has been honored may remain forever in honor. But if they pass away, what use is there in so brief a span of honor, an honor which once did not exist and again will not exist? [Some words are illegible here in the source, evidently disputing the notion of receiving God in this manner and comparing it to a supposedly superior wisdom.] Further, what keeps the beings above, who live in perpetual leisure, from understanding — a thing no one but a madman would grant? The Savior, then, will be shown by us to be more a seeker of glory than a true honorer of the things above. For what honor is it to things that are eternal, when the things offering the honor are themselves temporal? There is no worth in an honor that quickly passes away, but only in one that endures as long as possible. Things that are destroyed as soon as they are made will rather be judged to have been made in insult to those supposed to be honored by them; and it is an insult to treat what is eternal in such a way, corrupting and dissolving its image. Yet suppose their mother had never wept, never laughed, and never sunk into perplexity? The Savior would have had nothing with which to honor the Pleroma — nothing but that extreme confusion, which has no substance of its own, by which to honor the Forefather.
O honor of vainglory, which passes at once and no longer appears! There will come some Aeon in which such an honor will be reckoned never to have existed at all, and the things above will then stand dishonored — or else the Mother must again be sent forth weeping and in perplexity, for the honor of the Pleroma. O image both unlike its original and blasphemous at once! You tell me that an image was sent forth by the Maker of the world — O Only-begotten, whom you also wish to be the Mind of the Father of all — and that this image is ignorant even of itself; ignorant also of its own condition; ignorant also of the Mother, and of everything belonging to the things that exist and to the things made by him. Are you not ashamed to carry ignorance in this manner all the way up to the Only-begotten in person? Supposing these things were fashioned by the Savior in the likeness of the things above, and the being fashioned after that likeness is ignorant to such a degree, then a corresponding ignorance (taken spiritually) must of necessity be found surrounding him as well — surrounding the very one whose likeness the ignorant being bears. There is simply no way, given that both were emitted in spiritual fashion, neither molded nor put together, for the likeness to have been kept intact in some respects while the image of that likeness sent forth here was defaced in others, if it must truly answer to the likeness of that emission above. But if it is not alike, the charge falls on the Savior, who sent forth an unlike image, as though he were a defective craftsman — nor can they say the Savior lacked the power of emission, since they call him 'the All.' [A phrase is illegible here.] In vain, then, does anyone try to correct the unlikeness of the images. If the image is unlike, the craftsman is at fault, and according to them the blame falls on the Savior. But if it is alike, then that identical ignorance will turn up surrounding the Mind of their Forefather also, that is, the Only-begotten: the Mind of the Father was ignorant of himself, ignorant also of the Father, and ignorant also of the things made by him. But if that one does know both himself and the being made after his likeness by the Savior, then he must also know the things like to it — and their whole argument thereby collapses. HOW THEIR ACCOUNT OF THE IMAGES RUNS OFF INTO THE IMMEASURABLE. Apart from this, how can the things of creation — so various, so many, and so innumerable — be images of those thirty Aeons within the Pleroma, whose names, as they give them, we set out in the book before this one? They will not be able to fit not only the whole variety of creation, but not even the variety of any single part of it — whether heavenly, earthly, or aquatic — to the smallness of their Pleroma. For that their Pleroma consists of thirty Aeons, they themselves testify; but that within a single part of what has been mentioned there are to be counted, not thirty, but many thousands of species, anyone willing to admit the truth can show. How then can things so numerous in kind, so contrary to one another, and so destructive of one another be images and likenesses of thirty Aeons — unless the Aeons themselves also exist in mutual opposition, and are not all equal and alike, with no difference among themselves? For if these are truly their images, then just as men say some persons are by nature wicked and some by nature good, so it would be necessary to show such differences existing also among the Aeons, saying that some were emitted good by their very nature and others evil by their very nature, so that the invention of the image might correspond to the Aeons. Further, since in the world some creatures are tame and others wild, some harmless and others harmful and destructive of the rest; and some belong to the earth, some to the water, some fly, and some belong to the heavens — the Aeons too must be shown to have such dispositions, if indeed these things are their images. And the eternal fire, which the Father prepared for the devil and his angels — of which Aeon, in turn, is this the image? For it too is numbered among the things of creation. And if they say these are images of the passion of the Aeon who suffered, then, first, they act impiously toward their own mother, calling her the originator of evil and corruptible images. And further, how can things so many, so unlike, and so contrary in nature belong to one and the same image? And if they say the Pleroma has many angels, and that the many things here below are images of these, even so their reasoning will not hold together. For first they must show contrary differences among the angels of the Pleroma, corresponding to the contrary natures of the images that lie beneath them. Then again, since the angels attending the Maker are many and innumerable, as all the prophets confess — ten thousand times ten thousand standing beside him, and thousands upon thousands ministering to him — then, by their own logic, the angels of the Maker will have as their images the angels of the Pleroma, and creation will remain intact as an image of the Pleroma without any further need of the thirty Aeons to account for its manifold variety. Further still, if these things were made according to a likeness, after the likeness of what, in turn, were those other things made? For if the Maker of the world did not make these things of himself but merely copied them, as they idly claim, whence did their Bythos derive the pattern for the arrangement he himself first sent forth? It follows, then, that he received the pattern from some other being above him, and that other again from yet another. And in this way the account of images will run off endlessly into the immeasurable — just as happens also with their gods — unless we fix our understanding on one Craftsman and one God, who made the things that were made of himself. Will someone allow that men have devised something useful for life by themselves, and yet not allow that God, who completed the world, fashioned of himself the pattern of the things made, and the design of their ordered arrangement?
But how, moreover, can these things be their images, when they are contrary to them and can have nothing in common with them? Things that are contrary to one another can indeed be destructive of one another, but cannot be images of one another — just as water is not an image of fire, nor light of darkness, and so with all such pairs; they will never be images of each other. So too the things that are corruptible, earthly, composite, and passing away cannot be images of things that, according to them, are spiritual — unless those spiritual things themselves are also confessed to be composite, circumscribed, and possessed of shape, and no longer spiritual, diffuse, abundant, and incomprehensible. For it is necessary that a thing possess shape and circumscription in order to be a true image, and it is settled that those other things are not of that kind. But if they say that those things are spiritual, diffuse, and incomprehensible, how can things that exist in a shape and within circumscription be images of things that are without shape and incomprehensible?
But if they say that these things are images not according to shape, nor according to form, but according to the number and order of their emission, then, in the first place, these things ought not to be called images and likenesses of the Aeons above at all. For things that have neither the appearance nor the shape of those Aeons — how are they images of them? And besides, they ought then to match the numbers and emissions of the higher Aeons as the same and similar to those belonging to the created order. But as it stands, while displaying thirty Aeons, and yet claiming that so vast a multitude of things existing in creation are images of these thirty, they will justly be convicted by us as senseless.

======== Book II — Chapter 8 ========

THAT IT IS NOT CREDIBLE THAT THE THINGS HERE ARE THE SHADOW OF THEIR PLEROMA. If they say that these things here are the shadow of the things above — as some of them venture to claim — so that in this sense they are images, it will then be necessary for them also to confess that the things above are bodies. For it is bodies that cast a shadow, not things that are spiritual, since nothing spiritual can be darkened by anything. But even if we grant them this — which is indeed impossible — that spiritual and luminous things can cast a shadow, into which they say their mother descended, still, since those things are eternal, the shadow produced from them would likewise remain everlasting, and the things here would not pass away but would remain together with the things that cast the shadow upon them. But if the things here do pass away, then those things too, of which these are the shadow, must necessarily pass away as well; whereas if those things remain, their shadow also remains.
But if they say it is called a shadow not because it is overshadowed by something, but because it is far separated from those things, then they thereby accuse the smallness and weakness of their paternal light — as though it did not reach as far as these things, but failed to fill up what is empty and to dissolve the shadow, even though nothing hinders it from doing so. For, according to them, their paternal light will be turned into darkness and blinded, and will fail in these places of emptiness, since it lacks the power to fill up the universe entire. So let them stop claiming, then, that their Bythos is the Pleroma, the fullness, of all things, since he has neither filled up nor illuminated that which is empty and shadow; or else let them abandon the notion of shadow and emptiness altogether, since their paternal light fills all things.
Therefore nothing can exist outside the first Father — that is, the God who is above all things, or the Pleroma — into which they say the Aeon who suffered the passion of Enthymesis (Thought) descended, in such a way that it would be bounded and circumscribed by something outside itself, and the Pleroma itself, or the first God, would thereby be contained. Nor can there be a void, or a shadow to receive it, since the Father already exists before it, lest his light should fail and be bounded within a void. It is unreasonable, indeed impious, to invent a place where the one whom they call Forefather and First-Beginning, the Father of all things and of this Pleroma, reaches its limit and comes to a close. Nor, moreover, is it permitted to claim that within the Father's own bosom some other being fashioned so vast a creation, whether with his consent or without it, for the reasons already given. For it is equally impious and senseless to say that so vast a creation was fashioned by angels, or by some emanation ignorant of the true God, working within the things that belong to him; nor is it possible that things earthly and material came to be beneath their Pleroma, since the whole of it is spiritual; nor even on their own showing — since they say the Aeons are few, of like form, and one — is it possible that things of manifold and mutually contrary constitution should have come to be from them. [Here the source text is joined by a run of editorial apparatus — a note on the recurring sense of 'emanation' elsewhere in the work, and a gloss suggesting the phrase 'the Father already existed before' means rather that the Father is too strong to fail — which cannot be rendered as continuous prose and is passed over.] THAT THEIR SHADOW AND VOID ARE SHOWN TO BE FALSE. But their talk of the shadow of the Cenoma (that is, of the Void) has proved false in every respect. Thus the void has been shown to be their invention, and their doctrine unstable; and as for the void, those who attend to it are truly caught in...

======== Book II — Chapter 9 ========

DEMONSTRATION THAT [ACCORDING TO THEM] A FATHER IS FOUND ABOVE THIS ONE. That God is the Maker of the world is agreed even by those who contradict him in many ways and who confess him, calling him Maker and calling him an angel — not to mention that all the Scriptures cry it out, and the Lord teaches that this Father who is in the heavens, and no other, is God, as we shall show as the discourse proceeds. For now it is enough to bring forward, as testimony, what comes even from those who speak against us — all men agreeing on this point in the end: the ancients, who from the very beginning kept this persuasion by the tradition of the first-formed man, and hymned the one God, Maker of heaven and earth; those who came after them, receiving from the prophets of this God the remembrance of this truth; and the Gentiles, who learned it from creation itself. For creation itself shows the one who founded it, and the work itself suggests the one who made it, and the world manifests the one who arranged it. The whole Church, moreover, throughout the whole world, has taken up this teaching handed down from the apostles.
Since, then, this God stands firm, as we have said, and receives testimony from all that he is, that other one whom, according to them, is found to be a Father, is without foundation and without witness — Simon Magus being the first to say that he himself was the god above all, and that the world was made by his angels; and after him, those who succeeded him, as we showed in the first book, brought around various opinions, impious and irreligious doctrines against the Maker. Their disciples, being what they are, make those who agree with them worse than the Gentiles. For the Gentiles, though they render service to what is created instead of to the Maker, and to things that are not gods at all, nevertheless assign the first rank of deity to the Maker of this universe, as to God. These men, however, call this very God the fruit of a defect, name him 'animal,' and say he does not know the power that is above him; and when he declares, 'I am God, and apart from me there exists no other,' they say he is lying — while they themselves lie, heaping every wickedness upon him, and inventing one who is not, as being above him who is. By their own reckoning they are exposed: blaspheming the one who is God, and inventing one who is not God, to their own condemnation. And those who say they themselves are perfect and possess the knowledge of all things are found worse than the Gentiles, and more blasphemous in their very reasoning, even against their own maker.

======== Book II — Chapter 10 ========

ON QUESTIONS AND PARABLES. It is utterly unreasonable, then, passing over him who truly is God and who has testimony from all, to inquire whether there is someone above him who is not, and who has never been announced by anyone. For since plainly nothing at all has been said of him — and they themselves bear witness to this — it is clear that by wrongly twisting the parables that are in question (parables whose own manner of expression is itself disputed) to fit the one they have invented, they are now generating someone else who was never before sought at all. For by their wish to resolve ambiguous Scriptures — not, indeed, ambiguous as though a God other than our Creator should be imagined, as the heretics assert, who blaspheme the God who is and fashion for themselves an idol of one who is not — by knotting together another God, they add a greater question to a lesser one. But no question at all is resolved by another thing equally in question, nor is an ambiguity resolved by another ambiguity, nor riddles by a greater riddle; rather, such things receive their solution from what is plain, consistent, and clear.
These men, in seeking to resolve the Scriptures and parables, introduce another, greater and impious question — whether, namely, above the Maker of the world there is another god — and thereby resolve nothing (for how could they?), but tie a great question onto a small one, fastening in an unsolvable knot. For while wishing it to be known that the Lord came to the baptism of truth at thirty years of age, and failing to learn from this the very fact that it was this same God the Maker who dispatched him for mankind's salvation, they impiously despise him; and thinking they can explain whence the substance of matter came, not believing that God, out of things that were not, made — as he willed — all the things that were made to exist, using his own will and power for the substance, they have gathered together empty words, truly showing their own unbelief: for by not believing the things that are, they have fallen into that which is not. AS TO THE CLAIM THAT THE SUBSTANCE OF MATTER SLIPPED FROM ACHAMOTH. That a moist substance came forth from her tears, a luminous one from her laughter, a solid one from her grief, and a mobile one from her fear, and that in these she is proud and puffed up — how are these things not worthy of derision, and truly ridiculous? These men do not believe that matter itself, being as it is powerful and rich in all things, was created by God, not knowing how great the power of a spiritual and divine substance is; yet they believe that their 'mother,' whom they call a female born of a female, from the passions aforesaid gave forth so vast a substance of created matter; and while they ask whence the Maker got the substance for his creation, they do not ask whence there came to their 'mother' — the one they term Enthymesis, impulse of a straying Aeon — so many tears, sweats, griefs, or the rest of that outflow of matter.
To attribute the substance of the things that were made to the might and purpose of the God of all things is credible, acceptable, consistent, and would be well said in this respect: that he is better than men, in that he himself devised the matter of his own workmanship, whereas men can indeed make something, but only out of matter already lying at hand, while God, before there was anything at all, himself brought matter into being. But to say that matter was put forth from the Enthymesis of a wandering Aeon, and that the Aeon is far removed from his own Enthymesis, and that this suffering and this affection lay outside that very substance of hers, is both incredible and foolish, impossible and inconsistent.

======== Book II — Chapter 11 ========

REFUTATIONS OF THE FOLLOWERS OF VALENTINUS. I. And those who refuse to believe that the God above all fashioned, within his own domain, things various and unlike by means of the Word, exactly as he willed it, being Lord of all — but instead claim that angels, or some power apart from God and unaware of him, made this universe — such men, then, not believing the truth but wallowing in falsehood, have lost the bread of true life, falling into emptiness and into the depth of a shadow; like Aesop's dog, who let go the bread and lunged at its shadow, and so lost his meal. And from the Lord's own words it is easy to show one who confesses one Father, both Maker of the world and Fashioner of man — the one announced by the Law and the Prophets — and rejects a second, unknown one, teaching that this same one is God above all, and himself granting, through himself, to the Father the adoption of sons, which is eternal life, bestowed upon all the righteous.
But since they love to bring accusation, and shake even what is free of reproach as though it were blameworthy, heaping upon us a multitude of parables and questions, we have thought it good first to question them in turn about their own doctrines, and to show what in them is not plausible, and to cut down their rashness; and after that to bring forward the Lord's own sayings — so that they may not merely be free to propose questions, but, being unable to answer by reason the things asked of them, and seeing their own argument come undone, either they may turn back to the truth, humble themselves, cease from their manifold fancy, and be saved by appeasing the God whom they have blasphemed; or, if they persist in the vainglory that has taken hold of their minds beforehand, they will at least be shown to have changed their own argument.

======== Book II — Chapter 12 ========

HOW THIS ACCOUNT OF THE THIRTY [AEONS] FAILS BOTH IN WHAT IT ADDS AND IN WHAT IT SUBTRACTS. I. First, then, concerning their Thirty (the Triacontad), we shall say this: that it collapses wondrously on both sides — both as regards what it lacks and as regards what it has in excess — the very thing on account of which they say the Lord came to baptism at thirty years of age. When this is stated, the overthrow of their whole argument will be plain. As to the shortfall, it is this: first, they number the Forefather among the rest of the Aeons. But the Father of all should not be reckoned among the rest of the emanation — he who was not emitted, alongside what was emitted; the unborn, alongside what was born; he whom none can contain, alongside what is contained by him and thus admits of containment; the formless, alongside what has taken form. Since he surpasses all the rest, he should not be classed together with them; and the same holds for the passible Aeon fixed in error, who cannot be classed with the impassible one who knows no error. For since they begin their Triacontad from Bythus and count up to Sophia — whom they call the wandering Aeon — as we showed in the book before this one, and set down there the names they give, once this last one is not counted, there are then, by their own reckoning, no longer thirty emissions of Aeons, but twenty-nine. THAT IT IS IMPOSSIBLE FOR ANYTHING TO HAVE BEEN EMITTED SEPARATELY. Next, as to the first emission, Ennoia, whom they call Sige (Silence), from whom in turn they say Aletheia was emitted — in both of these they go astray. For it is impossible for the 'thought' or the 'silence' of anyone to be understood as separate, having its own distinct form apart from the one who put it forth. But if they will not say that it was emitted apart, but united to the Forefather, why then do they number it among the rest of the Aeons, which are not so united, and which for this very reason are ignorant of his greatness? And if it is indeed united to him — let us consider this too — then it is altogether necessary that, from a union undivided and inseparable and existing as one, the emission that comes from it should likewise be undivided and one, so that it is not unlike the one who emitted it. But if this is so, then Bythus and Sige will be one and the same thing, just as also Nous and Aletheia, always cleaving to one another, since neither can be understood without the other — just as water is unthinkable without moisture, fire without heat, or stone without hardness (for these cling to one another, and neither can be split away from the other, though the two always coexist) — so likewise Bythus must be united with Ennoia, and Nous with Aletheia in the same way. Again, Logos and Zoe, being emitted from things so united, must themselves be united and be one. And by the same reasoning, Anthropos and Ecclesia, and the whole emission of the remaining pairs of Aeons, must be united, and each must always coexist with the other. For the female Aeon must, on their own view, exist equally with the male, since she is, as it were, his affection. Yet, this being so, and though this is what they themselves say, they in turn shamelessly presume to teach that the youngest Aeon of the Twelve, whom they also call Sophia, apart from any joining with her partner, whom they name Theletus, suffered a passion and, without him, alone brought forth a fruit — which they also name a female born of a female — descending into such madness that they plainly hold two contrary opinions about the same thing at once. For if Bythus is united with Sige, and Nous with Aletheia, and Logos with Zoe, and so on in order, how could Sophia, apart from union with her consort, suffer anything, or bring anything forth? But if she suffered this apart from him, then all the other pairs must likewise be understood to undergo separation and division from themselves — which is impossible, as we said before. It is therefore impossible for Sophia to have suffered apart from Theletus; and so their whole argument again comes undone. Indeed, concerning this passion, which they say she suffered without union with her consort, they have gone on to fashion the rest of it like the plot of a tragedy. And if they shamelessly say that the other pairs too are disjoined and separated from one another — so that, because of this last pair, their idle talk should not be dissolved — they run first into an impossibility. For how will they separate the Forefather from his Ennoia? Or Logos from Zoe, or Nous from Aletheia? And so with whatever pairs remain? And yet how, on the other hand, do they themselves say that all things run back into unity, and that all are one, if indeed the pairs within the Pleroma do not keep their unity, but stand apart from one another to such a degree that they can suffer and generate without their partners? THAT IN THE SAME PLEROMA THE WORD AND SILENCE COULD NOT BOTH BE. After this, again, their first and original Ogdoad will likewise be undone. For there will be, specifically, in the same Pleroma, Bythus and Sige, Nous and Aletheia, Logos and Zoe, Anthropos and Ecclesia. But it is impossible, where the Word is present, for Silence to be there also; or again, where Silence is present, for the Word to be shown — for these consume one another, just as light and darkness cannot both be in the same place: where there is light, there is no darkness; and where there is darkness, there will be no light, for when light comes, the darkness is dissolved. So where Sige is, there will be no Logos; and where there is Logos, there certainly is no Sige. But if this is nonetheless to be resolved by an 'indwelling Word' — well, since he is not an indwelling Word, this very ordering of their emission proves the point against them.
Let them, then, stop claiming that Logos and Sige make up their foremost, chief Ogdoad; rather, let them abandon either Sige or Logos — for whichever way, that chief and foremost Ogdoad of theirs collapses. If they say the pairs are unities, their whole argument is undone: for how, once the pair is made into a unity, could Sophia, without a consort, have produced her defect? But if, as they say elsewhere, they still hold to consorts, then it can be shown by the same reasoning that Sige and Logos are likewise a pair. This concerns the diminished form of their scheme. But as regards the fuller number, their Triad of Tens is again dissolved in this way. They call Horos, whom they also call by many other names (as we have said above concerning the Aeon before him), 'Only-begotten,' just as they do the rest of the Aeons. Some of them say this Horos was put forth by the Only-begotten, others that he was put forth by the Forefather himself in his own likeness. Further, they say that Christ and the Holy Spirit were also put forth by the Only-begotten, and yet they do not count these among the number of the Pleroma — nor even the Savior, whom they also say is the 'All.' For this much is plain even to the blind: that according to them not only thirty emissions were put forth, but four more besides those thirty. For they count the Forefather himself within the Pleroma, along with those who were successively put forth from one another. What then of these — Christ, whom they say was put forth by the Only-begotten with the Father's consent, and the Holy Spirit, and Horos, whom they also call Savior, and even the Savior himself who came to help and form their mother — why are these not to be counted among the same Pleroma, existing as they do within it and having obtained the very same act of emission? What just cause can they give for not counting them along with the rest of the Aeons? Are these lesser than the others, and so unworthy of the name and the number of the Aeons? Or are they, rather, better and different? But how could they be the lesser, when they were even put forth to fix and correct the rest? And how, on the other hand, could they be counted better than, and distinct from, the first and principal Tetrad, from which they too were put forth — since that Tetrad is itself already reckoned within the aforesaid number? They ought, then, either to have counted these also within the Pleroma of the Aeons, or else to have stripped the rest of the Aeons of the honor of that very name.
Since, then, their Triad of Tens is dissolved — as we have shown — both in its diminished and in its fuller reckoning (for if a number of this kind has either more or fewer than it should, it makes the whole reckoning suspect, and how much more so in so great a number), their fable about the Ogdoad and the Duodecad is likewise unstable. And their whole system is unstable, its very foundation shaken and dissolved into the Bythos — that is, into what does not exist. Let them, then, try from now on to find other reasons why the Lord came to baptism at thirty years of age, why there are twelve apostles, and why there was the woman who suffered the flow of blood, and all the other things over which they toil in vain and rave. [Heading:] How the first order of their emission is shown to be worthless. And so we have shown the very first order of their emission to be untenable, in this way. They say that Nous and Aletheia were put forth from Bythos and his Ennoia; but this is shown to be contrary to reason. For Nous is itself the ruling principle, the highest thing, as it were the beginning and source of all understanding, whereas Ennoia is something derived from this and from whichever of those Aeons it happens to be — namely from the first and principal Tetrad. It does not follow, then, that Nous was put forth from Bythos and Ennoia; it would be far more reasonable to say that from the Forefather and from this Nous a daughter, Ennoia, was put forth. For Ennoia is not the mother of Nous, as they claim, but rather Nous becomes the father of Ennoia. And in what way was Nous himself put forth from the Forefather, who holds the primary and first place of that hidden and invisible disposition within him, from which understanding is generated, and ennoia, and enthymesis, and the other things which are nothing other than Nous itself — that is, various movements of it arranged, as we have said, around some object of thought, taking their names according to persistence and growth, not according to any change of substance, and coming to definite knowledge, and being uttered together into speech, while the understanding itself remains within, founding, administering, and governing freely and by its own power, exactly as it wills, as has been said above.
For its first movement toward some object is termed ennoia; once it persists and grows, taking possession of the entire soul, it earns the name enthymesis. Enthymesis of this kind, when it continues for a long while upon the same object and is, so to speak, put to the test, is called sensatio (perception). This perception, when greatly extended, becomes deliberation; and the growth and movement of that deliberation, when greatly extended, becomes the examination of thought — which, persisting still in the mind, becomes word (verbum). All these things that have been named are one and the same, taking their beginning from Nous and receiving their names according to growth. Just as the human body is called sometimes an infant, sometimes a grown man, sometimes an old man, taking these names from its growth and duration rather than from any alteration of substance or forfeiture of the body — and so it is with these as well. For what a man contemplates, of that he also thinks; and what he thinks, of that he also has understanding; and what he understands, of that he also takes counsel; and what he takes counsel about, that he turns over in his mind; and what he turns over in his mind, that he speaks. All these things, as we have said, Nous governs, since it is itself invisible, and puts forth speech from itself through the things aforesaid, as a ray of light is put forth from the sun, yet it is not itself put forth by another.
Now this may fairly be said of human beings, since they are composite by nature, consisting of body and soul together. But those who say that Ennoia was put forth from God, and Nous from Ennoia, and then Logos from these, are refuted first of all by this very consideration: that the thought of the mind, so long as it remains within the mind where it was conceived, is one thing; but when this conceived word is, as it were, separated off from the mind and uttered, it is another. They have used the term 'emissions' improperly. Afterward, in cataloguing the affections and passions of men, and the mind's operations, still ignorant of God, they pin on the Father of all — whom they themselves call unknowable to all — precisely what happens to human beings whenever they utter speech; refusing him the making of the world (lest he seem diminished thereby), yet handing him the passions and affections proper to men. Had they instead been schooled in the sacred writings and instructed by the truth, they would have grasped that God is nothing like men, nor are his thoughts anything like human thoughts. For the Father of all stands utterly apart from whatever befalls men — their passions and their affections. He is simple, not composite, of like parts throughout, wholly like himself and equal to himself, being wholly understanding, and wholly spirit, and wholly perceptive, and wholly ennoia, and wholly reason, and wholly hearing, and wholly eye, and wholly light, and wholly the source of every good thing — as befits devout and God-fearing men to say of him.
But he is also, beyond all this and on account of it, indescribable. For understanding capable of all things may rightly and properly be affirmed of him, yet not in the manner of human understanding; and light too may most fittingly be said of him, yet unlike any light known among us. So too in everything else: the Father of all will be like nothing that belongs to human littleness. He is spoken of, in these terms, out of love — but he is perceived, beyond these terms, in his greatness. [Heading:] That understanding could not have been put forth, since it is itself what put forth the rest. If, then, even in human beings, the understanding itself is not put forth, nor separated from the living one who puts forth the rest — while its movements and affections come to visible expression — how much more will God, who is wholly understanding, never in any way be separated from himself, nor be put forth as one thing from another. For if he put forth understanding, then he who put it forth is, according to them, understood as composite and corporeal, so that there would be one who put it forth, namely God, and another, separately, that which was put forth, namely understanding. And if they say that understanding was put forth from understanding, they are cutting God's understanding in pieces and dividing it. Where, and from what, was it put forth? For whatever is put forth by something is put forth into some underlying substrate. But what substrate more ancient than the understanding of God existed, into which they say it was put forth? And how vast a place must there have been, to receive and contain the understanding of God? And if they liken it, as they do, to a ray from the sun — into what does it come, as into some underlying, receptive substance, older than itself, and where do they show anything of the kind subsisting, into which the understanding of God was put forth? For it will be necessary for them to say, just as we see the sun to be smaller than everything, sending out its rays far from itself, that the Forefather likewise sent out his ray outside himself and far from himself. But what can be conceived as outside or far from God, into which he sent forth his ray? And if they claim it was emitted, not outside the Father, but staying inside the Father himself — well, to begin with, it would be pointless even to speak of an 'emission' — for how could something be emitted while remaining lodged within the Father? For emission is the manifestation, outside the one who emits, of that which is emitted. And further, on this view, the Logos who comes from it will still remain within the Father; and likewise all the other emissions of the Logos. They will not, then, be ignorant of the Father, since they remain within him; nor will anyone know him less because of the descending order of the emissions, since all alike are equally surrounded by the Father on every side; and all alike will remain free from suffering, being within the Father's own depths, and none of them will be in any way diminished. For the Father admits no diminishment — unless, perhaps, they mean it as one great circle containing within it a lesser circle, and within that again another still lesser; or, on the analogy of a sphere or a square, they say the Father contains within himself, in the likeness of a sphere or square, the remaining emission of the Aeons, each one surrounded by the one greater than itself above it, and itself surrounding the lesser one that comes after it — so that the least and last of all, being set in the middle, and greatly separated from the Father, would be ignorant of the Forefather. But if they say this, they will be shutting up their Bythos within a figure and a boundary — the containing and the contained — for they will be forced to admit that there is something outside him as well, which surrounds him. And in any case their argument will run on without end concerning what contains and what is contained, and it will become plain that all these are bodies enclosed one within another. Moreover, they will either have to admit that he is empty, or that all that is within him partakes alike of the Father — just as, if one makes circles in water, whether round or square, all of them partake alike of the water; or as things within light all partake of the light; so too those who are within him would be filled, and if he is full, there will be no ignorance there. Thus their whole account of the diminishment, and of the emission of matter, and of the rest of the fashioning of the world, which they say had its origin from passion and ignorance, would be dissolved. But if they will confess him to be empty, they fall into the gravest blasphemy, denying that he is spiritual at all — for how could he be spiritual who cannot even fill the things that are within him? Now what has been said here about the emission of understanding applies equally against the followers of Basilides, and against every other Gnostic sect, since it was from these very sources that our men drew the starting-points of their emission-doctrine, as we already exposed at the outset. But since we have clearly shown that the first emission of Nous — that is, of understanding — is untenable and impossible according to them, let us look also at the rest. From this Nous, they say, the makers of this Pleroma put forth Logos and Zoe. As for the emission of the Logos, they take it from the analogy of human speech, imagining they have discovered something great against God in saying that Logos was put forth from Nous — a claim which everyone plainly recognizes is properly said only of human beings; whereas, regarding the one who is God above everything, since he is, as already stated, entirely Nous and entirely Logos, containing within himself nothing earlier or later, nothing set apart from another thing, but staying uniformly equal, alike, and single throughout, no emission of that sequential kind can possibly result. Just as one who says he is wholly sight and wholly hearing (for in that in which he sees, in the same he also hears, and in that in which he hears, in the same he also sees) commits no error, so too one who says he is wholly understanding and wholly word, and that in that in which understanding is, in the same word also is, and that this Nous is his Word, will still fall short in his thought of the Father of all — yet will speak more fittingly than those who transfer the generation of uttered human speech to the eternal Word of God, granting it a beginning and a coming-into-being of utterance, just as with their own word. And in what way will God differ — since he himself is Word — if his Word has the same ordering and emission of generation as the word of men? They have gone wrong too concerning Zoe, saying that it was put forth in the sixth place, when it should have ranked ahead of everything else, seeing that God himself is life, incorruption, and truth. Nor did such attributes come into being through any sequence of emission; rather, these titles belong to those powers forever present with God, insofar as men are able and permitted to hear and speak of him. For bound up together with the very name of God are understanding, word, life, incorruption, truth, wisdom, goodness, and all things of that sort. And no one can say that understanding is older than life, for understanding itself is life; nor that life comes after understanding, so that he who is the understanding of all things — that is, God — should ever be without life. But if they say that life was indeed present in the Father, then it ought to have been put forth in the fourth place, so that Nous might live — and even before that, it ought to have been present with Bythos, so that their own Bythos might live. For in numbering Sige alongside their Forefather and giving her to him as a consort, while failing to number Zoe among them, how is this not beyond all folly? — And that this is emission, and that it is spoken of him after the manner of surpassing rather than after the manner of ordinary things. As for the second production that comes from these — indeed rather the separation from — let it be understood accordingly; but the consubstantiality and the personal distinction of the Father and the Word will be affirmed clearly and thoroughly in the course of this work. In the matter of the emission of Anthropos and Ecclesia, these self-styled Gnostics — their own fathers — fight against one another, each claiming his own view and thereby proving themselves to be wicked thieves of one another's ideas: some saying it is more fitting to the emission, as more plausible, that the Word was put forth from Man, and not Man from the Word, and that Man precedes the Word, and that it is Man who is truly God above everything. And up to this point, as we have said, all of them, plausibly imagining human affections, and movements of mind, and generations of intentions, and emissions of words, have lied against God without any real plausibility. For the things that happen to men, and whatever they recognize themselves to suffer, they transfer to the divine reasoning, carrying their own understanding of these human passions across, and declaring the generation and putting-forth of the Word of God to be fifth in order — professing to teach wonderful mysteries, indescribable and lofty, known to no one else, concerning which the Lord himself said: 'Seek, and you shall find' — meaning, no doubt, that they should seek who it is that proceeded from Bythos and Sige, Nous and Aletheia; and whether after these come again Logos and Zoe, and after Logos and Zoe, Anthropos and Ecclesia.

======== Book II — Chapter 14 ========

One of the ancient comic poets, Antiphanes, said something far more plausible and pleasing about the origin of the universe in his Theogony. He says that Chaos was brought forth from Night and Silence; then from Chaos and Night came Love; and from Love, light; and thereafter, according to him, everything else belonging to that earliest brood of deities. Following on from this initial company he brings in a further, later brood of gods and the shaping of the cosmos, and thereafter recounts, out of that later divine company, how man was fashioned. [Editorial note: an ancient commentator observes that Antiphanes was unaware of the Hesiodic verses he cites, and that Irenaeus's argument here corresponds closely to the tenets of the earliest, Orphic-style Greek cosmogony as it appears, for example, in Hesiod's Theogony, in Aristophanes' Clouds, in Damascius' On First Principles, and elsewhere — for instance Hesiod's account, according to which Chaos existed first, and from Chaos came Erebus and black Night, who through Erebus begot Aether and Day; Earth, out of Air, brought forth Heaven; and from these, without intercourse, came Cronos and Rhea, from whom sprang Zeus and all the gods of the second generation; compare Aristotle, Metaphysics A.]

So it is that the men we speak of, taking this fable for themselves, have made it out to be a kind of natural philosophy, merely changing the names, while showing forth the very same beginning and emission of all things: in place of Chaos, they set the Deep [Bythos]; in place of Love — through whom, the comic poet says, all the rest was arranged — they have drawn in the Word. And in place of the first and greatest gods, they have fashioned Aeons; and in place of the second gods, they tell of the arrangement of their mother who is outside the Pleroma, calling her the second Ogdoad; and from her, just as the poet does, they announce the fashioning of the world and the forming of man, claiming that they alone know mysteries beyond telling and beyond knowing — mysteries which are everywhere acted out on the stage by the most splendid-voiced play-actors, who carry the very same matter over into their own plots, indeed teach with the very same plots, only changing the names. [Editorial note: those who do not know God, and who are called philosophers —] these men gather up such things and, stitching together a kind of patchwork out of many and very poor scraps, have prepared for themselves a false surface with a subtle style of speech: putting forward what looks like a new teaching, only because it has now been substituted by a new art, but which is in fact old and useless, since it is stitched together from old doctrines that reek of ignorance of God and irreligion.

Thales of Miletus [Editorial note: compare, on Thales in general, Zeller, Philosophie der Griechen; also compare Diogenes Laertius, and, closest to Irenaeus's own words, Zeller again] said that the beginning and origin of the universe was water. And to say water is the same as to say the Deep. The poet Homer, too, taught that Ocean was the origin of the gods, and Tethys their mother; and these are exactly what the heretics have transposed into their Bythos and Sige. Anaximander, again, laid down as the beginning of all things that which is boundless, holding within itself, as a kind of seed, the origin of all things, out of which he says innumerable worlds come to be; and this too they have transfigured into their Bythos and into their Aeons.

[Anaximenes(?), badly damaged in the source] taught that living creatures came to be from seeds falling out of heaven onto the earth; and this very thing they have transposed into the seed of their Mother, saying that this seed is themselves.

Straightaway they have also put together a great deal of talk, bordering on that of the philosophers, about the void and about atoms — terming the first thing "being" and naming the second, "what has no being." These men do likewise: they call whatever lies within the Pleroma "being," exactly as the philosophers term the atoms; while whatever lies outside the Pleroma they label "non-being," exactly as the philosophers term the void. So they have assigned themselves, in this world — since they are outside the Pleroma — to the place that is not!

And what they say — that these things here are images of those things above — again plainly repeats the opinion of Democritus and of Plato. For Democritus was the first to say that many and various shapes, stamped from the totality of things, have come down into this world; whereas Plato, in turn, speaks of matter together with pattern and God as the source. These men, taking their cue from that, have called the shapes of that pattern "images of the things that are above," and, merely by changing the name, boast that they themselves are the inventors and makers of this fanciful fiction of images.
And as for their saying that the Fashioner made the world out of matter lying ready at hand — Anaxagoras, and Empedocles, and Plato before them, were the first to say this; for Plato, as is well known, held that there are three things — God, matter, and the forms of things, which he calls "ideas." [Editorial note: compare Aëtius, De placitis; Justin, Cohortatio] — it is plain to see that these men too were "inspired," as it were, by their own Mother. And as to their saying that this necessity was brought into being, and that God is a slave to this necessity, such that he cannot bestow immortality on what is mortal, nor incorruption on what is corruptible, but that each thing must withdraw into a substance akin to its own nature — this is affirmed also by those called Stoics, from the Porch, and by all in general who do not know God, both poets and writers of prose. These men, sharing the same unbelief, have assigned to spiritual beings their own region, that which is within the Pleroma; to animal (soul-possessing) beings, the middle region; and to material beings, that which is earthly — and beyond this they affirm that God can do nothing, but that each of the things named must withdraw to what is of its own substance.
And as to their saying that the Savior was made up out of all the Aeons, each one of them contributing to him as it were the flower of itself, this brings forward nothing new beyond Hesiod's Pandora. What Hesiod says of her, these men insinuate of the Savior, bringing him in as a kind of Pandora — as though each of the Aeons had bestowed upon him whatever best thing it possessed. As for their own indifferent view about foods and about other observances, and their belief that they can in no way be defiled at all, on account of their noble birth, whatever they eat or do — this they took over from the Cynics, since they share the same covenant with them in this respect. And their word-splitting and subtlety over questions, though it belongs to Aristotle, they try to smuggle into the faith.

As to their wishing to reduce this whole universe into numbers, this they took over from the Pythagoreans, who were the earliest to lay down numbers as the origin of all things, and the beginning of the numbers themselves as the even and the odd, and from these they derived the things perceptible to sense and the things without sense. [Editorial note: compare Diels; on the Cynics compare Tatian; a like charge against Aristotle is brought by Justin, Cohortatio; how badly the Philosopher — i.e. Aristotle — was regarded in Irenaeus's own day, Hippolytus repeatedly attests, complaining, in language echoing Irenaeus, of the corrupt subtleties of eloquence brought into the Church.] — of these, they say, one kind are the beginnings of substance, the other of sensation and being; and out of these first principles they say all things are perfected, just as a statue is made out of bronze and out of its shaping. This is what they have fitted to those beings that are outside the Pleroma. And as the beginnings of sensation they named that in which the perceiving sense of what was first apprehended searches, until, grown weary, it comes together into the One and the Indivisible. And that the beginning of all things, and the substance of the whole generation, is the One, and the Five, and the manifold generation of the rest — this is exactly what they say, word for word, about the Fullness of their system and about Bythos; whence also they try to bring in, from the notion of the One, those conjunctions — which Marcus, as though it were his own discovery, boasting of it as something newer than the rest had found, set forth as Pythagoras's Tetrad, explaining it as the origin and mother of all things.

We shall say to them, then: did all these men we have named, with whom you are shown to be saying the very same things, know the truth, or did they not know it? If indeed they did know it, then the Savior's descent into this world was superfluous. For why should he have come down? Was it in order to bring into the knowledge of men who already knew it, the truth that was already known? But if they did not know it, then, since you say the very same things as men who did not know the truth, on what ground do you boast that you alone possess the knowledge that is above all things — a knowledge which even those who do not know God likewise possess? By an inversion of terms, then, they call ignorance of the truth "knowledge" [gnosis]; and Paul rightly speaks of "the novelties of empty words... of knowledge falsely so called" [Editorial note: cf. 1 Tim. 6:20] — for their so-called knowledge has indeed been found to be false.

But should they grow bolder still and claim, further, that mankind was in fact ignorant of the truth, while their Mother, working through such men, proclaimed truth's mysteries by way of the paternal seed, just as she did through the prophets, while the Demiurge remained ignorant — then, in the first place, the things thus foretold are not such as could not be understood by anyone at all: for the very men who spoke them knew what they were saying, as did their disciples and those who came after them. And further, if either the Mother or the seed knew and declared the things that belonged to the truth — the truth being the Father — then the Savior, according to them, must have lied when he said, "No one has known the Father except the Son." For if the Father was known either by the Mother or by her seed, then that saying, "No one has known the Father except the Son," is overturned — unless they mean to say that their own seed, or their Mother, is nobody!

And so far, then, [Editorial note: on this whole matter compare Tertullian, De praescriptione; Ambrosiaster on 1 Corinthians and elsewhere; Augustine on 1 John, and other commentators] through human feelings and through saying things similar to what many who do not know God have said, they have plausibly seemed to draw certain persons away, luring them by means of the very things they were accustomed to, and thereby setting forth their account of the birth of the Word who is over all things — and still further, even Perceptions and Emissions of God acting as midwives to one another; but the things which they have invented out of these, without any likelihood or proof, are all lies drawn from other lies. Just as men who set out familiar food, in order to entice some animal to be caught, coax it gently with the food it is used to until it takes the bait — and then, once they have it in their power, bind it most bitterly and drag it off by force wherever they please — so too these men, by degrees taming their hearers, persuading them through plausible talk to accept the aforesaid emission, then bring in things that have neither fittingness nor any semblance of the other emissions imagined: from the Word and Life, they say, ten Aeons were emitted, and from Man and Church, twelve — and for none of these have they any proof, nor any testimony, nor any likelihood, nor anything at all of the sort, but idly and just as it happens, they name them: Paracletus and Faith, Patricus and Hope, Metricus and Love, Ainos and Understanding, Ecclesiasticus and Blessedness, Theletus and Wisdom.
As for the sufferings of this Sophia, and her error, and how she was in peril of perishing on account of her search for the Father, as they say, and her toil outside the Pleroma, and out of what kind of defect they teach that the Fashioner of the world was emitted — these we have set forth with all diligence in the book before this one, recounting the opinions of the heretics; and how Christ, whom they say was emitted after all these Aeons, and the Savior, had their being from those Aeons that came into existence out of the defect. We now, of necessity, call these names to mind again, so that, using them, we may show clearly just how absurd their falsehood is, and how muddled their invented terminology. For they themselves rob their own Aeons of dignity by such names, borrowing, from the pagans, plausible and credible-sounding names belonging to those called the twelve gods — whom they too wish to be images of the twelve Aeons — names that are far more fitting and more suggestive, in their derivation and their bearing, of divinity, than the names they themselves have given.

======== Book II — Chapter 15 ========

On the Inconsistency of the Emission, and on the Incoherence of the Pleroma.

Let us return, then, to the question of the aforesaid emissions. And first let them tell us the reason for such an emission of the Aeons, so that it touches nothing belonging to creation. For they say that creation was not made for the sake of those things, but that those things were made for the sake of creation; and that those things are not images of these, but that these are images of those. Just as, then, they give the reason for these images, claiming the month runs to thirty days because of the thirty Aeons, the day divides into twelve hours, and the year into twelve months, all on account of the twelve Aeons found within the Pleroma, and whatever else they rave about in this fashion — now let them tell us the reason for that emission of the Aeons, why it came to be such as it is. Why was it precisely the first, archetypal Ogdoad that was emitted, rather than a Pentad, a Triad, a Heptad, or any other number by which things may be counted out? And why were ten Aeons emitted from the Word and Life, and not more or fewer; and again twelve from Man and Church, when these too might have been made either more or fewer?
Again, why is the whole Pleroma divided into three parts — into the Ogdoad, the Decad, and the Duodecad — and not into some other number besides these? And why was the division itself set at three, rather than at four, at five, at six, or at any other figure, having no bearing whatever on the numbers belonging to creation [Editorial note: for they say those numbers are more ancient than these, and ought to have their own proper reason, in general terms — the following chapters will take up each point individually — that is, the reason belonging to the order that exists before the constitution of things, not the order that follows the constitution], but agreeing, as it happens, in a mere consonance of pattern?
When we, in speaking of creation, call such numbers "fitting" — for this rhythmic patterning does indeed suit the things that have been made — we apply that word to this rhythmic patterning of creation; but they, having no proper reason of their own to give for those things which are prior to and perfected from themselves, are bound to fall into utter perplexity. For the very things they ask us about creation, as though we did not know the answer, when they themselves are asked the same about their Pleroma, they will either explain by an appeal to human feelings, or else they will fall back into that same argument about the harmony found in creation — answering improperly about the secondary things, instead of, as they ought, about the primary things belonging to their own system. For we are not asking them about the harmony found in creation, nor about human feelings; but we ask this: since their Pleroma — whose image they say creation is — is itself eightfold, tenfold, and twelvefold in form, will they not have to confess that their Father made the Pleroma of such a shape idly and without forethought, and so wrap their Father in unseemliness, if he did anything without reason? Or, on the other hand, if they say that the Pleroma was thus emitted, according to the Father's providence, for the sake of creation, so that creation might be well fashioned according to its pattern — then the Pleroma will turn out not to have been made on its own account at all, but on account of that image destined to come into being after its likeness (just as a wax model is not molded for its own sake, but so that a bronze, gold, or silver statue may afterward be cast from it) — and so creation will turn out to be more honorable than the Pleroma, if those things were emitted for creation's sake.

======== Book II — Chapter 16 ========

That whoever transfers this argument to another, must of necessity be undone by it. But if none of them are willing to agree, because they will be refuted by us as having no way to render a cause for such an emission of their Pleroma, they will be compelled to conclude by confessing that above their Pleroma there is some other disposition, more spiritual and more sovereign, according to which their Pleroma was shaped. For if the Demiurge did not fashion the form of creation from himself, but perfected the being of the Pleroma according to the patterns of the things above, from whom did he receive the form of the things made before him? For it is necessary either to hold to the view that the God who made the world received the pattern of the world's fashioning from his own power and from himself; or, if anyone moves away from this, there will always be a necessity of asking whence the one who is above him received the shaping of the things that were made, and what the number and substance of the emissions was that enabled him to perfect such a shaping of the Pleroma by himself. In that case, why was it not permitted to the Demiurge to have made such a world from himself? Again, then, if their fashioned image is a copy, what prevents one from saying that those things above them are likewise images of things still above them, and those above them in turn images of others, and so on into infinity —
This was the fate of Basilides too, since he never touched on the truth at all, and imagined that by an endless chain of things generated each from the last he could slip past such a difficulty; for he taught that a total of three hundred sixty-five skies came into being one after another in a like manner, and offered as demonstration the count of days making up a year, as we noted earlier; and set above these a power, which his followers likewise term unnameable, together with its arrangement — yet even so he did not slip past such a difficulty. For should one press him as to whence the pattern for shaping arrived at that topmost sky, from which he holds all the rest to have arisen in sequence, he will answer: from the arrangement belonging to the Unnameable One. And he must then either claim the Unnameable One fashioned it out of his own resources, or he will be forced to concede that yet another power stands over even this one, and that from it the Unnameable One obtained a shaping so vast for what belongs to him.
How much sounder and more prudent it is, then, to admit right away, from the outset, what is true — that this God who fashions, who built such a world, is the sole God, and there exists no other God apart from him; that he drew from his own resources both the pattern and the shaping of the things made — rather than, after so much impiety and wandering in circles, growing exhausted and finally being driven to settle on some single opinion, only then confessing the shaping of what was made. Concerning what they lay to our charge, being of another kind. For this very accusation which Valentinus's followers level against us — that we linger in the hebdomad below, as though never raising our thought upward, nor grasping the realities above, since we refuse their grotesque fables — this same accusation is leveled by the Basilidians in turn, as though they, still anchored in their intent on the lower things, up through the first and second eightfold set, and after thirty Aeons, vainly imagine they have at last laid hold of the Father who stands over everything, without ever probing in thought that fullness lying beyond the three hundred sixty-five skies, itself beyond forty-five sets of eight. And some other party will rightly turn the reproach back on these, for dreaming up four thousand three hundred skies or Aeons, reasoning that this equals the hours contained across the days of a year; and should one further add the nights, doubling that same hour-count, and so imagine he has uncovered a vast crowd of eightfold sets and some uncountable, intricately arranged host of Aeons, fancying himself thereby more consummate than the one who is Father of everything above everything — the identical charge will land on every one of them alike; for the throng of skies or Aeons that each of them proclaims will never suffice to reach his height, and yet, falling short even among the things below, they remain mired in the middle.

======== Book II — Chapter 17 ========

Let us next look over the remainder too — the arrangement of their fullness, and above all what touches on the first eightfold set — matters riddled with contradiction and difficulty, given how senseless they are, even while we probe things that have no real existence; yet we undertake this out of necessity, both since the task has been laid upon us as our charge, and since we desire that everyone should arrive at a true grasp of the matter, and since you yourself requested from us many varied grounds for their overthrow.
The question, then, is by what manner the remaining Aeons came to be emitted. Were they joined to their emitter the way sunbeams stay joined to the sun; or did each come forth actively and on its own, existing apart and bearing its own distinct form, the way a man begets a man, and a beast a beast? Or perhaps by sprouting, the way branches grow out from a tree? And did they possess a substance unlike his own? And did their emission happen all together, making them equal in age to each other; or did it unfold in stages, with some coming earlier and others later? And were they sent forth plain and uniform, alike and equal to one another in every respect, in the manner spirits and lights are emitted; or composite and varied, differing among themselves in their parts?
But if indeed each of them was emitted effectively and according to its own generation, after the likeness of men, then either the generations of the Father will be of the same substance as him and similar to their begetter, or they will appear dissimilar, and one must confess that they are of some other substance. And if they are generations of the Father similar to the one who emitted them, then the things that were emitted will remain impassible, just as the one who emitted them; but if they are of some other substance, one capable of passions, whence comes this dissimilar substance within that Pleroma of incorruption? Moreover, according to this reasoning each of them will be understood as separately divided from the other, as men are, not mixed or united one with another, but each of them shaped in a discrete form and a bounded outline, and in a definite quantity of magnitude — things which are proper to a body, and not to spirit. They can no longer, then, call it a spiritual Pleroma, nor call themselves spiritual, if, like men, they each have their own proper and separate shape.
But if, as light kindled from light, the Aeons were emitted from the Logos, and the Logos from Nous, and Nous from Bythos — as, for example, torch from torch — then, though they may perhaps differ from one another in generation and in magnitude, yet since they are of the same substance as the source of their emission, either they all remain impassible, or their Father too will share in their passions. For the torch that was kindled later has no other light than that which was in the one before it. Wherefore also their lights, when brought together into one, run back into their original union, so that there becomes one light which existed from the beginning. And which one is younger and which older cannot be discerned either in the light itself (for it is one whole light) nor in the torches themselves that received the light (for they, according to the substance of their material, share one and the same time, since the material of the torches is one and the same); but only in respect of kindling, because one was kindled a little before, and another only now. The blemish, then, of the passion that comes through ignorance will either come upon their whole Pleroma equally, since they are of the same substance, and the Forefather himself will be involved in the blemish of ignorance — that is, ignorant of himself; or else all the lights within the Pleroma will remain equally impassible. Whence, then, does passion come upon the younger Aeon, if the paternal light, from which all the lights were established, is by nature impassible? And how can any of the Aeons be called younger or older, when the whole Pleroma is one light? And if anyone should call them stars, they will nonetheless appear to share the same nature throughout. For if a star differs from a star in brightness, but not in quality nor in substance — the substance according to which a thing is either passible or impassible — then either all of them, since they are of the paternal light, must by nature be impassible and immutable; or all of them, together with the paternal light, are passible and capable of change and corruption.
The identical reasoning applies even should they claim that the Aeons' emission sprang from the Logos as branches sprout from a tree, given that the Logos derives his own begetting from their Father: for every one of them proves to share the Father's substance, varying from each other solely in size, not in kind, and rounding out the Father's magnitude, much as fingers round out a hand. If, then, the Father lies open to passion and ignorance, then necessarily so do those Aeons begotten out of him. Yet if it is irreverent to pin ignorance and passion on the Father over all, how can they claim an Aeon liable to passion issued from him — and, pinning that same irreverence on God's own Sophia, how will they claim to be pious themselves? But should they instead claim the Aeons issued as rays do from the sun, since all share one substance and one origin, then either every one of them shares in passion alongside their emitter, or every one stays free of passion. They cannot, from such an emission, admit some are free of passion while others are liable to it. If, then, they claim all are free of passion, they collapse their own case. For how could the lesser Aeon suffer, if none were liable to passion? But if they claim all took part in this passion — as some venture to say, that it truly originated with the Logos, yet its transmission traced back to the Mind of the Forefather — then, by tracing the passion back that far, they end up admitting that both the Forefather's Mind and the Father himself were caught up in passion. For the Father is not, like some composite creature, distinct from Nous — as we showed earlier, Nous and the Father are one and the same, each truly being the other. It follows, then, that the one who is Logos issuing from him — or instead, that very Nous, seeing he is also Logos — must be complete and untouched by passion; and that what is emitted from him, sharing his very substance, must likewise be complete and untouched by passion, forever resembling the one who sent it forth.
Demonstration that the Logos was not put forth in a diminished state. The Logos, then, was not, as though he held some third rank in the order of generation, kept ignorant of the Father, as these men teach — a notion which might perhaps sound plausible where the begetting of men is concerned, since men often fail to recognize their own parents; but where the Father's own Logos is concerned, it is wholly unthinkable. For since he exists within the Father, he is acquainted with the one in whom he dwells — that is, he does not lack self-knowledge — and so the emissions issuing from him, being his powers and forever attending him, will not lack knowledge of their emitter, no more than a ray lacks knowledge of the sun. God's Sophia, then, the one dwelling within the Pleroma, being of such an emission — called, as they term him, the Only-begotten of the Forefather's Nous — cannot be imagined to have collapsed through passion and conceived ignorance of this sort. It is the Wisdom of Valentinus, however, being of the devil's own emission, who is capable of collapsing wholly into passion and yielding the depth of ignorance as her fruit. For since they themselves testify about their own mother, calling her the offspring of an Aeon gone astray, there is no further need to ask why the offspring of such a mother forever wallow in the depths of ignorance. Apart from these emissions, I myself can no longer make out what other sort they might name; nor, despite our long and thorough dispute with them on such points, have they ever been caught offering any further distinguishing mark of an emission — they say only this much, that each was sent forth, and that each recognized solely his own emitter, remaining ignorant of the one before that — yet they never go on to demonstrate the manner of their sending forth, or how such a thing could occur among spiritual beings. For wherever they turn, they will be caught out, exposed as blind to sound reasoning about the truth, to the point of asserting that the Word, sent forth from their Forefather's Nous, was sent forth in a diminished condition. For Nous, they claim, though perfect and begotten of the perfect Bythos, was nonetheless powerless to render his own emission perfect, but instead blind regarding the Father's greatness and understanding; and they claim the Savior signified this mystery through the man born blind, since the Word had likewise been sent forth blind out of the Only-begotten Aeon — that is, in ignorance — thereby inventing ignorance and blindness to lay against the Word of God, who, on their account, holds second place among the emissions from the Forefather. Remarkable sophists indeed, probing the depths of an unknown Father and narrating the heavenly secrets the angels themselves long to glimpse, only to conclude that the Word, sent forth out of the Nous belonging to that Father who surpasses all, was sent forth blind — that is, without knowledge of the very Father who emitted him! And how, you supremely empty sophists, could that Father's Nous — or rather the Father in his own person, seeing that he is Nous, complete in every respect — have sent forth his Logos as a flawed and sightless Aeon, when he might just as easily have sent forth along with him full knowledge of the Father? For just as you claim Christ, though born later than the rest, was sent forth complete, how much more, then, ought the Logos, senior to him in age, have been sent forth complete by that same Nous, and not sightless — nor would he, in turn, have sent forth Aeons even more sightless than himself, until at last your Sophia, kept perpetually sightless, produced so vast a store of evils. How, according to the heretics, the Father is the cause of this evil. And it is your own Father who bears the blame for this wickedness: you claim the immensity and might of the Father are what cause the ignorance, comparing him to Bythos and pinning that name on the Father none may name. But if ignorance counts as an evil, and you hold that every evil sprouted from it, and you claim its cause lies in the Father's immensity and might, then you make him out to be the crafter of evils. For you claim the evil's cause is simply that he could not be beheld, owing to his vastness. Yet if it truly lay beyond the Father's power to reveal himself at the outset to those he had made, he stands blameless, powerless as he was to lift the ignorance weighing on those who followed him. But supposing that later — once that ignorance, having swelled alongside the unfolding emissions, had taken root among the Aeons — he proved able to lift it, through Jesus, the Pleroma's flawless fruit, its loveliest adornment and star, then all the more, had he willed it earlier, he could, by refusing that ignorance any chance to exist, have kept it from ever arising. Given, then, that he made himself known once he chose to — not merely to the Aeons but also to those men living in the last age — and given that, refusing to reveal himself at the outset, he stayed hidden, it follows on your own premises that the ignorance's cause is nothing but the Father's own choosing. For had he foreseen that matters would unfold this way, why did he not, before they occurred, sever their ignorance at the root, rather than treating it afterward as though repenting, through Christ's emission? For the knowledge he conveyed to everyone through Christ, he might have conveyed far sooner through the Logos, who was likewise the firstborn Only-begotten. Or if, foreseeing it, he chose that these things happen, then ignorance's works endure without end and never perish. For whatever was made according to your Forefather's choosing must persist alongside the choosing of the one who chose it; or if such things do perish, then his choosing too must perish along with them — the very choosing by which he willed them into being. For why, once instructed, did the Aeons find their rest and gain flawless understanding, namely that the Father cannot be grasped or comprehended? They might have possessed this understanding before ever falling into their passions: for the Father's immensity suffered no diminishment among those who understood from the outset that he cannot be grasped or comprehended. For if he went unknown on account of his boundless immensity, then on account of his boundless love he ought to have preserved those born of him free from passion from the very start; nothing stood in the way of it, and it would rather have served them better to have understood from the outset that the Father cannot be grasped or comprehended.

======== Book II — Chapter 18 ========

THAT SOPHIA WAS NEVER IN IGNORANCE AND DEFICIENCY. 1. How is it not empty, then, for them to say that their Sophia too existed in ignorance, in deficiency, and in passion? These things are alien to wisdom and contrary to it; nor are they even her proper affections. For where there is lack of foresight and ignorance of what is useful, there wisdom is not present. Let them, then, no longer call the Aeon who suffered "Sophia"; let them instead drop either her name or her sufferings. Nor let them call the whole Pleroma spiritual, if within it this Aeon lived through such great passions while she was there. For not even a strong soul, let alone a spiritual substance, could endure such things. ENTHYMESIS. Again, how could her Enthymesis, proceeding along with passion, come to exist separately? For an "enthymesis" (a thought or intention) is understood as being directed toward something; it can never come to exist by itself, apart. For an evil enthymesis is destroyed and swallowed up by a good one, just as sickness is by health. What, then, was this Enthymesis of passion earlier? To seek out the Father and consider his greatness. And what was she persuaded of afterward, and grew strong in? That the Father is incomprehensible and cannot be found. It was not, then, a good thing for her to have desired knowledge of the Father, and it was on this account that passion took hold of her; rather, once she was persuaded that the Father was unsearchable, she grew strong. But that very Nous who was seeking the Father ceased, according to them, still to seek, learning that the Father is incomprehensible. How, then, could Enthymesis, separated, conceive passions which were themselves but her own affections? For an affection arises toward something; it cannot exist or stand by itself apart. Not only is this position unstable, it also contradicts what was said by our Lord: "Seek, and you shall find" — for the Lord, by seeking and finding the Father, brings his disciples to perfection. But their Christ who is above, by commanding the Aeons not to seek the Father, persuading them that however much they labored they would not find him, made them perfect! And they say that they themselves are made perfect in that they claim to have found their Bythos, while the Aeons are made perfect in being persuaded that he whom they sought is unsearchable.
Since, then, Enthymesis herself could not exist apart from the Aeon on her own, they bring in a still greater falsehood about her passion, again dividing her off separately, and declaring this to be the very stuff from which matter is made. As though God had no light in him, and as though the Word were absent to expose them and cast down their wickedness! For surely whatever the Aeon thought, this too he suffered; and what he suffered, this too... [text defective] ...they cannot have a separate substance, and here again their rule is dissolved. THAT SHE COULD NEITHER BE DISSOLVED NOR HAVE BEEN LIVING AMONG THINGS UNLIKE HERSELF. How, again, could the Aeon both be dissolved and suffer? Since he was of the same substance as the Father. For what is like, existing among what is like, is not dissolved into nothing, nor is it in danger of perishing, but rather it holds its ground and increases — flame within flame, breath within breath, water joined to water — while opposites, meeting their opposites, suffer harm, are altered, and perish. So too, if there had been an emission of light, it would not have suffered or been endangered in a light like itself, but would rather have shone forth the more and increased, as day increases from the sun — for indeed they say that Bythos is the image of his own father. Whatever animals are foreign and alien to themselves and contrary to their nature are endangered and corrupted; but whatever is familiar and akin to itself suffers no danger while living among such things — a principle not hard to understand — but rather draws safety and life from it. If, then, this Aeon had been emitted from the same substance as the whole Pleroma, he would never have undergone change, since he was living among things like and familiar to him, a spiritual being among spiritual beings. For fear, terror, passion, dissolution, and the like may perhaps arise from contraries in the case of things that are, like us, bodily; but among spiritual beings possessing a diffused light, such calamities no longer follow. IT PRODUCED IN THE AEON NOT RUIN BUT A STATE OF PERFECTION. Moreover, to reflect on seeking the perfect Father, and to wish to come to be within him, and to have comprehension of him, could not implant ignorance or passion — not even in a spiritual Aeon — but rather perfection and impassibility... [the manuscript here is defective, mixing in editorial matter about what Menander is said to have written] ...for not even men themselves, when they reflect upon one who is before them, and, as it were, already grasping the perfect one, being established within the knowledge of him, say that they are thereby in a state of consternation and passion, but rather in knowledge and apprehension of the truth. And indeed they say that the Savior said to the disciples "Seek, and you shall find" for this reason: that they might seek after him whom they themselves have fashioned by their own reasoning, above the Maker of all things — the ineffable Bythos; and they wish to consider themselves perfect, because, seeking, they have found the perfect one while still on earth; yet they say that the Aeon within the Pleroma, wholly spiritual, who sought the Forefather, and strove to come to be within his greatness, and desired to have comprehension of the paternal truth, fell into passion — and such a passion that, had he not met with the Power that establishes all things, he would have been dissolved into universal substance and utterly destroyed. THAT IT IS UNTHINKABLE THAT AN AEON WITHIN THE PLEROMA SHOULD HAVE FELT THE DESIRE OF PASSION. This presumption is insane, and truly the thinking of men bereft of truth. For since this Aeon is, by their own rule, better and older than themselves — they themselves confess this, saying that they are conceived from the Enthymesis of this Aeon who suffered, so that this Aeon stands as father to their mother, which makes him, in fact, their grandsire — then for the later grandchildren the seeking of the Father produces truth, perfection, confirmation, and refinement from fluid matter, as they say, and reconciliation with the Father; but for their own grandfather, this same inquiry, they say, implanted ignorance, passion, terror, fear, and consternation, out of which they also say the substance of matter was made. To seek and search out the perfect Father, then, and to desire communion and unity with him, becomes salvation for themselves — but for the Aeon from whom they have their origin, they say it was the cause of dissolution and ruin. How is this not utterly incongruous, foolish, and irrational in every respect? And those who assent to such things are truly blind, following blind guides, and justly fall into the abyss of ignorance that lies beneath them.

======== Book II — Chapter 19 ========

HOW THE WHOLE ACCOUNT OF THE SEED IS SHOWN TO BE UNSTABLE. What, again, is their teaching about their seed — conceived by the Mother after the form of the angels who attend the Savior, formless, without shape, and imperfect; then deposited in the Demiurge without his knowing it, so that through him it might, in the soul which was sown by him, receive perfection and form? First it must be said that these angels who attend their Savior are themselves imperfect, shapeless, and formless, since a thing conceived after their likeness turns out to be of the same kind. THE DEPOSITING. Next, that they say the Maker was ignorant both of the descent of the seed into him, and again of the sowing that was afterward made through him into man — this is an idle and empty claim, which can in no way be demonstrated. For how did he remain ignorant of it, if the seed itself possessed some substance and its own quality? But if it had no substance, no quality, and was nothing whatsoever, then it stands to reason he could know nothing of it. For anything possessing a motion and a quality proper to itself — be it heat, or swiftness, or sweetness, or some particular radiance — never goes unnoticed even among men living among men; how much less could such a thing hide from the God who fashioned this entire universe, whose action extends to everything and who is in every respect [aware]? And for this reason it seems to me that the Lord also said: "Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account of it in the day of judgment." For all who pour such idle words into the ears of men will stand at the judgment, giving an account of the things they have vainly conjectured and falsely spoken against God — so far do they go as to say that they themselves, on account of the substance of the seed, know the spiritual Pleroma, the inner man showing them the true Father (for they say there is need of instruction in perceptible things suited to the animal nature); while the Maker, receiving this whole seed deposited by the Mother into himself, was, they say, wholly ignorant of it, and had no perception at all of the things pertaining to the Pleroma. AND THAT THE SPIRITUAL [SEED] IS IN HIM. And they say that they themselves are spiritual, because a certain particle of the Father's universal substance was deposited in their soul, this seed being called [a Greek term, garbled in transmission] ... but that he who once received this whole seed from the Mother, and has it in himself, remained merely animal (psychic), and perceived nothing at all of the higher things which they themselves boast of understanding while still on earth — how is this not beyond all irrationality? For to hold that this same seed conferred knowledge and perfection on their own souls, but ignorance on the God who made them, is truly the mark of madmen, and of men utterly bereft of sense. Further, it is quite absurd for them to say that in this depositing the seed is given shape and grows, and is made ready to receive the perfect word. For the admixture of matter — which they say derives its substance from ignorance and defect — will then prove more fitting and useful to it than was their own paternal light, if indeed, as begotten according to the contemplation of that light, it was formless and unshaped, while from this matter it received form, appearance, growth, and perfection. For if the light that comes from the Pleroma was the cause of the spiritual seed having neither form nor appearance nor its own proper magnitude, while this coming down to earth supplied it with all such qualities and carried it through to completeness, then this dwelling here — which they themselves call darkness — will appear far more effective and useful than was their paternal light. And how is it not ridiculous to say that their Mother, on the one hand, was endangered in matter, so that she was nearly suffocated, and would have been corrupted, only somewhat more gently, had she not barely been rescued by the Father — and yet to say that her seed, in this very same matter, grows and is formed and made fit to receive the perfect word, and this while flourishing amid things unlike and unfamiliar to it — just as they themselves claim that earthly things oppose the spiritual, and spiritual things stand opposed to the earthly? How, then, could so slight a thing, dispatched among opposites and strangers to it, as they tell it, manage at once to grow, take shape, and reach completeness? A DEMONSTRATION THAT THERE COULD HAVE BEEN NEITHER CONCEPTION NOR GENERATION OF THE SEED. Further, this too must be asked concerning what has been said: did their mother bring forth the seed all at once, as she saw the angels, or bit by bit? If all at once and at a single time, then what was then conceived is by now no longer an infant — so that her descent to the men who now exist is superfluous. But if bit by bit, then the conception was no longer made according to the likeness of the angels she saw; for having seen and conceived them all together and at once, she ought to have brought forth at once those whose forms she had conceived all at once.
But what of this: that, seeing the angels together with the Savior, she conceived their images, but not that of the Savior, who is more glorious than they? Did she perhaps not take pleasure in him, and for that reason not conceive from him? Again, how is it that the Demiurge, whom they call psychic (animal), possessing his own greatness and form according to their system, was emitted perfect according to his own substance, while the spiritual element — which ought to be more excellent than the animal — was emitted imperfect, and had need to descend into a soul in order to be formed within it, and so, becoming perfect, be made ready to receive the perfect word? If, then, it is formed within earthly men and within animal souls, it is no longer according to the likeness of the angels, whom they call "lights," but according to the likeness of the men who are here. For it will not bear the likeness and form of the angels, but of the souls in which it is formed — just as water, once put into a jar, conforms to the jar's own shape, and should it then freeze there, it keeps the outline of whatever vessel held it while it froze — inasmuch as the souls themselves have the shape of the body, being fitted to that vessel, as we said before. If, then, that seed too coagulates and is formed here, it will have the shape of a man, not the form of angels. How, then, is that seed made after the images of angels, when it is shaped according to the likeness of men? And further, if it was spiritual, what need had it to descend into flesh? For flesh has need of the spiritual, if indeed it is to be saved at all, that it may be sanctified in it, and glorified, and that its mortality may be swallowed up by immortality; but the spiritual has no need at all of the things that are here. For it is not we who make it better, but it that makes us better. Further, the falsity of their teaching about the seed is shown still more plainly, and can be seen by anyone, in this: that they claim souls which have taken seed from the Mother turn out superior to the rest, and are therefore given honor by the Demiurge and set up as rulers, kings, and priests. Were this so, surely Caiaphas the high priest would have been the very first to believe, along with Annas, the remaining chief priests and scribes, the leaders of the people, and King Herod besides. Yet not Caiaphas himself, not any of the chief priests, none of the men in authority, nor the people's notable figures came running to him — it was rather those sitting as beggars along the roads, the deaf, and the blind, and those trodden down and despised by the rest — just as Paul also says: "Behold your calling: not many noble, not many mighty; but the things that were despised in the world, God has chosen" — such souls, then, were not better on account of the deposit of seed, nor were they for that reason honored by the Demiurge. Concerning the weakness, instability, and utter emptiness of their rule, then, what has been said suffices. For it is not necessary, as is commonly said, that one who wishes to learn that the sea's water is salty must drink the whole sea. But just as a statue made of clay, though its surface is colored so that what is really clay might be taken for gold, is revealed as clay by anyone who scratches beneath the coating and so delivers truth-seekers out of a mistaken notion — just so we too have laid out, not some trifling portion, but the main and weightiest points of their system, which bear on their own kinship — namely, with the Savior (to whom, they say, they are akin on account of that same seed). Now observe how clearly the aristocratic character of their Gnosticism shines forth in the contrast that follows. And these are but a few things reported out of many great ones. For just as those who wish to judge whether honey or wine is good in itself... [we have set out] all these things, unraveling the chapters, for everyone who does not wish to be deceived, showing what is wicked, deceitful, seductive, and destructive in the school of those who come from Valentinus and from the rest of the heretics — as many as mistreat the Demiurge, that is, the Maker and Fashioner of this universe, who alone truly exists as God — thereby exposing the dissolvable character of their path. For who that has any sense, and has grasped even a little of the truth, could bear to hear them saying that there is another Father above the Demiurge; and that one is the Only-Begotten, another the Word of God (whom they say was emitted in a state of deficiency); and another Christ, whom they say came into being after the rest of the Aeons, together with the Holy Spirit; and yet another Savior, whom they say was not even put together by the Father of all, but was contributed and assembled by those Aeons who came into being in a state of deficiency, and was necessarily emitted on account of that deficiency? So that, unless the Aeons had been in ignorance and deficiency, according to them neither Christ would ever have been sent forth, nor would the Holy Spirit, nor Horos, nor the Savior, nor would the angels, their Mother, or her offspring, nor the remainder of the world's making — and all these numerous good things would be absent and missing. In this way they show impiety not merely toward the Maker, naming him the offspring of a flaw, but toward Christ and the Holy Spirit, saying that these too were emitted on account of a defect; and likewise the Savior, after the defect. For who could bear the rest of their vain talk, by which, cunningly trying to fit it to parables, they have turned both themselves and those who believe them into the greatest impiety?

======== Book II — Chapter 20 ========

[Heading: That They Undo Their Own Argument.] 1. We have thus shown that they force even the parables and the acts of the Lord improperly and inconsistently onto their fabrication. For the suffering which they say befell the twelfth Aeon, they attempt to show was fulfilled by the Saviour's own passion through the twelfth apostle, and during the twelfth month of his ministry -- since they maintain he preached across a single year following his baptism. They further assert this is made evident in the woman afflicted with a flow of blood: she had suffered for twelve years, and by touching the fringe of the Saviour's garment obtained her cure from the power that issued out of the Saviour, a power they claim presided over her affliction. For that power, having endured by being drawn out and poured forth into limitless extension, to the point where it stood in peril of dissolving entirely into the surrounding substance, upon touching the first Tetrad -- which, they say, is signified by the fringe -- halted, and its passion was brought to an end.
Now this claim of theirs, that the passion of the twelfth Aeon is shown through Judas -- how can Judas be brought into a fitting comparison, seeing that he had been thrust out from the circle of the Twelve, and no place among them was ever given back to him? For the Aeon whose type they say Judas is, once his Enthymesis was separated from him, was himself restored, or recalled; but Judas was cast off and expelled, and someone else, Matthias, was installed to fill his position, in fulfillment of the scripture: 'and let another take his office of oversight.' They ought therefore to have said that the twelfth Aeon was cast out of the Pleroma, and another put forth or sent out in his place -- if indeed the matter is shown in Judas at all. Further, they say the Aeon himself is the one who suffered, but Judas is the one who betrayed. But it was Christ, in his suffering, who came to the passion, not Judas -- and they themselves admit this. How, then, could Judas -- who handed over the one destined to undergo suffering on behalf of our deliverance -- serve as the figure and likeness of the suffering Aeon? Nor is Christ's passion in any way like the Aeon's passion, nor accomplished in a similar manner. For the Aeon suffered a passion of dissolution and ruin, such that the very one who suffered was in danger of being destroyed; but our Lord Christ suffered a strong passion, one that did not befall him to his harm -- not only was he himself not endangered or corrupted, but he even strengthened corrupted man by his own might, and recalled him to incorruption. And the Aeon suffered his passion while seeking after the Father, and not succeeding in finding him; but the Lord suffered so that he might lead those who had strayed from the Father to knowledge, and bring them to him. And in the Aeon's case the passion arose from the search for the greatness of the Father, and was a passion of ruin; but for us the Lord's suffering, by conferring knowledge of the Father, bestowed salvation. And that one's passion, as they say, brought forth a feminine fruit -- weak, sickly, formless, and ineffectual; but this one's passion brought forth strength and power. For the Lord, ascending on high through his passion, led captivity captive, gave gifts to men, and granted to those who believe in him the ability to trample serpents and scorpions underfoot, together with every force belonging to the adversary, namely the prince of rebellion. And the Lord, through his passion, destroyed death and dissolved error, but manifested life, showed forth truth, and bestowed incorruption. Their Aeon, on the other hand, once he had suffered, produced ignorance and brought forth a formless substance, from which, according to them, all the material works proceeded -- death, corruption, error, and the like. Judas, then, the twelfth disciple, was not the type of the suffering Aeon; but neither was he the type of our Lord's passion, for in every point the two are shown to be unlike and unfitting to one another -- not only in what we have already said, but even in the matter of number itself. For Judas is called a betrayer with respect to the Apostles in the Gospel; but this Aeon is not the twelfth but the thirtieth -- for according to their scheme not merely twelve Aeons were put forth by the Father's will, nor was he put forth twelfth in order, since according to their reckoning he was emitted as thirtieth in rank. How then might Judas, who ranks twelfth, stand as the emblem and likeness of an Aeon occupying the thirtieth rank? And even granting that he is, the image would still not be like the truth that corresponds to him. For the Enthymesis, once separated from the Aeon, was afterward given form by Christ, and thereafter made prudent by the Saviour, and having wrought all things outside the Pleroma according to the image of those within it, is reported, in the end, to have been taken back into the Pleroma by them, and, following the pairings, joined to the Saviour who was constituted from all of them together. But Judas, once cast out, never returns to the number of the disciples -- otherwise another would never have been numbered in his place. And concerning him the Lord declared: woe to that man through whose act the Son of man is given up to death, and it would have been far better had that man never come into existence -- and he named him the son of perdition. And even if the Enthymesis is not separated from the Aeon, still the number twelve cannot be the type of the number thirty. For in this case Judas was cast out and Matthias ordained in his place; but in their scheme the Aeon was in danger of dissolution -- and they even separate the Enthymesis from the passion, making the Aeon be restored, the Enthymesis be given form, and the passion be separated from these as a distinct matter. There being, then, these three existing realities -- the Aeon, the Enthymesis, and the passion -- Judas and Matt[hias]--

======== Book II — Chapter 21 ========

32. But if they say that the twelve apostles are the type of that sole emission of twelve Aeons which Man, together with Church, put forth, then let the remaining ten Aeons -- who, as they say, were put forth by Word and Life -- also have their type in ten other apostles. For it is unreasonable that the younger Aeons, and therefore the lesser, should be shown forth by the Saviour through his choosing of the apostles, while the older ones among them, and therefore the better, should not likewise be prefigured beforehand -- since the Saviour (if indeed he chose the apostles for the purpose of showing forth through them the Aeons who are in the Pleroma) could just as well have chosen ten other apostles besides -- and before these, eight others too, so as to show forth that principal and first Ogdoad -- by making the number of apostles into a type. Nor does the number seventy fit either: beyond the twelve apostles, our Lord is discovered to have dispatched seventy further disciples ahead of himself; and seventy can be the type neither of the number eight, nor of ten, nor of thirty. What reason is there, then, that the lesser Aeons should be prefigured, while those from whom these very ones proceeded should not be prefigured at all? And if the twelve apostles were chosen for this reason, that through them the number of the twelve Aeons might be signified, then the seventy ought to have been chosen as a type of seventy Aeons -- and they should no longer say the Aeons number thirty, but rather say there are eighty-two. For if it is for the purpose of prefiguring those who are in the Pleroma that he makes his choice of apostles, he would never have made the choice for some and not for others; rather, through all the apostles together he would have tried to preserve the image and show forth the type of those who are in the Pleroma.

Nor should Paul be passed over in silence either; rather they must be compelled to state in the type of which Aeon the Apostle has come down to our knowledge -- unless it is perhaps of that composite Saviour who is constituted by a gathering-together of them all, and whom they also call 'All,' because he is made up of all of them. Of him the poet Hesiod too spoke splendidly, naming her Pandora (that is, the gift of All), because the best gift from each of them all had been bestowed upon her. And in this the reasoning runs thus: Hermes (as it is expressed in the Greek tongue -- to render this same thing in Latin: words of deceit and seduction, and cunning, insinuating ways, he implanted in their senses) -- did this to seduce foolish men, that they might believe their fictions. For their Mother -- namely Leto -- covertly incited them (hence her very name Leto, drawn from the sense of the Greek term, since she covertly incites men), without the Demiurge's knowledge, to speak profound and ineffable mysteries into ears eager to hear them. And it is not only through Hesiod that their mother has thus been made to speak of the mystery, but also, very cleverly, through the lyric poet Pindar, so as to conceal it from the Demiurge in the story of Pelops -- whose flesh was divided into parts by his father, and gathered together by all the gods, and brought and compacted again -- signifying Pandora in this manner: from which fable these men too, moved by the same spirit, speak in the same terms, being of the same kind and spirit as those poets.

======== Book II — Chapter 22 ========

[Heading: A Demonstration that He Had This Age for Only One Year.] 1. We have already shown that their entire number thirty collapses, since sometimes fewer, sometimes more Aeons are immediately found within the Pleroma according to their own account. There are not, then, thirty Aeons; nor was it for this reason that the Saviour, being thirty years old, came to his baptism -- to show forth their silent Aeons, thirty in number. Otherwise they will find themselves distinguishing and excluding the very first among them by this very reasoning [textual gap in source -- scholarly notes on Pindar, Pelops, and related mythological allusions are corrupt or illegible in the manuscript at this point] ... they claim his suffering fell within the twelfth month, meaning his preaching spanned the single year following his baptism, and they attempt to bolster this very claim from the prophet -- since the text reads: 'to announce the Lord's favorable year, and the day of retribution' -- truly blind, these men who claim to have discovered the depths of the Bythos, and yet do not understand that Isaiah spoke of an 'acceptable year of the Lord' and a 'day of recompense' in a quite different sense. For it is not of a day consisting of twelve hours that the prophet speaks, nor of a year measured by twelve months. For the prophets have said many things in parables and allegories, and not according to the plain sound of the words themselves -- and they themselves admit this.

The day of retribution, accordingly, denotes that day on which the Lord repays every person in keeping with their deeds -- the judgment itself. And the Lord's favorable year is the present age, throughout which those who put faith in him are summoned and rendered acceptable to him -- that is, the entire span from his advent until the end, during which he collects to himself, as a harvest, those being saved. For according to the prophet's own words, the day of recompense follows the year; and the prophet would be proven false if the Lord had preached for only a single year, and it is of that single year he is speaking. For where is the day of recompense? The year has passed, and there is still no day of recompense; rather, he still makes his sun to rise on the good and the evil, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. And indeed the righteous suffer persecution, and are afflicted and killed; while sinners abound in plenty, and drink with harp and lyre, and yet the works of the Lord do not... [text corrupt/illegible in source] ...does the echo of persecution and disaster seem to resound throughout, close upon what follows? Indeed these things were written long before... and that the day of recompense follows the year. For the text reads: 'to announce the Lord's favorable year, and the day of retribution.' Fittingly, then, the present age is understood as the Lord's favorable year, throughout which people are summoned and brought to salvation by him; and the day of retribution -- namely the judgment -- comes after it. And this span of time is termed not merely a 'year' but also a 'day' -- so named by the prophet and likewise by Paul, for the Apostle, calling the Scripture to mind, writes in his letter to the Romans: as the text has it, on your account we face death the whole day through; we are reckoned like sheep marked for slaughter. Here 'the whole day through' refers to this entire stretch of time, throughout which we endure persecution and are put to death like sheep. Accordingly, just as this 'day' does not mean one made of twelve hours but rather the entire period during which those who trust in Christ endure suffering and death on his account, so likewise that 'year' is not one comprising twelve months but the entire era of faith, throughout which people, upon hearing the message preached, come to believe, and are made acceptable to the Lord as they join themselves to him.

It is indeed a matter for great wonder how these men, who claim to have discovered the depths of God, have not examined in the Gospels how many times, according to the season of the Passover, the Lord went up to Jerusalem after his baptism -- seeing that it was the custom of the Jews, from every region, to gather together at Jerusalem each year at this season, and there to celebrate the feast day of the Passover. First, indeed, when he made wine from water in Cana of Galilee, he went up for the feast day of the Passover; at which time also it is written: 'because many believed in him, seeing the signs which he did,' as John, the Lord's disciple, records. After this he is again found withdrawing into Samaria, where he conversed with the Samaritan woman, and healed the centurion's son by his word though absent, saying, 'Go, your son lives.' And after this he again went up a second time to Jerusalem for the feast of the Passover, at which time [he healed] the paralytic, [bidding him] rise and take up his pallet and go; and again withdrawing from there across the Sea of Tiberias, where, when a great crowd had followed him, he satisfied that whole multitude from five loaves, and twelve baskets of fragments were left over. Afterward, once he had brought Lazarus back from death, and the Pharisees conspired against him, he withdrew to the city of Ephraim; and from there, coming to Bethany six days before the Passover, it is written, and going up from Bethany to Jerusalem, and eating the Passover, and on the following day suffering. That these three seasons of the Passover do not make up a single year, everyone will admit. And as for the month itself in which the Passover is celebrated, in which the Lord also suffered -- it is not the twelfth month but the first -- as those who boast that they know everything ought to know, if indeed they do not know it... [remainder of note badly corrupted in the source, referring to a fourfold division of the Gospel narrative around successive Passover ascents: the wedding at Cana; the paschal ascent; the healing of the centurion's son; the healing of the para[lytic — text breaks off]
Feeding of the multitudes; Resurrection; Passion. But this cannot be understood plainly without doing violence to Irenaeus's text. Moreover, since the trustworthiness of this point cannot be doubted here — for Irenaeus's whole argument would utterly collapse if in his time the reading were not found in the fifth, or sixth chapter — we think that Irenaeus actually read these two words where they are handed down from the same source, namely in V, 6, whence afterward extended to VI; there alone would they probably stand firm, from the resemblance of the completion of the true and the twelfth month. And they must either reject their own resolution or reject the Gospel: otherwise, how did the Lord preach for only one year? For being about thirty years old when he came to baptism, and then having reached the full age of a teacher, he came to Jerusalem, so that he was justly heard by all as "Teacher": for he did not appear one thing and was another, as those say who bring in a merely apparent Christ; but he was, in every respect, precisely what he appeared to be. Since he was thus a teacher, he also possessed a teacher's age, neither refusing nor overstepping the human condition, nor undoing in himself the law of the human race, but hallowing every stage of age by that resemblance proper to him. For it was to rescue everyone that he came, through his own person — all, I mean, who are reborn through him unto God: infants, and little children, and boys, and young men, and elders. Therefore he passed through every age, and was made an infant for infants, sanctifying infants; in little children a little child, sanctifying those who are of that very age, and at the same time becoming to them an example of piety, of righteousness, and of submission — for those who suppose that Irenaeus read in Luke... For all things were in Christ...
...in young men a young man, becoming an example to the young, and sanctifying them for the Lord. So too an elder among elders, that he might be a perfect teacher in all things, not only in respect of the exposition of truth, but also in respect of age, sanctifying elders as well, becoming an example to them also; then he went on even unto death, that he might be "the firstborn from the dead," himself holding the preeminence in all things, the prince of life, before all, and taking precedence of all. But those men, in order that they may affirm their fiction concerning what is written as "the accepted year of the Lord," say that his preaching lasted merely a single year, and that he suffered in the twelfth month: in this they forget themselves and undo his whole work, and take away from him that age which is more necessary and more honorable — that more advanced age, I say, in which he was also teaching and presiding over all. For without teaching, how could he have gathered disciples at all? And without a teacher's age, how could he have taught? For he came to baptism not yet having completed thirty years, but had only just entered his thirtieth year (for Luke, who recorded his age, wrote it thus: "Jesus was then close upon thirty years of age" at the time of his baptism), and from his baptism he preached for one year only; completing his thirtieth year he suffered, still being a young man, and not yet having reached the more advanced age. But that the age of thirty years is the first stage of youth, and extends even to the fortieth year, everyone will admit; and after the fortieth and fiftieth year, a person already passes into the elder age, which age our Lord had when he was teaching, even as the Gospel and all the elders bear witness, who conversed with John in Asia, testifying to that tradition; since he continued to live among them well into the reign of Trajan. And some of them saw not only John, but other apostles also, and heard these same things from them, and testify to such a tradition. Whom should we rather believe? Such witnesses as these, or Ptolemy, who never saw the apostles, and has not even in his dreams attained to a trace of an apostle? And indeed the very Jews who at that time disputed with the Lord Jesus Christ themselves most plainly indicated this. For when the Lord declared to them, "Abraham your father rejoiced that he would see my day, and he beheld it, and rejoiced," they replied to him, "You are not yet fifty years old — and have you seen Abraham?" Now this is fittingly said of one who has already passed forty years, but has not yet reached fifty, though not far off from the fiftieth year. But to one who was only thirty years old, it would certainly have been said, "You have not yet reached forty." Those seeking to expose him as untruthful would not have pushed his years much past the age he was seen to have, but would have kept it close to the age they judged him to be, which was above forty; yet not so as to make it appear he was thirty years old. For it would be utterly unreasonable for them to lie by twenty years, when they wished to make him out younger in relation to the times of Abraham. What they saw, that they also spoke of; and he who appeared thus was not merely apparent, but was in truth what he appeared to be. He was not then far from fifty years; and therefore they said to him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?" He therefore did not preach for only a single year, nor did his suffering occur in the year's twelfth month. For the span from the thirtieth to the fiftieth year can never be but one year — unless indeed, as the poet Homer said, himself too inspired by the mother of their error (which we shall render thus in Latin):

======== Book II — Chapter 23 ========

How the account they give based on numbers and names is destroyed. But also concerning that woman afflicted for years with a flow of blood, who touched the fringe of the Lord's garment, and thereby was made well, their ignorance stands exposed (for they say that through her is shown the suffering of that twelfth power, which flowed away into infinity, that is, the twelfth Aeon) — first, because according to their own system the twelfth is not this Aeon, as we have shown. But even granting them this point beyond what is due: of the twelve Aeons, eleven are said to have remained free from suffering, and the twelfth alone suffered; whereas the woman, on the contrary, was healed in her twelfth year — it is plain that for eleven years she had a continuing affliction, and recovered in her twelfth year. Now if the eleven Aeons were reported to have suffered incurably, while only the twelfth was cured, one might grant that the woman prefigured them. But since this woman suffered for eleven years and was not healed, and was healed in the twelfth year, how then can it be that they suffered nothing at all except that the twelfth alone was involved in suffering? For a type and image differs from the truth in some respects as regards material and substance, but must preserve the resemblance in form and outline, and thus show, by means of things present, those things which are not present.
And not only in this woman are the years of her infirmity recorded, which they say correspond to their fiction, but see also: another woman likewise, infirm for eighteen years, was healed, of whom the Lord asked: "Should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham bound by Satan for eighteen years, be set free on that day..." and she ought to be a type of the eighteenth suffering Aeon. But they cannot show this: otherwise their first and principal Ogdoad would have to be numbered among the Aeons that suffered together. And yet another again is healed by the Lord, having been thirty-eight years in his infirmity: and let them say that the thirty-eighth Aeon suffered. For if they claim that the Lord's deeds are figures of what exists within the Pleroma, then that figure must be maintained consistently throughout. But they cannot fit either the woman healed after eighteen years, or the man healed after thirty-eight, into their scheme. It is senseless and utterly inconsistent to say that the Savior preserved the type in some cases, but not in others. The woman's type is therefore shown to be dissimilar to the business of the Aeons.

======== Book II — Chapter 24 ========

Further, their fabrication is shown to be false and their fiction unstable also by this: that in interpreting names they attempt to bring in proofs sometimes by letters, sometimes by the numbers which are contained in the letters according to the Greeks; and this most plainly shows the confusion and instability, and the forced and violent character, of their so-called knowledge. For "Jesus," being a name of another language, they transfer to the Greek numeral system, and say that sometimes it is the "episemon" [the numeral-sign], having six letters; sometimes that it signifies the fullness of the Ogdoads, having the number 888. But concerning the Greek name of him who is called "Soter" (that is, Savior), because it does not fit their fiction, neither by number nor by letters, they have kept silent. And yet, if the names of the Lord had been received by the providence of the Father, signifying by number and by letters the number that is in the Pleroma, then "Soter," being a Greek name, ought to have shown the mystery of the Pleroma both by its letters and by its numbers, according to Greek usage. But this is not so, for it has five letters, while its number is 1,400. These figures agree in no way with their Pleroma: therefore that transaction which they claim takes place in the Pleroma is not true.

But "Jesus," according to the proper Hebrew tongue, has two and a half letters, as their own experts say, signifying "the Lord who contains heaven and earth," because in the ancient Hebrew tongue "Jesus" means "heaven," while "earth" again is called by another word. The Word, then, who possesses heaven and earth, is himself Jesus. False, therefore, is also their rendering of the episemon, and their number is manifestly overthrown. For according to their own [Greek] tongue, "Soter" is a Greek word of five letters; while "Jesus," again, according to the Hebrew tongue, has two and a half letters. Their reckoning of 888 therefore collapses. And in every respect the Hebrew letters do not agree with the Greek number, so as to sustain a calculation of the names. For the ancient and original Hebrew letters, the sacred ones — that one which is without a vowel — has, as it were, a half value; and these three are the initial letters of certain words... This may perhaps signify something of the sort, but the text has been wretchedly corrupted through the ignorance of the copyist and the scribes. Probably, after the word for "Lord," it went on to say that, according to that same Hebrew tongue, [another letter] means "heaven"; but the letter in the first syllable was perhaps badly transcribed in Greek letters as "ZPA" instead of "Sura," over which some more learned reader wrote the gloss "dust," since the initial letter of this word seemed to him to fit better with the final letter of the name Jesus. Others propose a different restoration of the text: that the tongue [means] "heaven" is "sma," and "earth" again is called "sura." [The Hebrew letters], which are called by their proper names, are ten in number, but each is written by fifteen [combinations], the last letter being joined to the first. And so some write them in the natural order, as we do; others turn them backward, from right to left. And Christ, too, ought to have had, in the reckoning of his name, a correspondence with the Aeons of their Pleroma, since he was, according to what they say, brought forth for the establishment and correction of their Pleroma. And the Father likewise, both by letters and by number, ought to have contained the number of those who were brought forth from him, both the Only-Begotten and, above all others, that name which is called "God" — which itself in Hebrew is called "Baruch," and has two and a half letters. From this, then, since the more solid names, both in the Hebrew and in the Greek tongue, agree neither in the number of letters nor in their computed sum with their fiction, it is plain...

That according to the Law neither can such patterns nor such figures exist. For indeed, out of the Law, picking out whatever numbers happen to agree with their system, they attempt to construct proofs by violence. But if it had been the purpose of their Mother, or of the Savior, that through the Demiurge types of the things that are in the Pleroma should be shown, then it would have been in the more sublime and more excellent matters that these types were worked out — and especially in the ark of the covenant itself, through which the whole tabernacle of testimony was constructed. Now it was built thus: two and a half cubits long, one and a half cubits wide, and one and a half cubits high — and none of these measures matches their invention in any way; nor does the mercy-seat correspond to their explanations either. Likewise, the table of showbread measured two cubits in length, one cubit in width, and a cubit and a half in height (this stood before the holy of holies); and none of these figures points at all to the Tetrad, the Ogdoad, or any other portion of their Pleroma. As for the lampstand, with its seven branches and seven lamps — had it truly been fashioned as a figure, it would have needed eight branches and eight lamps, matching the primal Ogdoad, which outshines the other Aeons and fills the whole Pleroma with light. And though they have carefully counted the ten curtains, they have not reckoned that they were made in a series of eleven. Nor have they even measured the size of the courts themselves, each court having a length of twenty-eight cubits. And they explain the length of the pillars, made ten cubits, as referring to the Decad of the Aeons; but the width of each pillar, which was one cubit and a half, they do not explain, nor the total number of all the pillars, nor of their sockets, because these do not fit their argument. What, further, of the oil of anointing, which sanctified the whole tabernacle? Did this perhaps escape the notice of the Savior, or did the Demiurge, while their Mother was asleep, decree its weight on his own authority! Hence it disagrees with their Pleroma: it had myrrh, five hundred shekels, of sweet cinnamon two hundred and fifty, of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty, and besides these, oil, so that from five ingredients it was compounded. And the incense likewise was made of stacte, and onycha, and galbanum, and sweet spice, and frankincense — which agree in no way, neither in their mixtures nor in their weights, with their system.

How no truth at all can be established from the Scriptures by means of numbers. It is therefore unreasonable, and altogether uncouth, to say that in the most sublime and elevated matters of the Law the types were not preserved, while in other, lesser matters, wherever some number happens to agree with what they say, they insist that it prefigures something within the Pleroma — since every number is set down in manifold ways throughout the Scriptures, so that anyone who wishes may build, whether an Ogdoad, a Decad, a Duodecad, or indeed whatever number he pleases out of the Scriptures, and contrive it to be a type of his own error. But since this is true, let the number five, which agrees in no way with their system, and coincides with none of their fiction, nor fits their typical demonstration of the things in the Pleroma, receive its proof from the Scriptures in this way. "Soter" is a name of five letters, and "Pater" [Father] likewise has five letters; and "agape" [love] too has five letters; and our Lord, blessing five loaves, satisfied five thousand men; the wise virgins are said by the Lord to be five, and likewise the foolish are five. Again, five persons are recorded as present with the Lord when he met the Father's testimony — Peter, James, John, Moses, and Elijah; and again the Lord, coming as the fifth to the dead girl, raised her, for he allowed no one to enter, it says, save Peter, James, and the girl's father and mother. That rich man's house has five members: two lengthwise, two crosswise, and one at the center, where the one who was nailed rests. Each of our hands has five fingers; after James, also John; and we also have five senses; and the organs that are in our inward parts can be numbered as five: heart, and liver, lungs, spleen, and kidneys. Moreover, the whole man can also be divided into this number: head, chest, belly, thighs, feet. Human life proceeds through five stages: infancy, childhood, boyhood, youth, and finally old age. In five books Moses handed down the Law to the people. Each of the tablets he received from God bore five commandments. The curtain shielding the holy of holies hung on five pillars. And the altar of burnt offering, its height was five cubits. Five priests were set apart in the wilderness: Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar. The tunic, and the breastplate, and the rest of the priestly vestments were woven of five materials: being woven from gold, blue, purple, scarlet thread, and fine linen. And as for the five Amorite kings whom Joshua son of Nun shut up in the caves, he had the people trample their heads underfoot. And countless other instances of this sort can be gathered, both in this number and in the works of nature — yet we do not on this account say that there are five Aeons above the Demiurge, nor do we set apart the Pentad as if it were something sacred, nor do we labor, through this vain labor, to confirm unstable ravings, nor do we force well-ordered creation, made by God, to submit to evil doctrines, since this whole exposure and overthrow can be shown by all.

Concerning days, and months, and years, and words, and syllables. For who would grant them that the year has only three hundred and sixty-five days, so that there are twelve months of thirty days each, in the pattern of the twelve Aeons, though this is a part unlike the whole Pleroma, since they hold a month to represent one-twelfth of a year? Had the year in fact been split into thirty portions, and the month into twelve, their figure might be thought to fit their invention. But now, on the contrary, their Pleroma is divided into thirty, and some part of it into twelve; whereas here, every year is divided into twelve parts, and some part of it into thirty. Absurdly, then, has the Savior made the month a type of the whole Pleroma, and the year a type of the Duodecad that is within the Pleroma: for it would have been more fitting that the year be divided into thirty, as is the whole Pleroma, and the month into twelve, as are the Aeons within their Pleroma. And they, indeed, divide the whole Pleroma into three parts, that is, into the Ogdoad, the Decad, and the Duodecad. But here the year is divided into four, that is, spring, summer, autumn, and winter. Moreover, the months, which they say are a type of the number thirty, do not fixedly have thirty days, but some have more, others fewer, since five days over are added to them. And the day, too, never keeps a constant twelve hours, ranging instead from nine up to fifteen, and back down from fifteen to nine. The months were not made of thirty days because of thirty Aeons — otherwise they would always have a fixed thirty days; nor again were the hours of the days made to figure the twelve Aeons by twelve hours — for then they too would always have had a fixed twelve hours.

Concerning the sheep, and the drachmas, of which one was lost and then found. Furthermore, calling material things "the left hand," and saying that of necessity the things that are on the left fall away into corruption, and that the Savior sought out the lost sheep so as to move it over to the right — that is, to those of salvation, the ninety-nine sheep, which did not perish but remained in the fold, being on the left hand — they are compelled to admit that this is no relief of salvation. And by the fact that this does not correspond in like manner in number, they are compelled to confess this same reckoning to belong to the left, that is, to corruption: and this name, which in Greek is called "Agape" [love], according to...

======== Book II — Chapter 25 ========

Chapter 25. Demonstration that it is so. But if someone should say to us in response to these things: What then? Are the placement of names, the choice of the apostles, the Lord's activity, and the arrangement of the things that were made, all pointless and merely as it happened? We will say to them: Not at all; rather, all things, both the ancient things and whatever the Word has worked in these latest times, have been made by God fittingly and adorned with great wisdom and diligence for a clear purpose, and they ought to be connected not to a numerical scheme but to the underlying argument, or else received merely as literal texts (for this is a weak approach, since it is manifold and variable, and since any argument today might equally be contrived by someone to draw from these same things testimonies contrary to the truth, because they can be applied to many different things). Rather, they ought to fit the numbers themselves and the things that were made to the underlying argument of the truth. For the rule does not come from the things made, but the things made come from God. For all things are from one and the same God.
Now because the things that have been made are various and many, and each is well fitted and consonant with the whole work, yet when one looks at each of them individually, they are opposed to one another and do not agree — just as the sound of a lyre, through the consonant interval of each string, produces a single melody arising out of many contrary sounds. The lover of truth, then, ought not to be led astray by the difference between one sound and another, nor should he suppose that one craftsman made this string and a different one that, or that one man tuned the sharper strings, another the deeper, and another the middle ones; but rather that it is one and the same craftsman, for the demonstration of the whole work and of his wisdom, justice, goodness, and generosity. Those who hear the melody ought to praise and glorify the craftsman, and should perceive the blending between the various sounds, and consider the character proper to each, and what each contributes, and seek out its cause — never departing from the rule, nor straying from the craftsman, nor casting aside the faith in the one God who made all things, nor blaspheming our creator.
But if someone does not find the cause of everything that is sought after, let him consider that he is a man, infinitely inferior to God, one who has received grace only in part, who is by no means yet the equal or the likeness of his own maker, and who cannot have experience and understanding of all things as God does; but insofar as he who was fashioned and who took his beginning of formation only today falls short of him who is without beginning and everlastingly unchanging, so too in understanding and in tracing out the reasons of all things does he lag behind him. For you, O man, are not uncreated, nor did you always coexist with God as his own Word does; but on account of his surpassing goodness, now that you have received a beginning of your existence, you learn little by little from the Word the dispositions of God who made you. (Here Irenaeus points to where the Scriptures direct us.) Demonstration that the Demiurge is not divinity itself. Keep, then, the order proper to your knowledge, and do not, out of ignorance of good things, overstep God himself — for he is not to be transcended — nor inquire beyond the Demiurge as to what he is, for you will not find it. For your maker is beyond determining; and do not measure him as though you had come through the whole of his workmanship and considered all the depth and height and length that is in it, and then imagine some other Father above him. For you will not succeed in imagining this, but, thinking contrary to nature, you will become foolish; and if you persist in this, you will fall into madness, considering yourself more exalted and better than your maker, and supposing that you have passed beyond his kingdom.

======== Book II — Chapter 26 ========

Chapter 26. Demonstration that it is by love that one is built up. It is therefore better and more useful to be like the simple and unlearned, who, by knowing little, do not come close to God through love — rather than, by seeming learned and experienced in many things, to be found blaspheming against one's own Lord, fabricating another God as Father. And for this reason Paul cried out: Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Not that he was condemning true knowledge of God — for otherwise he would have accused himself first — but because he knew that certain people, puffed up on the pretext of knowledge, drift away from loving God, and on that basis imagine themselves perfect while putting forward an imperfect Demiurge; cutting off their arrogance arising from such knowledge, he said: Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Now there is no greater puffing-up than for someone to suppose himself better and more perfect than the one who made him, and formed him, and gave him the breath of life, and granted him this very existence. It is better, then, as I have said before, for someone to know nothing at all — not even a single reason why any one of the things that were made was made — and yet to believe in God and to remain in love toward him, than to be puffed up through such knowledge and to drift from the love that gives man life; and to seek no other object of knowledge than Christ Jesus, God's own Son, who suffered crucifixion on our behalf, rather than falling into impiety through the subtleties and trivialities of endless questioning.
For what if someone, puffed up a little by these efforts, because the Lord declared that every single hair upon your head has been counted, should wish to pry curiously into the tally of hairs on each person's head, and to hunt for the reason why this man carries so many and that man so many, since people do not all share one identical total, but countless thousands of differing counts turn up, because some have larger heads and others smaller, and some always have thick hair while others have thin, and still others very little hair at all — let those who think they have discovered the number of hairs make the attempt. Or again, if someone, because the Gospel says, Do two little sparrows not go for a single coin? yet not a single one of them drops to earth apart from your Father's consent, should wish on this account to count up all the sparrows caught everywhere every day, in every region, and to seek the reason why yesterday so many were caught, the day before so many, and today so many again, and should attach the number of sparrows to his argument — does he not utterly deceive himself, and drive those who agree with him into great madness, since people are always ready to think that in such matters they have discovered something beyond what even their teachers found?
But what if someone should ask us whether the whole number of everything that has been made and that is being made is known to God, and whether each of these things has received, according to his providence, the quantity proper to itself; and if we agree and confess that absolutely nothing among things already made, things now being made, and things still to come is hidden from God's knowledge, but that each thing has received and receives, through his providence, its own condition, order, number, and quantity, and that nothing at all has been made or is being made pointlessly or merely as it happens, but with great fitness and lofty awareness, and that there is an admirable and truly divine reasoning able to discern such things and to declare their proper causes — then, having received from us this testimony and agreement, suppose he proceeds to count the grains of sand and the pebbles of the earth, and the billows of the ocean, and the stars strewn across heaven, and to devise causes for the number he supposes he has found? Will he not justly be declared, by all who have sense, to be laboring in vain, and to be a raving and irrational man? And the more he occupies himself with such questions beyond others, and the more he supposes himself to have discovered more than others — calling the rest ignorant, unlearned, and merely animal because they will not take up his vain labor — the more insane and stupid he is, as if struck by a thunderbolt, yielding nothing to God, but through the knowledge he supposes himself to have found, changing God himself, and hurling his own opinion against the greatness of the Maker.

======== Book II — Chapter 27 ========

Chapter 27. In what manner one ought to resolve difficulties. A sound mind, free from danger, reverent and a lover of truth, will readily meditate on those things which God has placed within human power and subjected to our understanding, and will make progress in them, rendering the knowledge of them easy through prolonged study. These are the things that lie plainly before our eyes, and whatever is stated openly and without ambiguity in the very words of the Scriptures; and for this reason the parables ought to be fitted to what is unambiguous. For thus whoever unravels them does so safely, and the parables will be given one consistent unraveling by everyone alike; and the body of truth remains whole and undamaged, with the members fittingly joined together and in harmony — (this makes their meaning easy to grasp; here Irenaeus indeed compares the Gnostics, on account of their pride, to the Giants of Phlegra). But those things which are not stated openly, and which are not set plainly before the eyes, ought to be linked to the resolutions given by the parables that are clear — not the reverse, setting up doctrines contrary to one another, as the questions of pagan philosophers do. According to this method, then, a man will always be seeking but will never find, because he has cast aside the very discipline of finding. And when the bridegroom comes, the one whose lamp is unready, shining with no clear light, runs back to those who deal out resolutions of the parables in darkness, abandoning the one who freely grants entrance through his plain proclamation, and is shut out from his bridal chamber. Since, then, the whole of Scripture, both the prophecies and the Gospels, can be heard plainly and without ambiguity, and alike by all, even though not all believe it, they proclaim — in order to exclude other gods — that the one and only God made all things through his Word, whether visible or invisible, whether heavenly or earthly, whether of the waters or beneath the earth, just as we have demonstrated from the very words of the Scriptures; and the created world in which we ourselves live testifies to this same truth through the things that come into view, namely that there is one who made it and governs it. Very dull indeed will those appear who close their eyes to so clear a disclosure, and who do not wish to see the light of the proclamation, but instead constrain themselves, and through the murky resolutions of parables each one supposes he has discovered a god of his own. For since nothing is said openly, in plain words and without dispute, anywhere at all in Scripture, about the invented Father imagined by those who hold contrary opinions, they themselves testify to this by saying that the Savior taught these same things in secret, not to all, but only to some of the disciples who were able to grasp them, and that he did so through hints, riddles, and parables to those capable of understanding what was signified. They come, then, to the point of saying that the God who is openly proclaimed is one, and the Father who is signified through parables and riddles is another.
But since parables admit of many possible resolutions, who that loves the truth will not confess that it is the mark of people rushing headlong into danger, and acting irrationally, to make assertions about the search for God based on such things, while abandoning what is certain, undoubted, and true? And is this not building one's house not upon rock, firm and solid and set in the open, but upon shifting sand poured out uncertainly? For which reason the overthrow of such a building is easy.

======== Book II — Chapter 28 ========

Chapter 28. That we cannot have complete knowledge in this life. Holding, then, the rule that is the truth itself, and the plainly given testimony concerning God, we ought not, by turning aside into resolving one question after another, to throw away our sure and genuine grasp of God. Rather, we should direct our efforts at resolving questions toward this pattern: it is fitting to be exercised in it, but to live our lives loving him who has accomplished such great things on our behalf and who is most clearly proclaimed as being alone truly God and Father — who made this world, and formed man, and granted increase within his own creation; who brings forth into the light of the sun what was conceived, small as it is, in the womb, and who, after wheat has grown strong within the stalk, stores it in the granary. And it is one and the same Demiurge who formed the womb and created the sun; and it is one and the same Lord who brought forth the stalk and, causing the wheat to grow, multiplied it and prepared the granary.
But if we cannot find resolutions for everything that is asked about in the Scriptures, let us nevertheless not seek some other God besides the one who exists — for this would be the greatest impiety. We ought instead to yield such matters to God, who also made us, knowing full well that the Scriptures are indeed flawless, seeing that they were uttered through God's Word together with his Spirit, while we, being lesser and coming later in time than God's Word along with his Spirit, are correspondingly lacking in the knowledge of his mysteries. Nor is it surprising that we suffer this with regard to spiritual and heavenly things, and things that are still to be revealed, when even of the things that lie before our very feet — I mean the things in this created world, which we can touch and see and which are with us — many escape our knowledge, and we entrust these very things to God, for it belongs to him to exceed all things. For suppose we should attempt to account for why the Nile rises as it does? We would say many things, some perhaps persuasive, some perhaps not; but what is true, certain, and firm lies with God. And likewise the habits of migratory birds, which arrive among us in spring and depart again as soon as autumn comes — even though this happens in this world, it escapes our knowledge. What can we explain about the ebb and flow of the ocean, though it is certain that there is a fixed cause for it? Or what can we say about what lies beyond it, and of what sort it is? What can we say of how rains, and flashes of lightning, and thunders, and the gathering of clouds, and mists, and the sending forth of winds, and similar things come about; and can we also declare the storehouses of snow and hail and things akin to these; what is the formation of clouds, or the condition of mist, or what is the cause by which the moon waxes and wanes, or the cause of the differences among waters, metals, stones, and things like these? In all these matters we would merely talk on, seeking their causes; but only God, who alone is truthful, actually makes them.
If, then, even in the case of created things, some matters lie close to God alone while others have come within our own knowledge, what is wrong if, among the things sought out in the Scriptures — all the Scriptures being spiritual — we resolve some by the grace of God, while committing others to God, and this not only in this age but also in the age to come? Thus God will always be teaching, and man will always be learning the things that come from God. As the Apostle said, when the other parts are done away, these then remain: faith, hope, and love. For faith in our Teacher always stands firm, assuring us that He alone is truly God; and so that we may always love God in truth, since He alone is the Father; and that we may hope to receive ever more, and to learn from God, because He is good, and possesses riches beyond reckoning, and a kingdom without end, and teaching without measure.

If, then, in the manner we have described, we commit some of these questions to God, we shall both keep our faith intact and continue without danger, and every Scripture given to us by God will be found consistent with itself; the parables will harmonize with what is plainly stated, and the plain statements will explain the parables; and through the many voices of its words we shall perceive in ourselves one harmonious melody, praising with hymns the God who made all things.

For example, suppose someone poses the question: 'What occupied God before He fashioned the world?' our reply is that such a question belongs to God alone. For that this cosmos was fashioned by God, taking its start within time, is what the Scriptures instruct us; yet what occupied God prior to that, no Scripture discloses. This answer, then, belongs to God; we ought not, in foolishness and undisciplined blasphemy, to try to invent explanations, and so, supposing we have discovered the origin of matter, reject the very God who made all things.

[HOW THEIR EMANATIONS ARE NOT EVEN CONSISTENT WITH ONE ANOTHER]

Consider, then, all you who invent such things: the Father alone is called God, and He truly is — this very one whom you call the Demiurge; and yet the Scriptures acknowledge this God and no other, and the Lord owns this same God as His very own Father, recognizing none besides Him, as we shall demonstrate from His own sayings. When, concerning the very phrase 'And God saw that it was good,' you say that through such worlds this was the fruit of a defect and the offspring of ignorance, not knowing what lay above him — and whatever else you say of him — consider the magnitude of the blasphemy against Him who is truly God.

This blindness and this foolish talk come upon you because you reserve nothing to God, but wish to declare the births and emanations of God Himself, and of His Ennoea, and of the Word, and of Life, and of Christ, taking these from nowhere else but from human feelings. You fail to understand that in man, a composite living being, it is fitting to speak of a 'sense' in this way, as we said before, but not of a 'logos.' For among the Greeks 'logos' means one thing as the ruling principle that thinks, and another as the instrument through which the logos is uttered; and man is sometimes silent and at rest, sometimes speaking and active.

[PROOF THAT MIND IS LOGOS AND LOGOS IS MIND, AND THAT HE HIMSELF IS THE FATHER OF ALL]

But God, being entirely Mind, entirely Reason, entirely active Spirit, and entirely Light, and ever constant, subsisting always in the same fashion — this being how it befits us to conceive of God, and as the Scriptures instruct us on the matter — such passions and divisions can no longer rightly be ascribed to Him. [Here the text teaches that Satan does not dare to utter this blasphemy.] For the sense of men, because of its spiritual object, is not adequately served by the tongue, the tongue being itself fleshly; hence our inward word is stifled and is not brought forth all at once, just as it was conceived by the mind, but part by part, according to what the tongue is able to convey.

[THAT THE SON HAS HIS EMISSION FROM THE FATHER]

But God, being wholly Mind and wholly Logos, what He thinks, that He also speaks, and what He speaks, that He also thinks. For what He thinks is Logos, and that Logos is itself Mind, and this all-containing Mind — that is the Father. Whoever, then, speaks of the Mind of God and grants to that Mind an emission of its own, declares Him composite, as though God were one thing and the ruling Mind existing in Him another. Likewise again with the Logos: granting Him a third emission from the Father — whence they also misjudge His greatness — they have thereby separated the Logos far from God. And the prophet says of Him: 'Who shall declare his generation?' But you, guessing at His generation from the Father, and transferring to the Word of God an emission modeled on the human word produced through the tongue, are rightly told that our own word is stifled within us before it can be uttered; you are covered with shame by your own arguments, for you know neither human things nor divine.
[HOW THE LORD CONCEDES CERTAIN THINGS TO THE FATHER]

Unreasonably puffed up, you boldly claim to know the inexpressible mysteries of God — although the Lord himself, the Son of God, conceded that the Father alone possesses knowledge of that day and hour of judgment, declaring in plain terms: 'Concerning that day and hour, none has knowledge — not the Son himself, but the Father alone.' Seeing, then, that the Son felt no shame in referring the knowledge of that day back to the Father, but spoke honestly, let us likewise feel no shame in committing to God those weightier matters that arise among our own questions. For no one is above his teacher.

If, then, someone should ask us: 'How, then, was the Son brought forth from the Father?' we tell him that this emission — whether one calls it generation, or naming, or opening-forth, or by whatever name he chooses for His inexpressible generation — is unknown to Saturninus and to Basilides alike, unknown to angels and to archangels, to principalities and to powers — known to none save the Father who did the begetting, and the Son who was thereby begotten. Since, then, His generation is inexpressible, whoever attempts to explain such generations and emissions is not in his right mind, promising to explain what cannot be explained. For that a word is emitted from thought and sense — this all men know well. Those, then, who devised these emissions have discovered nothing great, nor any hidden mystery, if they have merely transferred what everyone understands onto the only-begotten Word of God; and Him whom they call inexpressible and unnameable, they nevertheless declare — as though they themselves had served as midwives — the emission and generation of His first begetting.
We shall not go wrong in saying the same thing also about the substance of matter — namely, that God brought it forth. For the Scriptures have taught us that dominion over all things rests with God. But from what, or in what manner, He brought it forth, no Scripture has declared; and we should not go inventing endless private opinions about God, but should grant that this knowledge belongs to God. Likewise too the reason why, although all things were made by God, some transgressed and fell away from subjection to God, while others — indeed the greater number — have persevered and continue to persevere in subjection to Him who made them; and of what nature are those that transgressed, and of what nature those that persevere — this too we ought to yield to God and to His Word, the one to whom alone was spoken: 'Take your seat at my right hand, until I have made your enemies a footstool beneath you.' We, however, remaining still on earth, have not yet taken our seat upon His throne. For though the Spirit of the Savior dwelling within Him searches out all things, even the very depths of God, yet so far as we ourselves are concerned, there are divisions of graces, and divisions of ministries, and divisions of operations, and we upon earth, as Paul also says, know in part and prophesy in part. As, then, we know in part, so too concerning all such questions we ought to yield to Him who grants us grace only in part.

[Chapter 43.] Since it is plain that eternal fire has been prepared for transgressors, and the Lord has said this openly, and the rest of the Scriptures show it; and that God foreknew this would happen, the Scriptures likewise show, just as, from the very outset, He made ready an unending fire for those destined to transgress; but the very cause of the nature of those who transgress no Scripture has related, nor has the apostle stated, nor has the Lord taught. We ought, then, to leave this knowledge to God, just as the Lord left the hour and the day; and we should not run such a risk as to grant God nothing at all, receiving even these things only in part. For when we inquire into things that are above us, and which it is not given us to attain, we ought not to fall into such presumption as to suppose we have laid bare God and things not yet discovered — as though we had already found, in the idle talk about emissions, that God the maker of all things Himself derived His being from defect and ignorance — and so to fashion an argument impious against God.
After this, moreover, they have no testimony at all for this fiction which they have recently invented — sometimes trying to establish their fabulous account by means of certain numbers, sometimes by syllables, sometimes by names, sometimes even by the letters found in writing, sometimes by parables wrongly interpreted, or by mere conjectures.

[WHAT IS THE REASON WHY THE FATHER ALONE KNOWS THE DAY]

For if anyone should ask the reason why, although the Father shares all things in common with the Son, the Lord declared that the Father alone knows the hour and the day, he will discover, upon reflection, no reply more fitting, more apt, or safer than this: that inasmuch as the Lord alone is the true Teacher, it is through Him we come to grasp that the Father surpasses all things in greatness. For, as He himself states, 'the Father is greater than I.' The Father, then, has been declared by our Lord to be superior in knowledge, to this end: that we too, so far as we exist within the pattern of this world, should yield to God perfect knowledge and such questions as these — lest, perhaps, while seeking to search out the depths of the Father, we fall into so great a danger as to ask whether there is another God above God.

But if anyone, loving contention, should contradict what we have said and what the Apostle has reported — namely, that our knowledge is partial and our prophecy likewise partial — supposing that he himself, being some Valentinus, or Ptolemy, or Basilides, or one of those who claim to have searched out the depths of God, has grasped, not in part, but wholly and universally, the entire knowledge of these things — let him not adorn himself with empty boasting over things invisible or things that cannot be demonstrated, boasting that he has learned more than the rest; but rather let him inquire diligently into the causes of things in this world which we do not know — for instance, the number of the hairs of his own head, and about the sparrows caught each day, and the other things not foreseen by us — and let him learn these from the Father, and report them to us, so that we may believe him also concerning greater things. But if those who claim to be perfect do not yet know the things that are in their hands, and before their feet, and before their eyes, and the things of earth, and above all the arrangement of the hairs of their own head, how shall we believe them concerning spiritual and supercelestial things, and the things which, by vain persuasion, they affirm to be above God? And let this much be said by us concerning their numbers and names and syllables, and concerning the questions about things above us, and about how improperly they expound the parables — since much more could be said by you on this.

======== Book II — Chapter 29 ========

[ON THE NATURE OF THE SOUL]

Let us return, then, to the remaining parts of their argument. They say that at the consummation their Mother will go back within the Pleroma and receive her Bridegroom, the souls having become intellectual spirits, destined to be brides of the spiritual angels; and that the Demiurge — whom they term the animal, or psychic, one — will occupy the place vacated by the Mother; and that the souls of the righteous will find rest in that intermediate region, the dwelling of the psychic. And in claiming that like joins with like — the spiritual drawn toward the spiritual, whereas the material remains among material things — they set out claims that contradict one another. For they no longer maintain that souls enter the intermediate place because they share a like substance, but rather because of how they conducted themselves — asserting that the souls of the righteous move on into that place, while the souls of the impious are left behind in the fire. Now if it were by reason of substance alone that all souls passed into refreshment, given that all are alike in nature insofar as they are souls, then such a belief would be pointless, and the Savior's descent equally pointless. But if it happens by reason of righteousness, then the deciding factor is no longer their being souls at all, but their being righteous. But if souls that were about to perish would not have begun to exist unless they had been righteous, then righteousness is able to save; and why, then, will it not also save bodies, which have likewise shared in righteousness? For if nature and substance save, all souls will be saved; but if righteousness and faith save, why should it not also save the bodies, which along with souls likewise begin to pass into corruption? For such a righteousness will appear either powerless or unjust, if it saves some because of their participation in it, but not others.
For it is clear that the things belonging to righteousness are accomplished in bodies. Therefore either all souls without exception must pass into the middle place, and there will be no judgment at all; or else the bodies too, which have shared in righteousness, will obtain the place of refreshment together with the souls that likewise shared in it -- since righteousness is well able to bring there those who have shared in it. And so a true and firm doctrine of the resurrection of bodies will emerge, which we indeed believe: that God, raising up our mortal bodies that have kept righteousness, will make them incorrupt and immortal, since God is good, and since he is powerful enough to do it, and since, being rich and perfect, he is able to bring it to completion.

[Showing that their souls too are said to share in salvation.]

But these men say the very opposite on every point: they do not hold that all souls pass into the middle place, but only those of the righteous. For they say that three natures were begotten by the Mother, naturally and according to substance: the first from anguish, weariness, and fear, which is matter; the second from impulse, which is the animal (psychic) nature; and the third, which she brought forth according to the vision of the angels who attend Christ, which is the spiritual nature. If, then, that which was brought forth by vision passes wholly into the Pleroma, since it is spiritual -- while that which belongs to matter remains below, since it is material, and is entirely consumed when the fire within it blazes up -- why then does the animal element not pass wholly into the middle place too, the place to which they also send the Demiurge? What indeed is it that they say remains there? As for bodies, since they have a material substance, they say these are dissolved into matter and burned up by the fire within them; and when the body is corrupted and the soul remains in the middle place, nothing further is left of the human being to enter the Pleroma. For a man's perception, mind, thought, and the intention of the mind, and everything of that kind, are nothing other than the soul itself -- they are simply the motions and operations of the soul, having no substance apart from the soul. What, then, is still left of them to pass into the Pleroma? For they themselves, insofar as they are souls, remain in the middle place; and insofar as they are body, they will be burned up along with the rest of matter.

======== Book II — Chapter 30 ========

[That in no respect...]

Matters standing thus, these fools claim to ascend above the Demiurge, and on this ground proclaim themselves superior to that God who fashioned and beautified the heavens, the earth, the seas, and everything within them. They wish to be reckoned spiritual, though -- so great is their impiety -- they are in fact shamefully carnal; while he who made his angels spirits, who wraps himself in light as though it were a robe, and grasps, so to speak, the circle of the earth within his hand, before whom its inhabitants are reckoned as grasshoppers, and who is Lord and Demiurge of the whole spiritual substance -- him they call merely animal. Beyond doubt they thereby show their own madness clearly, and, as though truly thunderstruck like the Giants told of in the old fables, they raise their voices against God, puffed up with vain presumption and unstable pride -- men for whose cure all the hellebore of the whole earth would not suffice to purge out so great a folly.
[One ought to be shown better by his works.]

From what, then, do they show themselves better than the Demiurge? -- that we too may descend, for the necessity of the argument, to comparing God with madmen, stooping to their own reasoning and often refuting them from their own doctrines (though may God be gracious to us in this, since we say these things not to compare him with them, but to refute and overturn their madness) -- a thing at which many of the foolish stand amazed, as though they could learn from these men something greater than the truth itself. And that saying which is written, 'Seek, and you shall find,' they interpret to mean that one should discover oneself to be above the Demiurge, calling themselves greater and better than God, and themselves spiritual while the Demiurge is merely animal; and on this ground they claim to ascend above God, entering the Pleroma themselves while God remains in the middle place. Let them, then, show themselves better than the Demiurge by their works; for a man ought to be shown better not by what he says, but by what he does.
What work, then, will they show accomplished by themselves, or by their Savior, or by their own Mother, that is greater or more splendid or more reasonable than the things made by him who arranged all this? What heavens have they made firm? What earth have they made solid? What stars have they sent forth? What luminaries have they set shining? With what circuits have they bound them? What rains, or colds, or snows, fitted to the season and to each region, have they brought upon the earth? What heat and dryness, in turn, have they set opposite these? What rivers have they made to abound? What springs have they brought forth? Out of what blossoms and timber have they decked the world that lies under heaven? What host of living creatures have they shaped, some endowed with reason and some without it, each given a comely form? And everything else that stands fixed by the power of God and is steered by his wisdom -- who could tally it item by item, or plumb the depth of the wisdom of the God who fashioned it? And what of those realities above the heaven, which never pass away -- how immense are they: Angels, Archangels, Thrones, Dominions, Powers past counting? Measured against any single one of these accomplishments, what do they have to display, done by themselves or from themselves, when they themselves are this God's own making and molding? For whether it was the Savior or their own Mother -- to speak in their own terms, refuting them by their own words as liars -- who, as they say, used this Demiurge to make an image of the things within the Pleroma, and of the whole vision she saw concerning the Savior, she used him as being better and more fitted to accomplish her will through him; for she would never have shaped the images of such great things through an inferior being, but through a better one.

[...that he is spiritual, and the Demiurge merely animal.]

For they themselves too, as they say, existed then only as a spiritual conception, according to the contemplation of those attendants who surrounded Pandora. And these remained empty, the Mother accomplishing nothing through them -- an idle and useless conception, whether through her or through the Savior, fit for nothing, for nothing appears to have been made through them. But he who, according to them, was sent forth as God -- though inferior to them by their own reasoning, since they will have him be merely animal -- proved active, effective, and capable in every work, so that through him the images of all things came to be: not only the visible things but the invisible as well -- Angels, Archangels, Dominions, Powers, and Virtues -- all made through him, evidently as the better one, one able to serve the will. Yet nothing does the Mother appear to have made through these beings, as they themselves confess; so that one may justly judge them to have been the miscarriage of their Mother's failed delivery. For no midwives attended her, and for that reason they were cast forth like an abortion, useless for anything, fit for no work by their Mother. And still they style themselves superior to the one through whom things so great and so many were formed and put in order -- when, by the very logic they themselves employ, they turn out to be far the lesser.
And just as with two tools of a craft, or two instruments, of which the craftsman always keeps one in hand and in use, doing with it whatever he wishes and displaying his art and wisdom, while the other remains empty, idle, and unused, through which the craftsman is seen to accomplish nothing at all and which he employs in no action -- if someone should then say that this useless, empty, idle instrument is better and worth more than the one he actually uses in his work, the one through which the craftsman himself is glorified -- such a person would rightly be judged dull and out of his mind. So too these men, calling themselves spiritual and better, and the Demiurge merely animal, and for this reason claiming to ascend above him and enter the Pleroma to their consorts (for, as they themselves confess, they are female), while God is inferior and therefore remains in the middle place -- yet they have no proof of this to offer. For the works were made by the Demiurge, while they themselves can show nothing worthy of reason made by themselves; they are mad with the utmost, incurable madness.

But if they should contend and say that whatever is material -- for instance the heaven, and the whole world contained beneath it -- was made by the Demiurge, while whatever is more spiritual than these, the things above the heaven, such as the Principalities, Powers, Angels, Archangels, Dominions, and Virtues, were made through the spiritual offspring which they claim to be themselves: we have already shown, first, from the Scriptures of the Lord, that all these things, visible and invisible, were the work of one God. As for these men, they merit no more credence than the Scriptures do; nor ought we to forsake the sayings of the Lord, and of Moses, and of the rest of the prophets who announced the truth, and believe these men instead, who assert nothing sound but babble unstable fantasies. Further, even granting that the things above the heavens were made through them, let them explain to us what sort of nature the invisible beings have; let them tally the multitude of the Angels and set forth the ranking of the Archangels; let them unfold the mysteries of the Thrones, and teach the distinctions among the Dominions, Principalities, Powers, and Virtues. But they cannot say. Therefore these things were not made through them. But if these things were made by the Demiurge, as indeed they were, and are spiritual and holy, then he who accomplished spiritual things is not merely animal, and their great blasphemy is dissolved.

[...outside the body.]

For that there are spiritual orders in the heavens, all the Scriptures proclaim, and Paul too testifies that they are spiritual, when he indicates that he was snatched up as far as the third heaven, and once more that he was borne into paradise and heard sayings that cannot be spoken, words no human being is permitted to voice. And what would it have profited him, either his entry into paradise or his being taken up to the third heaven, since all these lie under the Demiurge's power, if he were only there beginning to witness and hear mysteries said to lie above the Demiurge, as some are bold enough to claim? For had he gone there to be instructed in the order above the Demiurge, he would in no way have stayed confined within what belongs to the Demiurge, nor would he have surveyed only part of it and not the whole (for there still remained, by their own account, a fourth heaven, so that he might draw near to the Demiurge and see the sevenfold order subject to him) -- but rather he would have been received, perhaps, even as far as the middle place, that is, to the Mother, so as to learn from her the things within the Pleroma. For the inner man within him, who indeed spoke in him, being invisible, as they say, could have arrived not merely at the third heaven but at their Mother herself. For if they claim that their own 'man' -- that is, the inner man -- immediately outstrips the Demiurge and passes to the Mother, this ought all the more to have taken place for the inward man of the Apostle; since the Demiurge would not have stood in his way, being already, on their own account, himself made subject to the Savior. And even if he had hindered him, it would have availed nothing, for it is not possible for him to be stronger than the providence of the Father -- especially since this inner, invisible man is said by them to be from the Demiurge as well.

Given, then, that Paul related this as a matter of great weight, these men assuredly do not rise above the seventh heaven, since they are no better than the Apostle. Should they claim to outdo him, their own deeds will refute them, for nothing comparable has ever been claimed on their behalf. And it was for this reason that he went on to say: 'Whether in the body or apart from the body, God knows' -- lest the body be supposed to have had no part in that vision, since it too was to share in what he had seen and heard; nor again should anyone say, because of the weight of the body, that he was not taken up any further -- but rather that he was allowed, even apart from the body, to gaze upon spiritual mysteries -- the works of that God who established heaven and earth, shaped man, and set him within paradise, and who furnishes such witnesses among those who, like the Apostle, have been brought to perfection in the love of God.

[Showing that the Demiurge is not merely animal.]

He, then, made the spiritual things too, which the Apostle came to witness as far as the third heaven; and the sayings that cannot be told, which no human tongue is allowed to voice because they are spiritual, he likewise grants to those found worthy, as he chooses -- for paradise belongs to him, and he is in truth God's own Spirit, no merely animal Demiurge; otherwise he would never have accomplished spiritual things. But if he is merely animal, the one through whom spiritual things were made, let them tell us so. But they cannot even show that anything was made by the offspring of their Mother, which they claim to be themselves. For these men cannot make so much as a fly, or a gnat, or any such contemptible little creature, apart from the process which God ordained from the beginning through the emission of seed among creatures of the same kind, by which such living things naturally are and continue to be made -- let alone anything spiritual. But not even by the Mother alone, they say, was anything made; rather, they say this Demiurge who was sent forth is lord of the whole operation. And yet, while insisting that the body too will share in the reward, just as it shares in righteousness -- if the difficulty is removed for those who think one cannot be taken up together with the body to these realities -- who then will grant that we, even without the body, might sometime behold those spiritual mysteries, which are the works of this same Demiurge who made all things, and who is Demiurge and lord of the whole operation? -- him they call merely animal, while calling themselves spiritual, though they are craftsmen and lords of no operation whatsoever, not even of what lies outside themselves, let alone of their own bodies. Indeed, they themselves often suffer many things in the body against their will, even while calling themselves spiritual and better than the Demiurge.
So they will be justly refuted by us and shown to have strayed far indeed from the truth. For either the Savior made the things that were made through this being — in which case he is shown to be not inferior to those things but superior, since he turns out to be the maker of these very beings, for they themselves are among the things that were made. How, then, does it follow that these beings are spiritual while the one through whom they themselves were made is merely animal? Or else — and this is the only view that is true, as we have shown through very many arguments, with the clearest possible demonstrations — it was he, unaided, who fashioned every existing thing out of his own free choice and by the strength that belongs to him, on his own initiative, shaping and bringing to completion the whole of it, and his purpose stands as the very foundation of everything that is. He alone is found to be the God who made all things, alone omnipotent, and alone the Father who founded and made all things, both visible and invisible, both things with sense and things without it, both the heavens and the earth, through the Word who is his power; and he fitted and arranged everything by his wisdom, and comprehends all things while himself being comprehended by none. He is the fabricator, he the founder, he the discoverer, he the maker, he the Lord of all. There is nothing besides him, nothing above him, no mother such as they invent, no unnameable Aeon, nothing at all of what these people and all the other heretics rave about. There is only the one God the fabricator, exalted over every rank and dominion, sovereignty and might: this is the Father, this is God, this is the founder, this is the maker, this is the fabricator, who made these things through himself — that is, through his Word and through his Wisdom — the heaven and the earth and the seas and everything that is in them. This one is just, this one is good; this is he who formed man, who planted paradise, who fashioned the world, who brought on the flood, who saved Noah; here is the God of Abraham, likewise of Isaac, and of Jacob too, God of those still living, whom the Law proclaims, whom the prophets announce, whom Christ reveals, whom the apostles hand down, whom the Church believes. Such is the Father belonging to our Lord Jesus Christ, and through his own Word — namely his Son — he stands disclosed and shown openly to every one granted such disclosure; since it is those to whom the Son has unveiled him who truly come to know him. And the Son, always coexisting with the Father, has from of old and from the beginning always revealed the Father, both to angels and archangels and powers and virtues, and to all to whom God wills to reveal him.

======== Book II — Chapter 31 ========

Chapter XXXI. How the things already said suffice to overturn all the heretics. Now that those who follow Valentinus have been demolished, the entire crowd of heretics has been overthrown along with them. For what and how much we have said against the Pleroma and against what lies outside it, showing that the Father of the universe will be enclosed and circumscribed by whatever is outside him (if indeed anything is outside him), and that there would need to be many Fathers and many Pleromas and many fabrications of worlds, some begun by one set of beings and failing off into others, in every direction; and that all these, persevering each in its own, ought not to meddle curiously with the affairs of others, in which they have neither part nor fellowship; and that there is no other God at all, but that the title 'Almighty' belongs to one alone — all this applies equally against those who follow Marcion, and Simon, and Menander, or whoever else likewise separates the created order that belongs to us from the Father. And again, what we have said against those who claim that the Father of the universe indeed comprehends all things, but that the created order that belongs to us was not made by him but by some other power, or by angels ignorant of the Forefather, enclosed like a point within the immense magnitude of the universe, like a stain on a cloak — showing that it is not credible that anyone other than the Father of the universe made the created order that belongs to us — this likewise tells equally against the followers of Saturninus, Basilides, and Carpocrates, along with the remaining Gnostic sects, who assert matters of the same kind in comparable terms. And what has been said about the emissions, and the Aeons, and the diminishment, and how their unstable mother behaved, likewise overturns Basilides and all who are falsely called 'the knowing ones,' even though they use different names for the same ideas — indeed it applies to them even more, since they transfer things that lie outside the truth into the shape of their own doctrine. And whatever we have said about numbers applies, and will be said to apply, against all who twist the appearance of truth into that kind of thing. And whatever has been said about the Demiurge, demonstrating him alone to be God, the universe's Father, and whatever will still be said in what follows, I say against all the heretics: the milder and more humane among them you will turn away and confound, so that they no longer blaspheme their own founder and maker and nourisher and Lord, nor invent for his origin some tale of defect and ignorance; but the fierce and horrible and irrational ones you will drive far from yourself, so that you no longer have to put up with their wordiness.
Beyond this, those who follow Simon, and Carpocrates, and any others who are said to work wonders, will be convicted: not working in the power of God, nor in truth, nor doing what they do as benefits to men, but for ruin and error, through magical delusions and every kind of fraud, doing more harm than good to those who believe in them, in that they lead them astray. For they cannot give sight to the blind, nor hearing to the deaf, nor drive out all demons — only those which they themselves have sent in, if indeed they even do that much; nor are they able to heal a person who is feeble, or one who limps, or one whose limbs are crippled, or anyone suffering in some different part of the body, as often happens through ordinary bodily infirmity; nor can they restore good health to those whose ailments come from outside causes — except through their sorceries. So far are they from raising the dead, as the Lord raised the dead, and as the apostles have done through prayer — and often within the brotherhood, when it was necessary, the whole church of a given place asking through fasting and much supplication, the departed one's spirit has come back and the man stands restored, given as a gift in answer to the entreaties made by God's holy people — something these people will not even grant is possible in the first place: that there is a resurrection from the dead is, in their view, simply a way of speaking of the 'knowledge' they talk about. Magical illusion is worked, impiously, before the gaze of men; but in the Church compassion, and mercy, and steadfastness, and truth are brought to the aid of men, not only without payment and freely, but with us even giving up what is our own for the salvation of others — and those who receive this are utterly foreign to arrogance and greed, and to any spiritual virtue; but full in every respect of every kind of fraud, and of apostate inspiration, and of demonic working, and of idolatrous phantasm — for they are the forerunners of that dragon who, through just such phantasms, will make the third part of the stars fall away in his tail and cast them down to earth. These people, like him, must be shunned; and the greater the phantasm they are said to work, the more one must watch them, as having received all the more a spirit of wickedness. If anyone observes the daily conduct and activity of these prophets of theirs, he will find it one and the same as that of demons.

======== Book II — Chapter 32 ========

Chapter XXXII. The overthrow of the heretics in those points on which they do not agree even with Valentinus. And this too — their impious view about conduct, which says that they must engage in absolutely any deed, however evil, in order... For he who commits adultery is excluded, but so is he who merely wishes to commit adultery; and not only he who kills is guilty of murder unto condemnation, but also he who is angry with his brother without cause; and he commanded not only not to hate men but to love even enemies; and he required abstaining not merely from false oaths but from any oath whatsoever; and forbade not merely speaking ill of one's neighbors, but not even to call anyone 'Raca' or 'fool' — otherwise such a one will be liable to the fire of Gehenna; and he demanded not merely refraining from a blow, but even, once struck, offering the opposite cheek in turn; and not only not to refuse what belongs to another, but even, if one's own goods are taken away, not to do any harm to the takers, but for those who are ill-treated to be magnanimous, and to show kindness toward such people, and to pray for them, that by repenting they may be saved — in none of this imitating the insolence and lust and pride of the rest of mankind. When, then, this man whom they boast of as their master, and whom they say had a soul much better and stronger than the rest, with such great care commanded certain things to be done as good and excellent, and commanded abstention not only from certain deeds but even from the very thoughts that lead to such deeds, as being evil and harmful and worthless — how is it that, while calling such a one their master, stronger and better than the rest, they are not ashamed to teach openly the very opposite of his doctrine? And if indeed there were no such thing as evil, or again as good, but only human opinion, by which certain things are supposed unjust and others just, he certainly would not have said, in his teaching: 'The righteous shall gleam as brightly as the sun within their Father's kingdom, while the wicked, and those who do not do the works of righteousness, he will send into eternal fire, where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.' The overthrow of the heretics in these matters, in which they do not agree even with Valentinus. And further, though they say that one ought, in every deed and in every course of life, if it can be done, to accomplish everything to perfection in a single lifetime's undertaking, yet as regards the things that pertain to virtue — the laborious, glorious, skillful things which even everyone agrees are good — they are found making no attempt at all. For if it were necessary to go through every deed and every kind of activity, then first of all everyone would have to learn every art, whatever is achieved either in reasoned discourse, or in practical works, or is taught through self-discipline and acquired through labor and study and perseverance — for instance, every branch of music, and calculation, and geometry, and astronomy, and everything occupied with reasoned discourse; further, the whole of medicine, and the science of herbs, and whatever has been devised for human health; and painting, and the making of statues, and metalworking, and stonework, and the like; and besides these, every kind of farming, and veterinary art, and shepherding, and the crafts, which are said to run through every trade — those concerned with the sea, and those that train the body, and hunting, and soldiery, and the arts of ruling, and however many there are — of which a man, laboring his whole life long, could not learn even a tenth part, or a thousandth. Of none of these do they even attempt to learn, these people who say that one must engage in every kind of deed — yet toward pleasures, and lust, and shameful acts they incline readily; and by their own doctrine they stand self-condemned, since they lack all the things listed above, and so will go to the correction of fire. These men, indeed, aping the doctrines of Epicurus alongside the apathy taught by the Cynics, boast of Jesus as their master — Jesus, who steered his followers clear not merely of wicked actions but of wicked speech and thought as well, as we have shown. Yet they say that they have souls from the same circuit as Jesus, and that they are like him, and sometimes even better than he; and when it comes to the works which he did for the benefit and strengthening of men, they are found to accomplish nothing like it, nothing comparable, nothing that can even be set beside it. But if they do accomplish anything, it is worked through magic, as we have said, and they attempt to deceive the unwary fraudulently, providing no fruit or benefit at all to those on whom they claim to work their powers; instead they bring forward unweaned children and deceive people's eyes, showing phantasms that vanish at once, not lasting even a moment — and so they show themselves like not to Jesus our Lord but to Simon the magician. And from this it is settled that on the third day the Lord came back from among the dead, showing himself to the disciples, and was received up into heaven in their sight — while these men, dying and not rising, and manifesting themselves to no one, are convicted of having nothing whatever in common with Jesus. But if they say that the Lord himself did these things through phantasm, we will show, by bringing them back to the prophetic writings, that everything about him was foretold and also firmly accomplished in fact, and that he alone is the Son of God. It is on account of this that, in his name, those who are truly his disciples, having received grace from him, accomplish good works for the benefit of the rest of mankind, each according to the gift he has received from him. Some indeed drive out demons truly and surely, so that those who have been cleansed of the wicked spirits often even come to believe and join the Church; others possess advance knowledge of coming events, along with visions and prophetic speech; others still, by laying on of hands, heal the sick and restore them to health. Indeed, people have been raised up who have persevered with us for many years. And what more shall I say? It is impossible to number the gifts which throughout the whole world the Church, having received them from God in the name of Jesus Christ crucified under Pontius Pilate, performs every day for the benefit of the nations, neither deceiving anyone nor taking money from anyone for it. For as she has freely received from God, so she freely ministers. Nor does she work anything by invocation of angels, or by incantations, or by any other depraved curiosity, but directing her prayers purely and openly and plainly to the Lord who made all things, and by invoking the name belonging to our Lord Jesus Christ, she accomplishes powerful deeds for men's good, not for their seduction. If, then, even now the name of our Lord Jesus Christ confers benefits, and heals surely and truly all who everywhere believe in him — but not the name of Simon, nor of Menander, nor of Carpocrates, nor of anyone else — it is plain that, having become man, he lived among his own creation, and genuinely accomplished everything through God's power, in keeping with the purpose held by the universe's Father, exactly as had been foretold by the prophets. What these things were will be set out in the demonstrations drawn from the prophets that follow.

======== Book II — Chapter 33 ========

A demonstration that souls do not pass from one body into another. Let us overturn the notion of a migration from body to body on the ground that these souls remember nothing at all of what they did before. For if they were sent forth for this purpose, that they might come to be in every kind of activity, they ought to have remembered what had been done before, so that they might fulfill what was lacking, and not go on laboring wretchedly, forever revolving around the same things. For the admixture of a body could not utterly extinguish the whole of the memory of what had previously been possessed by these souls; for even when the body is asleep and at rest, the soul itself, remembering, communicates with the body — and sometimes, even after a great length of time, a man reports on waking whatever he saw in a dream. In just this way the soul would surely remember also the things it did before it came into this body. For if a thing seen in the briefest span of time, or conceived merely in a fantasy, is recalled by the soul alone through a dream even after it has been mixed with the body and dispersed through every member, much more would it remember those things in which it dwelt for such long ages and for the whole span of a past life. A demonstration that, according to Plato, souls do not drink a cup of forgetfulness. To meet this difficulty Plato, that ancient Athenian who was the first to introduce this opinion, thought he could escape an aporia of this kind — offering no demonstration, but answering dogmatically — by saying that souls entering into this life are given a drink of forgetfulness by the daemon set over the entrance, before they enter their bodies. And in doing so he unwittingly fell into a still greater difficulty. For if a cup of forgetfulness, once drunk, can blot out the memory of everything done, then how, O Plato, do you yourself know this — since your soul is now in a body — that before it entered the body it was given the drug of forgetfulness by a daemon? For if you remember the daemon, and the cup, and the entrance, you ought to know the rest as well; but if you are ignorant of these things, then neither is the daemon real nor is the cup of forgetfulness a genuine invention. A demonstration that the body is not forgetfulness. Against those who say that the body itself is the medicine of forgetfulness, this objection arises: how then does the soul, through itself alone, see whatever it sees both in dreams and in thought (the mind's own attention) while the body is at rest, and itself remember it, and report it to those nearby? But indeed the soul, existing in the body, would not even remember things once known through the eyes or through hearing, if the body were forgetfulness; rather, as soon as the eye was absent from the things observed, the memory of them would likewise be taken away. For a soul existing in utter forgetfulness could know nothing else but what it was looking at in the present moment alone. But how then would it learn divine things, and remember them, existing in a body, if — as they claim — the body itself is forgetfulness? Indeed the prophets themselves, while they were on earth, remembered, once turned back into human form, whatever they had spiritually seen or heard in visions of heavenly things, and reported it to others; and the body did not produce forgetfulness in their souls of what had been spiritually seen, but rather the soul taught the body, and made it a partaker of the spiritual vision granted to it. That the soul rules the body, not the reverse. The body is inferior to the soul, since it is the soul that breathes life into it, and gives it growth, and gives it its articulation; rather the soul holds sway over the body and governs it. The soul's swiftness is slowed only to the extent that the body takes part in its movement, yet it does not on that account forfeit what it knows. For the body is like an instrument, while the soul holds the reasoning power of the craftsman. Just as the craftsman devises the work swiftly within himself, but performs it more slowly on the instrument, owing to the sluggishness of the material worked upon — and the swiftness of his mind, mingled with the slowness of the instrument, produces a tempered result — so too the soul, sharing in its body, is hindered only in a measure, but not entirely, in the exercise of its powers; yet, though it lends the body its life, it does not for that reason stop living on its own. So too, communicating the rest of itself to the body, it loses neither its own knowledge nor the memory of the things it has observed. A demonstration that each of us has his own soul, just as he has his own body. If, then, no one remembers anything of past events, but only gains knowledge of things now existing, it follows that no soul was ever previously in other bodies, nor did it do things which it does not even recognize, nor does it know things which indeed it does not even see. Rather, just as each of us receives his own body through the craft of God, so too he has his own soul. For God is neither so poor nor so lacking that he would fail to give each body its own proper soul, just as he gives it its own proper character. And therefore, when the number of those written for life is completed, they will rise again, each keeping the body proper to it, the soul proper to it, and the spirit proper to it, in which condition they found favor with God. But those judged worthy of punishment will depart into it, likewise keeping each his own soul and his own body, the state in which they turned aside from God's goodness. And both parties will thereupon cease to generate more, and the appointed fullness of the human race, predetermined by God, will preserve the perfected fitting-together of the Father's plan.

======== Book II — Chapter 34 ========

How souls persevere, retaining the form of the body. The Lord taught not merely that souls persist, not passing from body to body, but also that they preserve the very character of the body to which they were fitted, and that they remember the deeds they did here, and the things from which they ceased — in the account written of the rich man and Lazarus, who found rest in the bosom of Abraham. In it he says that the rich man recognized Lazarus after death, and Abraham likewise, and that each of them remained in his own rank, and that the rich man asked that Lazarus be sent to bring him relief — Lazarus, to whom he would not even give a share of the crumbs from his table. And there is the answer of Abraham, who declared not only the things concerning himself but agreed also with the prophets, saying that those who did not wish to arrive at that place of punishment ought rather to receive the proclamation of him who would rise from the dead. By these things it is most plainly declared both that souls persist and do not pass from body to body, and that they retain the form of a human being, so that they may also be recognized and may remember the things that belong to this life here; and that Abraham's prophetic foresight is present, and that each nation receives a fitting dwelling-place even before the judgment. How souls, though they had a beginning of generation, nevertheless persevere as incorruptible into the future. But if anyone should say at this point that souls which only recently began to exist cannot persist for a long span of time, but must either be unbegotten, in order to be immortal, or else, if they received a beginning through generation, must die along with the body itself — let such a person learn that only God, who governs all as Lord, has neither a start nor a finish, remaining forever the same in the identical manner. But all things that come from him, whatever has been made and is being made, receive indeed a beginning of their generation, and are for that reason inferior to the one who made them; yet they are extended into the length of the ages according to the will of God the maker — so that, just as they came to be at the beginning, so afterward it is granted to them to continue existing. For just as the heaven that is above us, the firmament, and the sun and moon and the remaining constellations, together with all their adornments, though none of these existed beforehand, were made, and persist for a long span of time according to the will of God — so too anyone who reflects on souls, and on spirits, and altogether on all things that have been made, will in no way go astray: for all things that have been made have indeed a beginning of their making, but they persevere for as long as God wills them to exist and to persevere. The prophetic spirit also bears witness to these statements, when it says: For he himself spoke, and they were made; he himself commanded, and they were created. He established them forever, and unto the ages of ages. And again, speaking of the salvation of man, it says thus: He asked life of you, and you granted him length of days forever and ever — as though the Father of all were the giver, and perseverance forever and ever belonged to those who are being saved. For life originates not with us, nor out of our own nature, but is granted as a gift of God's favor. Therefore whoever preserves the gift of life, and gives thanks to him who bestowed it, will receive length of days forever and ever as well. But whoever rejects it, and proves ungrateful to his maker, because though made he did not recognize the one who bestows it, robs himself of everlasting continuance. On this account the Lord said to those ungrateful toward him: If you have not proved faithful in a small thing, who will entrust you with what is great? — meaning that whoever shows ingratitude toward the one who gave him this brief, passing life will rightly be refused, by that same giver, an unending span of days. Just as the animal body itself is not the soul, but partakes of the soul only for as long as God wills, so too the soul itself is not life, but partakes of the life bestowed on it by God. Hence the prophetic saying concerning the man first fashioned: he was made into a living soul — instructing us that, through partaking of life, the soul was made living, so that the soul is understood as one thing and the life that belongs to it as another. Since God, then, grants life and perpetual perseverance, it follows that souls, not existing at first, thereafter begin to persevere, once God has willed them to exist and to subsist. For the will of God must hold first place and rule in all things, and everything else must yield to it, and be subject to it, and given over into its service. And let this much be said, up to this point, concerning the making and perseverance of the soul.

======== Book II — Chapter 35 ========

An overturning of Basilides' fabrication of the heavens. Basilides himself too, in addition to what has already been said, is compelled by his own rule to speak not merely of three hundred and sixty-five heavens, successively made one after another, but of some immense and innumerable multitude of heavens, always being made, and being made still, and destined to go on being made, and that this fabrication of heavens never fails — one made in the likeness of another, and the third similarly, and all the rest that follow after it; and concerning this heaven which belongs to us, which he also calls the last, it is necessary that from its outflow another be made resembling it, and from that again another, and that this never fails — neither the outflowing of those already made, nor the makings of heavens still to come — but that they run on into an unmeasured and undetermined number of heavens. A demonstration that the prophets, who spoke what is contained in the prophets... And the rest, too, who are falsely called Gnostics, who say that the prophets uttered their prophecies as coming from different gods, will easily be refuted by this: that all the prophets proclaimed one God and Lord, and him as the one who fashioned heaven and earth together with everything they contain, and that they signified the coming of his Son — as we shall demonstrate from these very Scriptures in the books that follow.
But if certain people object, on the ground of the Hebrew language, to the various names set down in the Scriptures — such as Sabaoth, and Eloe, and Adonai, and whatever others of this kind there are — striving thereby to demonstrate a plurality of divine powers and deities, let such persons be taught that every one of these names and titles refers to a single, identical being. For the word Eloe, in the Hebrew tongue, signifies God, and Eloeuth, in that same Hebrew language, signifies that which contains all things. And Adonai sometimes signifies 'nameable and admirable,' and sometimes, with the letter delta doubled and an aspiration — that is, Addonai — it signifies 'the one who defines and separates the earth from the water.' Likewise the word rendered 'Sabaoth' signifies 'voluntary,' but written with the Greek omega, as in Sabaoth, it signifies 'the first heaven'; and by the same token it signifies a predetermined measure, while when contracted with the short Greek omicron, as in Iaoth, it signifies 'the one who grants deliverance from evils.' All these are designations belonging not to different beings but, as in Latin, to one and the same — as when we say 'Lord of powers,' and 'Father of all,' and 'almighty God,' and 'Most High,' and 'Lord of the heavens,' and 'Creator,' and 'Maker,' and other names like these: these do not belong to different beings, but are the names and titles of one and the same being, through which the one God and Father who contains all things, and who bestows existence upon all things, is made known. Since, then, the preaching of the apostles, and the teaching of the Lord, and the proclamation delivered through the prophets, together with the sayings handed down by the apostles, all concur with what has been stated, and all praise God the Father — and do not speak of one and then another, nor of all things as coming from many different sources rather than from the one and the same Father, who fits all things to the nature and disposition of what lies beneath him — and since visible and invisible things alike, and altogether all things whatsoever that have been made, come not from angels, nor from some other power, but from God the Father alone, I consider that this has now been shown sufficiently, and that by so many proofs the one God and Father, maker of all things, has been demonstrated. But lest we seem to avoid the proof that comes from the Lord's own Scriptures, the Scriptures themselves suggest this very truth much more plainly and clearly, in the Hebrew text, where it reads: Sing to God, sing a psalm to him in his name, Jah... Jah is his name; father of orphans, judge of widows is God in his holy place. And it should be noted that this name is displayed here, as it were, in its own proper seat, so much so that Symmachus and the second version, in Origen's Hexapla, retain this name even in Greek. But if these matters seem too difficult, let it suffice to hold to the author's main purpose, who demonstrates that, though God has various names, this does not mean that various gods are thereby indicated. To those, however, who do not distort his meaning, we shall furnish proofs from the divine Scriptures in the volume that follows this one, rendering to all who love the truth their proper book of proofs drawn from these Scriptures.

======== Book III — Preface ========

...hidden opinions, as they themselves suppose, into the open, and to show their inconsistency, and to bring forward an argument that destroys them. We set out, then, refuting them from Simon, the father of all heretics, both to make plain their teachings and successions, and to contradict them all: and since this work of theirs is one and the same, both its exposition and its refutation involving many points, we have sent you these books. Of these the first contains the opinions of all of them, and shows the customs and character of their manner of life. In the second, those who are wrongly taught by them are refuted and overturned, and their teachings are laid bare and shown for what they are. In this third book we shall bring forward proofs from the Scriptures, so that nothing may be lacking from us of what you had asked, but that, beyond what you expected, you may receive from us further occasions for refuting and overturning those who in any way teach wrongly. For the love that is in God, being rich and free of envy, gives more than anyone could ask of it. Remember, then, what we said in the first two books; and adding these to them, you will have from us a most complete refutation against all the heretics, and will withstand them with confidence and unwavering firmness for the sake of that single genuine, life-bestowing faith which the Church took from the Apostles and hands onward to her children. For it was the Master of all who granted his Apostles the authority of the Gospel, and through them we too came to grasp the truth, namely the doctrine concerning God's Son; of whom the Lord himself declared: Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you rejects me, and rejects him who sent me.

======== Book III — Chapter 1 ========

From whom, and in what manner, the Church received the Gospel.
For we came to know the plan of our salvation through no others than those through whom the Gospel reached us: this same message they proclaimed at first, and later, through God's own will, committed to writing in the Scriptures, so it might serve as the base and support-pillar of our belief. It is wrong to claim they preached without having full understanding already, as some venture to assert, priding themselves on correcting the Apostles. Once our Lord had risen from among the dead, and once the might of the Holy Spirit descending from above had clothed them, they were made complete in every respect and possessed full understanding; they journeyed to earth's remotest regions, bringing the good news of what comes from God to us, and proclaiming to mankind a peace from heaven, every one of them together and each individually holding the Gospel of God. So Matthew brought out a written Gospel among the Hebrew people in their native tongue, at the very time Peter and Paul were proclaiming the Gospel in Rome and laying the Church's foundation there. Following their deaths, Mark, who was Peter's follower and translator, likewise passed on to us in writing the message Peter had preached. Luke too, Paul's companion, recorded in a volume the Gospel his teacher proclaimed. Later John, that disciple of the Lord who had rested against his breast, brought out his own Gospel while dwelling in Ephesus in Asia. All of these transmitted to us the teaching of a single God, fashioner of heaven and earth, foretold through the law and the prophets, and a single Christ, God's Son: whoever refuses assent to this indeed holds in contempt the Lord's own companions, and holds Christ the Lord himself in contempt, and the Father besides, standing thereby self-condemned, fighting against and rejecting his own deliverance, just as every heretic does.

======== Book III — Chapter 2 ========

That the heretics follow neither the Scriptures nor the traditions.
For when they are refuted out of the Scriptures, they wheel around and lay blame on those Scriptures themselves, claiming they lack correctness and carry no authority, that their wording varies, and that the truth cannot be drawn from them by anyone ignorant of the tradition. That truth, they insist, was passed on not through writing but by a spoken voice: and for this reason Paul is said to have written, We utter wisdom among those made perfect, though it is not the wisdom belonging to this present age. And each of them says that this wisdom is what he himself has invented — a fiction, of course, so that, according to them, the truth may fittingly be found now in Valentinus, now in Marcion, now in Cerinthus, and afterward in Basilides, or even in him who argues against them, though he could say nothing salutary. For each of them, being altogether perverse, is not ashamed to preach, distorting the rule of truth to suit himself.
But when we appeal them again to that tradition which is from the Apostles, and which is preserved in the churches through the successions of presbyters, they set themselves against the tradition, claiming they are wiser than the presbyters and indeed than the Apostles too, and have uncovered the pure, unmixed truth. The Apostles, they claim, blended matters proper to the law together with the Savior's own sayings; and not the Apostles alone, but the Lord himself, spoke on one occasion out of the Demiurge, on another out of the intermediate realm, and on yet another out of the highest heights, whereas they alone, so they say, grasp with certainty, purely and honestly, the concealed mystery — which indeed is to blaspheme their own maker most shamelessly. It comes about, then, that they agree neither with the Scriptures nor with tradition. Against such people, my most beloved, our struggle is one in which they try, like slippery serpents, to escape on every side. For this reason they must be resisted on every side, if by refuting some of them we may be able to bring them round to conversion to the truth. For even if it is not easy for a soul caught in error to come to its senses, it is not altogether impossible to escape error when the truth is set before it.

======== Book III — Chapter 3 ========

Concerning the tradition of the Apostles, and the succession of bishops in the churches from the Apostles.
The tradition of the Apostles, then, made manifest throughout the whole world, can be clearly seen in every church by all who wish to see the truth; and we are able to enumerate those who were instituted bishops in the churches by the Apostles, and their successions down to our own time, who taught and knew nothing of the kind these people rave about. For if the Apostles had known hidden mysteries, which they taught to the perfect separately and secretly from the rest, they would have handed these down above all to those to whom they were entrusting the very churches. For they wished those whom they were leaving as their successors, handing over to them their own place of teaching, to be very perfect and blameless in everything; since, if these acted rightly, it would be of great benefit, but if they fell, the greatest calamity. But since it would be a very long task, in a volume such as this, to enumerate the successions of all the churches, we shall point to the tradition which the very great, most ancient, and universally known Church, founded and set in place at Rome by the pair of most illustrious Apostles, Peter and Paul, holds from the Apostles, together with the faith proclaimed to mankind, which has reached us through the successive line of bishops; and by this we confound all those who in whatever way, whether through self-pleasing or vainglory, or through blindness and evil opinion, gather otherwise than they ought. For with this church, because of its more powerful preeminence, every church must agree — that is, the faithful everywhere — in which church the tradition that is from the Apostles has always been preserved by those who are everywhere.
The blessed Apostles, once they had established and reared up the Church, entrusted the episcopal ministry to Linus. Paul mentions this Linus in his letters to Timothy. Anacletus followed him; and next, occupying the third rank counting from the Apostles, Clement received the episcopate by lot — a man who had himself beheld the Apostles and spoken with them, still carrying their preaching fresh in his ears and their handed-down teaching fresh before his eyes — not alone, for many still survived at that time who had been taught by the Apostles. Under this Clement, then, when no small dissension arose among the brothers at Corinth, the church at Rome wrote a very powerful letter to the Corinthians, bringing them together in peace, renewing their faith, and announcing the tradition which it had recently received from the Apostles, declaring one almighty God, fashioner of heaven and earth, shaper of humankind, who sent the flood and summoned Abraham, who brought his people forth out of Egyptian territory, who conversed with Moses, who gave the law and dispatched the prophets, who made ready fire for the devil together with his angels. Anyone who wishes may learn from this very writing that the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is proclaimed by the churches, and may understand the apostolic tradition of the Church, since this letter is older than those who now falsely teach and fabricate another God above the Demiurge and maker of all these things that exist. Euarestus succeeded this Clement, and Alexander succeeded Euarestus; then Sixtus was appointed, the sixth from the Apostles, and after him Telesphorus, who also won a most glorious martyrdom; then Hyginus, then Pius, after whom came Anicetus. When Anicetus had been succeeded by Soter, Eleutherius now holds the episcopate in the twelfth place from the Apostles. By this order and succession, the tradition that is in the Church from the Apostles, and the proclamation of the truth, have reached us. And this stands as the fullest possible proof that a single, identical, life-bestowing faith has been kept safe within the Church, running from the Apostles up to our own day, and passed on faithfully.
And Polycarp too received not only instruction from the Apostles, and spoke with many people who had beheld the Lord, but was also placed as bishop by the Apostles over the church in Smyrna, in Asia; and we ourselves saw him in our early youth, for he lived a long time and departed this life at a very great age by a most glorious and noble martyrdom, having consistently taught what he himself learned at the feet of the Apostles, teachings which he in turn passed on to the Church, and which alone hold true. All the churches throughout Asia testify to this, as do his successors in office right up to today, he being a far more authoritative and reliable witness to the truth than Valentinus, Marcion, and the rest of those holding twisted views. Indeed, when he traveled to Rome under Anicetus, he brought many of the heretics mentioned above back to God's Church, declaring that this single truth was what he had gotten from the Apostles, which he likewise passed on to the Church. There are, moreover, those who heard him tell how John, that disciple of the Lord, once went to wash at Ephesus, and on noticing Cerinthus within, dashed back out of the bath-house unwashed, exclaiming: Let us get away, in case the bath-house itself collapses, seeing that Cerinthus, that foe of the truth, is inside it. And Polycarp himself, when Marcion once met him and said, Do you know us? replied, I know you, the firstborn of Satan. Such was the caution the Apostles and their disciples had, not even to converse in word with any who adulterated the truth, as Paul also said: A heretical man, after a first and second admonition, avoid, knowing that such a one is perverted and stands self-condemned. There is likewise an outstanding letter from Polycarp addressed to the Philippians, and from it those willing to attend and concerned for their own deliverance can learn both the shape of his faith and the proclamation of the truth. Moreover the church at Ephesus, which Paul founded and where John stayed among the believers until Trajan's time, likewise stands as a genuine witness to the tradition handed down from the Apostles.

======== Book III — Chapter 4 ========

The testimony of those who saw the Apostles concerning the preaching of the truth.
Such proofs being before us, then, there is no need to hunt elsewhere for a truth readily gotten from the Church, seeing that the Apostles, much like a wealthy man storing up his riches in a bank, deposited within her, in full abundance, everything belonging to the truth, so that anyone who desires may draw from her the water of life. She herself is the doorway into life; everyone else is a thief and a bandit. For this very reason we ought to steer clear of such people, and cherish with the greatest care whatever pertains to the Church, and grasp firmly the truth's own tradition. What then? Even if there were a dispute over some small question, would it not be right to turn to the most ancient churches, in which the Apostles lived, and to receive from them what is certain and clear regarding the present question? And what if the Apostles had not even left us the Scriptures — would it not then be needful to follow the sequence of the tradition which they passed along to those entrusted with running the churches? Many barbarian nations who believe in Christ give their assent to this very sequence, holding salvation written not with ink on paper but by the Spirit upon their hearts, and guarding the old tradition with great care — believing in a single God, fashioner of heaven and earth and of everything within them, through Christ Jesus, God's own Son, who, on account of his overwhelming love for what he had shaped, submitted to being born of the Virgin, joining humanity to God in his own person, and suffered beneath Pontius Pilate, and rose once more, and was taken up in glory, and will return in glory as deliverer of those granted salvation and as arbiter of those under judgment, casting into everlasting fire whoever twists the truth and holds his Father and his coming in contempt. Those who have believed this faith without letters are, as far as our language goes, barbarians; but as far as their opinions, customs, and manner of life go, they are, on account of their faith, most wise indeed, and pleasing to God, living in all righteousness, chastity, and wisdom. And should anyone announce to them what the heretics have concocted, addressing them in their native tongue, they would immediately clap their hands over their ears and run off as fast as they could, unwilling even to tolerate hearing such blasphemous nonsense. Thus, through that ancient tradition of the Apostles, they do not even admit into their thoughts any of the monstrous talk these people utter; for among them there has never been either assembly or doctrine founded on it.
For before Valentinus there were none who held the views of Valentinus; nor before Marcion did any hold the views of Marcion; nor, indeed, did any of the other malicious sects we have listed above exist before the founders and inventors of their perversity came into being. Valentinus came to Rome under Hyginus, grew in influence under Pius, and continued on into the time of Anicetus. Cerdon, who preceded Marcion, likewise came under Hyginus — who was the eighth bishop — often coming into the church and making confession; and so he went on, at one time teaching secretly, at another making confession, and at another being exposed by some for the evil things he taught, and being kept away from the assembly of religious men (Tertullian, Prescription against Heretics; Eusebius, Church History) — and this went on throughout that identical tenure of oversight. As for the remainder, those styled Gnostics, they took their beginnings, as we have shown, from Menander the disciple of Simon; and each of them appeared as father and champion of whatever opinion he had come to hold. All these, however, arose much later, in the very midst of the Church's own times, rising up into their own apostasy.

======== Book III — Chapter 5 ========

A demonstration that the Lord and the Apostles delivered their teaching in truth, and not according to the opinion of their hearers. Returning, then, to the tradition which comes from the Apostles, and which is preserved in the Church and abides among us, let us come to that demonstration, drawn from the Scriptures, given by those who wrote the Gospel of the Apostles — from which they set down their teaching concerning God, showing that in our Lord Jesus Christ truth itself resides, and that no falsehood dwells within him. As David also, prophesying both his birth from the Virgin and his resurrection from the dead, says: 'Truth has sprung up from the earth.' And the Apostles too, being disciples of the truth, stand outside all falsehood; for falsehood shares nothing in common with truth, exactly as darkness shares nothing with light — wherever one is present, the other is driven away. The Lord, therefore, being the truth, did not lie; and since he knew the fruit of falsehood to be evil, he — being perfect — would surely not have confessed as God, and as ruler, supreme King, and his own Father, one who was imperfect; nor would the spiritual one have confessed an animal one, nor the one within the Pleroma confessed one outside the Pleroma. Nor would his disciples have named some other god, or called any 'Lord' besides him who truly is God and Lord of all — as those most vain sophists claim, saying that the Apostles taught with hypocrisy, shaping their teaching to the capacity of their hearers and their answers to the suspicions of their questioners, speaking blind things to the blind according to their blindness, sick things to the sick according to their sickness, and mistaken things to the mistaken, matching their own delusion; and that to those who supposed the Demiurge alone to be God, they preached him as God, while to those who could grasp the unnameable Father, they made known the ineffable mystery through parables and riddles — so that, on this view, the Lord and the Apostles delivered their teaching not as the truth itself has it, but hypocritically, and according to what each hearer was able to receive.
But this is not the way of those who heal and give life, but rather of those who burden and increase men's ignorance; and the Law will be found far truer than this teaching, when it pronounces accursed everyone who puts a blind man in the way, so that he wanders from it. For the Apostles, who were sent to seek out those who were wandering, to give sight to those who could not see, and to bring healing to the sick, surely did not speak to them according to their hearers' own present opinion, but according to the manifestation of the truth. For no one would be acting rightly toward blind men if, seeing them already being carried over a precipice, he urged them to keep to that most dangerous road, as though it were truly the right one, and as though they would arrive safely. What physician, wishing to cure a sick man, would act according to the desires of the one who is ill, rather than according to what the art of healing requires? Now that the Lord came as physician to those who are ill, he himself testifies, saying: 'It is not the healthy who have need of a physician, but those who are unwell. I have not come to summon the upright, but sinners, to a change of heart.' In what way, then, will the unwell be restored, and in what way will sinners turn back — by persevering in that same condition? Or rather, by undergoing a great change and turning away from their former way of life, through which their sickness is healed; for ignorance, the mother of all these ills, is done away with through knowledge. It was knowledge, then, that the Lord imparted to his disciples, by which he healed those who were suffering and restrained sinners from sin. He therefore no longer spoke to them according to their former opinion, nor answered according to the suspicion of his questioners, but according to saving doctrine, without hypocrisy and without respect of persons.
This is also shown from the Lord's own words. To those who were of the circumcision he made known the Son of God, manifesting that he himself was the very one who had been proclaimed beforehand by the prophets as the Christ, who would restore freedom to mankind and bestow on them the inheritance of incorruption. The Gentiles, in turn, the Apostles taught to abandon vain wood and stone, which they supposed to be gods, and to worship the true God, who established and made the whole human race, and who through his own work of creation nourishes, increases, and sustains it and grants it its very being; and to await his Son Jesus Christ, who ransomed us from our apostasy through his own blood, so that we too might become a sanctified people — who is to descend from the heavens in the power of the Father, who will also execute judgment upon all, and will grant the good things that come from God to those who have kept his commandments. He, appearing in the last times as the chief cornerstone, gathered into one and joined together those far off and those near at hand — namely, uncircumcision together with circumcision — spreading wide Japheth, and establishing him in the house of Shem [Eph. 2].

======== Book III — Chapter 6 ========

A demonstration that in the Scriptures no one else is named God, nor styled Lord, except the one true God, the Father of all, and his Word.
Neither the Lord, therefore, nor the Holy Spirit, nor the Apostles would ever have named someone who was not God as 'God' in a definitive and absolute sense, except he were truly God; likewise they would never, in their own words, have styled anyone 'Lord' save him who is Lord of all — God the Father — and his Son, who has received from his Father dominion over all creation, as it is written: 'The Lord declared to my Lord: Take your seat at my right hand, until I place your enemies beneath your feet as a footstool.' This shows the Father speaking to the Son, to whom he gave the inheritance of the nations and subjected to him all his enemies. Since, then, the Father truly is Lord, and the Son truly is Lord, the Holy Spirit rightly marked both of them with the title of Lord. And again, at the overthrow of the people of Sodom, Scripture says: 'And the Lord sent down upon Sodom and Gomorrah a rain of fire and sulfur, from the Lord, out of the sky.' Here it signifies the Son, who also spoke with Abraham, as having received from the Father the power to judge the Sodomites for their iniquity. Likewise it is written: 'Your throne, O God, is forever; a scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated iniquity; therefore God, your God, has anointed you.' For here the Spirit has marked both with the name of God — him who is anointed, the Son, and him who anoints, that is, the Father. And again: 'God takes his stand in the assembly of the gods; in their midst he renders judgment upon the gods' — meaning here the Father and the Son, and of those who have received adoption, of whom it says, 'these are they.' For this is God's congregation, which God — that is, the Son himself — gathered together through himself. Of this it again says: 'The God of gods, the Lord, has spoken, and has summoned the earth' — who is this God? Concerning whom it says: 'Our God shall come openly, and shall not remain silent' — meaning the Son, who appeared among men in his manifestation, who says: 'I appeared openly to those who did not seek me.' And of what gods does it speak? Of those to whom it says: 'I have said, You are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High' — namely, those who have received the grace of adoption, through which we cry, 'Abba, Father.'
No one else, then, as I have already stated, bears the name God or the title Lord, save the one who is Lord and God over all things, the same who spoke thus to Moses: 'I am the one who is. This is what you are to tell the sons of Israel: The One Who Is has sent me to you' — and to bring this people out of bondage; and whose Son is Jesus Christ our Lord, who makes those who believe in his name to be sons of God. For it is he himself who descended and who ascended for the salvation of men. Through the Son, then — dwelling in the Father as the Father dwells in him — 'the One Who Is' was disclosed as God, with the Father testifying concerning the Son while the Son makes known the Father. As Isaiah likewise states: 'I myself, he declares, am the witness, says the Lord God, together with the servant I have chosen, so that you might come to recognize, put your trust in, and grasp that it is I.' But when Scripture names those who are not gods, it does not, as I have said, present them as gods without qualification, but always with some addition or indication by which they are shown not to be gods. As with David: 'The gods of the nations are idols of demons,' and 'You shall not go after strange gods.' For by saying 'gods of the nations' — the nations not knowing the true God, and calling these 'gods' that belong to others — he has already taken away their claim to be gods. And what he says of them in his own voice is this: 'For they are, he says, idols of demons.' And Isaiah: 'Let all be put to shame who worship graven images, who boast in idols that are useless, and I am witness, says the Lord' — he has taken away their claim to be gods, and employs the name merely so that his subject can be identified. This same thing Jeremiah also states: 'Let the gods, he says, that did not fashion sky and ground, vanish away from the ground and from beneath this sky.' For by adding their destruction, he shows that they are not gods. Elijah, moreover, having gathered all Israel to Mount Carmel and wishing to turn them from idolatry, said to them: 'How long will you waver between two opinions? The Lord God is one; come, follow him.' And again, over the burnt offering, he said to the priests of the idols: 'Invoke your own gods by name, and I for my part will invoke my Lord and God; whichever one answers this day shall be acknowledged as God.' For in saying this, the prophet showed that those who were thought by the people to be gods were not gods at all. He turned them, instead, to that God whom he himself believed in and who truly was God, and whom, calling upon, he cried out: 'Lord God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, hear me today, and let all this people understand that you are the God of Israel.'
And I too, therefore, call upon you, O Lord, God of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob, and of Israel, who are the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; O God, who through the abundance of your mercy have been pleased to let us know you; who made heaven and earth; who rule over all; who alone are the true God, above whom there is no other God: grant, through our Lord Jesus Christ, the governing gift also of the Holy Spirit. Give to everyone who reads this writing to know that you alone are God, and to be strengthened in you, and to turn away from every heretical, godless, and impious opinion.
The Apostle Paul, too, says: 'For you once served those who by nature are not gods; but now, having come to know God, or rather being known by God' — thereby setting apart those who are not gods from him who alone is God. Elsewhere, speaking of the Antichrist, he writes: 'the one who opposes and lifts himself up above every so-called god or object of worship' — meaning here those whom the ignorant style gods, that is, idols. The Father of all bears the name God truly; it is not against him that the Antichrist will lift himself up, but against those falsely styled gods. Paul confirms this elsewhere: 'We are aware that an idol amounts to nothing, and that no God exists but one alone. For granted there be so-called gods, whether up in heaven or down on earth — since indeed many gods and many lords are spoken of — yet for us there exists a single God, the Father, source of all things and goal of our existence; and a single Lord Jesus Christ, agent of all things and means of our existence.' Thus he marked off and distinguished the falsely-named gods from the one Father who is God, source of all things, while most firmly confessing, in that same passage, the one Lord Jesus Christ. And as for the phrase 'whether in heaven or on earth,' he does not mean by this, as some interpret it, that there are makers of the world; rather it is like what was said by Moses: 'You shall not make for yourself any likeness of anything, whatever is in heaven above, or whatever is on the earth beneath, or whatever is in the waters under the earth.' And what things are in heaven he himself explains: 'Take care, he says, that when you lift your eyes skyward and behold the sun, moon, and stars, that whole host of heaven, you not be led astray into worshiping and serving them.' And Moses himself, godly man though he was, was indeed appointed 'a god' in Pharaoh's sight; yet nowhere is he truly called Lord, nor named God, by the prophets, but is called by the Spirit the faithful attendant and servant of God — which indeed he was.

======== Book III — Chapter 7 ========

What is meant by Paul's words, that the god of this world darkened the reasoning of the faithless. 1. As for what they claim — that Paul openly wrote, in his second letter sent to the church at Corinth, that the deity ruling this present age darkened the reasoning of those without faith — and that from this they infer a god belonging only to this age, distinct from another set above every rule, origin, and dominion — the blame lies not with us if men who claim insight into secrets beyond God cannot even manage to construe Paul rightly. For should someone read him in keeping with his customary manner — as we have already demonstrated elsewhere that he frequently employs transposed word-order — taking it so: "in whom God," then breaking off briefly with a slight pause, and afterward reading what follows as a single continuous clause — "of this age darkened the reasoning of those without faith" — he will discover this to be accurate; so that the sense conveyed becomes: God darkened the reasoning of the faithless belonging to this age. The pointing of the sentence itself bears this out. Paul is not naming "the god of this age" as if acknowledging some further deity above the true one; rather he was simply acknowledging God as God, while describing as "faithless of this age" those who will have no share in the incorruptible age to come. In what manner God darkened the reasoning of the faithless we will explain from Paul's own words as this discussion moves forward, so as not, for now, to wander too far off from the subject before us.
That the Apostle habitually employs this transposed word-order, owing to the rapidity of his speech and the driving impulse of the Spirit within him, one may confirm from many further passages. So also, writing to the Galatians, he states: what purpose, then, does the law of deeds serve? It was appended, to remain in force until the offspring should arrive to whom the pledge had been given, set in place through messengers by a go-between's hand. For the true sequence runs rather: what purpose, then, does the law of deeds serve? It was set in place through messengers by a go-between's hand, and appended, to remain until the offspring should arrive to whom the pledge had been given — as if one voice were posing the question and the Spirit supplying the reply. And once more, writing his second letter to the Thessalonians concerning the Antichrist, he says: the lawless figure will then be unveiled, whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the breath from his mouth and abolish at the brightness of his arrival — that one whose arrival follows Satan's operation, accompanied by every kind of power, and portents, and deceptive marvels. Here again the true sequence of the words runs: the lawless figure will then be unveiled, whose arrival follows Satan's operation, accompanied by every kind of power, and portents, and deceptive marvels, whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the breath from his mouth and abolish at the brightness of his arrival. For he does not intend that the Lord's arrival should follow Satan's operation, but rather the arrival of the lawless figure — the very one we also name Antichrist. Now if a reader fails to attend properly and does not mark the breathing-pauses where they belong, the outcome will be not merely awkward but downright blasphemous, as though it were the Lord's own arrival that followed Satan's operation. Just as, then, this transposed order must in such instances be brought out through the reading, with the Apostle's sense thereby kept intact, so here too we ought not read "the god of this age" but rather grasp "God" — whom we rightly confess as God — and understand that those blinded in their unbelief are "of this age," seeing that they will have no portion in the life of the age still to come.

======== Book III — Chapter 8 ========

By exposing this bit of sophistry of theirs, it has now been made plain that neither prophets nor Apostles ever spoke of a second god, nor acknowledged any lord apart from the one true God. Still less did the Lord himself, who directed that Caesar's due be rendered to Caesar and God's due to God — thereby naming Caesar simply Caesar, and acknowledging God simply as God. That same statement of his, that no one can be enslaved to two masters, he glosses in like fashion by saying that one cannot serve both God and mammon — acknowledging God as God, and calling mammon by its proper name. He is not styling mammon "lord" when he says a person cannot be enslaved to two masters; he is instead teaching his followers that, in giving themselves to God's service, they must not fall under mammon's yoke or be governed by it. Everyone, he says elsewhere, who commits sin has become sin's bondservant. Just as he can call those who serve sin its slaves without thereby making sin itself into a god, so too he calls those who serve mammon its slaves without making mammon a god. Now the word "mammon," in the speech of the Jews — which the Samaritans likewise use, with a slight change in form — is rendered "Mamuel," and means gluttonous: that is, a person unable to restrain himself from the gullet. So then, the strong man is not first tied up and only afterward has his goods carried off. His furnishings and his household were ourselves, back when we lived in rebellion: he made use of us as suited him, and a foul spirit had taken up residence in us. Yet he held no strength against the one who bound him and stripped his house, but only against those men who lay under his control, since he had turned their judgment away from God — men whom the Lord then set free. As Jeremiah likewise states, the Lord bought back Jacob and delivered him out of the grip of one mightier than himself. Now if the text meant something other than the one who binds him and carries off his possessions — if it merely called him "strong" and nothing further — he would stand as an unbeaten strong man. But he also added the one who prevails; for the one who binds holds fast, while the one bound is held. And this comparison holds no real parity, so that the runaway slave is not set on equal footing with the Lord: for neither he nor anything whatsoever among created and subordinate things can be set beside the Word of God, through whom everything came into being, who is our Lord Jesus Christ.
That Angels, Archangels, Thrones, and Dominions — whatever their rank — were established and fashioned alike through the Word of him who is God over all, John made plain in his own way. Having spoken of God's Word, that this Word existed within the Father, he went on to state that through him everything came to be, and apart from him nothing came into being at all. David likewise, once he had catalogued the works deserving praise — naming precisely the things already mentioned, the heavens together with their entire host — went on to add that he gave the order and they were brought into existence, he spoke and they took shape. To whom, then, was the order given? Plainly to the Word — through whom, as he says, the heavens were set firm, and all their host by the breath issuing from his mouth. And that he fashioned everything freely, exactly as he chose, David says again elsewhere that our God dwells in the heights of heaven, and has accomplished on earth whatsoever pleased him. There is, then, a real distinction between what was established by the establisher and what was fashioned by the fashioner. He himself is unmade, without origin, without end, wanting nothing, complete in himself, and moreover bestowing on everything else this very gift — that it should exist; whereas whatever he fashioned has taken on a beginning. And anything that has taken on a beginning, and is liable to dissolve, and stands in dependence upon and need of its maker, must of necessity — even by the reckoning of those with only modest skill in drawing such distinctions — carry a separate designation: so that he who fashioned all things, together with his own Word, alone rightly bears the title God and Lord; while the things fashioned are not entitled to share that same name, nor may they properly lay claim to the title belonging to their Maker.

======== Book III — Chapter 9 ========

What knowledge of God the Apostles had, who handed down the Gospel to us.
This, then, has already been shown plainly here, and will be shown still more plainly further on: that no one else, neither the prophets nor the Apostles nor the Lord Christ himself, confessed in his own person any other Lord or God, but only and above all the true God and Lord — the prophets and the Apostles confessing the Father and the Son, and naming and confessing no other; and the Lord himself passed down to his followers that the Father by himself is God and Lord, the one solitary sovereign and master of everything that exists. It is right that we hold to their testimony just as it stands, seeing we are truly their followers. For Matthew the Apostle, aware that it is a single, identical God who pledged to Abraham that his descendants would multiply like the stars filling the heavens, and who through his Son Christ Jesus summoned us out of stone-worship into knowledge of himself — so that a people once excluded might be counted a people, and those once unloved might be counted beloved — tells of John, forerunner of Christ, that to those priding themselves on fleshly ancestry, though their minds were crowded with every sort of malice, he proclaimed a turning-away from wickedness, saying: brood of serpents, who alerted you to run from the anger soon to come? Produce, then, fruit fitting for that turning-away; and do not tell yourselves, we have Abraham as father. For I say to you, God has power to raise up, out of these very stones, offspring for Abraham. He was, then, urging on them that turning-away born of wickedness, yet he was not proclaiming some different God apart from the one who had pledged himself to Abraham — this forerunner of Christ, of whom Matthew speaks again, and Luke as well: for this is the one spoken of through the prophet by the Lord: a voice shouting out in the desert, make ready the road for the Lord, level out the paths belonging to our God. Every ravine will be raised up, every mountain and hill brought low, the twisted places straightened, and the jagged roads smoothed over; and every living creature will witness God's deliverance."
There exists, then, one and the same God, Father of our Lord, who both pledged through the prophets to send his herald ahead of him, and who caused his own salvation — namely, his own Word — to be seen and shown openly to all flesh, taking on flesh himself so as to be revealed to everyone as their King. For it belonged to the judge to look upon those under judgment and to recognize those by whom he was to be judged; and it belonged to the giver of honor to recognize those attaining that honor. Speaking again of the messenger, Matthew records that a messenger of the Lord appeared to Joseph while dreaming — and he himself explains which "Lord" is meant, namely so that the word spoken by the Lord through the prophet should be fulfilled: Out of Egypt have I summoned my son. And further: behold, a maiden shall carry in her womb and bring forth a son, whose name men will call Emmanuel — a name whose meaning, translated, is "God among us." Concerning this Emmanuel, born of the Virgin, David declared: turn not away the face of your anointed one. The Lord gave David a faithful oath and will not go back on it: of your own bodily offspring I will place one upon your throne. And elsewhere: God has made himself known in Judea; his dwelling is founded in peace, his abode in Zion. There is, then, but a single God, proclaimed by the prophets and made known through the gospel — this same Son, sprung from David's bodily line — that is, from the Virgin descended from David — and Emmanuel; concerning whose star Balaam too foretold that a star would climb up out of Jacob, and a ruler would rise up in Israel. Luke also notes that, as crowds streamed to him for washing, John preached repentance to them — this too Luke records. Chapter 10. Concerning the gifts the Magi brought to our Lord. Matthew records that the Magi, arriving from the East, declared: we have caught sight of his star while still in the East, and have journeyed here to bow before him; and that, guided by the star into the dwelling, to the line of Jacob, to Emmanuel, they revealed through their offerings whom it was they worshiped: myrrh, since he was destined to die and be laid in a tomb on behalf of mortal humanity; gold, since he was a King whose reign has no end; and incense, since he was God, made known both in Judea and revealed to those who had not sought him out. Matthew further records, at the moment of his washing, that the heavens opened and he beheld God's Spirit coming down upon him like a dove, and a voice sounded from heaven, saying: this is my cherished Son, with whom I am greatly pleased. It was not, then, that some separate Christ descended into Jesus, nor that Christ and Jesus were two distinct beings; rather the Word of God — the Savior of all and governor of both heaven and earth — that same one being Jesus, as already shown — this very one took on flesh, was anointed by the Father with the Spirit, and became Jesus Christ; exactly as Isaiah likewise states: a branch shall spring up from the stock of Jesse, and a bloom shall rise from his root, and God's Spirit shall settle upon him — the spirit of wisdom and comprehension, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and reverence, and the spirit of fear of God shall fill him full. He shall not render judgment by outward appearance nor rebuke merely by hearsay, but shall judge the humble with righteousness and rebuke the powerful of the earth. And Isaiah again, foretelling both his anointing and its purpose, states: the Lord's Spirit rests upon me, for he has anointed me; he has dispatched me to bring good tidings to the humble, to mend the brokenhearted, to announce liberty to captives and sight restored to the blind, to declare the Lord's welcome year and the day of requital, to console every mourner. Insofar, then, as God's Word had become man, sprung from Jesse's stock and a descendant of Abraham, in that respect God's Spirit settled upon him and he was anointed to bring good tidings to the humble; but insofar as he was God, he did not render judgment by outward appearance nor rebuke merely by hearsay — having no need of any witness concerning humanity, since he himself already knew what lay within a person. And he summoned to himself every mourner, and by his own gift loosed them from their fetters — fetters of which Solomon states that each man is held fast by the ropes of his own transgressions. God's Spirit thus came down upon him, sent by him who had pledged through the prophets to anoint him, so that we, drawing from the fullness of that anointing, might attain salvation. So indeed Matthew relates it.

======== Book III — Chapter 11 ========

A demonstration that there can be neither more nor fewer than four Gospels.
Luke, companion and disciple of the apostles, tells of Zacharias and Elizabeth—the parents from whom, by God's promise, John was born—saying: "Both were upright before God, conducting themselves without fault in every command and statute of the Lord." And again, of Zacharias he writes: "It happened that, as he was serving in the priesthood before God, taking his turn in the order assigned to his division, the lot fell to him to offer incense, and he entered the Lord's temple." Speaking plainly, directly, and with full conviction, in his own words Zacharias acknowledges as Lord and God the one who had chosen Jerusalem and established the priestly ordinance, whose messenger is also Gabriel. For he recognized no other besides this one; had he grasped some notion of a God and Lord more perfect than this one, he would surely not, plainly and entirely, have acknowledged as Lord and God the one he knew to be descended from the [patriarchal] loins, as we showed earlier. And concerning John he likewise declares: "He will be great before the Lord, and will turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God; he will go ahead of him, endowed with the spirit and strength of Elijah, to make a people ready for the Lord." For whom, then, was he preparing a people, and before whom, as Lord, did he become great? Surely before him of whom it is said that John was something greater than a prophet, and that "of those born of women none surpasses John the Baptist"—he who indeed made the people ready for the Lord's arrival, announcing repentance ahead of time to his fellow servants and urging them to repent, so that, turning back to the one from whom, through their sins and trespasses, they had grown estranged, they might obtain pardon at the Lord's coming; even as David likewise says: "The wicked stray from birth, they wander from the womb." And so, turning them back to their Lord, he made ready for the Lord a people fit for him, endowed with the spirit and strength of Elijah. And again, speaking of the angel, he says: "At that time the angel Gabriel was sent by God, who also spoke to the Virgin, saying, 'Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found grace with God.'" And of the Lord he says: "He will be great, and will be named Son of the Highest; the Lord God will grant him his father David's throne, and he will rule over Jacob's house forever, his kingdom having no end." But who else rules the house of Jacob without interruption forever, except Christ Jesus our Lord, the Son of God Most High, who through the Law and the Prophets pledged that his salvation would be made plain to every creature, so that he might become Son of Man, in order that man might in turn become son of God? For this reason Mary, rejoicing, cried out prophetically on the Church's behalf: "My soul exalts the Lord, and my spirit has found gladness in God my Deliverer... He has come to the aid of his servant Israel, calling to mind his mercy, just as he told our ancestors, toward Abraham and his descendants forever."
Through these and many further witnesses, the Gospel demonstrates that the God who addressed the patriarchs is the very one who, by Moses, delivered the law—the law by which it became known to us that he had addressed the patriarchs. This same God, out of his abundant goodness, poured his compassion out upon us, and in that compassion the "Dawn from on high" looked down on us and "shone upon those seated in darkness and death's shadow, directing our steps onto the path of peace"; just as Zacharias too, once his muteness ended—a condition brought on by his disbelief—filled with a fresh spirit, praised God anew. Everything had become new, the Word freshly ordering his coming in flesh, so that the man estranged from God could be counted again as God's own; for this reason people were taught to honor God in a renewed manner—not a different God, however, since there is but a single God, who declares righteous both the circumcised through faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith. And Zacharias, speaking as a prophet, said: "Praised is the Lord, Israel's God, for he has come to his people and accomplished their ransom, raising up for us a strong deliverer within the house of David his servant, just as he promised through the mouths of his holy prophets from ages past: rescue from our foes and from the grip of every hand that hates us; mercy shown toward our ancestors, remembrance of his sacred covenant, the vow he made to our father Abraham—that we, freed without terror from the grip of our enemies, might serve him in devotion and uprightness in his presence all our lives." Then, addressing John, he says: "And you, child, will be named prophet of the Highest, for you will go ahead of the Lord to make his paths ready, to bring his people the understanding of deliverance through the pardon of their sins." This, then, was the understanding of deliverance still lacking to them—an understanding of the Son of God—which John provided, declaring: "Look, the Lamb of God, who removes the sin of the world. This is the one about whom I said, One is coming behind me who ranks ahead of me, because he existed before me; and from his abundance we have all received." Such, then, is the understanding of deliverance; not a different God, nor a different Father, nor Bythus, nor a Pleroma composed of thirty Aeons, nor a Mother of the Ogdoad—rather, the understanding of deliverance was understanding of the Son of God, who is himself both deliverance and Deliverer, rightly named and truly the one who delivers. "Deliverance," as it is written: "For your rescue I have waited, Lord." "Deliverer," again: "See, my God, my rescuer—I will put my trust in him." "Delivering," likewise: "God has revealed his rescuing power before the nations." For he is truly Deliverer, being the Son and Word of God; and delivering, being the Spirit—for it is written, "the breath of our own countenance, Christ the Lord"; and deliverance, being flesh—for "the Word became flesh and made his home among us." This understanding of deliverance, then, John was conveying to those who turned in repentance and put their trust in the Lamb of God, who removes the sin of the world.
"An angel of the Lord appeared," it says, "to the shepherds, bringing them news of joy, for a Deliverer had been born in David's town, who is Christ the Lord." Then "a company of the heavenly army," praising God, declared: "Glory to God in the heights, and on earth, peace—goodwill among men." These messengers, the false Gnostics claim, issued from the Ogdoad and disclosed the descent of the Christ from above. But they contradict themselves once again when they say that he who is above, the Christ and Savior, was never actually born, but that only after his baptism did the being belonging to the dispensation of Jesus settle upon him in the shape of a dove. So the Ogdoad's messengers are lying, deceiving their hearers, when they proclaim: "Today, in David's town, a Deliverer has been born for you, who is Christ the Lord." For by their own account, neither Christ nor the Deliverer was born at that moment; rather it was the being tied to the dispensation of Jesus, son of the world's maker, into whom—after his baptism, that is, thirty years later—they claim the Supernal Deliverer descended.
But what further point did they intend by locating this happening "in David's town," except to announce the fulfillment of the pledge God had given David, that a King from his own bodily line would rule without end? Indeed, the maker of the entire universe was the one who gave this pledge to David, as David himself states: "My aid comes from the Lord, maker of sky and earth." And elsewhere: "The farthest reaches of the earth rest in his hand, and the mountain heights belong to him; the sea too is his, for he formed it, and his hands shaped the dry ground. Come, let us bow and kneel before him, and let us weep before the face of the Lord, our maker, since he is our God." Through David, the Spirit of God speaks openly to any who will listen, declaring that some would come to scorn the one who fashioned us, who alone is God. This is why he uttered these predictions, meaning: do not wander off—apart from this one, or beyond this one, no other God deserves such regard; readying us to be reverent and thankful toward the one who made and set all things in order, and who has thereby been recognized as his own maker. The angels acted no differently. For in proclaiming, "Glory to God in the heights, and on earth peace," they were praising, through these very words, the maker of the heights—that is, of what lies above the heavens—and the founder of everything on the earth below. For upon his own handiwork, mankind, he sent down from heaven his own generous salvation. For this reason the shepherds too, it says, went back, praising God for everything they had heard and seen, exactly as they had been told. The shepherds of Israel were not praising some other God, but the very one proclaimed by the Law and the Prophets, maker of all things, whom the angels also glorified. But if the angels from the Ogdoad were praising one God, while the shepherds praised another, then those Ogdoad angels brought them falsehood, not truth.
Luke also relates of the Lord: "When the time for her purifying was complete, they carried him up to Jerusalem to set him before the Lord, since it stands written in the Lord's law that every firstborn male shall be dedicated as holy to the Lord; and to make an offering as prescribed in the Lord's law—a couple of turtledoves, or two young pigeons" — in doing so, unmistakably naming as "Lord" the very one who gave that law. Simeon too, it says, gave praise to God, declaring: "Now, Master, release your servant in peace, for my own eyes have witnessed the salvation you have made ready before every nation's gaze—a light to be unveiled to the Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel." And Anna the prophetess, in turn, it says, praised God upon seeing Christ, and spoke of him to everyone awaiting Jerusalem's ransom. Through all of this, then, one God is revealed, opening to humanity, by his Son's fresh arrival, the covenant belonging to the new order of liberty.
For this reason Mark also, Peter's interpreter and companion, opens his Gospel account in this way: "The start of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, Son of God—just as it stands written among the prophets: Look, I am sending my herald ahead of you, who will get your road ready. A voice calling out in the desert: Get the Lord's road ready, straighten out his paths before our God." Clearly stating that the Gospel's start lies in the utterances of the holy prophets, and indicating beforehand that the one these very prophets acknowledged as Lord and God is the Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who likewise promised to dispatch his messenger ahead of him — that being John, calling out in the desert with the spirit and strength of Elijah, "Get the Lord's road ready, straighten out his paths before our God." For the prophets, without exception, did not proclaim separate gods but one and the same, though through varied signs and numerous names. The Father is indeed manifold and abundant, as we established in the book prior to this, and as we shall continue to demonstrate as our argument moves through the prophets themselves. And near the close of his Gospel, Mark writes: "Thus the Lord Jesus, once he had finished speaking to them, was taken up into heaven and took his seat at God's right hand" — bearing out what the prophet had foretold: "The Lord declared to my lord, Take your seat at my right hand, until I make your foes a footstool beneath your feet." So then, one and the same God and Father is he who was proclaimed by the prophets and made known to us through the Gospel, whom Christians revere and cherish with their entire heart, maker of heaven and earth and everything they contain.
John, the Lord's own disciple, proclaiming this identical faith, sought, by his proclamation of the Gospel, to strip away the error sown among men by Cerinthus, and, well before him, by those termed Nicolaitans, an offshoot of that falsely titled "knowledge"; his aim was to refute them and convince all that a single God made everything by means of his Word — not, as they claim, one maker apart from another, higher Father of the Lord, with the maker's son being one figure and the Christ from the upper regions another — who, so they assert, stayed free of suffering, settling down upon Jesus the maker's son, then afterward soaring back up into his own Pleroma; and that the origin was the Only-begotten, while the Word was the genuine offspring of that Only-begotten; and that the creation surrounding us was not fashioned by the first God, but by some inferior power stationed far beneath, cut off from any contact with what is unseen and beyond naming. Meaning, then, to sweep aside every such notion, and to fix in the Church the standard of truth — that there exists a single almighty God, who made everything, seen and unseen, by his Word — and showing further that through this same Word, by whom God brought the creation to completion, he also granted salvation to its inhabitants, he opened his Gospel's teaching thus: "At the origin existed the Word, and the Word existed alongside God, and the Word was God; this one existed at the origin alongside God. Everything came to be through him, and apart from him nothing came to be. What had come to be was, in him, life, and that life was mankind's light; and the light shines within darkness, and the darkness has not overpowered it." "Everything," he states, "came to be through him"; so this creation surrounding us must fall under "everything," since they cannot be allowed to claim that all that lies beneath their Pleroma is excepted. For should this creation too lie within their Pleroma, then this immense creation is not external to it, as was shown in the volume preceding this; yet should these things lie outside the Pleroma — which indeed seems unworkable — then their Pleroma would no longer be "everything"; hence this immense creation cannot be external to it either. John himself stripped from us every such evasion, stating: "He existed in this world, and the world came to be through him, yet the world did not recognize him. He arrived among his own people, and his own people did not welcome him." Yet according to Marcion and his followers, the world was not made through him at all, nor did he arrive among his own, but rather among what belonged to someone else. Certain Gnostics claim instead that angels, under the Demiurge, made it. For the Demiurge, they say, labored to fashion copies imitating the realities above, saying that "the Demiurge was bringing the fabric of creation to completion." They further claim that the Mother sent out both the Lord and her Demiurge for this arrangement concerning creation, and that through him, as they hold, this world came into being — while the Gospel states plainly that everything came to be through the Word, who existed at the origin alongside God; and this Word, it says, "became flesh and made his dwelling among us."
But according to them, it was not the Word, nor the Christ, nor the one formed out of all the Aeons as Savior, who became flesh. Indeed, they hold that the Word and the Christ never even came into this world; that the Savior was not made flesh and did not suffer, but descended like a dove upon that Jesus who was formed by the dispensation, and, after he had proclaimed the unknown Father, ascended again into the Pleroma. As for who was incarnate and suffered, some of them say it was that Jesus of the dispensation, who they claim passed through Mary as water passes through a pipe; others say it was the son of the Demiurge, upon whom that dispensation-Jesus descended; still others say that Jesus was simply born of Joseph and Mary, and that upon him descended the Christ from the regions above, existing without flesh and incapable of suffering. According to none of the heretics' opinions, then, did the Word of God become flesh. For if one examines the rules of belief of all of them, he will find that every one of them represents the Word of God, and the Christ who is above, as fleshless and incapable of suffering. Some think he was manifested as a man who had been transfigured, yet say he was neither born nor made flesh; others say he did not even take on the form of a man, but descended like a dove upon that Jesus who was born of Mary. Unmasking all these as false witnesses, the disciple whom the Lord loved states: 'The Logos became flesh and pitched his tent among us.' And lest we ask which God's Logos it was that took on flesh, he goes on to teach, stating: 'A man appeared, sent from God, and his name was John; this man came as a witness, to testify concerning the light. He was not himself the light, but came so as to testify concerning the light.' John, then, this forerunner who testifies concerning the light — under which God's authority was he dispatched? Surely under the one whose messenger is Gabriel, who also announced the good tidings of his birth, and who had likewise, through the prophets, given his word that he would dispatch his own messenger ahead of the face of his Son to make ready his path — that is, to testify concerning the light, moving in Elijah's spirit and strength. And Elijah, for his part — to whom did he belong as servant and prophet? He belonged to the one who fashioned sky and earth, as Elijah himself admits. Dispatched, then, by the builder and craftsman of this cosmos, how could John possibly testify to a light descending from those regions that lie beyond naming and beyond sight? For all the heretics have laid it down that the Demiurge knows nothing of the power situated above him — yet John turns out to be the one who witnesses to and unveils that very power. It is for this reason that the Lord declared him greater than a prophet, and so indeed he was. For every other prophet proclaimed the arrival of the Father's light, longing to be judged worthy of beholding the one they announced; but John did what the others did in foretelling him ahead of time, yet also beheld him upon his arrival and singled him out, winning many over to trust in him — so that he occupied the office of both prophet and apostle at once. He surpasses a prophet, indeed, being first an apostle and only then a prophet; yet every one of these gifts flows from one and the same God. In like manner, the wine produced in the vineyard, through God's arrangement of the created order, and served first — nobody who tasted it had any complaint, and the Lord himself shared in drinking it. Yet finer still was the wine the Logos produced swiftly and effortlessly out of water, for those summoned to the marriage feast to enjoy. For though the Lord might have supplied wine for the company and stocked food for the hungry from absolutely nothing already existing in creation, he chose otherwise; rather, taking loaves drawn from the soil and offering thanks, and once more converting water into wine, he provided for those seated at the meal and poured drink for the wedding guests — thereby demonstrating that the God who fashioned the earth and ordered it to yield fruit, who set the waters in place and called forth springs, is that very same one who, in these final times, through his Son, confers on humankind the boon of nourishment and the favor of drink: the incomprehensible disclosed by means of the comprehensible, the unseen through the seen, since he does not stand apart from the Son but abides within the Father's breast. For, so he states, 'God has at no time been seen by anyone; the only-begotten Son of God, situated within the Father's breast, is the one who has disclosed him.' Because the Father cannot be seen, the Son, dwelling within his breast, makes him known to every one. For this cause he becomes known to those the Son has chosen to reveal him to, and likewise the Father, by way of the Son, imparts recognition of his Son to those holding him dear. Through him, too, Nathanael came, once instructed, to recognize him — Nathanael, concerning whom the Lord testified that he was a genuine Israelite lacking all deceit. This Israelite recognized his own sovereign, and declared to him, 'Teacher, you are God's Son, you are Israel's King.' Through him as well Peter came, once instructed, to recognize the Anointed One, Son of the God who lives, of whom it is written: 'Look, my dearly loved Son, in whom my favor rests; I will set my Spirit upon him, and he will announce justice to the nations. He shall not contend, nor shout aloud, nor shall anyone catch his voice out in the open streets; a battered reed he shall not snap, and smoldering wick he shall not douse, until he carries justice through to triumph, and the nations will place their hope in his name.'
These, then, stand as the underlying tenets of the Gospel: that there exists a single God, builder of this entire cosmos, the very one heralded by the prophets, and who by means of Moses set in place the arrangement of the Law — declaring him to be Father to our Lord Jesus Christ, admitting no God besides him, and no other Father whatsoever. Such is the certainty surrounding these Gospels that even the heretics offer testimony to them, each starting from these same texts in an attempt to build his own doctrine. The Ebionites, for example, relying solely on the Gospel according to Matthew, are shown by that same Gospel to be mistaken concerning the Lord. Marcion, meanwhile, having hacked apart the Gospel according to Luke, stands exposed, through what still survives of it among his adherents, as a blasphemer against the sole true God. Those who split Jesus apart from Christ, maintaining that Christ stayed immune to suffering while Jesus suffered, and who favor the Gospel according to Mark, may be corrected should they approach it out of genuine devotion to truth. Those who follow Valentinus, making the fullest possible use of the Gospel according to John to demonstrate their pairings of Aeons, are shown by that very Gospel to be saying nothing correctly, as we have already shown in the first book. Since, then, those who contradict us themselves bear witness on our behalf and make use of these Gospels, our demonstration concerning them stands firm and true.
Nor could there be a greater tally of Gospels than these, nor fewer either. For seeing that there are four directions of the earth we inhabit, and four cardinal winds, and given that the Church has been dispersed across the whole globe, and the Gospel serves as the Church's pillar and support and the breath of life, it stands to reason that she must possess four supports, exhaling incorruption from all quarters and imparting life to mankind. From this it becomes evident that the Word, craftsman of all things, seated above the Cherubim and sustaining everything in being, once revealed to mankind, granted us the Gospel in a fourfold shape, bound together by one and the same Spirit. As David likewise declares, entreating his arrival: 'You who are enthroned upon the Cherubim, appear in radiance.' For the Cherubim likewise possess four forms, their shapes being pictures of the divine plan for the Son of God. 'The first living creature,' so it reads, 'resembled a lion' — denoting his energetic power and his kingly, sovereign nature; 'the second resembled an ox' — denoting his role as priestly sacrifice; 'the third bore a face like that of a man' — clearly setting forth his coming in human fashion; 'and the fourth resembled an eagle in flight' — clarifying the Spirit's gift descending in flight upon the Church. The Gospels, therefore, correspond to these shapes, upon which Christ Jesus sits enthroned. One Gospel recounts his chief, mighty, and glorious begetting from the Father, speaking in this way: 'In the beginning existed the Word, and the Word existed alongside God, and the Word existed as God,' and, 'Through him all things came into being, and apart from him not one thing came into being.' For this reason that Gospel overflows with utter assurance, such being its character. The Gospel according to Luke, however, carrying a priestly stamp, opens with Zachariah the priest presenting sacrifice to God; for the fatted calf was even then being readied, the one destined to be killed at the recovery of the younger son. Matthew, for his part, recounts his begetting in human terms, stating: 'The record of the origin of Jesus Christ, David's son, Abraham's son,' and further, 'Now the birth of Christ came about thus.' This Gospel, accordingly, carries a human shape; hence, across its whole span, he is depicted as a man of lowly disposition and mild temper. Mark, by contrast, opened with the prophetic Spirit descending upon men from above, stating, 'The start of the Gospel, just as it stands written in Isaiah the prophet' — exhibiting the swift, winged likeness proper to the Gospel; for this reason too he made his proclamation terse and rapid, as befits the prophetic style. And the Word of God in person addressed the patriarchs who lived prior to Moses in keeping with his deity and splendor; upon those living beneath the Law he conferred a priestly and ministering role; and afterward, having taken on manhood on our behalf, he dispatched to every corner of the earth the gift of the Spirit from heaven, sheltering us beneath his wings. As, then, is the divine plan for the Son of God, so too is the shape of the living creatures; and as is the shape of the living creatures, so too is the character of the Gospel. The living creatures bear four shapes, the Gospel bears four shapes, and the Lord's plan bears four shapes. And on this account four covenants were granted to mankind: the first before the deluge, under Adam; a second, following the deluge, under Noah; a third, the granting of the Law, under Moses; and a fourth, which renews man and gathers all things up within itself — the covenant that comes by way of the Gospel, raising men up and equipping them with wings for the kingdom above.
These things being so, all those who annul the true form of the Gospel, and who introduce either more figures into the Gospel than have been named, or again fewer, are vain, unlearned, and moreover rash — some so as to seem to have discovered more than the truth, others so as to reject the dispensations of God. Marcion, for one, spurning the entire Gospel — or rather, severing himself from the Gospel altogether — nonetheless claims for himself a portion of the Gospel. Others, aiming to strip away the gift of the Spirit which, in these final times, by the Father's kind design, has been lavished upon mankind, decline to accept that shape of the Gospel found in John, wherein the Lord gave assurance that he would dispatch the Paraclete; and thus they cast off together both that Gospel and the prophetic Spirit. Wretched men indeed — desiring to count as prophets themselves, they nonetheless spurn the gift of prophecy within the Church, all the while tolerating others who, on account of certain hypocritical figures, go so far as to withdraw from fellowship with the brethren. It should be recognized that people of such a sort do not even receive the apostle Paul. For in his letter to the Corinthians he treated with care the matter of prophetic gifts, and he recognizes both men and women prophesying within the Church. Offending, then, against the Spirit of God in all these respects, they lapse into the sin that cannot be forgiven. Those, on the other hand, who follow Valentinus, showing no restraint whatsoever, put forward writings of their own devising and claim to hold more Gospels than genuinely exist. They have, in fact, carried their boldness so far as to attach the title 'Gospel of Truth' to a composition of their own recent making — a text that has nothing in common with the Gospels handed down by the apostles, so that not one of their Gospels is free from blasphemy. For if what they produce is indeed the Gospel of truth, and yet it is unlike what has been handed down to us by the Apostles, then anyone who wishes to learn can discover, from the Scriptures themselves, that what was handed down by the Apostles is, on their reckoning, not the Gospel of truth at all. But that only those four Gospels are true and reliable, and that there can be neither more nor fewer than have been stated, we have shown through so many and such weighty arguments. For since God made all things well-ordered and fitting, it was necessary that the form of the Gospel too should be well-ordered and well put together. Having examined, then, from their own first principles, the teaching of those who handed the Gospel down to us, let us turn also to the rest of the Apostles and inquire into their teaching about God; and after that let us give heed to the actual sayings of the Lord himself.

======== Book III — Chapter 12 ========

The apostle Peter, then, once the Lord had risen and gone up into the heavens, wanting to round out the number of the twelve apostles and select a replacement for Judas — someone chosen by God — addressed those gathered: 'Men, brothers, this writing had to reach fulfillment, which the Holy Spirit foretold through David's mouth concerning Judas, who acted as guide for those who arrested Jesus, given that he was counted among our number: Let his homestead become a waste, with no one to dwell in it; and, Let a different man take up his post' — thereby restoring the apostles' number to completeness in accordance with what David had spoken. Again, once the Holy Spirit had come down upon the disciples, so that all of them uttered prophecy and spoke in tongues, and certain onlookers jeered that they were drunk on fresh wine, Peter answered that they were not drunk, seeing as it was merely nine in the morning, but rather this was the fulfillment of what had been declared through the prophet: 'And it shall be in the final days, the Lord says, that I will pour my Spirit out upon every living creature, and they will prophesy.' It is God, therefore, who gave his word through the prophet that he would pour out his Spirit upon mankind, who indeed carried this out; and it is this very God whom Peter announces as having brought his own pledge to completion.
For Peter declares: "Fellow Israelites, listen to what I tell you: this Jesus of Nazareth was a man singled out by God in your midst, through the powerful deeds and wonders and signs that God worked by his hand, as you yourselves are well aware—this same man, given over according to God's settled purpose and foreknowledge, you seized and put to death, fastening him up by the hands of lawless men; but God raised him, releasing him from death's grip, since it could not hold him fast. For David says concerning him: I kept the Lord ever set before my sight, for he stands at my right side, so that I should not be shaken. Because of this my heart was glad and my tongue rang out in joy, and further, my very body shall dwell secure in hope, for you will not leave my life abandoned in the grave, nor let your Holy One undergo decay." He then goes on to speak plainly to them regarding the patriarch David, saying that he perished and was laid in a tomb, and that his burial-place remains among them even now. "Yet because he was a prophet," he continues, "and understood that God had bound himself by oath that a descendant from his own body would occupy his throne, he spoke in advance, looking ahead, about the rising of the Christ.
[Editorial note in the source: Vulgate and Syriac translators.] ...that his life was not left forsaken in the grave, and his flesh underwent no decay. This very Jesus," he continues, "God has raised, a fact we can all testify to; exalted, then, at the right hand of God, and having taken from the Father what was promised—the Holy Spirit—he has poured out this very thing you now witness and perceive. David, after all, never went up into heaven, yet he himself declares: The Lord spoke to my lord, Take your seat at my right hand till I place your foes beneath your feet as a stool. Let the whole house of Israel therefore be certain beyond doubt that God has made this same Jesus, the one you nailed to the cross, both Lord and Christ." On hearing this, the crowds asked, "What are we to do, then?" Peter answered them: "Turn back from your sins, and let every one of you be washed in Jesus's name for release from sin, and you will be given the Holy Spirit as a gift." In this way the apostles announced not some second God, nor a second Fullness; not a Christ who suffered and was raised while another, incapable of suffering, soared off on high; but a single, identical God who is Father, together with Christ Jesus who was brought back from among the dead. And to those without faith in the Son of God they proclaimed the very faith that rests in him, urging from the prophets that the Christ God had pledged to send, he had indeed sent—that is, Jesus, the one they themselves had nailed up, whom God brought back to life.
On another occasion, Peter, accompanied by John, encountered a man crippled since birth who sat begging at the temple gate known as Beautiful. Peter told him: "I possess neither silver nor gold; yet what I do have, I give you: by the power of the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, stand up and walk." Instantly his feet and ankle joints grew firm, and he stood, walking with them into the temple courts, leaping about and praising God. When the crowd gathered around them, astonished at what had happened, Peter addressed them: "Fellow Israelites, why does this astonish you, and why do you stare at us as though it were by some power or piety of our own that we had made this man walk? The God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our ancestors, has honored his servant, whom you handed over and rejected before Pilate's face, even after he had decided to set him free. Instead, you disowned the Holy and Righteous One and demanded that a murderer be released to you instead; you killed the very source of life, whom God has since raised from death, and of this we are witnesses. Through faith in his name, this man whom you now see and recognize has been made strong by that name; the faith that comes by him has granted him this complete health in front of you all. Now, brothers, I recognize that ignorance drove your actions... yet in this way God fulfilled what he had announced long before through the lips of every prophet—that his Christ would suffer. Turn back, then, and change your ways, so that your sins may be wiped clean, and seasons of relief may arrive for you sent from the Lord's presence, and that he may dispatch the one appointed on your behalf, Jesus Christ, whom the heavens must keep until the era when all things are set right again, just as God announced long ago through his holy prophets. For Moses told our forefathers: The Lord your God will raise a Prophet for you from among your own people, just as he raised me; to him you must listen in everything he tells you. And any soul who refuses to listen to that Prophet will be cut off from the community. Likewise all the prophets, beginning with Samuel and continuing after him, everyone who has spoken, have also foretold these very days. You are heirs of the prophets and of the agreement God made with our ancestors, when he told Abraham: Through your offspring every nation on earth will find blessing. To you first, God, having raised up his servant, sent him to bring you blessing, so that each one of you might turn away from your evil deeds." In this manner Peter, together with John, delivered to them a plain announcement, declaring as good tidings that what God had promised the ancestors had now come to pass through Jesus—not, mind you, proclaiming a different God, but the Son of God, who had also become man and suffered, leading Israel to know him, announcing his rising from among the dead, and demonstrating that everything the prophets foretold about the Christ's suffering had been carried out by that same God.
So it was that when the chief priests convened once more, Peter spoke to them without fear: "Leaders of our people and elders of the nation, if we today stand accused over a kindness shown to a sick man, by which he was restored, let this be known to every one of you, and to the whole nation of Israel—it was accomplished by the power of the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you put on the cross and whom God brought back from death; it is by that name alone that this man now stands before you sound and whole. This is the stone which you builders threw away, and it has become the cornerstone. And no other name has been given under heaven among mankind by which salvation may come to us." So the apostles were not substituting some different God for the one they had always proclaimed; rather they told the people that the Christ who had been crucified was none other than Jesus, raised up by that same God who had sent forth the prophets, and who had granted salvation to humanity through him.
They were left bewildered, both by the cure itself (since, as the record notes, the man upon whom this healing sign had been performed was over forty years old) and by what the apostles taught and their reading of the prophets. Once the chief priests released Peter and John, the pair returned to the remaining apostles and the Lord's followers—the assembly, that is—and told them everything, including how fearlessly they had spoken in Jesus's name. Hearing this, the whole assembly raised their voices together to God, saying: "Master, you are the one who fashioned heaven and earth and sea and everything within them, who spoke through the Holy Spirit by the mouth of David your servant, our father: Why did the nations rage in fury, and the peoples devise empty schemes? The rulers of the earth took their positions, and the leaders banded together as one, opposing the Lord and his Anointed. For truly, within this very city, they assembled against your holy servant Jesus, the one you anointed—Herod and Pontius Pilate together with the nations and the peoples of Israel—to carry out whatever your hand and counsel had determined beforehand would take place."
Such are the utterances of the assembly, out of which every congregation traces its origin; such are the utterances of the great city, belonging to the citizens of the fresh covenant; such are the utterances of the apostles, the utterances of the Lord's own disciples, of those who, once the Lord had ascended, were brought to completion by the Spirit and who called upon the God who fashioned heaven and sea and earth, the one announced beforehand by the prophets, together with his Son Jesus, chosen by God—recognizing no rival deity. Valentinus was nowhere among them at that time, nor was Marcion, nor any of their disciples, nor the corrupters allied with them. It was on this account that the maker of all things heeded them. For, the record states, the location where they had assembled trembled, and every one of them was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke God's message fearlessly to anyone open to belief. With mighty power, it goes on, the apostles bore witness to the rising of the Lord Jesus, declaring to the people: "The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, the one you seized and put to death, hanging him upon a tree. This is the one God has lifted up as Ruler and Deliverer through his own splendor, to grant Israel a change of heart and forgiveness of wrongs; and we bear witness to these matters, as does the Holy Spirit, given by God to all who put their trust in him." And daily, it continues, both in the temple precincts and moving from home to home, they never stopped instructing and announcing the good news concerning Christ Jesus, God's Son. This, indeed, was the knowledge that brings salvation, perfecting before God all who acknowledge his Son's arrival.
Now, given that certain people brazenly claim that the apostles, in their preaching to the Jews, were unable to present any deity beyond the one already accepted among them, we answer as follows: if the apostles merely addressed people according to a notion long since fixed in their minds, then nobody obtained truth from them at all, still less from the Lord himself—since these same people hold that he too spoke in that fashion. On such a view, these very critics likewise possess no truth, but only adopted teaching suited to whatever view of God they already carried, according to what could be tolerated. By this logic no standard of truth would exist anywhere; every follower would claim the message reached each person simply as that person felt it and could take it in. And the Lord's arrival would then be pointless and unnecessary, if his sole purpose was to leave undisturbed, in each person, whatever notion about God had already taken root. Beyond that, it would have been a far tougher task for them to declare that the very man the Jews had watched being nailed to a cross was in fact the Christ, the Son of God, their King without end. Clearly, then, they were no longer speaking to their former way of thinking. For those who confronted the Jews openly as murderers of the Lord would, with even greater boldness, have announced that Father set above the Craftsman—had that been true—rather than each person's mere assumption; and it would have counted as a far smaller failing had it truly been a loftier Savior to whom they owed their ascent, one who, being immune to suffering, had never actually been fastened to any cross. Just as the apostles addressed the nations not by their existing beliefs but declared plainly that their gods were no gods but demonic images, so too they would have announced to the Jews a different, higher, more perfect Father, had they known of one—rather than nourishing and confirming their mistaken notion of God. And in the same way, when freeing the nations from their error and pulling them away from their own gods, the apostles certainly did not lead them into some further error; instead, by drawing them away from what were not gods at all, they revealed the one who alone was God, the genuine Father.
From what Peter told Cornelius the centurion at Caesarea, along with the nations gathered with him—the first occasion the message of God was declared to them—we can gather what the apostles announced, what shape their preaching took, and what view they held about God. For, the account says, this Cornelius was a reverent man who, together with his entire household, held God in awe, gave generously to the poor, and prayed to God without ceasing. Around the ninth hour he saw a messenger of God appear to him and say: "What you have given the poor has risen up as a remembrance before God. So send for Simon, called Peter." When Peter had received the vision, in which a voice from heaven told him, "Do not treat as unclean what God has purified"—this was because the God who, through the law, had separated clean from unclean had now purified the nations through the blood of his Son, whom Cornelius likewise worshiped. Arriving before him, Peter declared: "I now truly grasp that God shows no partiality toward persons, but welcomes, from every nation, whoever reveres him and does what is right." By these words he made it evident that the very God Cornelius had already revered—known to him by way of the law and the prophetic writings, on whose account he had given alms—is indeed God in truth. What was missing was complete understanding. So Peter continued: "You are aware of the message spread through the whole of Judea, starting in Galilee following the baptism John proclaimed: how Jesus the Nazarene, anointed by God with the Holy Spirit and power, traveled about doing good and curing all who were under the devil's oppression, because God stood with him. And we can testify to everything he did, both across Jewish territory and in Jerusalem—the very man they put to death by hanging him upon a tree. This man God brought back to life on the third day, and allowed him to be seen, not by the whole populace, but by witnesses handpicked beforehand by God—by us, who shared food and drink with him following his rising from the dead. And he charged us to proclaim to the people and to bear witness that he has been appointed by God as Judge over both the living and the dead. All the prophets testify concerning him, that whoever puts faith in him obtains forgiveness of sins through his name."
The Apostles, then, proclaimed the Son of God to men who did not know him, and his coming, to those who had already been instructed about God; yet they introduced no second deity. Had Peter known of any such distinction, he would gladly have declared to the nations that the Jews' God was one, and the Christians' God a different one; and since all of them stood in awe before the angelic vision, they would have trusted whatever he told them. Yet Peter's very words make clear that he retained for them the same God they had already known, testifying that Jesus was that God's Son, the one who judges both the living and those who have died, in whose name he also directed them toward washing that would free them from sin. And that is not all — he further testified that this same Jesus was God's Son, who — anointed by the Holy Spirit — bears the title Christ Jesus, and that this is the very man born of Mary, as Peter's own testimony makes plain. Are we to suppose, then, that Peter did not yet have the perfect knowledge which these men later discovered? If so, then Peter is imperfect according to them, and the rest of the Apostles are imperfect as well; and they will have to come back to life and become disciples of these men, so that they too may become disciples not of the Apostles but of their own perverse opinion. This is why each of them holds a different opinion, each embracing error as he was able to grasp it. But the Church, scattered across the whole world, resting on a firm foundation laid by the Apostles, holds fast to a single unchanging conviction about God and his Son.

Again, Philip, when the Ethiopian queen's eunuch was returning from Jerusalem and reading the prophet Isaiah, alone with him, whom did he proclaim? Was it not the one about whom the prophet spoke, saying: "Like a sheep he was brought to be slaughtered, and like a lamb silent before the one shearing it, so he did not open his mouth"? "But who will describe his origin? For his life has been taken away from the earth." That this one was Jesus, and that the writing had found its fulfillment in him, the eunuch came himself to believe; he at once asked for baptism, declaring, "I believe Jesus is the Son of God." He was then dispatched to the Ethiopian territories, there to proclaim what he himself had now come to believe: that the one God had been announced in advance through the prophets, and that his Son had now taken on human form, and had been brought like a sheep to be offered up, and all the other things the prophets say concerning him.

Paul too, after the Lord addressed him from heaven and revealed to him that by harassing his disciples he was harassing the Lord in person, and sent Ananias to him so that he might see again and be baptized, "preached in the synagogues at Damascus with all boldness, that this is the Christ, the Son of God." This is the secret he declares was disclosed to him — that the one who suffered under Pontius Pilate is ruler over all, King, God, and Judge, having received this power from him who is God of all, because he became obedient even to death, death on a cross. And that this is true is shown by what he preached to the Athenians at the Areopagus, where, since no Jews were present to hinder him, he was free to proclaim the true God with boldness, saying to them: "The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all life and breath and everything; and he made every nation of men of one blood, to dwell upon the whole face of the earth, having determined beforehand their appointed times, that they should seek what is divine, if perhaps they might feel after it and find it, though indeed it is not far from any one of us. for it is in him that we exist and are stirred and have our very being — as indeed some among your own poets have declared, 'for we too belong to his lineage.' Since, then, we belong to God's lineage, we should not suppose the divine nature resembles gold, silver, or stone, shaped by human skill or fancy. The times of ignorance, then, God overlooked, and now commands all men everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness, by the man whom he has appointed, having given assurance to all by raising him from the dead." In this passage he proclaims to them, though no Jews were present, not only that God is the maker of the world, but also that he made the one human race to dwell over all the earth — just as Moses likewise said: "When the Most High apportioned the nations, when he dispersed Adam's sons, he fixed the borders of the peoples to match the count of God's angels"; yet those who believe are no longer subject to angelic rule, but stand instead under the Lord's own authority. "For the Lord's portion is his people Jacob, Israel the cord of his inheritance."

And again at Lystra in Lycaonia, when Paul was with Barnabas, and had enabled a man lame from birth to walk by calling on our Lord Jesus Christ's own name, and the crowd wanted to honor them as gods on account of this astonishing deed, he said to them: "We too are men, of the same nature as you, bringing you good tidings, urging you to turn from these empty things toward the God who lives, who fashioned heaven and earth and sea and everything within them; who in generations past permitted every nation to walk its own path, yet did not leave himself without a witness, doing good, sending you rain from the sky and seasons that bear fruit, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness." Since all his epistles agree with these proclamations, we have shown this elsewhere, expounding the apostle from the epistles themselves in their proper place. But as we work through these proofs drawn from Scripture, and since many points have been touched on in various ways while we present them briefly and compactly, we ask that you too give heed to them patiently rather than finding them wearisome, understanding that what Scripture proves can only be established from Scripture itself.

Stephen too, again — who was chosen by the Apostles as the first deacon, and who was the first of all men to follow in the footsteps of the Lord's martyrdom, being the first killed for the confession of Christ — spoke boldly among the people and taught them, saying: "The glorious God showed himself to our forefather Abraham, saying to him: 'Leave your country and your relatives, and go into the land that I will point out to you.' And he brought him into this land which you now inhabit, and gave him no inheritance in it, not even a foot's length." God spoke to him thus, that his descendants would be sojourners in a foreign land, and would be brought into slavery, and would be afflicted four hundred years; "'but the nation to which they are enslaved I will judge,' says the Lord. 'And afterward they will come out and serve me in this place.'" He granted him the covenant of circumcision, and thus Isaac was born to him. The remainder of Stephen's speech likewise announces this identical God, present with Joseph and the patriarchs alike, who also conversed with Moses.

And that the entire teaching handed down by the Apostles announces a single, identical God — the one who brought forth Abraham, who gave him the promise of an inheritance, who established the covenant of circumcision at the appointed time, who called his descendants out of Egypt, keeping them distinct through circumcision, since he granted it as a mark so that they would not resemble the Egyptians — this same God as maker of all things, this same as Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, this same as God of glory — anyone who wishes may learn and see from these very words and from the Acts of the Apostles, that this one God exists, above whom there is no other. But if there were indeed another God above him, we would say, arguing from the abundance of his works by comparison, that this one is better than that other. For he is shown to be better by his works, as we have already said; and while those others can point to no work of their supposed Father, this one alone is shown to be God. If anyone, troubled by these questions, thinks that what the Apostles said about God must be understood allegorically, let him examine our foregoing arguments, in which we have shown that there is one God, founder and fashioner of everything that exists, and have refuted and laid bare what those others say; and he will find that our arguments agree with the teaching of the Apostles, and that things stand just as they taught and were persuaded — that there is one God, the fashioner of all things; and when he has driven from his mind that great error and that blasphemy against God, he will find in himself the reason for it, coming to know both the law given through Moses and the grace of the New Testament, each suited to its own era, both granted by that single, identical God for humanity's good.

For all those of perverse opinion, moved by the legislation given through Moses, considering it unlike and contrary to the teaching of the Gospel, never turned to inquire into the reasons for the differences between the two Testaments. Having thus abandoned the Father's love, and puffed up by Satan, they turned to the doctrine of Simon Magus, drifting in their thinking away from the one who truly is God, imagining that they themselves had discovered more than the Apostles, by inventing another God; and they suppose that the Apostles, still holding Jewish views, preached the Gospel, while they themselves are more sincere and wiser than the Apostles. Hence Marcion and his followers turned to mutilating the Scriptures, not acknowledging some of them at all, and trimming down Luke's Gospel and Paul's letters, declaring that only these, as they themselves have shortened them, are legitimate. We, however, will refute them, God granting it, even from what remains among them still preserved, in another treatise. As for the rest, all puffed up with the false name of knowledge, they too suppose that they have discovered more than the Apostles: they acknowledge Scriptures, but bring in two gods, set apart from one another, one good and one evil; while the followers of Valentinus, using more respectable names, speak of a Father and a Lord and a God, showing this to be the Fashioner — yet hold a purpose or sect that is more blasphemous still, for they say he was sent forth not from any of those beings within the Fullness, but from that defect which was cast out beyond the Pleroma. All this has been brought upon them by their ignorance of the Scriptures and of the dispensation of God. We, for our part, will treat both of the cause of the difference between the Testaments, and again of their unity and harmony, in what follows.

That the Apostles, then, and their disciples, taught just as the Church preaches, and that in teaching thus they were made perfect — for which reason also they were called to perfection — Stephen shows: for while teaching these very things, while still upon the earth, he saw the glory of God and Jesus at the right hand, and said, "Look — I see the sky torn open, and the Son of man standing at God's right hand." Having said this, he was stoned, and so fulfilled his perfect teaching, following in every way the pattern set by the master of martyrdom, and interceding on behalf of those who were putting him to death, saying, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." Thus were they made perfect, who knew one and the same God, present with the human race from beginning to end through varied dispensations — just as the prophet Hosea states: "I gave many visions, and through the prophets' hands I spoke in figures." Those, then, who gave up their lives even unto death for the Gospel of Christ — how could they have spoken according to some notion merely implanted in men by common opinion? Had they done this, they would not have suffered; but because they preached things contrary to what those who did not accept the truth believed, they therefore suffered. It is plain, then, that they did not abandon the truth, but preached with all boldness to both Jews and Greeks: to the Jews, that this Jesus whom they themselves had crucified is the Son of God, judge of the living and the dead, who has received from the Father an eternal kingdom in Israel, as we have shown; and to the Greeks, proclaiming one God who made all things, and his Son Jesus Christ.

This appears yet more plainly from the Apostles' letter, addressed not to Jews or Greeks but to those very Gentile converts who had already come to trust in Christ, strengthening that trust. For certain individuals had traveled down from Judea to Antioch — the very city where the Lord's disciples were first given the name Christians, because of their allegiance to Christ — and these men were urging believers to accept circumcision and observe the rest of the Law's requirements. Over this dispute Paul and Barnabas traveled up to Jerusalem to consult the other Apostles, and the entire congregation gathered together. Peter addressed them: "Brothers, you are aware that in earlier days God selected me from among you, so that through my own mouth the nations would hear the gospel message and come to trust it; and God, who reads the heart, vouched for them by granting them the Holy Spirit exactly as he did for us, drawing no line between us and them, purifying their hearts through faith. Why, then, do you now test God by placing on the disciples' necks a burden that neither our ancestors nor we ourselves could carry? No — we hold that it is by the favor of our Lord Jesus Christ that we will be saved, just as they will." James spoke next, saying: "Brothers, Simeon has explained how God first turned his attention to the nations, to draw from among them a people bearing his name. This matches what the prophets declared, as the writing states: 'After these events I will come back and rebuild David's fallen tent; I will restore its ruins and raise it up once more, so that the remainder of humanity may seek out the Lord — including every nation called by my name, says the Lord who accomplishes these things, known to him from ages past.' My judgment, therefore, is that we should not burden those Gentiles who are turning toward God, but rather instruct them to keep away from the defilement of idols, from sexual immorality, and from blood; and whatever they would not want done to themselves, they should not do to others." Once this had been said and everyone had reached agreement, they composed this letter: "The Apostles and the elder brothers, to the brothers of Gentile birth throughout Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia, greetings. We have learned that some who came from our number have unsettled you with their words, troubling your minds by insisting, 'You must undergo circumcision and observe the Law' — though we gave them no such directive. It therefore seemed right to us, having reached one mind, to select representatives and send them to you alongside our dear friends Barnabas and Paul, men who have risked their very lives for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ's name. We are accordingly sending Judas and Silas, who will confirm this decision to you in person, by speaking directly. For the Holy Spirit and we ourselves judged it best to place on you no heavier requirement than these essentials: that you keep away from what has been offered to idols, from blood, and from sexual immorality; and whatever you would not wish done to yourselves, refrain from doing to others. Keep clear of these things and you will do well, guided by the Holy Spirit." From all this it is evident that they were not teaching of some other Father, but were extending, through the Spirit, the new covenant of liberty to those newly coming to believe in God. And by the very fact that they inquired whether the disciples still needed to be circumcised or not, they plainly showed that they had no conception of any other God.

Yet they did not have such fear regarding the first Testament that they would not even eat together with the Gentiles. For Peter too, though sent for their instruction and struck by so great a vision, nevertheless addressed them with much caution, saying: "You yourselves know that it is not lawful for a Jewish man to associate with, or come near, one of another nation; but God has shown me that I should call no man common or unclean. Therefore I have come without objection" — by these words indicating that he would not have gone to them unless he had been commanded. Likewise he would not readily have granted baptism, unless he had heard them prophesying once the Holy Spirit came to rest upon them. And for this reason he said: "Can anyone forbid water for baptizing these, who have received the Holy Spirit just as we did?" — thereby persuading those who were with him, and showing that unless the Holy Spirit had rested upon them, there would have been someone to forbid their baptism. Now those around James, though the apostles freely permitted the Gentiles to act as they did, granting us this by the Spirit of God — these same men, since they knew the same God to be the true God, persevered in their former observances, so much so that even Peter, fearing that he would be blamed by them, though earlier he had shared meals with the Gentiles on account of the vision and of the Spirit resting upon them, when certain men arrived from James he drew back and refused to share their table; and Paul reported that Barnabas acted likewise. Thus the apostles, made by the Lord witnesses to everything he did and taught — for Peter and James and John are everywhere found standing together with him — conducted themselves scrupulously with regard to the ordinance of the law that is according to Moses, demonstrating that it came from one and the very same God. This they certainly would not have done, as we said before, if they had learned from the Lord of another Father besides him who made the ordinance of the law.

======== Book III — Chapter 13 ========

Against those who say that Paul alone, of the apostles, knew the truth. As for those who say that Paul alone knew the truth, to whom the mystery was made known by revelation, Paul himself refutes them, saying that one and the same God worked in Peter for the apostleship of the circumcision, and in himself for that of the Gentiles. Peter, then, was an apostle of that same God whose apostle Paul also was; and the God whom Peter proclaimed among the circumcision, and the Son of God, this same one Paul also proclaimed among the Gentiles. For our Lord did not come merely to save Paul, nor is God so lacking that he possessed but a single apostle to know his Son's plan. And Paul himself, saying, "How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good things, who preach peace," makes it clear that it was not one man only, but many, who preached the truth. And again in the letter to the Corinthians, after he had first named all who saw God after the resurrection, he adds: "Whether then it were I or they, thus we proclaim, and thus you came to believe" — thereby confessing one identical proclamation shared by all who beheld God once he had risen from among the dead.
And the Lord, when Philip wished to see the Father, answered him: "Have I been so long with you, and you have not known me, Philip? He who sees me sees the Father also. How do you say, Show us the Father? I dwell in the Father, and the Father dwells in me, and from this time you have known him, and have seen him." Those, then, to whom the Lord bore this witness — that they had come to know him and had seen the Father in him, the Father being truth itself — to claim that such men were ignorant of the truth is the speech of false witnesses, and of those estranged from the doctrine of Christ. For why would the Lord have sent the twelve apostles to the sheep that had perished from the house of Israel, if they did not know the truth? And how could the seventy have preached, unless they themselves had first known the truth of the preaching? Or how could Peter have been ignorant, he of whom the Lord testified that it was not flesh and blood that disclosed this to him, but rather the Father dwelling in heaven? So then, just as the apostle Paul received his gospel not from men, nor through a man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father — the Son bringing them to the Father, and the Father revealing to them the Son.
And that Paul agreed with those who had called him to the apostles concerning the question, and traveled up with Barnabas to meet them at Jerusalem, was not without purpose, but so that through them the freedom granted the Gentiles might be established — as he himself says: "Then, fourteen years later, I went up once more to Jerusalem together with Barnabas, bringing Titus along as well. And I went up according to a revelation, and laid before them the gospel that I preach among the Gentiles." And again he says: "To this we did not yield in subjection for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel might remain with you." If, then, anyone should carefully examine, from the Acts of the Apostles, the moment recorded when he traveled up to Jerusalem concerning this question, he will find that the years correspond to what Paul has set down. Thus Paul's own account and Luke's testimony concerning the apostles are consonant, and are, as it were, one and the same.

======== Book III — Chapter 14 ========

Concerning Luke, the follower of the apostles, and the things that we know from the Gospel through Luke alone.
That this Luke never left Paul's side, laboring together with him in the gospel, he himself shows clearly — not boasting of it, but carried along by the truth itself. For he says: "When we had parted from Paul, and from Barnabas, and from John called Mark, and had put out to sea for Cyprus, we arrived at Troas"; and after Paul had beheld, in a dream, a Macedonian man saying, "Cross over into Macedonia and help us, Paul," he says, "at once we looked to depart for Macedonia, concluding that the Lord had summoned us to bring them the good news. Putting out, then, from Troas, we ran a straight course to Samothrace" — and from there he carefully sets down the entire course of their travel up to Philippi, and how the word was first spoken there: "for we sat down," he says, "and spoke to the women assembled there"; and who believed, and their number. Again he says: "Yet we set sail out of Philippi once the days of unleavened bread were past, arriving at Troas, where we remained seven days." And he lays out everything that followed in sequence alongside Paul, recording with great care the places, the towns, and the tally of days, right up to their ascent to Jerusalem; and what befell Paul there, how he was sent in chains to Rome, the name of the centurion into whose charge he was given, the particulars of the ships, the wreck they endured, the island on which they were saved, the hospitality shown them there, Paul's healing of that island's leading man, and the length of their stay at Rome. Because Luke was present through all of this, he set it down carefully, so that no charge of falsehood or embellishment could touch him, since every detail held together, and since he was earlier than all those who now teach otherwise, and was no stranger to the truth. That he was not merely a companion but a genuine co-laborer of the apostles, Paul above all, Paul himself confirms in his letters, writing: "Demas has abandoned me, departing for Thessalonica; Crescens for Galatia, Titus for Dalmatia; only Luke remains with me" — thereby revealing that Luke stayed constantly at his side, never parted from him. And again, writing to the Colossians, he says: "Luke, the beloved physician, sends you greeting." If, then, Luke, who never ceased preaching alongside Paul, whom Paul called beloved, who proclaimed the gospel in his company, and who was charged with passing the gospel on to us, learned nothing from him beyond what his own words show — how can those never joined to Paul claim to possess concealed and unutterable mysteries? And that Paul taught openly what he himself knew, not merely to his companions but to everyone who would listen, he himself demonstrates plainly. For at Miletus, gathering the bishops and elders from Ephesus and the surrounding towns, since he was eager to reach Jerusalem in time for Pentecost, having testified many things and telling them of the trials awaiting him in that city, he added: "I know that none of you will see my face again; for that reason I declare to you on this very day that I bear no guilt for anyone's blood, for I did not hold back from proclaiming to you God's whole design. Watch, then, over yourselves and over the whole flock in which the Holy Spirit has appointed you as overseers, to shepherd the assembly belonging to the Lord, which he purchased through his own blood." Then, foretelling the corrupt teachers still to come, he said: "I know that once I have gone, fierce wolves will come among you, showing the flock no mercy, and from your own number men will rise up speaking twisted things to lure the disciples away after themselves." "I did not hold back," he says, "from proclaiming to you God's whole design." So the apostles, freely and withholding nothing from anyone, passed on to all what they themselves had received from the Lord. So too Luke, withholding nothing from anyone, passed down to us all that he had gathered from them, testifying to it himself in these words: "Just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word."
Now if anyone dismisses Luke as a man ignorant of the truth, he will openly be throwing away the very gospel he professes to follow. For very many and most necessary parts of the gospel we know through him — such as the birth of John, and the history of Zacharias, and the coming of the angel to Mary, and the exclamation of Elizabeth, and the coming down of the angels to the shepherds, and what these angels declared, and the testimony of Anna and Simeon concerning Christ, and that he was left behind in Jerusalem at twelve years old, and the baptism of John, and at what age the Lord was baptized, and that it fell in Tiberius Caesar's fifteenth year. And within his teaching, that saying spoken to the rich: "Woe to you rich, for you have received your consolation"; and, "Woe to you who are full, for you shall hunger; and you who laugh now, for you shall weep"; and, "Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for that is how their fathers treated the false prophets." All such things we know through Luke alone (and we have learned through him a great many of the acts of the Lord, which all make use of) — such as the great haul of fish those with Peter took in when they let down their nets at the Lord's bidding; and the woman who for eighteen years had suffered and was healed on the sabbath day; and the man with dropsy, whom the Lord healed on the sabbath day, and how he defended his healing on that day; and how he taught his first disciples not to seek the first places at table; and that the poor and the weak, who have no means to repay, ought to be invited; and the man who knocked at night to get loaves, and obtained them because of his persistent importunity; and how, as he reclined at table with the Pharisee, the sinful woman covered his feet with kisses and rubbed them with perfumed oil, and everything the Lord told Simon about the two debtors; and the parable of the rich man who hoarded what had been given him, to whom it was said, "This very night your soul is demanded of you; and the things you have laid up, to whom shall they belong?" — and likewise the account of the rich man dressed in purple who dined sumptuously, and of poor Lazarus; and how he responded when his disciples asked him, "Increase our faith"; and the conversation he had with Zacchaeus the tax collector; and the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector who prayed together in the temple; and the ten lepers whom he cleansed together on the road; and how he commanded that the lame and the blind be gathered from the streets and lanes to the wedding feast; and the parable of the judge who did not fear God, whom the persistent widow made to avenge her; and of the fig tree that was in the vineyard and bore no fruit. And there are many other things that can be found spoken by Luke alone, which both Marcion and Valentinus make use of. And beyond all these, what he spoke to his disciples on the road after the resurrection, and how they recognized him in the breaking of bread.
It is necessary, then, that they either accept the rest of what was said by him as well, or reject these things too. For it is not permitted to those who have any sense to accept some of the things said by Luke, as though they were true, and to reject others, as though he had not known the truth. If indeed those who follow Marcion reject them, they will have no gospel at all; for by cutting down the Gospel according to Luke, as we said before, they boast of possessing a gospel; while those who follow Valentinus will cease from most of their vain talk, for it is from this Gospel that they have taken many occasions for their subtle speech, daring to give a wrong interpretation to what was well said by Luke. But if they are compelled to accept the rest as well, giving heed to the complete gospel and to the teaching of the apostles, they must repent, so that they may be saved from their peril.

======== Book III — Chapter 15 ========

Against those who reject the Apostle Paul.
We say the same thing again to those who do not acknowledge the Apostle Paul: either they must renounce the rest of the Gospel's words, which have come to our knowledge through Luke alone, and not use them; or, if they accept all of that, they are bound to accept also that testimony which concerns Paul, where he himself tells how the Lord first spoke to him from heaven: 'Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? I am Jesus Christ, whom you are persecuting'; and then how he says of him: 'Go, for he is a chosen vessel to me, to bear my name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel; for I will make clear to him what great things he is destined to endure on behalf of my name.' As for those who refuse the one chosen by God for this purpose, that he might confidently bear his name, sent as he was to the Gentiles we have spoken of, despise the Lord's own choice and cut themselves off from the company of the Apostles. For they cannot argue that Paul is not an Apostle, when he was chosen precisely for this; nor can they show Luke to be a liar, since he announces the truth to us with all diligence. Perhaps indeed it was for this very reason that God brought it about that many things of the Gospel should be shown through Luke, which all would need to use, so that by following his subsequent testimony concerning the acts and teaching of the Apostles, all who follow it, holding the rule of truth unadulterated, might be saved. His testimony, then, is true, and the teaching of the Apostles is open and firm, withholding nothing, and teaching nothing secretly that differs from what they teach openly.
For this is the contrivance of impostors and wicked seducers and hypocrites, as those who belong to Valentinus do. For before the crowd, for the sake of those who belong to the Church, whom in their own vocabulary they term 'common' and 'ecclesiastical', they put forward statements by which they ensnare the more simple and entice them, imitating our own manner of teaching, so that these people may hear them more often; and indeed they already complain of us, that though they hold views similar to ours, we needlessly hold ourselves back from communion with them, and even though their statements resemble ours and their teaching matches ours, we brand them heretics. And when, through the questions they raise, they have cast some down from the faith and made their hearers unable to answer them, then, apart from the rest, they recount to them the ineffable mystery of their 'fullness.' But all who suppose they can learn the truth from mere plausibility of words are deceived. For error is persuasive and plausible, and skilled in dressing itself up; but truth is without adornment, and for this reason it was entrusted to little children. And if any of those who hear them should seek solutions or contradict them, such a one they declare, straightaway, not to have grasped the truth, and not to have within him the seed from his mother that comes from the higher realms; of him they say nothing further at all, calling him one of the 'middle,' that is, one of the 'psychic' or soul-bound sort. But if someone, like a little sheep, hands himself over to them, having attained their initiation and their redemption, such a one becomes puffed up, and supposes himself to be neither in heaven nor on earth, but to have already entered into the Pleroma and to have already embraced his own angel—while among those who say that the man who comes from above ought to live a good life, they for this reason also affect a certain solemn gravity. But most of them, having become scornful, as if already perfect, live without reverence and in contempt of others, calling themselves 'spiritual,' and claiming already to know that place of refreshment which is within their Pleroma.
But let us return to the same discussion. For since it has been clearly shown that those who were preachers of the truth and Apostles of freedom called no other being God, nor named any other Lord, than the single true God, the Father, together with his Word, which governs all things, it will be plainly demonstrated that they confess the maker of heaven and earth, who spoke with Moses and gave him the ordinance of the law, who called the fathers, to be the Lord God, and that they know no other. The judgment, then, both of the Apostles and of their disciples concerning God is made clear from their own words.

======== Book III — Chapter 16 ========

What the Apostles' judgment is concerning our Lord Jesus Christ. Given that certain people claim Jesus was nothing more than a vessel for Christ, into whom Christ descended from above like a dove, and that after he had made known the unnameable Father, he departed incomprehensibly and invisibly into the Pleroma—for they say he was apprehended neither by men, nor even by the powers and virtues that are in heaven—and that Jesus is indeed the son, but the Father is Christ, and God is the father of Christ; while others hold that he suffered only in appearance, being by nature incapable of suffering; and those who belong to Valentinus say that the Jesus who came by the 'dispensation' is the one who passed through Mary, and that it was into him that the Savior from above descended—the one they also call Christ, since he takes the name of all who had sent him forth—and that he who was of the dispensation shared in something of his power and of his name, so that death might be abolished through him, and that the Father might be known through him; while they say the Savior himself who descended from above, whom they also call the receptacle of Christ and of the whole fullness, though with their tongue confessing one Christ Jesus, are in fact divided in their judgment (for this, as we said before, is their rule: that they speak of one Christ who was sent forth beforehand by the Only-Begotten for the correction of the fullness, and another Savior sent to bring the Father glory, and still another—the one 'of the dispensation'—whom they also claim suffered, who returns into the Pleroma, that is, the Savior who bore Christ)—we are compelled to bring forward the whole judgment of the Apostles concerning our Lord Jesus Christ, and to show not only that they thought nothing of this kind about him, but further, that they foretold through the Holy Spirit that there would arise men who, sent forth by Satan, would begin to teach such things, in order to overturn the faith of some and draw them away from life.

======== Book III — Chapter 17 ========

Proof that Christ the Word is one and the same. That John recognizes a single, identical Word of God—this one being the Only-Begotten, this one having become flesh for our salvation—Jesus Christ our Lord—we have already shown sufficiently from John's own words. But Matthew too, recognizing this same single Jesus Christ, laying out that birth of his which follows the human line, from the Virgin—just as God pledged to David that he would set upon the throne, from the fruit of his own body, an everlasting King, having given that same pledge earlier still to Abraham—writes: 'A record of the origin of Jesus Christ, descendant of David, descendant of Abraham.' Then, to clear our mind of any doubt concerning Joseph, he writes: 'The origin of Christ came about thus. His mother Mary, while pledged in marriage to Joseph, before their union, was discovered to be carrying a child by the Holy Spirit.' Then, when Joseph considered sending Mary away quietly, since she was with child, an angel of God appeared to him and said: 'Have no fear in taking Mary as your wife, for what she carries comes from the Holy Spirit; she will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for it is he who will rescue his people from their sins. All this took place so that what the Lord had spoken through the prophet would be fulfilled: See, a virgin will conceive and bear a son, and his name will be called Emmanuel,' which is translated, 'God with us'—clearly revealing that the promise given to the fathers stands fulfilled, in that the Son of God came into being from a virgin, and that this very one is the Christ and Savior the prophets had foretold—not, as they themselves claim, that Jesus is merely the one born of Mary while Christ is a separate being who descended from above. Otherwise Matthew might simply have written, 'Now the origin of Jesus came about thus'; instead the Holy Spirit, foreseeing the corrupters and guarding against their deceit, had Matthew write, 'Now the origin of Christ came about thus'; and given that this one is Emmanuel, lest we take him for a mere man—seeing that the Word became flesh through neither fleshly desire nor human will, but through the will of God—we ought not imagine Jesus to be someone distinct from Christ, but should recognize them as one and the same. Paul explained this very point writing to the Romans: 'Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ, singled out for the Gospel of God, announced beforehand by his prophets in the sacred writings, regarding his Son, who came from David's line according to the flesh, and who was marked out as Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, through rising from among the dead—Jesus Christ our Lord.' And again, addressing the Romans concerning Israel, he writes: 'To them belong the patriarchs, and from them, according to the flesh, comes Christ, who is God over all things, blessed for ever.' And again, in his letter to the Galatians: 'But when the appointed time arrived, God sent out his Son, born of a woman, born subject to the law, so as to buy back those held under the law, that we might obtain adoption as sons'—clearly revealing that there is one God, who made the promise about the Son through the prophets; and one Jesus Christ our Lord, descended from David according to that birth which comes through Mary; this same one destined to be Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, through rising from among the dead, so that he might be firstborn of the dead just as he is firstborn of the whole creation; the Son of God rendered Son of Man, so that through him we might obtain that adoption, humanity taking up, receiving, and holding fast the Son of God.
For this reason Mark too writes: 'The start of the good news of Jesus Christ, Son of God, just as it stands written in the prophets'—acknowledging one identical Son of God, Jesus Christ, foretold by the prophets, who is, from the fruit of David's body, Emmanuel, the herald of the mighty counsel of the Father, by whom God brought about, for the house of David, the rising of the Dayspring and the Just One, raising up for him a horn of salvation and lifting up his witness in Jacob—just as David, explaining the grounds of his lineage, states: 'He set up a decree in Israel, so that a coming generation might come to know it—the children yet to be born—who would in turn rise and declare it to their own children, so that they would fix their trust in God and search out his commands.' And again the angel, delivering good news to Mary, states: 'This one will be great and will be named Son of the Most High, and the Lord, his God, will grant him the throne of David his father'—acknowledging him who is Son of the Highest to be this same one whom David also names his own son. And it was concerning this same one that David, knowing through the Spirit the plan of his coming, by which he holds dominion over all the living and the dead, acknowledged him as Lord, seated at the right hand of the Father Most High. And Simeon too, who had received word from the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Christ, the Lord's Anointed, took this one, the firstborn of the Virgin, into his arms, praised God, and declared: 'Now, Master, release your servant, according to your word, in peace, for my eyes have witnessed your salvation, which you have made ready before the face of every people: a light for revealing to the Gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel'—acknowledging that the infant held in his arms, born of Mary, is himself the Christ, the Son of God, a light for all, and the glory belonging to Israel itself, and the peace and rest of those who have fallen asleep.
For already he was stripping men bare, taking away their ignorance and giving them instead the knowledge of himself, and making a division among those who came to know him, just as Isaiah says: 'Call his name, Swift is the plunder, speedy is the spoil.' These, then, are the works of Christ. He, then, was the Christ whom Simeon, holding him, blessed the Most High for; whom the shepherds glorified God on hearing of; whom John, while still in his mother's womb, recognized as Lord while that Lord was still in the Virgin's womb, and greeted him with joy; whom the Magi, seeing and worshiping and offering the gifts we mentioned before, and prostrating themselves before the eternal King, went home by a different route, no longer going back along the road of the Assyrians. For 'before the child comes to know how to call upon father or mother, he will take up the strength of Damascus and the plunder of Samaria, in the face of the king of Assyria'—hidden, yet powerfully bringing all things to light, since the Lord waged war on Amalek with an unseen hand. For this reason too he rescued the children in the house of David, who happened by providence to be born in that same season, so that he could dispatch them ahead of himself into his own kingdom; he himself, while yet an infant, preparing infant men as martyrs on behalf of Christ, who came into the world at Bethlehem in Judah, the city of David, slain in accordance with the Scriptures.
For this reason too the Lord, after rising, said to his disciples: 'You senseless ones, sluggish in heart to trust everything the prophets declared. Was it not necessary for the Christ to endure these very things before entering into his glory?' And again he told them: 'These are my own words, spoken to you while I was still among you—that everything set down concerning me across the Law given through Moses, the writings of the Prophets, and the Psalms had to reach fulfillment.' Then he opened their minds, so they could grasp the Scriptures, and said to them: 'So it stands written, that Christ would suffer, and rise from the dead, and that turning from sin and forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in his name to every nation.' And this is the one who was born of Mary. For, as he states, 'it is necessary for the Son of Man to endure much, to be cast aside, put to death, and to rise on the third day.' No other Son of Man, then, does the Gospel recognize besides this one born of Mary, who likewise suffered; nor does it recognize any Christ who fled the passion by abandoning Jesus beforehand; rather it recognizes this very one who was born, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and knows that this same one, once he had suffered, rose again—just as John, the Lord's disciple, affirms, saying: 'These things stand written so that you would come to trust that Jesus, God's own Son, is the Christ, and that trusting this you would hold life unending through his name'—anticipating in advance these blasphemous systems which, for their part, split the Lord apart, claiming he was composed of one substance and another. For this reason too he bore witness to us thus in his letter: 'Little children, it is the final hour; and just as you heard that Antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have already appeared; by this we recognize that it is the final hour. They departed from our company, yet they never truly belonged to us; had they belonged to us, they would certainly have stayed among us; but they left, so it would become plain that not all of them are truly ours. Know, then, that no falsehood has any part in the truth, nor comes from the truth. Who is the liar, if not the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? Such a one is the Antichrist.'
That all those we have named, though with their tongue they confess one Jesus Christ, mock themselves, thinking one thing while saying another. For their arguments are varied, as we have shown: one group proclaims that the one who suffered and was born is Christ, and that he is different from the Demiurge's own — that is, from the one who is by "dispositio," or from the one who is from Joseph, whom they argue to be passible — while another of their Christs, they say, descended from the invisible and unspeakable realms, and this one they affirm to be invisible, incomprehensible, and impassible. In this they wander from the truth, because their opinion falls away from him who is truly God. They do not know that the only-begotten Word of this God, who is always present to the human race, joined and blended with his own handiwork in keeping with the Father's benevolent will, and became flesh, being that very Jesus Christ our Lord and Master — who also suffered for us, and rose again for us, and will come again in the glory of the Father, to raise up all flesh, to show forth salvation, and to display the rule of just judgment to all who have been made subject to him. There is, therefore, as we have shown, a single God who is Father, and a single Christ who is Jesus our Lord, who passes through the whole economy and gathers all things together within himself (Eph. 1). Now man, the handiwork of God, is contained among "all things"; therefore in summing up man in himself he became visible though invisible, comprehensible though incomprehensible, and passible though impassible; and the Word became man, drawing all things together within his own person — so that, even as the Word of God possesses the chief place in the realm above the heavens, spiritual and unseen, so likewise he might possess the chief place in the realm that is seen and bodily, taking to himself the primacy, and setting himself as head of the Church, that he may draw all things to himself at the fitting time.
For with him nothing is out of order or untimely, just as nothing is incongruous with the Father. All these things were foreknown by the Father, but they are accomplished by the Son, as is fitting and consistent, at the proper time. For this reason, when Mary was hastening toward the wondrous sign of the wine, and wished to partake of the shortcut cup before the time, the Lord, restraining her untimely haste, said: "What have I to do with you, woman? My hour has not yet come" — awaiting that hour which had been foreknown by the Father. For this reason too, when men often wished to seize him, "no one," it says, "laid hands on him"; for the hour of his seizure had not yet come, nor the time of the passion, which had been foreknown by the Father, just as the prophet Habakkuk also says... But Paul too says: "When the completion of the appointed time arrived, God dispatched his own Son." By which it is made clear that all the things which had been foreknown by the Father, our Lord accomplished in their foreknown order, time, and hour — he being one and the same, yet rich and manifold. For he serves the rich and manifold will of the Father, since he himself is the one who rescues those being rescued, and rules as Lord over those under his rule, and stands as God of the things that were made, and the only-begotten of the Father, and the Christ who was preached, and the Word of God made incarnate, when the fullness of time had come, in which it was fitting for the Son of Man to become the Son of God. All those, therefore, are outside the divine economy who, under the pretense of knowledge, understand one Jesus and another Christ, and another Only-begotten, and yet another Word again distinct from him, and another Savior — whom the disciples of this error call an emission of the Aeons who fell into deficiency. Outwardly these are sheep, for by the speech they use externally they appear like us, speaking the same things we speak, but inwardly they are wolves. For their opinion is murderous, fabricating many gods and feigning many fathers, and cutting up and dividing the Son of God into many pieces. Against these the Lord warned us to be on guard, and his disciple John, in the epistle mentioned above, commanded us to flee from them, saying: "Many seducers have gone forth into this world, refusing to acknowledge that Jesus Christ arrived in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the Antichrist. Watch yourselves, that you do not lose what you have worked for." And again in the epistle he says: "Many false prophets... By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that severs Jesus Christ apart is not from God, but belongs instead to the Antichrist." This matches what is stated in the Gospel, namely that the Word became flesh and took up dwelling among us. For which reason he cries out again in the epistle: "Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God" — knowing one and the same Jesus Christ, to whom the gates of heaven are openly shown on account of his taking on of flesh; who will likewise return in that identical flesh in which he bore suffering, unveiling his Father's splendor.
And Paul too, in agreement with this, addressing the Romans, says: "Much more shall those who receive the abundance of grace and of righteousness reign unto life through the one Jesus Christ." He therefore does not know one who flew away as "Christ" apart from Jesus, nor does he know as Savior the one who is above and whom they call impassible. For if one suffered while another remained impassible, and one was born while the other descended into the one who was born and then left him again — then not one but two are shown. But since the Apostle knows him as one — both the one who was born and the one who suffered — as Christ Jesus, he says: "Just as Christ rose from the dead, so we too should walk in newness of life." And again, signifying that Christ underwent suffering and that this very one is God's own Son, who perished on our behalf and bought us back with his own blood at the fitting moment, he says: "For while we were still weak, Christ died for the ungodly at the right time. God demonstrates his own love for us in this, that while we were yet sinners, Christ perished for us; how much more, then, being now made righteous by his blood, shall we be rescued through him from wrath. For if, when we stood as foes, we were brought back into harmony with God through his Son's death, how much more, now restored, shall we be rescued by his life." This same one who was seized and suffered and poured out his blood for us — this Christ, this Son of God — he most plainly proclaims, who also rose and was taken up into the heavens, as he himself says, and likewise: "Christ died, or rather rose again, who is at the right hand of God"; and again: "knowing that Christ, once raised up from among the dead, will die no longer." For, foreseeing by the Spirit the subdivisions introduced by wicked teachers, and wishing to cut off every occasion for their dissension, he said what was foretold: "But if the Spirit of the one who awakened Jesus from among the dead makes his home in you, the one who awakened Christ from among the dead will likewise vivify your mortal bodies." With this single testimony he cries out, as it were, to those willing to hear: "Do not err; one and the same is Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who through his suffering restored us to harmony with God, and was raised up from among the dead, and sits at the Father's right side, and lacks nothing in his perfection — who, when he was struck, did not strike back; who, when he suffered, did not threaten; and when he endured tyranny, prayed the Father to forgive those who had crucified him. He himself is the true deliverer; he himself is God's own Word; he himself the sole-begotten of the Father, namely Christ Jesus our Lord." Concerning him who descended by the Spirit itself, the Apostles could never have said that Christ descended into Jesus, or that the higher Savior descended into the one belonging to the dispensation, or that the one from the invisible realms descended into the one belonging to the Demiurge. They neither knew nor said any such thing; had they known it, they would certainly have said it. But what was the case, that is what they said: that the Spirit of God came down upon him in the manner of a dove — this Spirit concerning whom Isaiah declared, "And the Spirit of God shall settle upon him," as we have said before. And again: "Upon me rests the Spirit of the Lord, for he has anointed me." This is the Spirit of whom the Lord says: "For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you." And again, giving the disciples the power of regeneration in God, he said to them: "Go, make disciples of every nation, immersing them into the title of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit." For he promised to pour out this Spirit through the prophets in the last days upon his servants and handmaids, that they might prophesy; and hence he descended also upon the Son of God become Son of Man, becoming used to make his home together with him among mankind, and to rest upon men, and to dwell in the handiwork of God, working the Father's will in them, and renewing them from oldness into the newness of Christ. This Spirit David sought for the human race, saying: "Confirm me with your governing Spirit." This is the Spirit whom Luke says descended upon the disciples at Pentecost after the Lord's ascension, having the power to open the way of life to all nations, and to open the new Testament; whence, joining together in all tongues, they sang a hymn to God, the Spirit bringing the scattered tribes into unity and offering the firstfruits of all nations to the Father. Hence too the Lord promised to send the Paraclete, who would fit us to God. For just as one lump cannot be made from dry wheat without moisture, nor one loaf; so neither could we, being many, become one in Christ Jesus, without the water that comes from heaven. And just as dry earth, if it does not receive moisture, bears no fruit, so we too, being originally dry wood, could never have yielded life-giving fruit apart from that freely-given rain descending from on high. For our bodies received unity, through the washing that leads to incorruption, and our souls received it through the Spirit. For this reason both are necessary, since both work together unto the life of God — our Lord having mercy on that Samaritan woman, that sinful woman, who had not kept to a single husband but had strayed into fornication through several marriages, and showing her, and promising her, living water, so that she would no longer thirst, nor be troubled with the laborious task of drawing water, having within her a spring welling up to eternal life — which the Lord, having received as a gift from the Father, himself also bestowed on those who share in him, sending the Holy Spirit into all the earth.
Foreseeing this grace of the gift, that Gideon of Israel, whom God selected to deliver the people of Israel out of the grip of foreign powers, changed his request, and prophesied a coming dryness upon the fleece of wool on which alone at first the dew had fallen — the fleece being a type of the people — that is, that God's Holy Spirit would no longer belong to them, just as Isaiah says: "I will command the clouds that they rain no more upon it"; but that dew, namely the Spirit of God that came down upon the Lord — the spirit granting wisdom and understanding, the spirit granting counsel and strength, the spirit granting knowledge and reverence, the spirit of fearing God — would descend over the whole earth. This same Spirit he gave again to the Church, sending the Paraclete from the heavens into all the earth, where too the Lord said he saw the devil cast down like lightning. Wherefore the dew of God is necessary to us, that we may not be burned up, nor become unfruitful; and where an accuser stands against us, there we may likewise possess an Advocate — the Lord entrusting to the Holy Spirit that man of his own who had fallen among bandits, on whom he himself had mercy, and whose wounds he bound up, giving two royal denarii, so that through the Spirit, receiving the image and inscription of the Father and the Son, we might bear fruit with the coin entrusted to us, returning it multiplied to the Lord's account.
Thus, the Spirit having descended upon this economy foretold, and the sole-begotten Son of God, being likewise the Father's Word, arriving once the appointed time had reached its completion, taking on human flesh for humanity's sake, and carrying out every element of the economy pertaining to man — Jesus Christ our Lord being one and the same, as the Lord himself testifies, the Apostles confess, and the prophets proclaim — all the doctrine of those who have invented supposed Ogdoads and Tetrads and devised subdivisions is shown to be false. For they do away with the Spirit, and understand one Christ and another Jesus, and hold that there was never a single Christ but rather several; and should they claim these are joined together, they nevertheless again show that one of them shared in the passion while the other remained impassible; that one ascended into the Pleroma while the other remained in the intermediate region; that one feasts and takes delight among the invisible and unnameable beings, while the other sits beside the Demiurge, emptying him of his power. For this reason it will be necessary for you, and for all who attend to this Scripture and are anxious for their own salvation, not to give way of your own accord when you hear their talk from outside. For though they speak things similar to the faithful, as we have said before, they hold not merely dissimilar but contrary opinions, and are, in every regard, laden with blasphemous claims, through which they ruin those who, misled by the resemblance of the wording, absorb into themselves the poison of their unlike disposition — just as one who gives gypsum mixed with water instead of milk deceives by the similarity of color, as someone before us has said, regarding all who, by whatever means, taint what belongs to God and falsify the truth: "Gypsum is wickedly mixed in with God's milk."

======== Book III — Chapter 19 ========

For what cause the Word of God became flesh; and, Against those who say that he appeared only in seeming.
We have clearly demonstrated that the Word, who existed from the beginning alongside God, the one by whose agency all things came into being, and who likewise abode continually beside the human race throughout every age, was in the final era, at the season the Father had fixed beforehand, joined to his own handiwork and made a man capable of suffering. Thus every objection of those who say, "If then he was born at that time, he was not Christ before," falls away. For we have already demonstrated that the Son of God had no such beginning of his existence, seeing he abides eternally alongside the Father; rather, once he took flesh and became man, he gathered up in his own person the whole long course of mankind, securing salvation for us by a shortened path, so that whatever we had forfeited in Adam - that is, existing after the image and likeness of God - we might regain in Christ Jesus.
For since it was not possible for the man who had once been conquered and struck down through disobedience to be reformed and obtain the victory by himself, and since again it was impossible for one who had fallen under sin to receive salvation, the Son, being the Word of God, accomplished both: descending from the Father, being made incarnate, descending even to death, and completing the dispensation of our salvation. Urging us to trust in him unhesitatingly, he says once more: "Do not say in your heart, Who will go up into heaven?" - meaning, to fetch Christ down; "or, Who will go down into the abyss?" - meaning, to bring Christ up again from among the dead; then he continues: "For if with your mouth you acknowledge the Lord Jesus, and in your heart believe that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." And he stated the reason the Word of God did so, saying: "For Christ died and returned to life for this very purpose, that he might be Lord over both the dead and the living." And again, writing to the Corinthians, he says: "We preach Christ Jesus, and him crucified." And he goes on: "The cup of blessing that we bless - is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? Who then is it that has given us a share of these foods? Is it the one they falsely portray as the Christ from above, extended over Horos, who shaped their mother - or is it instead Emmanuel, born of the virgin, who ate curds and honey, of whom the prophet asks: "He is but a man, so who will recognize him?" This is the very one Paul proclaimed: "For I handed on to you as of first importance," he says, "what Christ suffered for our transgressions in fulfillment of what was written, and that he was entombed, and on the third day was raised in fulfillment of the writings."
It is plain, then, that Paul recognizes no Christ apart from this single one, who underwent suffering, was laid in the tomb, and rose to life again, and who was likewise born and is called man by him. For when he had said, "But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead," he went on to explain the ground of his incarnation: "For since death came by a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also by a man." And throughout, whenever he speaks of our Lord's passion, his humanity, and his being killed, he uses the name Christ, as in this passage: "Do not let your food destroy the one on whose behalf Christ gave up his life." And again: "But now, joined to Christ Jesus, you who were once distant have been drawn near through the blood of Christ." And again: "Christ bought us back from the law's curse by becoming accursed on our behalf; for it stands written, Cursed is everyone hung upon a tree." And again: "And through your knowledge the weak one perishes, the brother on whose behalf Christ gave up his life" - showing thereby that it was no impassible Christ who came down into Jesus, but Jesus Christ himself, in his own person, who suffered on our account: the one who was laid low and rose again, who came down and went up, the Son of God rendered Son of Man, exactly as his name signifies. For within the very title "Christ" is contained both the anointer and the one anointed, together with the anointing by which he was anointed. And the Father is indeed the anointer, while the Son is the one anointed, in the Spirit, who serves as the anointing; just as the word declares through Isaiah: "The Spirit of the Lord rests upon me, for he has anointed me" - pointing at once to the Father who anoints, the Son who is anointed, and the Spirit, who is the anointing itself.
And the Lord himself makes manifest the one who suffered. For when he had asked his disciples, "Whom do men say that the Son of Man is?" and Peter had answered, "You are the Christ," the Lord declared that this had not been revealed to him by flesh and blood, but by the Father, who dwells in the heavens - making it manifest that this Son of Man just spoken of is the Christ, the Son of God. "From that time," it says, "he began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem, and endure much at the hands of the priests, and be rejected, and undergo crucifixion, and rise again on the third day." It was this very one, whom Peter had acknowledged as the Christ - the one Peter had called blessed, because the Father had disclosed to him the Son of the living God - who declared that he himself must endure much and undergo crucifixion. And thereupon he reproved Peter, who, holding the view common among men, imagined him to be a Christ incapable of suffering and turned aside from his passion; and he said to the disciples: "If anyone wishes to walk behind me, let that one renounce self and shoulder his own cross, accompanying me. For whoever chooses to keep his life shall forfeit it, while whoever gives up his life on my account shall keep it." Christ stated this without disguise, being himself the Savior of those who, through confessing him, would be handed over to death and forfeit their lives. But if he himself were exempt from suffering, and only Jesus suffered, why then did he urge his own followers to shoulder the cross and accompany him - a cross which, on their account, he himself supposedly never bore, but had set aside as though it were merely the outward staging of the passion? That he is not speaking here of some acknowledgment of a "cross from above," as certain ones venture to construe it, but of the real suffering he himself was about to undergo, and which his followers would likewise undergo, is evident from what comes next: "For whoever wants to keep his life will forfeit it, and whoever forfeits it will find it." And because his followers were destined to suffer for his sake, he told the Jews: "See, I am sending you prophets, sages, and men learned in the law, and some among that number you will put to death and hang upon a cross"; and to his disciples he said: "Before rulers and kings you will be brought to stand for my sake, and some of you they will flog, and execute, and hound from town to town." He knew, then, both those destined for persecution and those who would be scourged and slain on his account; and he speaks not of some separate cross, but of the very suffering he himself would undergo first, and his followers afterward. His words, then, were also meant to encourage them: "Have no fear of those who can kill the body but not the soul; fear instead the one who has the power to destroy both soul and body in hell," and to hold fast to the confessions made in his name. For he himself vowed to acknowledge before the Father those who acknowledged his name before others, but to disown those who disowned him, and to shame those who were ashamed to confess him. Given this, some have gone so far in recklessness as to scorn the martyrs themselves and mock those slain for confessing the Lord, who bear all that the Lord foretold, and who, following this pattern, strive to walk the same road the Lord walked toward death, becoming martyrs in turn - whom indeed we ourselves acknowledge as genuine witnesses. For when their blood is required, and they obtain glory, then all those who dishonored them shall be put to shame by Christ.
And from the fact that the Lord said on the cross, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do," both the patience and the goodness of Christ are shown - that he himself both suffered, and himself made excuse for those who had treated him badly. For the Word of God, who instructed us, "Show love to your enemies, and offer prayer for those who hold you in hatred," himself carried this out upon the cross, loving the human race so greatly that he made intercession even for those who were putting him to death. But if anyone should judge these things as belonging to two distinct beings, he will find the one who, amid his very wounds and stripes and all the other things they did against him, was beneficent - who did not remember the malice done against him, who felt no injury nor reproach, though he was in fact the one who bore them all away - to be far better, more patient, and truly good. This same difficulty confronts also those who say that he suffered only in appearance. For if he did not truly suffer, there is no thanks due to him, since there was no real suffering at all; and when we ourselves come to suffer in reality, he will appear to be deceiving us, exhorting us to endure what he himself did not endure in truth - just as he deceived them, in seeming to be to them what he was not, so he deceives us also, exhorting us to bear what he himself did not bear. We would then even surpass our Master, in that we suffer and endure things which our Master neither suffered nor endured. But since our Lord alone is truly the Master, and truly good, and truly the Son of God who suffered, being the Word of God the Father made Son of Man - for he struggled and conquered; for he was man contending on behalf of the fathers, and through obedience did away with disobedience completely; for he tied up the mighty one and released the powerless, granting salvation to his own handiwork by putting sin to ruin. For the Lord is most compassionate and merciful, and loves the human race.
Thus he caused man to cleave to and be united with God, as we have said before. For had man not gotten the better of mankind's adversary, that adversary could not rightly be said to be beaten. And again, had God not bestowed salvation, we would hold it insecurely. And had man not been brought into union with God, he could never have shared in incorruptibility. For it befitted the Mediator between God and men, through his own relation to both, to bring the two together into concord and friendship, causing God to receive man to himself and man to yield himself to God. For by what other means could we share in sonship's adoption, had we not received, by way of the Son, communion with him who is himself the source of it - had not his Word, once made flesh, come into fellowship with us? For this cause he traveled through every phase of human life, giving back to each of them fellowship with God. Those, then, who claim he was shown only in outward appearance, and was neither truly born in flesh nor truly made man, still lie under the old sentence, lending support to sin - for according to their view, death, which held sway from Adam down to Moses even over those who had not sinned in a manner resembling Adam's transgression, remains unconquered. For when the law came, which was given through Moses, and testified concerning sin that it was a sinner, it took away indeed its kingdom, exposing it as a robber and not a rightful ruler, and showing it to be a murderer; but it laid a burden upon man, who had sin within him, showing him to be liable to death. For being spiritual, the law only made sin manifest, but did not destroy it - for sin held dominion not over the Spirit, but over man. It was necessary, therefore, that the one who was to begin the destruction of sin, and to redeem man who was liable to the debt of death, should himself become that very thing which man was - that is, a man, who had been dragged into servitude by sin, and was held fast by death, so that sin might be put to death by means of man, and man might go forth from death. For just as, through the disobedience of that single man first shaped from unworked soil, the many were rendered sinners and forfeited life, so it was fitting that, through the obedience of that single man first born of a virgin, the many would be set right and gain salvation. Thus the Word of God became man, as Moses also says: "God, his works are true." But if he who appeared as flesh had not truly become flesh, his work would not have been true. But what appeared, that also he truly was: God, recapitulating in himself the ancient formation of man, so that he might destroy sin, and empty death of its power, and give life to man - and for this reason his works are true.

======== Book III — Chapter 20 ========

Against those who claim he was fathered by Joseph.
But then again, those who hold that he was plainly nothing more than a man, fathered by Joseph, remain enslaved to the age-old disobedience and subject to death, since they have not yet accepted, through the Son, the liberty coming from the Word of God the Father, as he himself declares: "If the Son sets you free, you will truly be free." And being unaware of him who is Emmanuel, born of the Virgin, they go without his gift, namely everlasting life; and refusing the Word of incorruption, they stay bound in perishable flesh, owing a debt to death, having never taken hold of the remedy that gives life. To such people the Word speaks, proclaiming his own gracious gift: "I have said, You are gods, and all of you children of the Most High; yet you will perish as mortals do." He undoubtedly addresses this to those who refuse the gift of adoption but instead scorn the untainted begetting of the Word of God made flesh, cheating man of the upward path leading to the Lord, and proving thankless toward the Word of God who took on flesh on their behalf. For it was to this end that the Word of God took on manhood, and the one who is Son of God became Son of Man, so that man, joined to the Word of God and taking hold of adoption, might be made a son of God. For we could gain incorruption and deathlessness in no other way than by being brought into union with incorruption and deathlessness themselves. Yet how could we have entered union with incorruption and deathlessness, unless these had first become what we ourselves are, so that the perishable might be swallowed up in incorruption, and the mortal in deathlessness, granting us the status of adopted sons...
Therefore who shall declare his generation? For he is man, and who shall know him? But he knows him to whom the Father who is in heaven has revealed it, so that he may understand that he who was born not of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man—this Son of Man—is the Christ, God's own Son, sprung of the living God. For since not one of the sons of Adam is called God, nor rightly styled Lord, above all the men who then existed, but he alone is God, and Lord, and eternal King, and Only-begotten, and the Word made flesh—proclaimed by all the prophets, and the Apostles, and by the Spirit himself—this is plain to see for all who have touched even a little upon the truth. But the Scriptures would not testify these things of him if he had been, like all others, a man only. But because he possessed, beyond all others, that glorious begetting owed to the Father Most High, and likewise underwent the birth belonging to the Virgin, the divine Scriptures testify of him in both respects: both that as man he was without comeliness, and subject to suffering, and sitting upon a colt of an ass, and given vinegar and gall to drink, and despised among the people, and went down even unto death; and that as the holy Lord, and Wonderful, Counsellor, Comely in beauty, and mighty God, coming upon the clouds as Judge of all—all these things the Scriptures prophesied concerning him.
For as he was man, that he might be tempted, so too was he the Word, in order that he might attain glory—the Word staying at rest so that the man could be tried, dishonored, crucified, and made to die, while the man was swallowed up in that which overcomes, endures, rises anew, and is carried up. This one, then, the Son of God, our Lord, is the Word belonging to the Father, and is also the Son of Man; for since from Mary, who traced her descent from men and was herself a human being, he had, on the human side, an origin—he counts as the Son of Man. For this cause the Lord himself furnished us a sign, reaching to the depth beneath and up to the height on high, something man had never asked for, since no one anticipated that a virgin might conceive while yet remaining a virgin, and bear a son, and that this offspring would be God among us, and would go down to the lowest parts of the earth in search of the sheep that were lost, which was after all his own handiwork, and would rise to the height, presenting and entrusting to the Father the man who had been recovered, making in his own person the first portion of mankind's rising again; so that just as the head was raised up out of death, in the same way the remainder of the body belonging to every man found still in life, once the season of his sentence—incurred through disobedience—has run its course, would likewise rise, knit together through joints and ligaments, and made strong by the growth that comes from God, each part holding its own suitable place within the frame. For many are the dwellings kept by the Father, seeing that the body too has many members.

======== Book III — Chapter 21 ========

Why God was magnanimous in the disobedience of man, and a demonstration that it was for the sake of the man who is to be saved that he was cast out of Paradise into this world. God, then, was magnanimous when man fell away, foreseeing that the victory which would be granted to him through the Word was to be given back to him. For when strength was made perfect in weakness, it displayed the exceedingly great kindness of God. For just as he patiently allowed Jonah to be swallowed by the sea monster—not so that he would be swallowed and altogether die, but so that, once cast up again, he would become all the more submissive toward God, and would all the more give glory to him who had granted this unlooked-for deliverance, and so that he might bring about lasting repentance among the Ninevites, that they would turn toward the Lord able to rescue them from death, struck with dread by the sign that had befallen Jonah—just as Scripture reports of them: every one turned back from his wicked path and from the wrongdoing that was in their hands, saying, Who can tell if God will change his mind and put away his wrath, so that we perish not?—so likewise from the start God patiently let man be swallowed by the vast sea monster who authored the transgression, not so that, having been swallowed, he would altogether die, but readying beforehand and preparing the plan of deliverance, which had been announced through that sign of Jonah: I am a bondservant belonging to the Lord, and it is the Lord God, maker of sea and dry ground, whom I worship; so that man, obtaining unlooked-for deliverance from God, would rise out of death and give glory to God, and would speak that word foretold through Jonah: In my distress I called upon the Lord my God, and out of the belly of Hades he listened to me; and that he might go on forever giving glory to God, offering thanks without pause for the deliverance he had received from him; so that no flesh should boast before the Lord, and man should never entertain a contrary opinion of God, esteeming the incorruption that surrounded him as his own by nature, and, not holding to the truth, should be puffed up with empty arrogance, as though he were by nature like God. For this would have made him more ungrateful toward him who had made him, and would have obscured the love which God had for man, and would have blinded his understanding from perceiving what befits God, comparing himself to God and judging himself equal to him.
This, then, was the magnanimity of God: that man, journeying through every experience and gaining knowledge of right conduct, might afterward arrive at rising from the dead, and, taught by what he had been rescued from, might stay forever grateful toward the Lord, having taken incorruption as a granted gift, so that he might cherish him all the more—since the one forgiven more loves more; and so that he might come to know himself as mortal and feeble; and so that he might likewise come to understand God as immortal and mighty to such a degree that he can bestow immortality on the mortal and endlessness on the transient thing; and so that he might grasp all the other powers of God displayed upon his own person, whereby, being taught, he might perceive God's greatness. For man's glory lies in God, while the deeds of God are worked out in man; man is the vessel holding all of God's wisdom and might. Just as a doctor's skill is shown through the sick, so too is God revealed among mankind. For this cause Paul likewise states: God has shut up everyone under unbelief, so as to show mercy toward everyone—meaning by this not the spiritual Aeons, but man, who had disobeyed God and had been thrust out of immortality, and only afterward found mercy, taking hold through the Son of God of the adoption that comes by way of him. This man, then, holding without arrogance or boasting the genuine glory belonging to created things and to their Maker, who stands as the mightiest God of all, and who has arranged for all things to exist, and remaining in love toward him, in submission, and in thanksgiving, will receive from him a still greater glory, moving forward until he grows like the one who died on his behalf; for that one too took on the likeness of sinful flesh, so that he might pass judgment on sin and, this judgment now as it were rendered, drive it out beyond the flesh; and so that he might summon man toward his own likeness, appointing him a follower of God, setting him beneath the fatherly rule ordained for the vision of God, and giving him strength to receive the Father—the Word of God, which took up residence in man and became Son of Man, so as to habituate man to receiving God, and to habituate God to dwelling within man, in keeping with the Father's good pleasure. For this cause, then, the Lord himself stands as the sign of our deliverance, he who is Emmanuel born of the Virgin, since it was the Lord in his own person who rescued them, because they had no power to rescue themselves; and for this cause Paul, declaring man's frailty, states: I know that within my flesh no good thing makes its home—showing this partly there, but even more in what comes after. And again: Miserable man that I am—who will rescue me from this body doomed to death? Then he names the rescuer: the favor of Jesus Christ our Lord. Isaiah likewise proclaims this: Take courage, he says, feeble hands and trembling knees; hearten the faint-hearted, take courage, have no fear; see, our God delivers judgment and will carry it out; he in person will come and rescue us. This makes plain that it was not through strength of our own but through God's aid that we came to be saved.

======== Book III — Chapter 22 ========

A demonstration that the Word of God was made flesh. Again, that our savior would not be a mere man, nor a fleshless being—since the angels have no flesh—he foretold, saying: Not an elder, nor a messenger, but the Lord in his own person will rescue them, because he loves them and will show them pity; he himself will set them free. And that this very one would appear truly as a man one could see, even though he was the rescuing Word, Isaiah says once more: Look, Zion, your own eyes will behold our deliverance, the city. And that it was not merely a man who died in our place, Isaiah says: And the holy Lord of Israel called to mind his dead ones who had fallen asleep in the ground of burial, and he went down among them to announce the deliverance that comes from him, so that he might rescue them. The prophet Amos declares the very same thing: He himself will turn back and show us pity; he will wipe away our wrongdoings, and cast our offenses down into the sea's depths. And once more, pointing to the place from which he would come, he says: The Lord has spoken from Zion, and Jerusalem has raised her voice. And that it was out of that district lying to the southern edge of Judah's allotted territory that the Son of God, who is himself God, would appear—he who came from Bethlehem, the town where the Lord was born—he will carry his praise out to the whole earth, as the prophet Habakkuk says: God shall come out of the south, and the Holy One out of Mount Ephrem [Paran]. His strength has covered the heavens, and the whole earth is filled with his praise. Ahead of his face the Word shall proceed, and his feet shall march over the level plains. This makes clear both that he is God, and that his arrival happened at Bethlehem, from Mount Ephrem, which lies toward the south side of the inheritance, and also that he was man. For the text says his feet shall march over the plains—a detail fitting for a man.

======== Book III — Chapter 23 ========

A demonstration that the wording runs, Behold, a virgin shall carry a child in her womb, and not, Behold, a maiden, as some render it. God, then, became man, and it was the Lord in his own person who rescued us, himself furnishing the sign of the Virgin. So then the reading offered by certain people is not accurate, who venture to render the passage this way: Behold, a maiden shall carry a child in her womb, and shall bear a son—as Theodotion of Ephesus rendered it, and Aquila of Pontus, both converts from paganism to Judaism; and the Ebionites, taking their cue from these, claim he was fathered by Joseph, thereby undoing, as far as it lies within their power, so vast a plan set in motion by God, and nullifying the witness borne by the prophets that God brought to pass. Now this was foretold prior to the people's exile into Babylon, that is, before the Medes and Persians rose to power; yet it had already been rendered into Greek by the Jews themselves, well before our Lord's coming, so that no doubt could linger that the Jews, out of some wish to gratify us, had rendered it this way. And truly, had they known that we would come to exist and would draw on these scriptural testimonies, they would sooner have set fire to their own sacred writings—writings which reveal that every other nation likewise shares in life, and which show that those priding themselves on being descended from Jacob's household and called the people of Israel have been stripped of their inheritance in God's favor.

======== Book III — Chapter 24 ========

How the Scriptures came to be translated into the Greek language, and when.
Before the Romans yet possessed their empire, while the Macedonians still held Asia, Ptolemy, son of Lagus, desiring to adorn the library which he had built at Alexandria with worthy writings of all peoples, asked the people of Jerusalem—for they were then still obedient to the Macedonians—to send him the men among them who were most skilled in the Scriptures and in both languages, so that they might do what he wished. And they sent seventy elders to Ptolemy. But he, wishing to test them, and fearing lest, being in agreement with one another, they might hide the truth that was in the Scriptures through their translation, separated them from one another, and commanded them all to translate the same Scripture; and he did this with all the books. And when they gathered again before Ptolemy and set their translations side by side, God received glory, and the Scriptures were recognized as genuinely inspired, since every one of them had spoken the identical things, using matching wording and matching designations, straight through from start to close—so that the nations who were present might also learn that the Scriptures had been rendered under God's inspiration. Nor is it any wonder that God accomplished this among them, given that during that captivity of the people brought about under Nebuchadnezzar, when the Scriptures had suffered corruption, and the Jews, once seventy years had passed, returned again to their own country, and afterward, under the reign of Artaxerxes, ruler of the Persian realm, ...
Since, therefore, the Scriptures were interpreted with such great faithfulness and by the grace of God — the Scriptures by which God prepared and formed our faith in his Son, and preserved for us in Egypt in their simplicity, in the land where the house of Jacob also grew up when fleeing the famine that came upon Canaan, and in which our Lord also was kept safe when he fled the persecution that came from Herod — and since this interpretation of the Scriptures was made before our Lord descended, and was translated before Christians were even shown to the world (for it was around Augustus's forty-first regnal year that our Lord came into being, whereas Ptolemy, in whose day the Scriptures underwent translation, lived a good while before that), those men are shown to be truly shameless and bold who now wish to produce different interpretations, since they are refuted by us out of the very Scriptures and are shut up to the faith in the coming of the Son of God.

======== Book III — Chapter 25 ========

A demonstration that a Virgin shall conceive in the womb, and not merely a young woman.
Steadfast, then, unmanufactured, and singularly genuine is the faith held among us, resting on clear evidence drawn from these very Scriptures, interpreted in the way already set forth; and the assembly of believers, together with John, Matthew, Paul, and the remaining line of witnesses and those who followed them, have declared every prophecy exactly as the Elders' rendering preserves it. For it is one identical Spirit of God who, speaking beforehand through the prophets concerning the nature and manner of the Lord's advent, likewise guided the Elders to a correct rendering of what had rightly been foretold; and that very Spirit further proclaimed through the Apostles that the appointed season of adoption had arrived, that heaven's kingdom had drawn close, and that it takes up residence in all who trust in him who came forth from the Virgin, Emmanuel. So the record itself testifies: before Joseph and Mary were joined together, while she still remained a virgin, she was discovered to be carrying a child by the Holy Spirit; and that the messenger Gabriel told her that the Holy Spirit would come over her and the might of the Most High would cast its shadow upon her, and for that reason the holy one born from her would be named Son of God; and that the messenger told Joseph, in a dream, that this had happened so the word spoken through the prophet Isaiah could reach fulfillment — namely, that a virgin would carry a child in her womb. Now the Elders rendered this Isaiah passage in the following manner: the Lord spoke once more to Ahaz, telling him to request a sign from the Lord his God, whether reaching into the depths beneath or up to the heights above; and Ahaz answered that he would neither ask nor put the Lord to trial. And he was told: is troubling men too slight a thing for you, and how does the Lord furnish a contest? Because of this, the Lord himself will grant you a sign: a virgin will carry a child within her, bear a son, and his name will be called Emmanuel. He will feed on curds and honey, and before he learns to prefer wrongdoing, he will already have turned toward what is good — since before that infant can distinguish good from evil, he will refuse wickedness in favor of choosing the good. With great precision, then, the Holy Spirit conveyed through these words that he was Virgin-born and that he possessed the essence of God (which the name Emmanuel itself declares), while also making plain his humanity by mentioning that he would eat curds and honey, by calling him a babe, and by noting that he had not yet learned good from evil — every one of these being marks proper to an infant of our race. Yet his refusal of wickedness in favor of the good belongs properly to God, so that neither should the eating of curds and honey lead us to regard him as a mere man and nothing beyond that, nor should the title Emmanuel lead us to imagine him as God devoid of flesh.

======== Book III — Chapter 26 ========

What is meant by what was said to David: Of the fruit of your womb I will set upon my throne.
And in saying, Hear, O house of David, it was indicating that the one whom God pledged to David that he would set up as an everlasting King out of the fruit of her womb is the same one born of the Virgin descended from David's line. God made this promise concerning a King from the fruit of the womb precisely because that belongs to a pregnant virgin, and not from the fruit of the loins or of the kidneys, which belongs to a man who fathers and a woman who conceives through a man. Scripture, accordingly, bypassed the generative organs of a man entirely in this promise — it does not so much as mention them — since he who was to be born did not arise through a man's will. Instead it set down and made certain the fruit of the womb, thereby announcing the birth of him who was to come from a virgin, just as Elizabeth, having been filled with the Holy Spirit, declared to Mary: Among women you are blessed, and blessed too is the offspring within your womb — the Holy Spirit thereby making known to any willing to listen that the promise God had made, to raise a King from the fruit of her womb, was accomplished in the Virgin's childbearing, that is, in Mary. Those, then, who distort what Isaiah says — that a young woman would carry a child in her womb — and insist that Joseph was his father, why do they not likewise distort the promise recorded concerning David, where God pledged to set up out of the fruit of his womb the horn of the King, Christ? But this they failed to grasp; otherwise they would have ventured to twist this passage too.
And regarding Isaiah's phrase, in the depths beneath, or in the heights above, this pointed to the fact that the one who went down was the very same one who also went up. But when it says, The Lord himself will grant a sign in the house of David — what remarkable thing, what sign at all, would that be if a young woman conceived by a man and bore a child, as happens with every woman who bears children in the ordinary way? Rather, because an unlooked-for salvation was drawing near for humankind through God's own working, an unlooked-for childbearing by a Virgin likewise came to pass, God himself furnishing this as the sign, not any human agency bringing it about.

======== Book III — Chapter 27 ========

What is signified, in Daniel, by the stone cut without hands. For this reason Daniel too, foreseeing his advent, declared that a stone was cut without hands and entered into this world. The phrase without hands pointed to this: that his entry into this world was not accomplished by human hands, that is, by the hands of those who ordinarily cut stone — meaning that Joseph had no part in shaping him, but Mary alone cooperated with the divine arrangement. For this stone, though drawn from the earth, exists through the power and craft of God. On this account Isaiah likewise says: Thus declares the Lord: See, I set within the foundations of Zion a costly stone, elect, a principal cornerstone, held in honor — so that we might grasp that his coming, regarding his human nature, arose not from a man's desire but from God's own will.

======== Book III — Chapter 28 ========

Why the staff of Moses, once thrown down, turned into a serpent. Moses threw his staff to the ground so that, becoming flesh, it would expose and consume all the malice of the Egyptians rising against God's design, and so that the Egyptians themselves would bear witness that a divine hand — the finger of God — brings deliverance to the people, not a son born of Joseph. For had he indeed been Joseph's son, how could he surpass Moses, or surpass Jonah, or surpass David, given that he sprang from the identical stock and was their kin? Why, then, did he pronounce Peter blessed for recognizing him as Son of the living God?

======== Book III — Chapter 29 ========

A proof that, had the Lord been Joseph's son, kingship would have been closed to him. Beyond even this, he could not have reigned as king at all, supposing him to be Joseph's son, nor could he have inherited, according to Jeremiah's word. For Joseph is traced to Jehoiakim and Jeconiah, exactly as Matthew likewise lays out his lineage. Now Jeconiah, together with all descended from him, was barred from the throne, Jeremiah stating it thus: As surely as I live, declares the Lord, even were Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, a signet ring upon my right hand, I would tear him off from there and hand him over to those seeking his life. And again: Jeconiah has been treated with contempt, like a vessel no one wants, cast off into a country he never knew. Earth, listen to the Lord's pronouncement: record this man as rejected, for none of his line will prosper, none will occupy David's throne, ruling again over Judah. And further God declares regarding Jehoiakim his father: For this reason, thus speaks the Lord about Jehoiakim his father, king of Judah: none of his descendants will occupy David's throne, and his corpse will be flung out to lie exposed by day's heat and by night's frost; and I will turn my gaze upon him and upon his offspring, and I will bring down upon them, upon Jerusalem's inhabitants, and upon the whole territory of Judah, every calamity I have pronounced against them. Those, then, who claim he was fathered by Joseph, and who fix their hope on that, disqualify themselves from the kingdom, falling under the very curse and censure pronounced against Jeconiah and his line. These words concerning Jeconiah were spoken for this reason: the Spirit, foreseeing what false teachers would later assert, meant them to learn that the eternal King is not born from that lineage, that is, from Joseph, but is raised up according to God's own promise from David's womb-line — he who sums up all things within himself. Chapter 30. A proof that through the very means by which man was driven from Paradise, through those same means he is brought back into Paradise, and that Christ, in himself, recapitulated the original forming of man. For just as sin entered through one man's disobedience, and death gained its grip through sin, so likewise righteousness was brought in through one man's obedience, producing life for those who had once been dead. And just as that first-formed man, Adam, drew his substance from earth that was unworked and still virgin soil (since God had sent down no rain as yet, nor had man begun tilling the ground), and was shaped by God's own hand, that is, by the Word of God, since all things came into being through him — the Lord having taken clay from the ground and fashioned man — so too the Word, in recapitulating Adam within himself, fittingly received a birth that mirrored Adam's own generation, being born of Mary, who remained still a virgin.

======== Book III — Chapter 31 ========

Against those who say that he received nothing from Mary.
If, then, that first Adam had a human father and came from the seed of a man, one might reasonably claim that he too, mirroring Adam, was fathered by Joseph. Yet if that first Adam was truly drawn from the earth and shaped by God's Word, it was fitting that this same Word, in carrying out the recapitulation of Adam within himself, should preserve a like manner of generation. Why, then, did God not once more take up clay, but instead carry out the forming through Mary? So that there would not exist a second, different formation, nor a different formed being needing salvation, but that the very identical one would be recapitulated, its likeness kept intact. Those, then, err who claim he took nothing at all from the Virgin, aiming thereby to discard the inheritance of the flesh and, with it, discard the likeness as well. For if the first man had his forming and substance from earth, by God's hand and skill, while this one lacked that same origin from God's hand and skill, then he would no longer have kept the likeness of man, who was fashioned according to God's own image and likeness, and God's handiwork would appear self-contradictory, having nothing left through which to display his wisdom. To claim this, moreover, amounts to saying he merely seemed to be man, appearing as one though not truly a man, and that he became man while taking on nothing whatsoever from man. For unless flesh's substance came to him from man, he was neither truly made man nor truly a Son of Man; and unless he was fashioned as we ourselves are, whatever he suffered and endured amounts to nothing of consequence. Yet we are a body drawn from the earth, together with a soul that receives spirit from God — a fact everyone will grant. This, then, is what the Word of God became: recapitulating within himself his own handiwork; and it is for this reason that he calls himself Son of Man, and declares the meek blessed, because they will inherit the earth. The apostle Paul, too, in writing to the Galatians, states plainly: God sent forth his Son, born of a woman. And again, in writing to the Romans, concerning his Son he says: descended from David's seed according to the flesh, marked out beforehand as Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, through resurrection from among the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Otherwise his descent into Mary would have served no purpose. For what reason would he have entered into her at all, if he intended to take nothing whatsoever from her? And had he taken nothing from Mary, he would never have partaken of the foods drawn from the earth, by which an earth-drawn body is sustained; nor would his body have grown hungry after a forty-day fast, as happened with Moses and Elijah, seeking its rightful nourishment; nor would his disciple John, in recording him, have written that Jesus grew weary from his travels; nor would David have cried out concerning him, They have added to the anguish of my wounds; nor would he have shed tears over Lazarus; nor would he have sweated great drops of blood; nor would he have said, My soul is overcome with sorrow; nor, when a spear opened his side, would blood and water have flowed out. For every one of these is a mark of flesh, drawn from the earth, which he recapitulated within himself, thereby saving his own handiwork.

======== Book III — Chapter 32 ========

...of our Lord back to Adam, he shows there are seventy-two generations, joining the end to the beginning, and signifying that he himself is the one who recapitulated in himself all the nations scattered from Adam onward, and all the languages, and the generation of humankind together with Adam himself. Hence Paul also called Adam himself a type of the one to come, since it was the Word, fashioner of all things, who had prefigured in himself the future disposition of the human race with respect to the Son of God, God having predestined the first man as an animal man, namely, so that he could afterward be rescued through the spiritual man. For since the one who would save already existed beforehand, it was necessary that there also come to be one who would be saved, so that the Savior should not be idle. Accordingly Mary, a virgin, proves herself obedient, declaring: Here is your handmaid, Lord; be it done to me according to your word. Eve, however, was disobedient, for she did not obey, even while she was still a virgin. Just as she, though she had a husband, Adam, was nevertheless still a virgin (for the two were naked in Paradise and were not ashamed, since, having been made only a little while before, they had no notion yet of childbearing; for it was needful that maturity come first, and only afterward increase), and having become disobedient, became a cause of death both for herself and for the whole human race, so also Mary, having a predestined husband and yet being a virgin, by her obedience became a cause of salvation both for herself and for the whole human race. And for this reason the Law names a woman pledged to a man as that man's wife, though she is still a virgin, indicating the recirculation from Mary back to Eve; because what had been bound could not be loosed otherwise than by the very windings of the bond being turned back on themselves, so that the first bonds should be loosed by the second, and the second in turn set the first free. And it turned out that the first bond was loosed by the second binding, and the second binding took the place of the loosing of the first. And for this reason the Lord said that the first would be last, and the last first. And the prophet signifies this same thing, saying: Instead of your fathers, sons were born to you. For what the virgin Eve bound through unbelief, this the virgin Mary loosed through faith.
It was therefore fitting that the Lord, having drawn near to the sheep that had strayed and having wrought the recapitulation of so vast a dispensation, and searching out the work of his own hands, would rescue that very man formed in his image and likeness—Adam himself—by filling up the time of his condemnation, which had arisen from disobedience, that condemnation the Father had kept within his own authority; since indeed the entire economy of man's salvation proceeded as the Father was well pleased to ordain, so that God should not be defeated, nor his workmanship rendered powerless. For if the man who had been made by God to live, upon losing life through the serpent that had corrupted him, were never to return to life but were cast off entirely to death, then God would have been defeated, and the wickedness of the serpent would have overcome the will of God. But since God is unconquered and magnanimous, he showed himself magnanimous both in the correction of man and in the testing of all, as we said before; but through the second man he bound the strong one, and plundered his goods, and abolished death by bringing to life the man who had been put to death. For the first vessel of his possession was Adam, whom he also held under his power, that is, by unjustly bringing transgression upon him, and by making, under the pretext of immortality, a means of putting him to death. For by promising that they would be as gods, which is not possible for him at all, he brought about death among them; so the one who had taken man captive was in turn, and justly, made captive by God, while the man once held captive was set loose from the bonds of condemnation.

======== Book III — Chapter 33 ========

A demonstration that Adam is the first to be saved by the Lord.
This, then, if we must speak the truth, is that first-formed Adam, the man of whom Scripture says the Lord said: Let us fashion man after our image and likeness; and all of us come from him, and being sprung from him, we have thus taken up his name as well. But when man is to be saved, it is necessary that the man who was formed first should be saved. For it is altogether unreasonable to say that he who was grievously wounded by the enemy, and who first suffered captivity, is not rescued by the one who conquered the enemy, while his children, whom he begot in that same captivity, are indeed rescued. Nor would the enemy yet appear conquered while his original spoils still remain in his possession. It is as if enemies had overpowered certain people and led them away captive and bound, and had kept them in servitude for a long time, so that they even begot children among them; and someone, grieving over those who had been made slaves, should then overpower those same enemies. He would not be acting justly were he to loose only the offspring of the ones taken prisoner from the grip of those who had enslaved their forebears, while leaving the fathers themselves, who had endured the captivity itself, subject to the enemies on whose account he had exacted vengeance in the first place — granting freedom to the children by reason of the vindication of the father, but not releasing the fathers themselves who had endured that very captivity. For God is neither weak nor unjust, he who came to man's aid and restored him to his own freedom.
For this reason also, at the beginning of Adam's transgression, as Scripture relates, God did not curse Adam himself but the ground, in regard to his works, as one of the ancients has said: God transferred the curse onto the ground, so that it should not remain upon man. But as the condemnation for the transgression, man was given toil and hardship upon the earth, eating his food by the sweat of his brow, and going back at last to the earth out of which he had been drawn; and likewise the woman received hardships, and labors, and the groans and sorrows of childbirth, and servitude, that is, that she should serve her husband — so that those cursed by God should not perish altogether, and yet, by not persevering without rebuke, should not hold God in contempt. But the whole curse ran its course upon the serpent, who had seduced them. And God said to the serpent, it says: Because you have done this, you are cursed above all cattle and above all beasts of the earth. And the Lord says this same thing in the Gospel to those found on the left hand: Go from me, you accursed, into everlasting fire, made ready by my Father for the devil and his messengers — showing that this unending fire was not primarily meant for man, but rather for the one who beguiled man and drove him to offend, namely the ringleader of the revolt, and for whichever angels turned traitor along with him; which fire indeed those also will justly receive who, like him, persist without repentance and without turning back in works of wickedness.

======== Book III — Chapter 34 ========

Concerning Cain, who killed his brother. Just as Cain, when he had received counsel from God to be at peace concerning the fact that he had not rightly divided the offering that concerned his brother's fellowship, but instead, out of envy and malice, suspected that he might be able to dominate him — he not only did not comply, but added sin upon sin, revealing his own character through his action. For what he had thought, this he also did: he dominated his brother and killed him, God subjecting the just man to the unjust one, so that the just man might be shown just by what he suffered, while the other, through what he had committed, might be exposed as unjust. And not even then was he softened, nor did he cease from the evil deed; yet when questioned as to his brother's whereabouts, he answered: I do not know -- am I my brother's guardian? — extending and multiplying the evil by his answer. For if it is evil to kill one's brother, it is much worse to answer thus boldly and irreverently to God, who knows all things, as though it were possible to deceive him. For this reason he too bore a curse, since he brought sin upon himself, having no reverence for God, and feeling no shame at his fratricide.

======== Book III — Chapter 35 ========

Why Adam girded himself with fig leaves; and why God cast Adam out of Paradise.
With Adam, however, nothing of this sort happened, but everything was the opposite. For having been seduced by another under the pretext of immortality, he is at once seized with fear and hides himself — not as though he could escape God, but because, ashamed at having transgressed his commandment, he considered himself unworthy to come into the sight and conversation of God. Now dread of the Lord marks the start of wisdom, and awareness of the wrongdoing brought about repentance; and to those who repent God grants his goodness. For indeed by the girdle he made he showed his repentance, covering himself with fig leaves, although there were many other leaves that would have troubled his body less; yet he made a garment fitting for his disobedience, terrified by fear of God, and restraining the wanton impulse of the flesh, since he had lost his innocent and childlike disposition and had come into the contemplation of worse things — he set upon himself and his wife a curb of self-restraint, standing in awe of God and looking for his arrival, and signifying, as it were, something of this sort: Since I have lost the robe of holiness which I had from the Spirit through disobedience, I now recognize that I deserve such a covering, which affords no pleasure at all, but rather chafes and pricks the body. And he would always have kept this garment, humbling himself, had not the Lord, who is merciful, clothed them with tunics of skin instead of fig leaves.
For this reason also he questions them, so that the accusation might come round to the woman; and he questions her in turn, so that she might pass the blame on to the serpent. For she said what had happened: The serpent, she said, seduced me, and I ate. But he did not question the serpent, for he knew that it had become the author of the transgression; rather he first pronounced the curse upon it, so that the second rebuke might then come upon man. For God hated the one who had seduced man, but toward the one who had been seduced he was gradually and little by little merciful. For this reason he likewise drove him out of Paradise and set him at a distance from the tree of life — not because he begrudged him the tree of life, as some dare to say, but because he had compassion on him, so that he should not remain forever a transgressor, nor should the sin that lay around him be immortal and evil without limit or cure. He therefore restrained his transgression by interposing death, causing sin to cease, putting a stop to it through the flesh's dissolution, a process appointed to occur within the earth, so that man, at length ceasing his life of sin and undergoing death to it, could commence living unto God instead.

======== Book III — Chapter 36 ========

What is meant by the prophet's saying: You shall walk upon the asp and the basilisk. For this reason he set hostility between the serpent, on one side, and the woman together with her offspring, on the other, each watching the other — the one being bitten in the heel, yet able to trample the enemy's head, the other biting, and killing, and obstructing man's path, until the predestined seed came to trample his head, which seed was the offspring of Mary, of whom the prophet says: You shall walk upon the asp and the basilisk, and you shall trample the lion and the dragon underfoot — signifying that the sin which was rearing up and spreading itself against man, and which made him cold toward God, would be abolished together with the reign of death, and would be trampled down by him in the last times when the lion, that is, the Antichrist, springs upon the human race; and that he would bind that old serpent, the dragon, and subject him to the power of the man who had been conquered, so that he might trample down all his strength. For Adam was the one overcome, stripped entirely of life; hence, once the foe was in his turn overcome, Adam had life restored to him; and last of all the last enemy, death, which had first taken possession of man, is abolished. Wherefore, when man is set free, it stands written: Death has been consumed by victory. Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? Which could not justly be said unless that one had been set free who had first been dominated by death. For his salvation is the abolition of death. Since the Lord, then, gives life to man, that is, to Adam...

======== Book III — Chapter 37 ========

Against the teaching of Tatian. All, then, who contradict his salvation are shown to be liars, forever excluding themselves from life, inasmuch as they refuse to believe the sheep that was lost has now been recovered. But if that sheep has not been found, then mankind's entire lineage remains yet in a condition of ruin. A liar, then, is the one who first introduced this opinion — or rather this ignorance and blindness — having become, as we have shown, a link joining together all the heretics; and he devised this from himself, so that by bringing in something new beyond the rest, and speaking emptily, he might prepare for himself hearers empty of faith, aspiring to be regarded as a teacher, and attempting, moreover, to make use for this purpose of the words repeatedly spoken by Paul: that in Adam we all die — not knowing that where sin abounded, grace has abounded still more. Given, then, that this has been plainly demonstrated, let everyone be ashamed who belong to his school and who dispute about Adam, as though they would gain something great if he were not saved — when in fact they gain nothing, just as the serpent gained nothing by persuading man, except that it revealed him as a transgressor, having man as the beginning and material of its own apostasy, but did not conquer God. So too those who contradict the salvation of Adam gain nothing by it, except that they turn themselves into heretics and deserters from the truth, revealing themselves as champions of the serpent and of death.

======== Book III — Chapter 38 ========

Against those who, for whatever reason, create schism.
We have thus shown, against all who bring forward wicked opinions about our Maker and Fashioner, who also made this world, beyond whom no other god exists, and having overturned by these very demonstrations those who teach falsely about the substance of our Lord and about the dispensation he arranged on behalf of man, his own handiwork — we have made plain that the proclamation of the Church holds together everywhere, remaining constant and unaltered in every place, and has testimony from the prophets and the apostles and from all the disciples, as we have demonstrated, running through its beginnings, its middle course, and its end, and through the whole dispensation of God, and through the sound working which concerns the salvation of man, which working is in our faith. This faith, received from the Church, we guard; and this faith, always growing young again by the Spirit of God as though it were some excellent deposit in a good vessel, causes the very vessel that contains it to grow young as well. For to the Church has been entrusted this gift of God, just as breath was entrusted to the thing fashioned, in order that all the members, receiving it, might be brought to life. And within the Church has been set the fellowship of Christ, namely the Holy Spirit, the pledge of incorruption, the strengthening of our faith, and the stairway by which we climb toward God. For, it says, God has placed in the Church apostles, prophets, teachers, and every other working of the Spirit; and none share in that Spirit unless they attach themselves to the assembly of the Church, but instead cheat themselves out of life through a depraved opinion and the vilest conduct. For wherever the Church stands, the Spirit of God stands also; and wherever God's Spirit dwells, there stands the Church, together with every sort of grace; and this Spirit is truth itself. Those, then, who take no part in him are neither fed at the breasts of the mother unto life, nor do they draw from Christ's body that most brilliant of springs which issues from it; instead they carve out for themselves broken cisterns from pits dug in the ground, and swallow foul water drawn from the mud, fleeing the Church's faith for fear of being exposed, and spurning the Spirit so as to escape correction.
Estranged from the truth, they are — and deservedly — tossed about in every kind of error, driven this way and that, holding at different times different opinions about the same things, and never possessing a settled knowledge, wishing to be sophists of words rather than disciples of the truth. For they are not founded upon the one rock, but upon sand, which in itself contains many stones. For this reason they also invent many gods, and they always have some pretext for seeking, since they are blind, but they are never able to find. For they blaspheme the Maker, that is, him who truly is God, who alone can grant the finding; imagining that they have discovered, above God, another God, or another Fullness, or another dispensation. For this reason the light which comes from God does not shine upon them, since they have dishonored and despised God, judging him to be of small account, because out of his love and his boundless kindness he came to be known by men — not a knowledge according to his greatness, nor according to his substance, for no one has measured that or touched it, but a knowledge according to this: that we might know that he who made us, and fashioned us, and breathed into us the breath of life, and nourishes us through the created order, confirming all things by his Word and framing them together by his Wisdom, is the one who alone is the true God; while they, dreaming up one who is not, imagine that above this true God they have found a great God, whom no one can know, one who has no dealings with the human race and administers no earthly things — plainly discovering an Epicurean God, who provides nothing either for himself or for others, that is, who exercises providence over nothing at all.

======== Book III — Chapter 39 ========

A demonstration that this world is governed by the providence of God. Now God exercises providence over all things, and on that account he also takes counsel; and whoever takes counsel makes himself available to those who can grasp it. It is necessary, then, that the things which are provided for and governed should recognize their director; these things are indeed neither irrational nor without purpose, but possess a perceived sensibility of the providence of God. And it is on this very account that some among the pagans, who were less bound to indulgence and pleasure and had not sunk so deep into the worship of idols, being stirred by his providence, if only in a small way, were still led to declare that the Maker of this universe was the Father of all, exercising providence and ordering the world just as we teach.

======== Book III — Chapter 40 ========

That justice cannot exist without goodness, nor goodness without justice; that the same one is both wise and judge; a demonstration that the Word of God is both just and good.
Again, wishing to remove from the Father whatever is reproving and judicial, judging this unworthy of God, and thinking they have discovered a God who is good but without wrath, they have said that one God judges and another God saves — not knowing that in doing so they take away the true sense of both, and also justice itself. Should the one who judges lack goodness as well, he would prove neither just nor wise as a judge, whether in granting rewards to those to whom he owes them or in bringing reproach upon those on whom it is fitting; and again, if the good one is only good and nothing more — not also one who tests those upon whom he bestows his goodness — his goodness will fall outside of justice, and his goodness will appear weak, since he does not save all, unless it is done with judgment. So, in calling one God good and another judicial, they destroy God on both counts. For the one who is judicial, if he is not also good, is not God, because it is not possible for God to lack goodness; and again the one who is good, if he is not also judicial, will suffer the same fate as the other, in that he is thereby deprived of being God. And how, besides, could they name the Father of all things wise, unless they were also willing to grant him what belongs to judgment? Being wise, he must also be a tester of things; and testing pertains to judgment; and judgment is accompanied by justice, that it may test rightly; from justice springs forth judgment, and that judgment, once carried out with justice, opens into wisdom. Wisdom, therefore, the Father surpasses all human and angelic wisdom, since he is Lord, and judge, and just, and ruler over all. For he is also good, and merciful, and patient, and he saves those whom it is fitting to save; and neither is his goodness deficient in its just effect, nor is his wisdom diminished — for he saves those he ought to save, and he judges those deserving of judgment; nor does his justice appear harsh, since goodness plainly goes before it and precedes it.
He, then, who makes his sun to rise upon all in kindness, and sends rain upon the just and the unjust, will judge those who, having received his kindness equally with others, have not conducted themselves in a manner worthy of the honor of his gift, but have instead lived in luxury and self-indulgence, contrary to his benevolence, and have even gone so far as to blaspheme him who has done them such great benefits.

======== Book III — Chapter 41 ========

How Plato is shown to be more religious than the heretics. Plato is shown to be more religious in that he confessed the same God to be both just and good, wielding authority over the whole of things, and carrying out judgment himself, speaking thus: 'God, as the old saying also has it, holding the beginning, the end, and the middle of all things, proceeds in a straight course' — or, as I might perhaps better render it, 'accomplishes what is right' — 'going about according to nature; and justice always follows him as an avenger upon those who fall short of the divine law.' And again he shows that the Maker and Fashioner of this universe is good: 'In one who is good,' he says, 'no envy of anything ever arises' — thereby establishing the goodness of God as the beginning and cause of the fashioning of the world; and not ignorance, nor an Aeon who went astray, nor the fruit of a fall, nor a mother weeping and lamenting, nor another God or Father.

======== Book III — Chapter 42 ========

How, judged by their own rule, those who follow Valentinus outside it are shown to be outside the truth.
Justly, then, does their mother mourn for them, the devisers and inventors of such things; for they have contrived things worthy of their own heads, since their mother herself is outside the Fullness, that is, outside the knowledge of God, and their gathering was formed as a shapeless and formless abortion; for it grasped nothing of the truth, but fell into emptiness and shadow, since their teaching is empty and shrouded in darkness, and Horos did not permit it to enter the Pleroma, for the Spirit did not receive them into rest. For their father, begetting ignorance, worked death in them. These things we do not slander them with; they themselves confirm them, they themselves teach them, they glory in them, they think highly of their mother, whom they claim was brought forth with no father at all — meaning, apart from God — and yet they profess to know the Maker and Fashioner of this universe, who alone is the true God and Lord of all. These things we press upon them, loving them more usefully than they think they love themselves. For the love that comes from us, since it is genuine, is salutary for them, if only they will receive it. It is like a harsh medicine, consuming the diseased and superfluous flesh of a wound; for it does away with their pride and their inflated conceit. Wherefore, in attempting with all our strength to reach out a hand to them, we shall not grow weary. We have deferred, however, beyond what has been said here, to bring forward in the following book the sayings of the Lord, in case, by convicting some of them through the very teaching of Christ, we might be able to persuade them to cease from error of this kind, and to abstain from that blasphemy which is directed against their own Maker, who alone is God — he who is Father to our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory.

======== Book IV — Preface ========

In sending you, my dearest friend, this fourth book of the work concerning the detection and overthrow of the falsely called knowledge, we shall, as we promised, confirm through the sayings of the Lord the things we have already stated, so that you, just as you asked, may from every quarter receive from us occasions for refuting all the heretics, and, having thoroughly beaten them back, not allow them to go on further into the depths of error, nor be suffocated in the sea of ignorance, but rather, by turning them into the harbor of truth, may bring them to obtain their own salvation. Now the one who wishes to convert them must know carefully their rules, or their arguments. For it is not possible for anyone to treat those who are sick unless he knows the disease of those who are unwell. For this reason those who came before us, though far better men than we, were nevertheless not able sufficiently to refute the followers of Valentinus, because they did not know their rule, which we have handed on to you in the first book with all diligence, and in which we also showed their teaching to be a recapitulation of all the heresies. For this reason too, in the second book, we have held them up as it were a mirror of the whole overthrow. For those who refute them as they ought thereby refute all who hold wicked opinions; and those who overturn these overturn every heresy.
For their rule is blasphemous beyond all others, seeing that they say the Maker and Fashioner, who is the one God, as we have shown, was emitted out of a defect or falling-away. They blaspheme also against our Lord, cutting apart Jesus from Christ, and Christ from the Savior, and the Savior in turn from the Word — that Word which itself proceeds from the Only-begotten. And just as they say the Maker was emitted out of a defect or falling-away, they have likewise taught that Christ and the Holy Spirit sprang forth because of that same defect, and that the Savior is the fruit of those Aeons who were themselves emitted from the defect — so that nothing among them is without blasphemy. In the book, then, that comes before this one, the opinion of the apostles concerning all these things has been set forth, showing that those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word of truth held nothing of this kind, but instead urged us to flee opinions of this sort, foreseeing by the Spirit those who would lead the simpler people astray.
For just as the serpent deceived Eve, promising her what he did not himself possess, so too these men, putting forward a greater knowledge and unspeakable mysteries, and promising that reception into what they call the Pleroma, plunge into death those who believe them, turning them into renegades against their own Maker. And in that former case the apostate angel, working through the serpent the disobedience of man, thought to escape the notice of the Lord; for which reason God assigned to him the same form and name as the serpent. Now, however, since these are the last times, evil is being extended among men, not only turning them into renegades, but also, through many devices — that is, through all the heretics who have already been mentioned — establishing them as blasphemers of the Fashioner. For all these, although they come forth from different quarters and teach different things, nevertheless converge upon the same purpose of blasphemy, dealing a mortal wound through their slander of God our Maker and Nourisher, and through their contempt for man's salvation. Now man is a temperate blending of soul and flesh, shaped after God's likeness and formed by his two hands — namely the Son together with the Holy Spirit — to whom he also spoke, saying, 'Let us make man' — such, then, is the purpose of him who envies our life: to make men unbelieving of their own salvation, and blasphemers against God the Fashioner. For whatever grave things all the heretics may say, in the end they all arrive at this: that they blaspheme the Maker, and deny the salvation of God's handiwork, which is indeed the flesh — for the sake of which we have shown, in many ways, that the Son of God carried out the whole dispensation, and we have made it clear that Scripture calls no one else God save the Father of all, the Son, and those admitted into sonship.

======== Book IV — Chapter 1 ========

A demonstration that the Lord acknowledged one only God and Father.
Since, then, it is a fixed and settled point that no other God and Lord was preached by the Spirit except him who governs all things as God, together with his Word — that is, together with all who receive that Spirit of adoption which marks out those who believe in the one true God and in Christ Jesus the Son of God; and that likewise the apostles called no one else God besides these, nor named any other Lord; and much more, that our Lord himself, who also taught us to confess no Father but the one dwelling in heaven, sole God and sole Father — it is thereby plainly shown that the things said by these deceivers and most perverse sophists are false, when they say that he whom they themselves have invented is God and Father by nature, while the Demiurge is by nature neither God nor Father, but is only called so in a manner of speaking, because he rules over the created order, as these perverse grammarians say, 'as if a God.' And, setting aside the teaching of Christ, and divining false things out of themselves, they argue against the whole dispensation of God. For indeed they say that their Aeons are also called father-gods and lords, and further even heavens, together with their Mother, whom they also call earth and Jerusalem, and by many other names besides.
To whom is it not plain that, had the Lord been aware of numerous fathers and deities, he would never have instructed his disciples to acknowledge a single God, naming that one alone as Father? Instead, he set apart those called gods merely in name from him who alone truly is God, lest they be misled by his teaching, or confuse the one with the other. Yet if he truly directed us to name a single being as both Father and God, while at other moments he himself acknowledged additional fathers and deities in similar fashion, he would seem to instruct his disciples in one manner while acting otherwise himself. This is not the mark of a good teacher, but of a deceiver and one who begrudges the truth. And the apostles, according to their own view, are shown to be transgressors of this precept, since they confess the Demiurge as God and Lord and Father, as we have shown — unless he alone is God and Father. Jesus, then, will be for them the author and teacher of transgression, since he taught that one alone should be called Father, yet laid upon them the necessity of confessing the Demiurge as their Father, as has been shown.

======== Book IV — Chapter 2 ========

The question of what it means when he says: I confess to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth. Moses, then, recapitulating the whole law, says: 'Heaven, and I will speak; and let the earth hear the words of my mouth.' And again the same is said elsewhere: 'Listen, O heaven,' he declares, 'and attend closely, O earth, for it is the Lord who has spoken.' And again: 'Thus says the Lord God, who made the heavens and stretched them out, who established the earth and the things that are in it, who grants breath to the people dwelling there, and life-spirit to those walking upon it.' Once more, our Lord Jesus Christ acknowledges this very Father, saying, 'I confess to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth.' Which Father, then, do these most perverse sophists of the unknown God want us to listen to? Their unknown God — whom we have shown by many arguments not to be God at all — or, as is true, the Maker of heaven and earth? Him whom the prophets proclaimed, whom Christ confesses as his own Father, and whom the Law announces, saying: 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord is God.' [This shows that the giving of the Law through Moses consists in the words of Christ; and here follows the exposition of the parable of the Rich Man and poor Lazarus.]
That the writings of Moses are in fact Christ's own words is stated by him to the Jews, as John recounts in the Gospel: 'Had you trusted Moses, you would have trusted me as well, since he wrote concerning me; but since you give no credence to his writings, how will you give credence to my sayings?' This most clearly signifies that the writings of Moses are his own words. Therefore, if the words of Moses, and without doubt of the rest of the prophets, are his own, as we have shown. And again, the Lord himself shows that Abraham said to the rich man, concerning those who were still living: 'If they will not heed Moses and the prophets, they will not be won over even should a man come back from among the dead to visit them.'
He did not relate to us a mere fable about a poor man and a rich man; rather, he first taught that no one ought to indulge in luxuries, or, living amid worldly pleasures and abundant feasts, become a slave to his own desires and lose sight of God. As the account goes: a certain wealthy man dressed himself in purple garments and fine cloth, feasting lavishly day after day. Of such people the Spirit also spoke through Isaiah: 'They drink wine to the sound of harps, timbrels, lutes, and pipes, giving no heed to the deeds the Lord has done, nor weighing the works his hands have made.' So that we might not fall into the same punishment as these, the Lord showed their end, at the same time signifying that those who obeyed Moses and the prophets would believe in him whom they themselves had foretold as God's own Son, raised up from among the dead and granting us life, demonstrating that all these share one and the same substance — namely Abraham, together with Moses and the prophets, and likewise the Lord in his own person, who was raised from among the dead, in whom many even from among the circumcised likewise believe, hearing Moses and the prophets proclaim the arrival of God's Son. Yet those who claim these belong to a different substance, refusing to acknowledge him as firstborn of the dead, treat Christ as one figure — supposedly incapable of suffering — and separately regard Jesus as the one who suffered. For they do not receive knowledge of the Son from the Father, nor do they learn the Father from the Son, who plainly and without parables teaches that he alone is truly God.

======== Book IV — Chapter 4 ========

This shows that heaven and earth will indeed pass away, but the Lord who made them abides forever — and likewise concerning Jerusalem, he swore not even by Jerusalem, since it is the city belonging to the great King. Such statements were plainly spoken of the Maker himself, as Isaiah likewise says: 'Heaven is my throne, and earth the footstool of my feet.' Besides him there is no other God; otherwise he could not rightly be called by the Lord either God or great King. For anything of that kind admits neither comparison nor any elevation above it. For whoever has some superior over him, and is under another's power, cannot rightly be called either God or great King. Nor can they say that these things were spoken ironically, since they are refuted by the very words, because they were spoken in truth. For it was Truth itself who was speaking, and he truly vindicated his own house, casting out of it the money-changers who bought and sold, saying to them: 'Scripture declares that my house is to be called a house of prayer, yet you have turned it into a den of thieves.' What reason would he have had to do and say this, and to vindicate his own house, if he had been proclaiming another God? Rather, he did it to show up the transgressors of the Father's Law; for he was not accusing the house, nor finding fault with the Law, which he had come to fulfill, but was rebuking those who misused the house and those who transgressed the Law. And for this reason the scribes and Pharisees, who ever since the giving of the Law had grown contemptuous of God, and had not received his Word — that is, had not believed in Christ — are those of whom Isaiah says: 'Your rulers are rebellious, partners with robbers, each one fond of bribes, chasing after payoffs, showing no justice to the fatherless, and paying no mind to the widow's plea.' And Jeremiah likewise: 'Those who lead my people,' he says, 'had no knowledge of me; they are foolish, senseless children, clever at wrongdoing yet untaught in doing right.'
Yet all those who revered God and kept diligent watch over his Law hastened at once to Christ, and all were saved; for he told the disciples that his mission was to the scattered sheep belonging to Israel's house. And of the Samaritans it is said that when the Lord had stayed with them two days, many more believed because of his own word, and said to the woman: 'We no longer believe because of what you said; for we ourselves have heard, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.' Paul says: 'And so all Israel shall be saved.' And he also called the Law our tutor leading us to Christ Jesus. Let them not, then, ascribe the unbelief of some to the Law; for the Law did not forbid them to believe in the Son of God, but rather exhorted them, saying that men could be saved from the ancient wound of the serpent in no other way than by believing in him who, according to [the text breaks off here in the source].
Now the malicious objectors say: if heaven is God's throne and earth his footstool, and it is said that heaven and earth will pass away, then this God who sits above them must also pass away along with them, and therefore he is not the God who is over all. First, they do not know what the throne of heaven or the footstool of earth means. For they do not even know what God is, but suppose that he sits and is contained after the manner of a man, rather than himself containing all things — as when Christ, lifted up from the earth on the wood of his passion, drew all things to himself and gave life to the dead: 'he draws all things to himself.' But they are also ignorant of the passing away of heaven and earth; Paul, however, was not ignorant of it, saying: 'For the form of this world passes away.' Then David resolves their question. For as the form of this world passes away, he says that not only God endures, but also his servants, in the hundred and first Psalm, saying thus: 'In the beginning you founded the earth, Lord, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you will remain; and they will all grow old like a garment, and like a covering you will change them, and they will be changed. But you are the same, and your years will not fail. The children of your servants will dwell there, and their seed will be established forever' — plainly showing what it is that passes away, and who it is that always endures: God together with his servants. And Isaiah likewise: 'Raise your eyes to the heavens,' he says, 'and gaze upon the earth below, since the sky will be set fast like smoke, and the earth will wear out like a garment, and its inhabitants will perish in the same fashion. Yet my salvation endures without end, and my righteousness will never fail.'

======== Book IV — Chapter 5 ========

In the same fashion, regarding Jerusalem and the Lord, they presume to assert that, had she truly belonged to the great King as his city, she would never have been forsaken. Yet this resembles claiming that straw, were it God's own creation, would never be separated out from the grain, or that a vine's branches, if fashioned by God, would never be pruned away once stripped of their clusters. But just as these things were made not chiefly for what they themselves are, but rather on account of the fruit ripening within them — which, once mature and harvested, leaves them behind to be cast off and cleared away, no longer serving any purpose in fruit-bearing — so also Jerusalem, which had borne upon herself the yoke of servitude by which mankind was disciplined (mankind who previously was not subject to God, while death still reigned), and having undergone that discipline was made ready for freedom, once the fruit of that freedom had appeared, and had ripened and been harvested and stored in the barn, with its yield carried forth from her to those capable of bearing fruit, and dispersed across every land. As Isaiah says: 'The root of Jacob shall sprout, and Israel shall blossom, and every nation on earth shall be filled with what he yields.' For once that fruit had been scattered across every land, she was justly forsaken and set aside — she who had indeed once yielded good fruit, since from her, according to the flesh, Christ himself sprang forth as fruit, together with the apostles; but she now serves no further purpose in fruit-bearing. For whatever has a temporal beginning must also, of necessity, have a temporal end.

======== Book IV — Chapter 6 ========

This shows that the Law was given for a time — and this is the reason why heaven and earth will pass away. Since, then, the Law began with Moses, it fittingly ceased with John, for Christ had come for its fulfillment; and for this reason the Law and the Prophets prophesied concerning these things until John. So too Jerusalem, beginning with David and fulfilling its own appointed time, had to have an end to its lawgiving, once the new Testament had been made manifest; for God does everything by measure and order, and nothing among him is without measure, since nothing is disordered either. And it was rightly said that the boundless Father finds his measure within the Son — the Son standing as the gauge by which the Father is comprehended, since he alone grasps him fully. Now, since their administration was for a time, Isaiah says: 'The daughter of Zion will be left like a hut in a vineyard, and like a watch-shelter in a cucumber field.' When will these things be abandoned? Is it not when the fruit is taken away, and only the leaves remain, which can no longer bear fruit? And what shall we say of Jerusalem, since even the pattern of the whole world must pass away, when the time of its passing comes, so that the fruit may be gathered into the barn, while the abandoned chaff is burned? For the day of the Lord is like a burning oven, and all sinners who do unrighteousness will be as stubble, and the coming day will burn them up.

======== Book IV — Chapter 7 ========

This shows that it is Christ who brings on that day like a burning oven. Who this Lord is who brings such a day, John the Baptist indicates, saying of Christ: 'He will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire; he has his winnowing fan in his hand to clear his threshing floor thoroughly, and will gather the wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.' It is not, then, some other being who named Jerusalem. For in the time of Abraham, our forefather (as Josephus says in his Antiquities), it was called Solyma. That city had once been founded by a certain powerful man of the Canaanites, Hegesippus writes — Melchizedek, that is, 'the righteous king,' whose name means 'separating.' Now grain and chaff, being things without soul and without reason, were made such by nature; but man, being rational, and in this respect like God, was made free in his own choice and master of himself, and is himself the cause that he becomes at one time grain and at another chaff. Wherefore he will also be justly condemned, because, having been endowed with reason, he cast reason aside, and through irrational living set himself against God's righteousness, delivering himself up to every earthbound spirit and becoming enslaved to all his cravings; as the prophet says: 'Man, though he was held in honor, did not understand; he was compared to the senseless beasts, and became like them.'

======== Book IV — Chapter 8 ========

This shows that the same God made both the present, temporal things and the eternal ones. There is, then, one and the same God, who rolls up the sky as one would a scroll and refreshes the surface of the earth; who made temporal things for man's sake, so that, ripening in them, he might bear the fruit of immortality; and who brings in eternal things because of his own goodness, that he might show, in the ages to come, the inexpressible riches of his goodness. This is he whom the Law and the Prophets foretold, and whom Christ acknowledged as his very own Father. He himself is the Maker; and he himself is the God over all things, as Isaiah says: 'I stand as witness, declares the Lord God, along with the servant I have chosen, so that you may come to know, to trust, and to grasp that I am he. No god existed before me, and none shall come after. I am God, and apart from me there is no deliverer. I have proclaimed it, and I have brought salvation.' And again: 'I am the first God, and I am he who is to come.' He speaks in this way neither inconsistently, nor out of arrogance, nor as a boast, but because God could not be learned apart from God himself, and it is through his own Word that he instructs men in knowledge of God. It was fitting that man, fashioned after God's image and resemblance, should possess freedom of choice and mastery over his own power — for this very freedom and capacity to choose is what constitutes God's image and resemblance within him; and it is through his own Word that God instructs men to know him. To those, then, who remain ignorant of these matters, and who consequently imagine that some different being has come as Father, one may rightly say: You are mistaken, having no grasp of the Scriptures nor of God's power.

======== Book IV — Chapter 9 ========

How the Lord, in the one who spoke to Moses from the bush, confesses that He is the God of the living.
For our Lord and Master, in that reply He returned to the Sadducees — who deny any resurrection, and thereby dishonor God and set the Law at naught — both proved the resurrection and disclosed God, telling them: You wander astray, ignorant of the Writings and of God's might. As regards the raising of the dead, have you never read what God declared, saying: I am Abraham's God, and Isaac's God, and Jacob's God? And He went on: He is God not of corpses, but of the living, since to Him they are all alive. By these words He showed plainly that the one who addressed Moses from the bush, and made Himself known as the fathers' God, is this very God of the living. For who else could be the God of the living, save Him who alone is God, beside whom there exists no other? Daniel the prophet likewise proclaimed this, when Cyrus, ruler of the Persians, asked him why he refused to worship Bel — to which he answered: Because I honor no handmade idols, but the living God, founder of heaven and earth, master over all flesh. And elsewhere he declared: I will adore the Lord my God, for He is the living God.
He, then, whom the prophets worshipped as the living God, is the God of the living; and it is His Word that likewise addressed Moses, likewise silenced the Sadducees, likewise granted the resurrection — instructing those blind on both counts, namely the raising of the dead and the knowledge of God. For if God is not a God of corpses but of the living, and yet is called the God of the fathers who sleep, then beyond doubt they remain alive before Him and have not perished. This overturns entirely the errors of the Sadducees and kindred sects. For He who addressed Moses declared this, seeing that they are children of the resurrection. And the resurrection is none other than the Lord Himself, as He states: I am the resurrection and the life. And the fathers are His children, for the prophet has written: In place of your fathers, sons were born to you. Christ, then, together with the Father, is Himself the God of the living, the very one who addressed Moses and who was likewise disclosed to the patriarchs.

======== Book IV — Chapter 10 ========

That Abraham beheld Christ; that the faith he held and the faith we hold are a single, identical faith. Teaching this very point, He told the Jews: Abraham your father exulted at the hope of seeing my day; he beheld it, and rejoiced. What then does this mean? Abraham trusted God, and this was credited to him as righteousness — first, because He is heaven and earth's Fashioner, the sole God; and second, because He would render his offspring as numerous as heaven's stars. This is what Paul means by: as lights within the world. Rightly, then, setting aside every earthly attachment, he followed after the Word of God, traveling in the Word's company that he might come to dwell with the Word. Rightly too the Apostles, drawing their lineage from Abraham, abandoned boat and father to follow the Word of God. Rightly too we ourselves, having taken up the very faith Abraham held, and bearing the cross just as Isaac bore the timber, follow after Him. For in Abraham humankind had already been trained and made ready beforehand to follow the Word of God. Indeed Abraham, obeying the Word of God's command through his faith, willingly surrendered his cherished only son as an offering to God, so that God in turn might be pleased, on account of Abraham's entire posterity, to give up His own cherished and only-begotten Son as an offering for our deliverance.
Abraham, being at that time a prophet, and perceiving by the Spirit the coming day of the Lord and the design of His suffering — through which he himself, together with all who trust God as he trusted, would begin to attain salvation — rejoiced beyond measure. The Lord, then, whose day he yearned to behold, was no stranger to Abraham; nor was the Lord's Father a stranger to him, for he had come to know Him through the Lord's own Word and had put his trust in Him. For this cause it was credited to him as righteousness by the Lord. For it is faith set upon God that makes a man righteous; and for this cause he declared: I will reach out my hand toward the God Most High, founder of heaven and earth. Yet those holding wicked opinions labor to overturn all of this because of a single saying, one which, in truth, they have grasped poorly.

======== Book IV — Chapter 11 ========

What is meant by saying that the Father is unknown save to the Son, and by how many means the Son discloses the Father.
For the Lord, showing His disciples that it is He who is the Word producing knowledge of the Father, and rebuking the Jews for imagining they possessed God even while nullifying His Word, through whom God becomes known, declared: The Son is unknown to any but the Father, nor is the Father known to anyone but the Son, and to him to whom the Son chooses to make Him known. So Matthew set it down, and Luke in the same way, and Mark likewise — John alone leaves out this passage. But those eager to appear cleverer than the Apostles render it thus: The Father has been known by none but the Son, nor the Son by any but the Father, and by him to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him — construing it to mean that the genuine God was recognized by nobody prior to our Lord's advent, and claiming that the God announced through the prophets is not Christ's Father. Yet if Christ came into being only when He appeared in human form, and it was merely from Tiberius Caesar's era onward that the Father began to be noted as concerned for mankind — His Word not having accompanied His own creation from the start — then it would hardly have been proper even to announce a different God on that basis, but rather to search out the reasons for such vast neglect and indifference on His part. For no inquiry should be pursued so far, or given such weight, that it alters God Himself and drains away our trust in the Craftsman who sustains us by means of His own handiwork. For exactly as we fix our trust upon the Son, so we must likewise keep a steady and unwavering devotion toward the Father.
And Justin says well, in his treatise directed against Marcion: I myself would not have trusted even the Lord, had He announced a God other than the one who fashioned, shaped, and nourishes us. But because the only-begotten Son proceeded from that single God who both built this world, shaped us, and both sustains and governs everything, summing up in Himself His own handiwork, my trust in Him stands secure, and my devotion toward the Father remains steady, both gifts bestowed upon us by God. For none can come to know the Father save through God's Word — that is, unless the Son discloses Him; nor can anyone come to know the Son except by the Father's favor. And the Son carries out the Father's favor, since the Father dispatches, and the Son is dispatched and arrives. His own Word, moreover, knows the Father, who remains unseen and past our reckoning; and though beyond speech, He Himself makes Him known to us. The Father, in turn, alone knows His own Word. The Lord has shown plainly that matters stand thus on both sides. And it is for this reason that the Son unveils knowledge of the Father through His own showing forth; for knowledge of the Father consists in the showing forth of the Son, since all things come to light through the Word. That we might understand, then, that it is the Son come among us who supplies knowledge of the Father to those who trust Him, He told His disciples: The Son is known to no one but the Father, nor the Father to any but the Son, and those to whom the Son will have disclosed Him — thereby teaching that He Himself is exactly what the Father is, so that we might accept no Father other than the one made known through the Son.
But it is He who fashioned heaven and earth, as His own words demonstrate, and not that counterfeit Father devised by Marcion, or Valentinus, or Basilides, or Carpocrates, or Simon, or the remainder of those wrongly called Gnostics. Not one of these was truly God's son, though Christ Jesus, our Lord, was; and it is against Him that they set their contrary doctrine, presuming to announce a God nobody knows. Yet let them attend to their own words: how can he be unknown, if he is known to them? Anything known even to a handful is no longer unknown. But the Lord never claimed that the Father and Son were wholly beyond knowing — otherwise His coming would serve no purpose. For to what end would He have come at all? Merely to tell us: Seek not after God, for He cannot be found, and you shall not discover Him — as the followers of Valentinus falsely allege Christ said to the Aeons? This is idle talk. Rather, the Lord taught that none can know God save as God instructs him — that God, in other words, is knowable only through God; and that to know Him at all is itself the Father's own will. For those come to know Him to whom the Son will have disclosed Him. And it was for this that the Father disclosed the Son, so that through Him He might become manifest to all, and so that He might welcome into incorruption and unending rest those who trust in Him and live justly; for to trust in Him is to carry out His will. But those who withhold their trust, and thereby shun His light, He will rightly confine within the darkness of their own choosing. To everyone, then, the Father has made Himself manifest, rendering His Word visible to all; and the Word in turn displayed to all both the Father and the Son, since He was beheld by everyone. Hence God's judgment falls justly upon all, who beheld alike yet did not trust alike. For through creation the Word discloses God its Maker; through the world, the Lord who fashioned the world; through the thing formed, the Artisan who shaped it; and through the Son, the Father who begot Him. All these speak the same message to everyone, yet not everyone trusts alike. So too, through the Law and the prophets, the Word proclaimed both Himself and the Father, and the entire people heard the same message, yet not all believed alike. And through the Word rendered visible and tangible, the Father was displayed, though not everyone believed in Him alike; yet everyone beheld the Father within the Son, for the Father remains unseen within the Son, while the Son is the Father's visible likeness. For this reason all, standing in His presence, spoke of Christ and called Him God. Even the demons, upon beholding the Son, cried out: We know who you are, God's Holy One. And the Devil too, testing Him and beholding Him, said: If you are God's Son — everyone indeed beholding and speaking of Son and Father, yet not everyone trusting.
For it was proper that the truth receive attestation from every quarter, and that a judgment follow bringing salvation to those who trust and condemnation to those who withhold trust, so that everyone might be judged fairly, and that the faith directed toward Father and Son might be established by every witness — confirmed, that is, by testimony drawn from all sides: from His own people, since they count as friends, and from outsiders, since they count as foes. For proof is genuine and beyond dispute when it draws separate testimonies even out of one's own opponents — who, persuaded here by the plain witness of their own eyes, both attest and confirm the fact, only afterward lapsing into hostility, laying accusations, and wishing their own admission were untrue. It was not, then, some other being who remained known while another said: The Father is known to none, but one and the same, the Father submitting everything to Him and gathering testimony from every source — that He is genuinely man, and genuinely God — witnessed by the Father, by the Spirit, by the angelic host, from creation itself, from humankind, from the fallen spirits, from demons, from the adversary, and finally from death itself. The Son carries out all the Father's business, start to finish, and apart from Him nobody can come to know God. For the knowledge of the Father consists in the Son; and knowledge of the Son resides in the Father, made known through the Son. It is for this reason the Lord stated: The Son is known to none but the Father, nor the Father to any but the Son, and those to whom the Son will have made Him known. Now will have made known is stated not merely of a future moment, as though the Word only began disclosing the Father once born of Mary, but is set forth as holding true across the entire span of time. For the Son, present alongside His creation since the beginning, discloses the Father to whomever He chooses, whenever He chooses, and in the manner the Father chooses. And it is for this reason that, in every respect and throughout every sphere, there exists a single God, the Father, and a single Word, and a single Son, and a single Spirit, and a single salvation extended to everyone who trusts in Him.

======== Book IV — Chapter 12 ========

How Abraham received instruction from the Word. Abraham, then, having come to know the Father through the Word, acknowledged this God as heaven and earth's Fashioner, and was shown, by a likeness foreshadowed, that God's Son would take on manhood among men, and that through His coming his own offspring would multiply like heaven's stars; he yearned to behold that day, so that he too might come to embrace Christ, and beholding it through prophecy's spirit, he was filled with joy. For this reason Simeon too, born of his line, brought the patriarch's joy to fulfillment, declaring: Now, Master, you release your servant in peace, for my eyes have looked upon your deliverance, which you have made ready in the sight of every nation — a beacon for uncovering the Gentiles, and the splendor of your people Israel. The angels likewise proclaimed tidings of great joy to the shepherds keeping their night watch. Mary too declared: My soul exalts the Lord, and my spirit has found joy in God my Deliverer — Abraham's joy descending upon those sprung from his line, who watched for and beheld Christ and put their trust in Him; and that same joy in turn flowing back from the sons to Abraham, who had yearned to behold the day of Christ's arrival. Fittingly, then, did our Lord testify concerning him, saying: Abraham your father exulted at the hope of seeing my day, and he beheld it and rejoiced.

======== Book IV — Chapter 13 ========

How Christ fulfilled the promise which God promised to Abraham. For he did not say these things only for Abraham's sake, but in order to show that all who from the beginning knew God and prophesied the coming of Christ received revelation from the Son himself, who during the final age was rendered visible and open to suffering, and conversed with mankind, so that he might raise up sons of Abraham out of stones and fulfill the promise which God had promised him, and make his seed as numerous as the stars of heaven, just as John the Baptist declares: God has the power even out of these very stones to raise up children for Abraham. This Jesus accomplished, turning us away from devotion to stones and carrying us over from hard and barren notions, and building in us a trust resembling that of Abraham. As Paul likewise attests, saying that we count as sons of Abraham through a shared likeness of faith, and as heirs both of the promise and of the inheritance. One and the same God, then, called Abraham and granted him the promise. This is the very Maker who, through Christ, also sets up as lamps within the world those who put their trust in him from among the nations. For, as he says, you stand as the world's light, resembling stars. We have thus rightly demonstrated that this God is recognized by none but the Son, and by those to whom the Son chooses to disclose him. It is the Son who makes the Father known to everyone he wills to be acquainted with him, and no one may come to know God apart from the Father's favor, nor apart from the Son's service. And for this cause the Lord told his disciples: I myself am the road, the reality, and the life-source; none reaches the Father but by my means. Had you recognized me, you would likewise have recognized my Father; and starting now you are acquainted with him, and you have looked upon him. Out of this discourse it stands plain that it is by way of the Son, that is, through the Word, that God comes to be known.

======== Book IV — Chapter 14 ========

Why the Jews fell away from God. For this reason the Jews fell away from God, not receiving his Word, but supposing that they could know the Father by himself, apart from the Word, that is, apart from the Son — not knowing him who conversed in human shape with Abraham, and once more with Moses, declaring: Truly I have looked upon the misery of my people who are in Egypt, and I have descended to rescue them. For it was the Son, being the Word of God, who from the very start was making all this ready, the Father having no need of angels for bringing creation into being and for shaping man, for whose sake creation itself was brought forth; nor again requiring any ministration for fashioning the things made, or for arranging matters bearing on man; but possessing an abundant and inexpressible service belonging to himself alone. For his own offspring and image render him service in every respect — namely, the Son together with the Holy Spirit, Word and Wisdom — beings whom every angel attends and under whom they stand. Empty, therefore, are those who, because it is said, No one knows the Father but the Son, bring in another, unknown Father.

======== Book IV — Chapter 15 ========

A demonstration that Abraham receives the kingdom of heaven as an inheritance. Now Marcion and those who follow him, driving Abraham out of his inheritance — Abraham, to whom the Spirit through many witnesses, and now also through Paul, testifies that he believed God and it was reckoned to him for righteousness — and the Lord, first raising up children to him from stones and making his seed like the stars of heaven, saying: For they shall arrive from East and from West, from North and from South, and shall take their place at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob within heaven's kingdom; and again telling the Jews: When you behold Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and every prophet inside the kingdom of heaven, while you yourselves are thrust outside. It is evident, then, that those who speak against his salvation, and who invent some other God apart from him who gave the promise to Abraham, stand outside God's kingdom, and lie disinherited from incorruption, cheating and reviling the God who leads Abraham into heaven's kingdom, along with his seed, which is the Church, through Christ Jesus — to whom is granted both the sonship and the legacy pledged to Abraham.

======== Book IV — Chapter 16 ========

That the Lord, in healing on the Sabbath, acted according to the Law. For the Lord was releasing his own people from their fetters and summoning them toward salvation, just as he did with the woman he cured, saying openly to those lacking a trust resembling Abraham's: Hypocrite, should not this one too, being bound eight years, be released from her bond even on a Sabbath? It is evident, then, that he set free and restored to life those who trusted in him just as Abraham had, violating no precept of the Law by healing on a Sabbath. For the Law never barred the curing of men upon the Sabbath — that very Law which had them circumcised on that day, and commanded the priests to carry out the services for the people; nor did it forbid the healing of dumb animals. And at Siloam, too, he often healed on the Sabbath; and for this reason many sat by him on the Sabbath day. For the Law commanded them to abstain on that day from every servile work — that is, from every kind of greed carried on through trade and other earthly business — but it urged the works of the soul, done through good judgment and good words, for the help of those who are near, to be carried out. And for this reason the Lord rebuked those who unjustly reproached him for healing on the Sabbath. For he was not destroying but fulfilling the Law, carrying out the works of the high priest, making atonement to God for men, cleansing lepers, healing the sick, and himself dying so that man, once banished, might go forth from condemnation and return fearlessly to his own inheritance.

======== Book IV — Chapter 17 ========

That the Lord's disciples were not acting against the Law when they plucked ears of grain on the Sabbath, since all the Lord's disciples were, as it were, Levites. The Law never barred those who felt hunger from taking food on the Sabbath out of what was near at hand; but it did forbid reaping and gathering into a barn. And so the Lord, to those who accused his disciples because they were plucking ears of grain and eating them, said: Have you not read this, that when David was hungry, how he entered God's house, ate the bread of the presence, and shared it with his companions, though it was permitted to none but the priests alone to eat it? — defending his disciples through the Law's own wording, and showing that it was lawful for priests to act freely. Now David was known to be, in God's sight, a priest, even though Saul persecuted him. For all the righteous hold a priestly rank. And all the Lord's apostles are priests, as, in the blessing of Levi, it is said: He who says to his father and mother, I do not know you, and did not acknowledge his brothers, and disowned his own sons — he kept your precepts and observed your covenant. Now who are they who have left father and mother and renounced all their kin, for the sake of God's word and his covenant, but the Lord's disciples? Of whom Moses states once more: They shall possess no inheritance; the Lord alone stands as their inheritance. And again: Throughout the whole tribe, the Levitical priests shall hold no portion nor possession alongside Israel; they shall live on the fruit-offerings belonging to the Lord, which is their possession. For this reason Paul also says: I do not seek the gift, but I seek the fruit. Since, he means, the Lord's disciples held a Levitical inheritance, it was permitted them, being hungry, to take food from standing grain. For the workman deserves his food. And the priests within the temple desecrated the Sabbath, yet incurred no guilt. Why then were they not guilty? Because, being in the temple, they were carrying out not worldly but the Lord's own services, fulfilling the Law and not transgressing it.

======== Book IV — Chapter 18 ========

A demonstration that the things according to the Law and the things according to the Gospel are of one and the same substance, and how the New Testament was foretold by the prophets. All things, then, are of one and the same source, that is, from one and the same God, as the Lord also said to his disciples: Therefore every scribe instructed in the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who draws forth from his storehouse both new and ancient things. He did not teach that one man produces the ancient and a different man the new, but a single, identical person. For the Lord is the householder who rules over the whole household of the Father, giving to the servants — those still undisciplined — a law suited to them, but to the free, those justified by faith, giving fitting precepts, and to the sons opening up his own inheritance. Now by scribes and teachers of the kingdom of heaven he meant his own disciples, of whom he also says elsewhere to the Jews: Behold, I am sending you sages and men learned in scripture and instructors, and a number of these you will put to death and chase from town to town. Thus, in speaking of things new and old brought out of the treasure, he speaks without contradiction of two testaments: the old one, which was the giving of the Law that came before; and the new one, which he shows to be the way of life according to the Gospel — of which David speaks: Sing to the Lord a new song. And Isaiah: Sing to the Lord a new hymn: its beginning is that his name is glorified from the ends of the earth; his mighty deeds are proclaimed in the islands. Jeremiah says: Behold, I will bring about, he says, a fresh covenant, unlike the one I struck with your ancestors at Mount Horeb. Both testaments, then, were produced by one and the same householder, God's Word, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who conversed both with Abraham and with Moses, and who has restored liberty to us in newness, and multiplied that grace which is from himself.

======== Book IV — Chapter 19 ========

What is meant by, Something greater than the temple is here, and, Something greater than Solomon is here.
For, he says, something greater than the temple is here. Now more and less are not said of things which have no fellowship with one another and are of contrary nature and at war with each other, but of things which are of the same substance and share fellowship with one another, differing only in scale and measure — much as water is set beside water, brightness beside brightness, and favor beside favor. Greater, then, is the giving of the covenant leading into freedom than the one given for bondage; and yet it is not another Lord who is greater than the temple and greater than Solomon, proclaiming the Father, but the very same one, who always has more to measure out to his own household, and, as their love toward God increases, bestows more and greater gifts — as the Lord also said to his disciples: For you shall see greater things than these. And Paul says: Not that I have already reached the goal, or already stand fully mature; for our knowledge is partial, and our prophesying is partial. But once what is complete arrives, the partial will be set aside. So then, once the complete arrives, we shall not behold a different Father, but this identical one whom we now yearn to behold: for happy are the clean of heart, since they will look upon God; nor shall we seek out a different Christ and Son of God, but this identical one who came from the Virgin Mary's womb, who likewise endured suffering, in whom we place our faith and whom we hold dear — as Isaiah says: And on that day they shall declare, Behold, this is the Lord our God, in whom we have placed our hope, and in whom our salvation has brought us gladness. And Peter, in his letter, states: Whom, without having seen him, you cherish; and in whom, even now not seeing him, you place your trust, and take delight with a joy beyond words. Nor shall we obtain some other Holy Spirit apart from this one dwelling among us and calling out, Abba, Father; and within these very gifts our growth shall continue — yet rather, meeting him face to face, we shall delight in the gifts of God. So also now, in obtaining something greater than the temple and greater than Solomon, which is the coming of the Son of God, we have learned of no other God besides the Maker and Fashioner of all things, who was shown to us from the beginning, nor of another Christ, Son of God, besides him who was proclaimed by the prophets.
For when the New Testament had been made known and proclaimed by the prophets, he too who was destined to establish it in keeping with the Father's own will was foretold in advance, and was later revealed to men just as God intended, so that believers might always be able to make progress in him, and, through the two testaments, mature in the growth of salvation. For salvation itself is single, and God is one; yet the precepts shaping man are many, and the steps that lead man to God are not few. To an earthly and temporal king, being a man, it is sometimes possible to grant greater advancement to his subjects; but shall it not be permitted to God, seeing he is ever the same, to bestow ever greater grace on the human race, and to honor with continual gifts those who please him? But if this is what is meant by advancing — namely, to find another Father besides the one who was announced from the beginning, and again, besides the one thought to have been found second, to find yet a third — then the same kind of advance will carry one from the third to a fourth, and from that again to another and another; and such a mind, ever supposing itself to be advancing, will never come to rest in one God. For, having been cast out from him who truly is, and having turned back, it will indeed always be seeking, but will never find God; rather it will forever swim in the depths of incomprehension, unless, converted by repentance, it returns to the place from which it was cast out, confessing and believing in the one God, the Father, the Maker, whom the Law and the prophets announced beforehand, and to whom Christ gave his own testimony — as he himself told those accusing his disciples of disregarding the elders' tradition: Why do you set aside God's commandment for the sake of your tradition? For God declared, Honor your father and mother; and, Whoever speaks evil of father or mother, let that one be put to death. And once more he told them a second time: You have made void God's word because of your tradition — Christ thereby most openly confessing as Father and God the one who declared in the Law, Honor your father and your mother, so that things may go well for you. For the true God acknowledged this precept of the Law as God's own utterance, and recognized no other besides his own Father as God.

======== Book IV — Chapter 20 ========

How Moses signified the coming of Christ, both the time and the place of his Passion.

John rightly records the Lord saying to the Jews: 'Search the Scriptures, in which you think you have eternal life; it is they that testify of me. Yet you are not willing to come to me, that you may have life.' How, then, did the writings bear witness to him, if not because a single Father originated them, forewarning mankind of his Son's advent and proclaiming ahead of time the deliverance that would come through him? 'For if you believed Moses, you would believe me also; for he wrote of me' -- meaning that the Son of God was scattered throughout all his writings: now conversing with Abraham and sharing a meal at his table; now supplying Noah with the dimensions of the ark; now searching after Adam; now visiting judgment on the men of Sodom; and once more appearing to Jacob and guiding his steps; and conversing with Moses out of the burning bush. It would take far too long to enumerate every way in which Moses points toward the Son of God. He was not even ignorant of the day of his Passion, but foretold it in a figure, calling it the Passover; and it was in fulfilling that very Passover, foretold by Moses so long before, that the Lord suffered, in his own person and at that very appointed time. Nor did he describe only the day, but also the place, and the very close of the ages, and the sign of the sun's setting, saying: 'You may not sacrifice the Passover in any of the other cities which the Lord your God gives you, but only in the place which the Lord your God shall choose, to make his name dwell there; there you shall sacrifice the Passover, in the evening, at the setting of the sun.'
He had already, besides, disclosed his coming clearly, declaring: 'A prince shall not depart from Judah, nor a commander from among his descendants, until the one arrives to whom it belongs, and the nations set their hope on him; he ties his young donkey to the vine, and to the choicest vine the colt of his ass. He shall rinse his cloak in wine, and his mantle in grape-juice reddened like blood; his glance more radiant than wine, and his teeth more pale than milk.' Let anyone who probes every detail ask who this figure from Judah is, on whom the nations set their hope, what the vine signifies, what the young donkey, the mantle, the glance, the teeth, and the wine mean -- let them weigh each of these words, and they will discover that no one else is being announced but our Lord Jesus Christ. For this reason Moses, rebuking the people for their ingratitude, says: 'Thus, foolish and unwise people, have you repaid the Lord?' And again, showing that it is the Word who from the beginning founded and formed them, and who in the last times, redeeming and giving us life, is shown hanging upon the tree, and that they would not believe him, he says: 'Your life shall hang before your eyes, and you will not believe in your life.' And again: 'Is not this your Father who possessed you, and made you, and created you?'

======== Book IV — Chapter 21 ========

That the prophets and the righteous, before the Lord's coming, knew of his coming.
That it was not the prophets alone but many of the righteous besides who, having foreknowledge of his coming through the Holy Spirit, prayed to survive until that hour when they might meet their Lord in person and listen to what he would say -- this the Lord himself declared openly to those who followed him: 'Many prophets and righteous men longed to see what you now see, and were not granted sight of it, and to hear what you now hear, and were not granted hearing of it.' What, then, made them long to hear and to see, if not that they already knew in advance that his coming would take place? And by what means could they have known this beforehand, unless they had first been given that foreknowledge by him? And on what basis did the writings speak of him, if not because everything had, from the start, been disclosed and made known to the faithful through the one identical God acting by his Word -- conversing at one point with the creature he had shaped, giving commandments at another, rebuking here, exhorting there, and later releasing the bondservant and receiving him as a son, and, when the moment was ripe, granting the inheritance of incorruptibility, so that man might be brought to completion? For he formed man for growth and increase, just as Scripture also says: 'Increase and multiply.' And in this God differs from man: God makes, man is made; and he who makes is always the same, while what is made must receive a beginning, a middle stage, an addition, and an increase. God does well, and it is done well to man. God is perfect in all things, equal and like to himself, being wholly light, and wholly mind, and wholly substance, and the source of all good things; while man receives advancement and increase toward God. Just as God remains forever unchanging, so man, having once been established in God, shall progress toward God without end. God never tires of doing man good and making him rich, nor does man ever tire of gaining that benefit and being made rich by God. The man grateful toward his creator becomes a vessel fit to hold his goodness, an instrument through which he is glorified; whereas the ungrateful man, scorning his own maker and refusing submission to his Word, becomes instead a vessel fit for his rightful condemnation. To those who continually bear the most fruit, and who have charge of the most of the Lord's money, he has promised to give the most: 'Well done,' he says, 'good and faithful servant; because you have been faithful over a little, I will set you over much; enter into the joy of your Lord' -- the Lord himself promising the greater reward.
Just as, then, he has promised to give the most to those who now bear fruit, in proportion to the reward of his grace, though not according to any change in the knowledge of him -- for the Lord himself remains, and it is the same Father who is revealed -- so too the one and the same Lord, through his coming, has bestowed on those who came later a greater reward of grace than that which belonged to the old Testament. For the people of old heard through servants that a king was to come, and rejoiced only moderately, in proportion to their hope of his coming; but those who saw him present, and obtained and enjoyed the freedom of his gift, have a greater grace and a more abundant exultation, rejoicing at the coming of the king, just as David says: 'My soul shall exult in the Lord, it shall rejoice in his salvation.' And for this reason, when he entered Jerusalem, all who were on the road recognized their king with deep joy of soul, and spread their garments before him, and adorned the way with green branches, shouting out in great joy and triumph: 'Save now, Son of David; blessed be he who arrives in the Lord's name; save now in the highest heights.' And when the wicked stewards grew jealous -- those who defrauded their inferiors and lorded it over those who did not understand the matter -- and, unwilling that the king had come, said to him, 'Do you hear what these are saying?', the Lord answered: 'Have you never read, Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babes you have perfected praise?' -- showing that what had been spoken by David of the Son of God was fulfilled in himself, and signifying that they did not know the power of Scripture nor the dispensation of God, but that he was the Christ heralded by the prophets, whose renown is celebrated throughout every land, bringing praise to completion for his Father out of the mouths of infants and nursing babes. For this reason also his glory has been lifted up above the heavens.
If, then, it is the very one who was proclaimed by the prophets, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is now present, and if his coming bestows fuller grace and a greater reward on those who receive him, it is clear that the Father, too, is the very one who was announced by the prophets, and that the Son, in coming, did not bring knowledge of a different Father, but of the very one who was proclaimed from the beginning -- from whom he also brought freedom to those who serve him rightfully, with a ready mind and with their whole heart. But on those who despise him and are not subject to God, and who instead pursue outward observances for the glory of men (observances that had been handed down as a figure of things to come, the Law providing, as it were, the outline of a shadow, and sketching eternal things by temporal ones, heavenly things by earthly ones), who pretend to observe more than what was actually commanded, as though setting their own diligence above God himself, while inwardly full of hypocrisy, and greed, and every kind of wickedness -- on these he has brought everlasting destruction, cutting them off from life.

======== Book IV — Chapter 22 ========

How the tradition of the elders was contrary to the Law given through Moses.

Their own tradition, which they pretended to observe on the basis of the Law, was in fact contrary to the Law given through Moses. On this account Isaiah too declares: 'Your innkeepers dilute wine with water' -- indicating that the elders diluted God's rigorous commandment with a watered-down tradition, that is, that they were introducing a corrupted law that ran counter to the true Law, exactly as the Lord likewise made evident when he asked them: 'Why do you overstep God's commandment on account of your own tradition?' Nor was this the only transgression by which they emptied God's Law of its force through diluting it like wine with water; they further erected, in the Law's place, a law of their own devising -- the one known even now as the Pharisaic law. Within it they subtract certain things, append others, and construe still others as they see fit, and every one of their teachers handles it after his own fashion. In their eagerness to uphold these traditions, they would not submit to the Law of God, which had been instructing them toward Christ's coming; they even censured the Lord for healing on the Sabbath, though, as already noted, the Law forbade no such thing. In fact they themselves carried out certain tasks on the Sabbath -- circumcising a man on that very day -- yet they never turned this charge against themselves, even though through their tradition and the Pharisaic law just mentioned they were overstepping God's commandment, and were not holding fast to the Law's true precept -- namely, love toward God and one's neighbor, on which, it is said, the entire Law and the Prophets depend. He himself introduced no commandment surpassing this one; rather he restated this very precept for his disciples, instructing them to love God with the whole of their heart, and their neighbor as themselves. Yet had he descended from some Father other than the God of the Law, he would hardly have relied, above all else, on the Law's supreme precept; instead he would surely have labored by every means to put forward some loftier commandment issuing from a more perfect Father, rather than one already given by the God of the Law. Paul likewise states: 'Love brings the Law to its fulfillment'; and that once all else is stripped away, faith, hope, and love endure, and love surpasses them all; and that understanding devoid of love toward God achieves nothing, nor does the comprehension of mysteries, nor faith, nor prophecy -- all these amount to nothing and are hollow apart from love; whereas love brings a man to maturity, and whoever loves God has reached maturity, in the present age as much as in the age still to come. For our love of God has no end; the more we gaze upon him, the deeper our love grows.

======== Book IV — Chapter 23 ========

On the Pharisaic law: which of its precepts are particular, and which universal.

Since, then, both in the Law and in the Gospel the foremost and weightiest precept is loving the Lord God with one's entire heart, and the precept ranking next after it is loving one's neighbor as oneself, a single author is thereby shown to stand behind both the Law and the Gospel. For since the precepts of a perfected life are the same in both Testaments, they show forth the same God -- who ordained particular precepts suited to each, but who, in both, urged the same higher and supreme precepts, without which there is no salvation. And how could the Lord fail to confound them, when he shows that the Law is not from a different God, saying to those he was teaching, the crowds and the disciples: 'The scribes and Pharisees occupy the chair of Moses. So carry out and keep whatever they tell you, but do not model your conduct on their deeds; for they talk yet fail to act. They tie up crushing loads and pile them onto people's shoulders, while refusing themselves to budge those loads even by a single finger.' He was not, then, finding fault with the Law given through Moses, which he was even then urging should be kept while Jerusalem still stood; rather, he was reproving them because, while they proclaimed the words of the Law, they were without love, and for this reason had become unjust toward God and toward their neighbors. As Isaiah likewise states: 'This people pays me honor with their mouth, while their heart keeps far away from me. Their worship of me is empty, since what they teach are the rules and commands invented by men.' By 'the rules invented by men' he means not the Law delivered through Moses but the traditions devised by their own elders; and by clinging to these they nullified God's Law, and on that account failed likewise to submit to his Word. This, indeed, is precisely what Paul says concerning them as well: 'For not knowing God's righteousness, and striving to set up a righteousness of their own, they did not submit themselves to God's righteousness. For Christ is the culmination of the Law, unto righteousness for every believer.' And how could Christ be the Law's culmination without having also been its origin? For the one who brought it to its close is the very one who set it in motion; and it is he who says to Moses: 'I have indeed witnessed the misery of my people dwelling in Egypt, and I have descended to rescue them' -- ever accustomed, from the very outset, as the Word of God, to go down and go up again for the deliverance of those in hardship.
Now the Law had already taught beforehand that man must follow Christ, and the Lord himself makes this plain to the man who asked him what he must do to inherit eternal life, answering him thus: "If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments." And when the man asked further, "Which?", the Lord said again: "You shall not commit adultery, you shall not kill, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, honor your father and mother, and love your neighbor as yourself" — proposing, as it were, the precepts of the Law as steps by which those willing to follow him might enter into life; and what he said to that one man he was saying to all. But when the man had said, "All these I have done" — and perhaps he had not, for otherwise he would not have been told, "Keep the commandments" — the Lord, exposing his covetousness, said to him: "If you wish to be perfect, go, sell everything you possess, give the proceeds to the poor, then come and follow me," pledging him a share with the apostles if he should do this; and he was not announcing to those who followed him some other God the Father besides the one who had been announced from the beginning through the Law, nor another Son; but he was teaching them to do the precepts which God had commanded from the beginning, and by good works to dissolve their old covetousness, and to follow Christ. And that the distribution of one's possessions to the poor dissolves former covetousness, Zacchaeus made plain, saying: "See, Lord, I now give half my possessions to the poor, and whatever I have taken from anyone by fraud, I pay back fourfold."

======== Book IV — Chapter 24 ========

How the Lord did not dissolve, but surpassed, what was contained in the Law, for the benefit of his disciples; and how our righteousness abounds more than that of the scribes and Pharisees.
That the Lord did not abolish but broadened and brought to completion the inborn precepts of the Law that render a man righteous — precepts which even before the Law was given were kept by those pleasing to God and justified through faith — is evident from his own sayings. For it was said, he notes, "to those of former times, You shall not commit adultery. But I tell you, whoever looks upon a woman with desire for her has already committed adultery with her within his heart." And again: "It was said, You shall not kill. But I tell you, whoever is angry with his brother without cause will be answerable to judgment." And, "It was said, You shall not swear falsely. But I tell you, swear not at all. Let your speech be simply Yes or No," together with whatever else belongs to this pattern. None of these sayings holds a conflict with or overturning of what came earlier, as Marcion's followers proclaim; rather they show a completion and widening, just as he himself declares: "Unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will find no entry into the kingdom of the heavens." And in what did this surpassing consist? First, that one should place faith not merely in the Father, but now also in his Son once he had appeared; for it is the Son who brings man into fellowship and union with God. Next, that one should not merely speak but also do; for people were accustomed to speak without acting; and that one should refrain not merely from wicked deeds but also from the desires giving rise to them. Now in this he was not instructing contrary to the Law, but rather completing the Law and establishing its just demands firmly within us. It would have run counter to the Law had he directed his disciples to commit the very thing the Law prohibited. But what he did direct — refraining not only from what the Law forbade but also from the desires leading to it — is not, as has been said, opposed to the Law, nor a dissolving of it, but rather its completion, widening, and enrichment.
For the Law, since it was given to servants, instructed the soul through bodily, external things, drawing it, as it were by a chain, to obedience to the commandments, so that man might be trained to serve God; yet it was the Word who liberated the soul, and through the soul instructed that the body too should be purified willingly. When this was done, it was necessary that the chains binding man to God should be removed, but that the decrees of liberty should be extended still further, and that subjection to the King should be increased, lest a man, turning back, should appear unworthy of him who had set him free; and that the piety and obedience which is owed to the father of the household should indeed be the same for both servants and free sons, but that the free should have greater confidence, since the labor of freedom is far weightier and nobler than mere compliance rendered in servitude. And for this reason the Lord, in place of the precept "You shall not commit adultery," forbade even to desire; and in place of "You shall not kill," forbade even to be angry; and in place of tithing, commanded to distribute all that one has to the poor; and to love not only neighbors but even enemies; and to be not merely good givers and sharers, but even generous donors to those who take what is ours without asking. "To him who takes away your tunic," he says, "give up your cloak as well; and from him who takes what is yours, do not demand it back; and as you wish that men should do to you, do also to them" — so that we should not grieve as though unwilling to be defrauded, but rejoice as though giving willingly, showing grace to our neighbors rather than being enslaved to necessity. "If anyone," he says, "forces you to go one mile, go with him two more," so that you may follow not as a slave but go ahead as a free man, showing yourself in all things fit and useful to your neighbor — not looking to their malice, but perfecting your own goodness, conforming yourself to the Father, who makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.
All these things, then, as we have said before, did not dissolve the Law but fulfilled it, extending and enlarging it in us — as if one were to say, a greater exercise of liberty, and a fuller subjection and affection fixed in us toward our Liberator. For he did not free us for this, that we should depart from him; for no one placed outside the Lord's own goods can procure for himself the nourishments of salvation; but rather, that having received more of his grace, we might love him more. And the more we shall have loved him, the greater the glory we shall receive from him, since we are always in the sight of the Father. Since, then, all the inborn precepts belong equally to us and to those who came before, having taken their start and source among them, while among us they have gained growth and completion. For giving assent to God, following his Word, loving him above everything and one's neighbor as oneself — since man is neighbor to man — together with steering clear of every wicked act, and whatever else falls under this heading, being shared by both, point to one and the same God. And such indeed is our Lord, God's own Word, who first drew servants to God, and afterward set free those who were subject to him, just as he himself says to his disciples: "No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his lord does; but I have called you friends, for everything I have learned from my Father, I have disclosed to you." For in saying, "No longer do I call you servants," he most clearly signified that it was he himself who first established, through the Law, that servitude toward God which men had, and afterward gave them liberty. And in saying, "For the servant does not know what his lord does," he shows, by his own coming, the ignorance of the servile people. And in calling his disciples friends of God, he plainly shows himself to be the Word of God, whom also Abraham, following willingly and without chains because of the nobility of his faith, became a friend of God. Nor indeed did the Word of God take up friendship with Abraham out of any need, existing from the beginning as perfect; for "before Abraham was, I am," he says; but rather that he might grant to Abraham himself eternal life, being good, since friendship with God is the bestower of immortality upon those who lay hold of it.

======== Book IV — Chapter 25 ========

Why God made man, and chose the fathers, and called us; and what benefit that service which is toward God confers; and why such a law was given to the people. In the beginning, God formed Adam not because he needed man, but so that he might have someone on whom to bestow his benefits. For not only before Adam, but before every created thing, the Word was glorifying his Father, remaining in him; and he himself was glorified by the Father, just as he himself says: "Father, glorify me with the glory I possessed alongside you before the world existed." Nor did he, needing our service, command us to follow him; rather he was assigning salvation to us ourselves. For to follow the Savior is to share in salvation, and to follow the light is to receive the light. Those dwelling within the light are not themselves the source lighting the light — rather they are lit up and made bright by it; they contribute nothing to it themselves, but obtaining its benefit, are made luminous by the light. So too service toward God confers nothing on God, nor does God have need of human obedience; but he himself bestows life and incorruption and eternal glory on those who follow and serve him, granting a benefit to those who serve him because they serve, and to those who follow him because they follow — yet receiving no benefit from them; for he is perfect in riches and without need. But God seeks service from men for this reason: being kind and compassionate, he may confer good on those who continue steadfast in serving him. For to the degree that God is in need of nothing, to that same degree man is in need of communion with God. For this is man's glory, to persevere and remain in the service of God. And for this reason the Lord said to his disciples: "You did not choose me, but I chose you," signifying that it was not they who bestowed glory on him through their following, but that, by attaching themselves to the Son of God, glory was bestowed upon them by him. And again: "I wish that where I am, they also may be, that they may see my glory" — not vainly boasting in this, but wishing his own glory to be shared by his disciples, of whom Isaiah says: "From the east I will bring your offspring, and from the west I will gather you; and I will say to the north, Bring them, and to the south, Do not hold them back; bring my sons from distant lands, and my daughters from earth's farthest reaches, everyone called by my name; for I have prepared them for my glory, and formed and made them." This is why, wherever the carcass is, there also will the eagles be gathered together, sharing in the glory of the Lord, who formed and prepared us for this, that while we are with him we might share in his glory.
So too God from the beginning formed man for his own generosity's sake; but he selected the patriarchs so that they might attain salvation; and he was forming the people beforehand, teaching the untaught to follow God; and he was preparing the prophets on earth in advance, accustoming man to bear his Spirit and to hold fellowship with God — he himself, in truth, standing in need of nothing at all, yet extending his own fellowship to those who need it; and for those pleasing to him, laying out, as a builder lays out a design, the arrangement of salvation; giving guidance by himself to those who could not see in Egypt; giving a most fitting law to those who were restless in the wilderness; offering a worthy inheritance to those who entered the good land; killing the fatted calf and giving the first robe to those who turn back to the Father — composing the human race in many ways toward the harmony of salvation. And for this reason John says in the Apocalypse: "His voice was as the voice of many waters." For truly the many waters are the Spirit of God, since the Father is rich and great. And passing through all these, the Word, without envy, was bestowing benefit on those who were subject to him, writing a law fitting and suited to every condition.
So too he ordained for the people the making of the tabernacle, and the building of the temple, and the choosing of the Levites, as well as sacrifices and offerings, and admonitions, and all the rest of the service of the Law. He himself truly stood in need of not a single one of these things; for he is forever brimming with every good thing, possessing within himself every sweet fragrance and every pleasant exhalation, even before Moses ever lived; but he was instructing a people prone to turn back to idols, through many things — through temporal things leading them to eternal things, through carnal things to spiritual things, through earthly things to heavenly things — just as it was also said to Moses: "You shall make all things according to the pattern of those things which you saw on the mountain" — heavenly characters, and spiritual images, and prefigurations of things to come, just as Paul likewise states: "For they drank from the spiritual rock accompanying them, and that rock was Christ." And again, concerning these things that are in the Law, he adds: "Now all these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our correction, upon whom the end of the ages has come." For through these types they were learning to fear God, and to persevere in obedience to him. And so the Law was to them both discipline and prophecy of things to come. For God, through the natural precepts which he gave to men, implanted in them from the beginning, admonishing them — that is, through the Decalogue (which if anyone does not keep, he has no salvation) — required nothing more of them at first. Just as Moses states in Deuteronomy: "These are the complete words the Lord addressed to the whole gathering of Israel's sons upon the mountain," and he continues, noting that he inscribed them upon two stone tablets and handed them over to him, so that those wishing to follow him might keep the commandments.

======== Book IV — Chapter 26 ========

How in the former people, and in the Church, certain precepts were given because of the hardness and disobedience of men.
But when they turned aside into the making of the calf, and turned back in heart toward Egypt, longing to be bondmen rather than freemen, they were given, matched to that longing, a lasting bondage — not one severing them from God, but one placing them beneath the yoke of a legal servitude. So too the prophet Ezekiel, setting forth why such a law was imposed, states: "And their eyes went after the idols of their fathers, and I gave them commandments that were not good, and ordinances by which they would not live." And Luke relates that Stephen, first of those chosen by the Apostles for the diaconate, and first put to death for testifying of Christ, spoke thus concerning Moses: "He took the living oracles of God to hand on to you — whom our forefathers refused to heed, but pushed him away from themselves, and in their hearts turned back toward Egypt, telling Aaron: Fashion for us gods to march ahead of us; as for that Moses who led us out of the Egyptian land, we cannot tell what has befallen him. In those very days they fashioned a calf, brought offerings to the image, and took delight in what their own hands had produced. But God turned from them and abandoned them to serving the armies of heaven," just as stands recorded in the prophetic writings: "House of Israel, did you bring me victims and offerings across forty years in the desert? Yet you carried the shrine of Moloch, and the star of your god Remphan, the images you fashioned to bow before them" — showing plainly that this law came not from some other god, but from that self-same God, fitted to their servile state. It is for this that he tells Moses also, in Exodus: "I will send my messenger ahead of you; I myself will not go up in your company, for you are a people of stiffened neck."
And not only this, but the Lord also made plain that certain precepts were laid down for them by Moses because of their hardness and because they would not be subject. For when they asked him, "Why, then, did Moses instruct us to hand a wife a certificate of divorce and dismiss her?" his reply to them ran: "It was on account of your hardened hearts that he allowed you this concession; yet such was not the case at the first" — thus clearing Moses as a trustworthy servant, while owning that it was the very one who at the outset fashioned them male and female who was God, even as he charged the people with hardness and refusal to submit. And for this reason they received from Moses the precept of divorce, fitted to their hardness. And why do we speak of these things only from the Old Testament, since in the New Testament also the Apostle is found doing the very same thing, saying: "I have no commandment of the Lord, but I give my counsel, as one who has obtained mercy from the Lord to be faithful." And elsewhere he says: "Lest Satan tempt you because of your lack of self-control." If, then, even in the New Testament certain precepts are found granted by the Apostle out of forbearance, on account of the lack of self-control of some — lest, being hardened, such persons should altogether despair of their salvation and become apostates from God — we ought not to wonder if in the Old Testament also the same God willed something of this sort to be done for the benefit of the people, alluring them by the aforementioned observances, so that by keeping them they might, through these observances of the Decalogue, offer him gifts and, being held fast by him, not turn back to idolatry nor become apostates from God, but might learn with their whole heart to love him. But if certain persons, because the Israelites were perishing and lost, call the giver of the law weak, they will find within the calling proclaimed among us as well that those summoned are numerous while those selected are few; and wolves lurking inside, though outwardly draped in sheep's fleece; and that what was always free and in man's own power God has always preserved, together with his own exhortation — so that those who do not obey him may be justly judged, since they did not obey; and those who obeyed and believed him may be honored with incorruptibility.

======== Book IV — Chapter 27 ========

Why circumcision was given to the people, and the observance of sabbaths, and what recapitulation they have.
But that God gave circumcision not as the accomplishment of righteousness, but as a sign, so that the race of Abraham might remain recognizable, we learn from that very Scripture. For it says, God spoke to Abraham thus: "Let every male of your household be circumcised — cut away the flesh of the foreskin — as a token of the pact between myself and you." The prophet Ezekiel states the like concerning the sabbaths: "I granted them my sabbaths, to stand as a token between myself and them, so they would recognize me as the Lord who makes them holy." And in Exodus God tells Moses: "You are to keep my sabbaths; this shall be a token for me toward you across your generations." These, then, were granted as a token — yet they were tokens neither meaningless, that is empty of purpose, nor idle, seeing they came from a wise maker. Rather, fleshly circumcision foreshadowed a circumcision of the spirit. For, as the Apostle states, "our circumcision is one not wrought by hands." And the prophet says: "Cut away the hardness of your heart." The sabbaths, meanwhile, taught the necessity of unbroken service toward God across every single day. For, the Apostle Paul states, "we are reckoned as sheep marked for slaughter the whole day through" — meaning set apart and serving without pause in devotion to our faith, holding fast to it, and steering clear of every kind of covetousness, neither amassing nor laying up riches on earth. And it was also made manifest, by the things that were made, that there would be a rest of God — that is, a kingdom — in which the man who has persevered in attending upon God shall, resting there, share in the table of God.
And because man found no justification through these observances, but they were granted the people as a token, Scripture reveals that Abraham, lacking circumcision and lacking any keeping of sabbaths, put his trust in God, and this was counted to him as righteousness, so that he was named God's friend. Lot likewise, uncircumcised, was led out of Sodom, obtaining rescue from God. So too Noah, uncircumcised yet pleasing to God, was granted the measure allotted to the world's second generation. Enoch as well, though an uncircumcised man pleasing to God, carried out a mission from God to the angels, and was carried off, and remains preserved down to this very day as a witness to God's righteous verdict — since the angels who rebelled fell earthward to face judgment, while the man who pleased God was carried off into salvation. So also all the rest of the great multitude of those who were righteous before Abraham, and of those patriarchs who were before Moses, were justified without the things aforesaid and without the law of Moses. As Moses himself says to the people in Deuteronomy: "The Lord your God made a covenant in Horeb: the Lord did not make this covenant with your fathers, but with you."
Why then did the Lord not make a covenant with the fathers? Because the law is not laid down for the righteous; but the righteous forefathers carried the force of the Decalogue engraved upon their hearts and inner selves, cherishing the God who had formed them, and holding back from wronging their neighbor; hence there was no call to correct them by spoken precepts, since the law's righteousness already dwelt within them. Yet once this righteousness and this love toward God had slipped into forgetfulness, and had been quenched during the Egyptian sojourn, God, moved by his abundant kindness toward mankind, was compelled to reveal himself through his own voice, and to bring the people forth by his might, so that man might once more become God's pupil and companion; and by his commandment he corrected the disobedient, lest they should scorn their own maker, and he nourished them on manna, that they might partake of a food fit for reason — as Moses likewise states in Deuteronomy: "And he fed you with manna, which your fathers did not know, that you might know that man does not live by bread alone."

======== Book IV — Chapter 28 ========

And he commanded love toward God, and instilled that righteousness which is toward one's neighbor, that man might be neither unjust nor unworthy of God, building man up beforehand through the Decalogue into friendship with himself and into concord with his neighbor. These things indeed profited man himself, while God had no need of anything from man. And for this reason Scripture says: "These words the Lord spoke to the whole assembly of the sons of Israel on the mountain, and added nothing more"; for, as already noted, nothing was lacking to him from them. And Moses states elsewhere: "So now, O Israel, what is it the Lord your God seeks from you, save that you revere the Lord your God, tread every one of his paths, hold him dear, and give service to the Lord your God with your whole heart and your whole spirit?" These things indeed brought glory to man, furnishing him with what he lacked, namely friendship with God; yet they added nothing to God, since God had no need of man's affection. Man's want was for the glory of God, which he could obtain by no other means than through that submission owed toward God. It is for this reason that Moses tells them again: "Choose life, so that you and your offspring may live, by holding the Lord your God dear, heeding his voice, and clinging fast to him; for in this lies your life and the number of your days." It was toward this life that the Lord, forming man in advance, spoke the words of the Decalogue equally to all; and thus they endure equally among us too, gaining extension and growth, though not abolition, through his arrival in the flesh. But the servile precepts he laid upon the people individually through Moses, matched to their schooling or their reproof, as Moses himself states: "And at that time the Lord charged me to make known to you decrees and ordinances." These, then, granted to them for bondage and as a token, he bounded within the new covenant of freedom. But the things that are inherent, generous, and shared by all, he expanded and multiplied, granting them freely to men without grudging, through adoption, letting them know God as Father and hold him dear with the entire heart, and follow his Word unswervingly, refraining not merely from wicked acts but from the very cravings behind them. He also deepened their reverence; for sons owe greater reverence than servants, and greater affection toward a father. It is for this that the Lord states: "Men shall answer for every careless word they utter, on the day of reckoning"; and, "whoever gazes upon a woman with longing has already committed adultery with her within his heart"; and, "whoever holds anger toward his brother without cause shall be answerable to judgment" — so that we might understand we shall answer to God not merely for our deeds, as servants do, but even for our words and inward thoughts, as those granted the power of freedom, wherein a man wins greater approval the more he reveres, fears, and holds the Lord dear. It is for this that Peter states that our freedom is not held as a covering for wickedness, but as proof and display of faith.

======== Book IV — Chapter 29 ========

A demonstration that God, not for his own sake, nor because he needed their service, commanded the Levitical law; for what does God, who lacks nothing, require of man? That God did not need their service, but on their own account prescribed certain observances in the law, the prophets very fully show. And again, that God does not need their offering, but requires it for the sake of the man who offers it, the Lord plainly taught, as we have shown. For whenever he saw them neglecting righteousness and abstaining from the love of God, while supposing that they propitiated God by sacrifices and the rest of the typical observances, Samuel told them: "The Lord takes no delight in burnt offerings and victims, but wants his voice obeyed. Note well, compliance outweighs sacrifice, and heeding him outweighs the fat of rams." And David states: "You wished for no sacrifice or offering, but you have shaped ears for me; you asked no burnt offerings even for sin" — instructing them that God wants the compliance that keeps them safe, rather than victims and burnt offerings, which add nothing to their righteousness, while at the same moment foretelling the New Testament. He speaks of this yet more openly in the fiftieth Psalm: "Had you wished for a victim, I would have given one; burnt offerings would not please you. A crushed spirit is a sacrifice fit for God; a heart broken and humbled the Lord will not scorn." And since God is in want of nothing, in the Psalm just prior he states: "I will not accept calves out of your household, nor he-goats out of your pens. Every beast of the forest belongs to me, the herds upon the hills and the oxen; every bird of the air is known to me, and the loveliness of the field is mine. Were I hungry, I would not say so to you; for the world and everything filling it is mine. Would I feed on the meat of oxen, or take the blood of goats as drink?" Then, so none might think he spurns these out of wrath, he continues with counsel: "Bring God a thank-offering, and render your vows to the Most High; call on me on your day of distress, and I will rescue you, and you shall render me glory" — thereby, on the one hand, rejecting the things by which sinners imagined they won God's favor, and showing he lacks nothing at all, and on the other, urging and warning them toward what brings man to righteousness and draws him near to God. [The Latin text breaks off here in a corrupt and fragmentary line: "But you have pierced my ears for me, and you have prepared a body for me..." — the source is unreadable beyond this point.]
Isaiah says the same thing: "What are your many sacrifices to me? says the Lord. I am full." And after refusing the burnt offerings, the sacrifices, the oblations, and further the new moons, the sabbaths, the feast days, and all the rest of the observance that goes with them, he added, urging on them what is truly salutary: "Wash, be clean, put away your wickedness from your hearts, from before my eyes; cease from your evil deeds, learn to do good, seek judgment, deliver the one who suffers wrong, judge the orphan's cause, and do justice for the widow, and come, let us argue it out, says the Lord." For it was not, as many dare to say, that he turned away from their sacrifices out of some human passion; rather, pitying their blindness and pointing them toward the true sacrifice, by offering which they would propitiate God so as to receive life from him.
As he says elsewhere: "A sacrifice to God is a broken heart; a fragrance of sweetness to God is a heart that glorifies him who formed it." For if he had refused these sacrifices of theirs out of anger, as though they were unworthy to obtain his mercy, he would certainly not have urged upon them these same means by which they could be saved. But because God is compassionate, he refrained from severing them from wholesome guidance. For through Jeremiah, after saying, "Why do you bring me frankincense from Sheba and cinnamon from a distant land? Your burnt offerings and your sacrifices have not pleased me," he went on: "Listen to what the Lord speaks, O Judah in its entirety. Thus says the Lord God of Israel: Set right your paths and your undertakings, and in this place I will make you dwell securely. Put no confidence in deceitful sayings, such as, 'Here is the Lord's temple, the Lord's very temple' — none of this will do you any good whatsoever." And again, to show that his purpose in bringing them up out of Egypt was not so they could present him sacrifices, but rather that, having left behind Egyptian idol-worship, they might become capable of heeding the Lord's voice, in which lay their deliverance and their glory, so through that same Jeremiah he says: "Thus speaks the Lord: Take your burnt offerings and pile them with your sacrifices, and consume the meat yourselves. For I gave your ancestors no command whatever about burnt offerings and sacrifices, on the day I brought them out of Egypt; rather this was the charge I gave them: Listen to my voice, so that I may be God to you and you may be a people belonging to me, and follow every path I have laid down for you, so that things will go well for you. Yet they neither listened nor paid attention; instead they followed the counsel of their own wicked hearts, and turned their backs toward me instead of their faces." And again through the same prophet, saying: "But whoever boasts should boast of this alone — that he grasps and knows me as the Lord, who works mercy, justice, and right judgment throughout the earth," he added: "For it is in such things that I take pleasure, declares the Lord; not in sacrifice, nor in burnt offering, nor in oblation." For these were not what the people had as a matter of first importance, but only as a consequence, and for the reason already stated. So too Isaiah again says: "I take no delight in the rams of your burnt offering, nor has your sacrifice brought me glory; you have not honored me through your sacrifices, nor exhausted yourself for my sake with incense, nor purchased incense for me with money, nor have I craved the choice fat of your victims; instead you have stood before me bearing your transgressions and your sins. On whom then, he says, shall I fix my regard, but on the one who is humble, still, and trembles before my sayings? For it is not richness of meat and fat that will lift your wrongdoing from you. Here is what I have chosen, says the Lord. Untie every cord of wickedness, release the knots of harsh contracts, set the crushed at liberty, and cancel every unjust bond. Divide your loaf with the one who hungers, and welcome the wandering poor beneath your roof. Should you spot someone unclothed, wrap him, and do not turn away from your own kin. Then your dawn light will burst forth, your recovery will hasten to appear, your uprightness will march ahead of you, and the Lord's splendor will enclose you round about; and even as you are speaking still I will answer, Here I am."
And Zechariah too, among the twelve prophets, showing them the will of God, says: "Thus says the Lord Almighty: Render judgment that is true, and deal in kindness and compassion, each man toward his own brother. Do not grind down the widow, the fatherless child, the foreigner, or the destitute, and let no one of you plot harm against his brother within his heart." And again: "These are the things you must do: let each speak truthfully to his fellow, and hand down verdicts that are honest and bring peace within your gates, and let no one among you scheme wickedness against his brother deep in his heart, and cherish no false oath; for I detest every one of these things, says the Lord Almighty." And David likewise: "Who is the man, he says, who longs for life, and desires to behold good days? Guard your tongue against wickedness, and keep your lips from uttering falsehood. Depart from wrongdoing and practice what is good; go after peace, chasing after it."
From all of this it is clear that God was not seeking sacrifices and burnt offerings from them, but faith, and obedience, and justice, for their salvation — God teaching them his will, saying: "Mercy is what I want, not sacrifice; acquaintance with God rather than burnt offerings," as stands in the prophet Hosea. And our Lord too pressed the same lesson on them when he said: "Had you grasped the meaning of 'mercy is what I want, not sacrifice,' you would not have passed judgment on those who bore no guilt" — bearing witness that the prophets truly proclaimed, while charging them with foolishness for their own fault. And to his own disciples he also gave the counsel to offer the first fruits to God from his own creatures, not as though he needed them, but so that they themselves might be neither unfruitful nor ungrateful. So he took bread, which is part of creation, and gave thanks, in acknowledgment of his supreme lordship over all things; and after the consecration, that it might be the mystical body and blood of Christ, representing the bloody offering of his own personal body and blood upon the cross, and the benefits of his death to be obtained by all for whom it was offered. And that this was the teaching and practice not of one private church or teacher, but of the whole universal Church — received by that Church from the Apostles, and by the Apostles from Christ himself — Irenaeus expressly teaches in the following chapter, as did Justin Martyr before him, partly in his Apology to Antoninus, but more clearly and at greater length in his work against Trypho the Jew. It is unnecessary to quote here the words of these and other writers, so often cited both by Catholic and by the more learned Protestant scholars. I choose only to bring forward the words of Clement of Rome — words neither spurious nor doubtful, of the kind Feuardent notes elsewhere, but most certainly genuine, from his letter to the Corinthians — since this matter has been cited from only one such early writer, and even then not in full. And lest this be taken to concern only the offerings of Jewish priests, or only those of Christian laypeople, I add that this same Clement appears to be the one whose name is written in the book of life, of whom Paul writes to the Philippians; and since he wrote the passage just cited only two or three years after the martyrdom of the Apostles Peter and Paul, and some twenty years before the death of Saint John, no room for doubt remains that this doctrine of the eucharistic sacrifice flowed from the Apostles themselves, and is therefore to be firmly held, even if no explicit statement to that effect could be produced from the writings of the Prophets or Apostles. For Paul's precept to the Thessalonians is a general one. Later theologians, not only Catholic but also Protestant — especially doctors of the Church of England — have brought forward passages of Scripture in support of the eucharistic sacrifice, following Irenaeus and the other Fathers; among these I name one man, eminent both for learning and piety, and by no means friendly to the errors and abuses of the Roman Church, nor to the personal presence and offering of Christ in the Mass — Joseph Mede, who in a special treatise on the Christian Sacrifice, written in English, proved and illustrated this matter admirably, and is therefore worth the attention of all students of theology, especially of the sacred kind. To this man's view, and also to the wish he expresses at the end of his chapter, I subscribe with all my heart, and I hope that, since many pious and learned men among the Protestants have now rightly recognized this error of Luther and Calvin and the true doctrine of the Apostolic Church, they will also bring back into use those most holy liturgical formulas by which the said sacrifice is offered to God — formulas wrongly banished from their assemblies — and will duly render this highest honor to the Divine Majesty. [Grabe.] Taking bread, he gave thanks over it, declaring, "This represents my body"; and likewise the cup, drawn from that same created order to which we too belong, he pronounced to be his own blood, teaching thereby the fresh offering that belongs to the new covenant — the one which the Church has taken up from the apostles and presents to God across the whole earth, to him who furnishes us with sustenance, giving him the first portion of his own gifts under the new covenant, concerning which Malachi, one of the twelve prophets, foretold in these terms: "You bring me no delight, says the Lord, nor will I take any offering out of your own hands. For from where the sun rises to where it sets, my name has won honor among the Gentiles, and incense together with a spotless offering is brought to my name in every region; for my name has become great among the Gentiles, says the Lord Almighty" — most plainly signifying by this that the former people would cease bringing offerings to God, while in every region a sacrifice would instead be brought to him, one that is spotless; and that his name would win honor among the Gentiles.

======== Book IV — Chapter 30 ========

How the name of our Lord Jesus Christ is shown to belong properly to the Father. What other name, then, is it that is glorified among the nations, than that of our Lord, through whom the Father is glorified, and man is glorified? And because it belongs properly to his Son, and it is by him that man was made, he calls that name his own. Just as if a king himself were to paint an image of his son, he would rightly call it his own image on both counts — because it belongs to his son, and because he himself made it — so too the name of Jesus Christ, which is glorified throughout the whole world in the Church, the Father confesses to be his own, both because it belongs to his Son, and because he himself, in inscribing it, gave it for the salvation of mankind. Since, then, the name of the Son belongs properly to the Father, and the Church offers it to God the Almighty through Jesus Christ, he rightly says on both counts: "Incense together with a spotless offering is brought to my name in every region." And John, in the Revelation, tells us that this incense stands for the prayers offered by the saints.

======== Book IV — Chapter 31 ========

Concerning sacrifices and oblations, and those who truly offer them.
The offering of the Church, then, which the Lord taught to be offered throughout the whole world, is counted before God as a spotless offering, and finds favor with him — not that he stands in want of any offering from us, but because whoever brings it wins glory for himself through what he presents, provided his gift is welcomed. For a gift shown to a king expresses both his honor and one's devotion toward him; and it was exactly this that the Lord wanted us to bring, in complete plainness and purity of heart, when he declared: "So, when you are bringing your gift up to the altar, and there recall that your brother holds some grievance against you, set your gift down there in front of the altar, go first and make peace with your brother, and only then return and present your gift." We are bound, then, to bring God the earliest yield of his creation, as Moses likewise says: "You must not come before the Lord your God with empty hands" — so that man, once he has proven himself thankful in this, might likewise be counted thankful by God, and obtain honor from him in return. And it is not the class of offerings that has been rejected — for there were offerings there, and there are offerings here; sacrifices among the people, and sacrifices in the Church — but only the kind has been changed, since now the offering is made not by slaves but by free men. For there is one and the same Lord; but the offering of a slave has its own character, and that of free men has its own, so that even through the offerings the mark of liberty may be shown. For with him nothing is idle, nor without meaning, nor without purpose. And for this reason they had their tithes set apart as sacred, while those who have received liberty appoint all that is theirs to the Lord's uses, giving cheerfully and freely — not merely the lesser things, since they have the hope of greater ones — as the poor widow put her whole livelihood into the treasury. Whom you reckon as dull as a beast.
From the beginning God looked with favor on Abel's gifts, because he offered them with simplicity and righteousness; but he did not look favorably on Cain's sacrifice, because in his heart he harbored division arising from envy and malice against his brother, just as God, exposing his hidden thoughts, said: "If you offer rightly but do not divide rightly, have you not sinned? Be still" -- since God is not appeased by sacrifice as such. For if someone merely attempts, as far as appearances go, to offer purely, rightly, and lawfully, but in his own soul does not rightly maintain right fellowship with his neighbor, nor holds the fear of God, then the fact that the sacrifice was rightly offered outwardly does not deceive God, who sees the sin within; nor will such an offering profit him at all, but rather the cessation of the evil conceived within -- lest, through a pretended act of worship, or rather through sin itself, the man make himself a murderer of himself. This is why the Lord also said: "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful outwardly to men, but within they are crammed with the bones of corpses and every sort of foulness; so you likewise seem just to men from without, while inwardly you brim with malice and hypocrisy." While they were believed to be offering rightly on the outside, they harbored in themselves an envy like that of Cain; and that is why they killed the Just One, disregarding the counsel of the Word, just as Cain did. For to Cain God said, "Be still" -- and he did not consent. And what else is "being still" but ceasing from a rash impulse? Speaking similarly to the Pharisees, he said: "Cleanse first what is inside the cup, that what is outside may also be clean." But they did not listen. For, says Jeremiah, "Your eyes and your heart are set on nothing good, but on your own greed, and on shedding innocent blood, and on injustice and murder, to commit them." And again Isaiah says: "You reached decisions, yet not by my counsel, and struck agreements, yet not through my Spirit." So that their inner will and intention, brought out into the open, might show without blame that it is not God who works evil, but he who lays bare hidden things -- and not God who is the doer of evil -- when Cain would by no means be still, God said to him, "His desire shall be for you, and you shall rule over him." He said something similar also to Pilate: "You would have no power over me at all, unless it had been given you from above" -- God always granting that the just man, by what he suffers and endures, is approved and received, while the one who acts wickedly is condemned and cast out for what he has done. Sacrifices, then, do not sanctify a man, for God has no need of sacrifice; rather, it is the conscience of the one who offers, if it is pure, that sanctifies the sacrifice and moves God to accept it as from a friend. "But the sinner," it says, "who sacrifices a calf to me is as one who slays a dog."
Since, then, the Church offers with simplicity, her gift is rightly reckoned before God a pure sacrifice. As Paul writes to those in Philippi: "I have been supplied, taking from Epaphroditus what was sent by you, a sweet fragrance, a welcome offering, pleasing before God." For we ought to make an offering to God, and in all things be found grateful to God our Maker, offering the firstfruits of his own creatures with pure understanding, with faith free of hypocrisy, in firm hope and fervent love. And this offering the Church alone offers pure to the Maker, presenting to him, from his own creation, the giving of thanks. The Jews, however, do not offer it, for their hands are full of blood; they did not receive the Word through whom the offering is made to God. Nor indeed do all the synagogues of the heretics offer it. For some, saying that the Father is other than the Maker, in offering to him what belongs to our creation show him to be one who covets what is not his own and desires what is another's. Others, who say that the things pertaining to us came into being through defect and ignorance and passion, in offering the fruits of ignorance, passion, and defect, sin against their own Father, doing him insult rather than giving thanks. How, then, can they maintain that the loaf consecrated by thanksgiving is their Lord's own body, and the cup his blood, while refusing to call him Son of the world's Maker -- that is, his Word, by whom timber bears its fruit, springs pour forth, and the ground brings up first the blade, next the ear, then the ripened grain within the ear? How can they claim flesh sinks into corruption, seeing it is fed by the Lord's body and blood? Let them abandon that notion, or else stop presenting the offering described above. Our conviction, meanwhile, agrees with the Eucharist, and the Eucharist confirms our conviction in turn. We present to him what belongs to him already, rightly announcing the fellowship and joining of flesh and Spirit. Just as earthly bread, once God's invocation rests upon it, ceases to be ordinary food and becomes Eucharist -- a thing composed of two realities, one earthly, one heavenly -- so too our bodies, on partaking of it, cease to be subject to decay, possessing instead the hope of rising again. Just as, before the bread is sanctified, we call it simply bread, but when the divine grace sanctifies it through the priest, it is no longer called bread, but is deemed worthy of the name "the Lord's body," even though the nature of bread still remains in it -- and we proclaim it to be, not two bodies, but one body of the Son -- so, in receiving the Eucharist, we proclaim one body, no longer corruptible, but bearing the hope of resurrection. We offer to him, then, not as though he were in need, but giving thanks to his dominion, and sanctifying what he has created. For just as God lacks nothing from us, so likewise it falls to us to present God with something -- as Solomon puts it: "Whoever shows kindness to the poor makes a loan to God." God, wanting for nothing, accepts our good deeds unto himself so as to give us, in exchange, a portion of his own goodness -- as our Lord declares: "Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom made ready for you. For I hungered, and you fed me; I thirsted, and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you welcomed me in; I was naked, and you clothed me; I was sick, and you visited me; I was in prison, and you came to me." Thus, though he had no need of these things, he wills that we too offer our gift at the altar frequently and without ceasing, not because he needs it, but so that we may serve God. There is, then, an altar in the heavens -- for our prayers and offerings are directed thither -- and a sanctuary, as John states in the Revelation: "And God's sanctuary stood open" -- and a dwelling-place: "See," he states, "God's dwelling among mankind, where he shall abide with them."

======== Book IV — Chapter 32 ========

The people received the pattern of these things. The people received all gifts, offerings, and sacrifices as types, as was shown to Moses on the mountain, from that one identical God whose name is today honored throughout the Church across every people. It is fitting that the earthly things arranged for us should be types of the heavenly things, though made by that same God -- for he could not otherwise represent the image of things spiritual. But to say that the things that are above the heavens and spiritual, which so far as we are concerned are invisible and indescribable, are in turn types of yet other heavenly things, and of another Pleroma, and that God stands merely as the likeness of some other Father, marks those who have strayed from the truth, and...

======== Book IV — Chapter 33 ========

How he who founded this creation of ours is shown to be beyond investigation and comprehension.
Against these people one may justly say, as the word itself suggests: "Since you exalt your thoughts above God, why are you so thoughtlessly puffed up? You have heard that the heavens are measured with a span; tell me their measure, and declare the countless number of cubits; explain to me the fullness, breadth, length, and height, the beginning and end of their circumference -- which the heart of man does not understand and does not grasp. Vast beyond telling are the heavenly stores; God cannot be measured by the heart, nor grasped by the mind -- he who holds the whole earth within the curve of his palm. Who has weighed the span of his right hand? Who has taken the measure of his finger? Or who has fathomed his hand, which spans the vastness, the depth lying below, and, above, the reach of all creation, whether it be visible, or perceived by hearing and thought, or altogether hidden from sight?" And on this account God stands above every principality, power, and dominion, and above every title that can be given, over all things fashioned and set in place. He fills up the heavens and gazes into the depths, and stands near to each one of us as well: "For I am a God close at hand," says he, "not a distant God. Should a man conceal himself in some hidden place, would I fail to see him?" For his hand grasps all things, and it is that same hand which illumines the heavens, and also illumines the things beneath heaven, and searches the hearts and minds, and is present in hidden and secret things, while in what is manifest he nourishes and sustains us.
But if man does not comprehend the fullness and greatness of his hand, how could anyone understand or conceive in his heart so great a God -- one who cannot even be seen, who is clearer than sight itself; who cannot be grasped, who is purer than touch; who is greater than sense itself? And so, as though they had already measured him and looked him through and surveyed him entirely, they fabricate above him another Pleroma and another Father -- not looking up to the things of heaven, but truly descending into the depth of a Bythos of madness: saying that their own Father is bounded at the point where the things outside the Pleroma begin, while the Demiurge, in turn, does not reach as far as the Pleroma; and so they make neither of the two to be perfect and to contain all things. For the one will lack the whole fabric of the world that is outside the Pleroma, while the other will lack the fabric of the world that is within the Pleroma, and neither of them will be God of all. Now it is plain to everyone that no one can fully declare the greatness of God from the things he has made; and it is likewise plain that his greatness does not fail, but contains all things, and reaches even to us, and is with us -- as everyone who thinks worthily of God will confess.

======== Book IV — Chapter 34 ========

In what respect God is known, and how the Father himself, the maker of all things, formed man by his own hands; and how the prophets foretold future things through their actions.
It is not, then, according to his greatness that God is to be known -- for it is impossible to measure the Father -- but according to his love; for it is this love which, through his Word, leads us to God, so that, always obeying him, we learn that so great a God exists, one who by himself established, chose, adorned, and contains all things; and among all things, us also, and this world which belongs to us. We, then, together with the things that are contained, were made by him who contains all things. And this is he of whom Scripture says: "And God shaped man, drawing soil from the ground, and blew into his countenance the breath that gives life." It was therefore not angels who fashioned us or gave us form -- angels being unable to produce a likeness of God -- nor was it anyone else beyond the Lord's own Word, nor any power set at a distance from the universal Father. God required none of these to accomplish what he himself had already resolved within his own purpose should come to be, as if he lacked hands of his own. For always present with him are the Word and Wisdom, that is, the Son and the Spirit, through whom and in whom he made all things freely and of his own will, and to whom he also speaks, saying, "Let us make man according to our image and likeness" -- drawing from his own self the material of the creatures, together with the model for the things fashioned, and the design of the world's adornments.
Well, then, did the Scripture pronounce which says: "First of all believe that God is one, who established all things and completed them, and made all things to be out of that which did not exist" -- he who contains all and is contained by none. Well also did Malachi say among the prophets: "Is there not one God who established us? Is there not one Father of us all?" And accordingly the Apostle too says: "One God, the Father, who is over all, and in all of us." And so too the Lord: "Everything," he states, "has been handed over to me by my Father" -- clearly by the one who made everything, since he handed to him what was properly his own, not something belonging to another. Nothing at all has been kept back; and for that reason this same one serves as arbiter of both the living and the dead, "holding David's key: what he opens, none shall close; what he closes, none shall open." For no one else -- not in heaven, not on earth, not beneath the earth -- was able to unseal the Father's scroll or gaze upon it, save the Lamb once slain, who ransomed us with his own blood -- taking up all authority from that very God who fashioned everything through his Word and arrayed it by Wisdom, when the Word took on flesh, so that, just as the Word of God had held the principality in the heavens, so also he might hold the principality on earth -- since he was a righteous man, who committed no sin, nor was deceit found in his mouth; and that he might hold the principality also of those who are under the earth, himself having become the firstborn of the dead, so that all might see, as we have said before, their own King; and that the paternal light might reach the flesh of our Lord, and from his flesh might come radiantly to us, and that man might thus attain to incorruption, encompassed by the paternal light.
We have shown by many proofs that the Word, that is, the Son, was always with the Father. But that Wisdom too, who is the Spirit, was with him before every created thing, he declares through Solomon: "God founded the earth by wisdom, and by prudence he prepared the heavens; by his understanding the depths broke open, and the clouds dropped down dew." And again: "The Lord created me as the beginning of his ways for his works, he founded me before the ages, at the very outset, prior to his fashioning of the earth, prior to his settling of the depths in place, and prior to the springs of water bursting forth, prior to the mountains being set firm; and before all the hills he begot me." And again: "When he was preparing the heavens, I was with him, and when he made firm the fountains of the deep, and when he made strong the foundations of the earth, I was beside him, fitting all things together. I was the one in whom he rejoiced; and I was glad daily before his face at all times, when he rejoiced over the completed world, and delighted in the sons of men."
There is, then, one God who by his Word and Wisdom made and disposed all things. This is the Demiurge who has assigned this world to the human race, who, as to his greatness, is unknown to all those who were made by him -- for no one, neither the ancients who have gone to rest nor those now living, has traced out his depth -- but in his love he continually makes himself known through the one by whom he arranged all things. And that one is his own Word -- our Lord Jesus Christ -- who came in these final times to be man among men, thereby uniting the beginning with its end -- that is, uniting man with God. For this reason the prophets, having received the gift of prophecy from that very Word, foretold his coming in the flesh, a coming through which the blending and fellowship of God and man came to pass, as pleased the Father well; the Word of God proclaiming ahead of time, from the outset, that God would be seen by men, and that Baruch would dwell among them on earth and converse with them, and would come to rescue us from the grip of all who despise us, that is, from every guise of the spirit of transgression, leading us to minister to him with devotion and uprightness throughout our days, so that man, once he had welcomed the Spirit of God into himself, could pass into the Father's glory.
These things the prophets signified prophetically, but not, as some say, on the supposition that the Father of all is invisible while another is the one who was seen by the prophets. Those who say this simply do not know what prophecy is. For prophecy is a foretelling of things to come, that is, a pre-signifying of what will happen afterward. The prophets, then, foretold that God would be seen by men, just as the Lord also said: "How blessed are those clean of heart, since they will look upon God." Yet in view of his greatness and marvelous glory, "no man will look upon God and go on living," for the Father is beyond grasp; but in view of his love, his kindness, and his capacity to do all things, he grants even this to those who love him -- namely, that they should see God -- which is precisely what the prophets foretold. For "what men cannot do, God can." Man cannot see God on his own initiative; but whenever God wills it, he lets himself be seen by men, by whichever men he chooses, at whatever moment and in whatever manner suits him. For God has power over all things: in ages past he was seen prophetically, by means of the Spirit; now he is seen, in adoption, by means of the Son; and in the coming kingdom of heaven he will be seen in fatherly fashion -- the Spirit making man ready within the Son of God, the Son bringing him onward to the Father, and the Father conferring incorruption unto life without end, which each person receives from gazing upon God.
Just as those standing inside the light share in its brilliance and are surrounded by it, so those who look upon God stand within God, sharing in his brilliance. And this brilliance confers life on them; hence those who look upon God share in life. For this reason he who exceeds all grasp and understanding renders himself visible, understandable, and within reach for men, so that he might give life to those who see and take him in. For just as his vastness cannot be fathomed, neither can his goodness be fully told; and it is through this goodness, once beheld, that he grants life to those who behold him. Since living apart from life is not possible, and life itself has its existence from sharing in God, and sharing in God means looking upon God and delighting in his goodness -- men, then, will look upon God so that they may live, rendered deathless through that sight and drawn all the way to God. This, as noted above, was pictured beforehand through the prophets, namely that God would show himself to men carrying his Spirit within them and looking forward continually to his arrival. So too Moses says in Deuteronomy: "This very day we have witnessed that God converses with man, and man lives." For some among them beheld the prophetic Spirit and its operations poured forth in gifts of every sort; others beheld the Lord's advent and that plan set in place from the first, by which he carried out the Father's will both in the heavens and upon the earth; and others still beheld the Father's glories fitted to their several seasons, both for the onlookers themselves and for their contemporary hearers, and for every future listener. In this way, then, God was disclosed: through all these things the Father is brought into view -- the Spirit at work, the Son ministering, the Father giving approval, and man being carried forward toward salvation's completion. So too through the prophet Hosea he says: "I have multiplied visions, and through the ministry of the prophets I have been given form." And the Apostle unfolded this same truth, saying: "There are various kinds of gifts, yet a single Spirit is behind them; and various kinds of service, yet one and the same Lord governs them; and various kinds of activity, yet one God alone produces every one of them in everyone. To each person is granted a manifestation of the Spirit meant for the common good." But since it is God who produces all things in everyone, what sort of being he is and how vast he is remains hidden and beyond description to everything he has made -- yet he is hardly unknowable, for every creature comes to learn, by way of his Word, that there exists a single God and Father, holding all things together and giving being to everything, exactly as scripture records in the Gospel: "God has never at any time been seen by anyone; it is the only Son, close to the Father's own breast, who has made him known." The Son, accordingly, makes the Father known from the very start, since he has been alongside the Father from the very start, and has disclosed to humankind, in proper order and fitting sequence, the prophetic visions, the assorted gifts, his own acts of service, and the Father's glorification, each at its appointed and beneficial moment. For wherever order exists, harmony follows; and wherever harmony exists, right timing follows; and wherever right timing exists, benefit follows; and so the Word became steward of the Father's grace for the good of mankind, for whose sake he arranged such great dispensations, revealing God to men while presenting man to God, all the while safeguarding the Father's hiddenness so that man would never grow contemptuous toward God and would always retain something further to strive after; and, conversely, revealing God to men in visible form through many dispensations, lest man, drifting entirely away from God, should stop existing altogether. For God's glory shows itself in a living man, and a man's life consists in beholding God. If, then, that display of God which comes by way of creation grants life to everyone who lives on earth, how much more will that display of the Father which comes by way of the Word grant life to those who look upon God.
Since, then, the Spirit of God through the prophets signified things to come, shaping us in advance and readying us so that we would be subject to God; and since it was destined that mankind, by the Holy Spirit's kind favor, would one day look upon God -- those very men through whom the things to come were foretold had to look upon that same God themselves, whom they proclaimed to others as one who would be seen, so that it would not be merely a prophetic claim that God exists, and the Son of God, and Father and Son, but that this would be actually witnessed by everyone whose faculties had been consecrated and schooled in the matters of God, so that man could be shaped and trained beforehand to be fit for that glory which would later be unveiled to those who love God. For the prophets prophesied not only through speech, but also through vision, through their manner of living, and through the actions they carried out, following the Spirit's prompting. In this way, then, they beheld the invisible God, as Isaiah too says: "My own eyes have beheld the King, the Lord of Hosts" -- signifying that man will look upon God with his eyes and hearken to his voice. Yes, in just this way they beheld the Son of God as well, as a man speaking with men, foretelling coming events, presenting as already here the one not yet arrived, proclaiming the one incapable of suffering as one who would undergo it, and setting forth the arrangements of his recapitulation -- some things they beheld in visions, some they declared in words, and some they marked out symbolically through deeds: what could be seen, they saw with their own eyes; what could be heard, they announced aloud; what could be enacted, they carried out in deed; and all of it they set forth prophetically. For this reason Moses declared that to the people who broke the Law, God was a devouring fire, threatening them with a day of flame sent from God; yet to those who revered God he said, "The Lord God is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in mercy and faithful, preserving justice and mercy for thousands, forgiving lawlessness and offenses and sins." And the Word did indeed converse with Moses, showing himself before him, the way one friend addresses another. Yet Moses wished to see openly the one conversing with him, and he was told: "Take your place upon the rock's height, and I will shield you with my hand; and once my glory has gone past, you shall see what lies behind, but my face you shall not see, for no man looks upon my face and remains alive" -- pointing to two truths together: that man cannot see God, and that in the final times man would see him through God's wisdom, upon the height of the rock, meaning in the one who came in human form. For this very reason he later conversed with him face to face atop the mountain's height, with Elijah also present, as the Gospel recounts, restoring at that culmination the promise given long before. The prophets, then, did not openly behold God's very face, but rather the arrangements and hidden truths through which mankind would come to behold God. So too it is written: "Watch, the Lord is about to pass by, and watch, a great, forceful wind will split the mountains apart and shatter the rocks in front of the Lord -- yet the Lord was not present in the wind; then, following the wind, an earthquake -- yet the Lord was not present in the earthquake; then, following the earthquake, flame -- yet the Lord was not present within that flame; then, following the flame, a faint whisper of breeze." By these events the prophet, deeply provoked over the people's wrongdoing and over the slaying of the prophets, was schooled toward a gentler bearing, and the Lord's coming in human form was thereby foreshadowed as one that would arrive, following that law delivered through Moses, mild and unassuming -- one who would break neither the crushed reed nor snuff the smoldering wick. And the calm, peaceable repose of his kingdom was likewise indicated. For following the wind that splits the mountains, and following the earthquake, and following the flame, there arrive, out of the settled and tranquil seasons of his reign, days in which God's Spirit, wholly at peace, gives life to man and causes him to flourish. This was made plainer still through Ezekiel, since the prophets glimpsed only in part the arrangements of God, without properly beholding God himself. For when this man of God had witnessed the vision, together with the cherubim and their wheels, and had recounted the entire mystery of their motion, and had glimpsed something resembling a throne set above them, with above that throne a form resembling, as it were, a human figure -- what appeared above the loins like amber, and what appeared below like fire -- and had described the whole remaining vision of the thrones, lest anyone suppose he had thereby properly beheld God, he added: "This was the vision of the likeness of the Lord's glory."
If, then, none of them -- not Moses, not Elijah, not Ezekiel, who witnessed many things concerning heavenly realities -- for what these men witnessed were likenesses of the Lord's radiance and forecasts of things to come -- it stands clear that the Father cannot be seen at all, the very one about whom the Lord likewise stated, "Nobody has ever set eyes on God." Yet his Word, exactly as he himself chose and for the good of those beholding, brought to light the Father's radiance and set forth his arrangements; just as the Lord also stated, "The only Son -- the one close against the Father's breast -- that one has made him known"; and this Word himself interprets the Father, being abundant and varied, and he appeared to those beholding him not through one shape or a single guise, but according to the causes and operations behind his arrangements, in the manner recorded by the prophet Daniel. For on one occasion he appeared standing next to Ananias, Azariah, and Mishael inside the blazing furnace, amid the flames, rescuing them out of the fire: "the appearance," it says, "of the fourth resembled a son of the gods" -- overturning earthly kingdoms and scattering them like chaff, filling the whole heaven himself as he arrives, drawing close to the Ancient of Days, and taking from him dominion and honor together with a kingdom. "His dominion," it says, "is a dominion without end, and his kingdom will never be destroyed."
John, the Lord's disciple, sitting in the Apocalypse and beholding the priestly and glorious coming of his kingdom, says: I turned to see the voice that spoke with me, and having turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like the Son of Man, robed in a garment falling all the way to his feet, cinched around the chest with a band of gold. His head and hair had gone white, white as wool, white as snow; his eyes blazed like fire's flame; and his feet gleamed like polished bronze, as though heated within a furnace. His voice sounded like the roar of many waters, seven stars rested in his right hand, from his mouth came forth a two-edged sword honed sharp, and his countenance shone like the sun at full strength. In these details something shows forth the brightness that comes from the Father, namely the head; something priestly is meant by the robe (and it was for this reason that Moses, following this same pattern, clothed the high priest and the Levite); and something pointing toward the end is meant by the bronze heated within the furnace, which stands for the strength of faith and the endurance shown in prayer. And when John could not endure that vision (for, it says, he collapsed at his feet like a dead man, so that the written word might be fulfilled: no man looks upon God and remains living), the Word who grants him life raises him up and gives him courage, being none other than the one on whose chest John had leaned during the supper, asking who would hand him over to betrayal; he declared: I am the beginning and the end, and the living one; though I died, look, I am alive for all ages without end, and death and Hades I hold the keys to. Then, in a further vision, beholding that same Lord, he reports: Amid the throne and the four living beings, and amid the elders, I beheld a Lamb standing though it had been slaughtered, bearing seven horns and seven eyes, these being the seven spirits of God dispatched across the whole earth. And once more, regarding this Lamb, he writes: and look, a white horse appeared, its rider called Faithful and True, and he renders judgment and wages war in righteousness; his eyes gleamed like fire's flame, upon his head sat many crowns, and he bore a name inscribed that none but he himself can know; he was dressed in a robe drenched with blood, and the name by which he is called is the Word of God. The heavenly hosts followed after him mounted on white horses, dressed in linen fine, white and unstained; from his mouth issues forth a sword honed sharp, with which he shall strike down the nations, and he shall rule them under an iron rod, and he tramples the winepress from which flows the fury of Almighty God's wrath; and inscribed on his robe and upon his thigh stands a name: King over kings, Lord over lords. Thus the Word of God always holds the outlines of things to come, and showed to men, as it were, the visible forms of the Father's arrangements, teaching us the things that are God's.
Not only through the visions that were seen and the words that were proclaimed, but also in his works, was he seen by the prophets, so that through them he might prefigure and foreshow beforehand the things to come. For this reason Hosea took a wife of fornication, prophesying by this very act, that the earth would indeed go whoring away from the Lord — namely, those who dwell upon its surface; and that from among such people God would choose to gather for himself a Church, to be made holy through fellowship with his Son, in the same way that woman was made holy through her fellowship with the prophet. And for this same reason Paul states that the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the believing husband. Furthermore the prophet also named his children Not-pitied and Not-my-people: so that, as the Apostle says, the one who was not-my-people might become my people; and she who had not obtained mercy might obtain mercy; and in the place where it was said, You are not my people, there they shall be called sons of the living God. What the prophet did typologically in this act, the Apostle shows to have been truly accomplished in the Church through Christ. In the same way Moses also took an Ethiopian wife, making her thereby an Israelite, foreshowing that the wild olive is grafted into the olive tree and comes to share in its richness. For since he who according to the flesh was born Christ was, on the part of the [Jewish] people, sought in order to be killed, but was delivered in Egypt — that is, among the Gentiles — and there sanctified the infants who were there (whence also he made the Church perfect; for Egypt from the beginning was a Gentile land, as was Ethiopia too), for this reason, through the marriage of Moses, the marriage of the Word was foreshown; and through the Ethiopian wife, the Church that is from the Gentiles was made known — a Church which those who disparage, accuse, and mock will not themselves be found clean, for they will be lepers, and will be cast out of the camp of the just. So likewise Rahab the harlot, though a Gentile who condemned herself as guilty of every sin, welcomed the three scouts who were surveying the whole land, and concealed within herself, namely, the Father, together with the Son and the Holy Spirit. And when the whole city in which she lived had fallen in ruin, at the sounding of the seven trumpets, in the end Rahab the harlot alone was preserved with her whole household, through the sign of the scarlet cord — just as the Lord told those who refused his coming, the Pharisees, who despised the sign of the scarlet cord, which stood for the Passover, the ransoming and departure of the people out of Egypt, declaring: Tax collectors and prostitutes enter the kingdom of heaven ahead of you.

======== Book IV — Chapter 35 ========

How our faith was prefigured in Abraham, and the exposition of the things that were done by the fathers.
Now, that our faith found its foreshadowing in Abraham, that he stood as forefather of our faith, and served as something like a prophet of it, the Apostle has taught most fully in that letter which is to the Galatians, saying: He then who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you — does it come through deeds required by the Law, or through faith that comes by hearing? Just as Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Know then that those who are of faith, these are the sons of Abraham. And Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, announced the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, In you shall all the nations be blessed. So then those who are of faith are blessed together with Abraham the faithful. For this reason he called him not only a prophet of the faith, but also father to those who, coming out of the Gentile nations, put faith in Christ Jesus, for his faith and our own are identical, one and the same: he believing in things to come as though already accomplished, on account of God's promise; and we likewise, through faith, looking upon that inheritance which is in the kingdom, on account of the same promise of God. For in that letter which is to the Romans, the Apostle says: But Rebecca too, having conceived by one act with Isaac our father, received an answer from the Word, in order that God's purpose according to election might stand, not from works but from him who calls; it was said to her: Two peoples are in your womb, and two nations are in your belly, one people shall prevail over the other, and the older shall be servant to the younger. From which it is clear that not only the prophecies of the patriarchs, but also the childbearing of Rebecca, was a prophecy of two peoples: that one would be the greater, the other the lesser; the one under servitude, the other free; both, however, of one and the same father. One and the same is our God and theirs, who knows the things that are hidden, who knows all things before they come to pass; and for this reason he said: Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.
Now if anyone examines closely the deeds of Jacob, he will find them not empty, but full of meaning. First, at his very birth, by how he grasped his brother's heel, he received the name Jacob, meaning Supplanter: one who holds fast while not himself held; who binds the feet of another but is not bound; who wrestles and prevails; grasping in his hand his rival's heel, which signifies triumph. It was toward this very purpose that the Lord came to be born, whose type this manner of birth foreshowed beforehand — of whom John also says in the Apocalypse: He went out conquering, that he might conquer. Then, again, he received the birthright, when his brother despised it — just as the younger people has received Christ, the firstborn, since the older people cast him off, declaring, We have no king except Caesar. Now in Christ is the whole blessing; and for this reason the later people carried off from the father the blessings of the former people, just as Jacob took away from Esau his blessing. For which reason his brother's own brother suffered plots and persecutions from him, just as the Church suffers this same thing from the Jews. The twelve tribes, the race of Israel, were born in a foreign land, since Christ too was to begin, in a foreign land, to beget the twelve-pillared foundation of the Church. The speckled sheep were Jacob's wages; and Christ's wage is the men who, gathered together out of various and differing nations into one fold of faith, become his own, just as the Father promised him: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession. And since the prophets who were sons of the Lord were born to Jacob, it was altogether necessary that he should have children from two sisters — just as Christ has children from two covenants belonging to one and the same Father, and likewise also from the handmaids; showing that, according to the flesh, from both free and slave, Christ would establish sons of God, giving the same gift equally to all who were called into the Church, for the sake of which Christ endured all things: he who then, through his patriarchs and prophets, prefigured and foretold the things to come, thereby in advance exercising his own portion in the arrangements of God, and training those who belonged to him to render God obedience, to dwell as sojourners in this world, to walk after his Word, and to point ahead to what was still to come. For nothing is empty, nor without meaning, before God.

======== Book IV — Chapter 36 ========

Why the Lord washed the feet of the disciples, and why while they were reclining; and that he himself is shown to be God before all things, in like manner. In the last times, when the fullness of the time of liberty had come, the Word himself, in his own person, washed away the stains of the daughters of Zion, washing with his own hands the feet of the disciples. For this is the goal toward which the human race is built up by God: that just as in the beginning, through the first man, we were all reduced to servitude to the debt of death, so at the last, through the last man, all who from the beginning were his disciples, cleansed and washed from the things of death, should come into the life of God. For the one who bathed the disciples' feet made the entire body holy, bringing it to a state of cleanness. Wherefore also he ministered food to them as they reclined, signifying those who were reclining upon the earth, to whom he came to minister life. As Jeremiah says: The Holy One of Israel remembered his dead, who had fallen asleep in the land of burial, and he went down to them, to preach to them his salvation, to save them. For this reason too the eyes of the disciples grew heavy as Christ came to his passion; and finding them asleep, the Lord first let them be, showing God's patience with the sleep of men; then, coming a second time, he roused them and raised them up, showing that his passion is the awakening of the sleeping disciples, for whose sake he likewise went down into the earth's lower regions, to witness for himself what remained incomplete within the created order, concerning which he also told his disciples: Many prophets and just men longed to behold and to listen to what you now behold and listen to.
For it was not for the sake of those alone who believed in him in the times of Tiberius Caesar that Christ came; nor was it for the sake of those alone who are now living men that the Father made his providence; but for the sake of absolutely all men, who from the beginning, each according to his own capacity, in his own generation, both feared and loved God, and lived justly and piously toward their neighbors, and longed to behold Christ and to listen to his voice. Wherefore he will, at his second coming, first rouse from sleep all such as these, and will raise up both them and the rest who are to be judged, and will establish them in his kingdom. For there is indeed one God, who directed the patriarchs in his arrangements, and justified the circumcision by faith, and the uncircumcision through faith. For just as we were prefigured and foretold beforehand in the men of old, so in turn those men find their true likeness in us, namely within the Church, and obtain the reward owed for that on which they labored — concerning which he said, You have not labored: others have labored, and you have entered into their labor. For this reason the Lord said to his disciples: Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and see the fields, for they are white for the harvest. For the reaper receives wages and gathers fruit for eternal life, so that both the one who sows and the one who reaps may rejoice together. For in this the saying is true, that one is the one who sows, and another the one who reaps. For I sent you to reap that on which you did not labor; others have labored, and you have entered into their labor. Who then are they who labored, who served the arrangements of God? It is clear that they were the patriarchs and the prophets, who also prefigured our faith beforehand, and sowed upon the earth the coming of the Son of God, who this one would be and of what sort: so that those who were to be the later men, having the fear of God, might readily receive the coming of Christ, instructed beforehand by the prophets. And for this reason, when Joseph learned that Mary was with child, and thought to put her away secretly, an angel said to him in a dream: Do not be afraid to take Mary your wife; for that which is in her is of the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. And he added, persuading him: Now all this took place, that what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet might be fulfilled, saying: Behold, a virgin shall conceive in her womb, and bear a son, and his name will be given as Emmanuel — convincing him through this word from the prophet, and excusing Mary, showing that she was the same one who had been foretold by Isaiah as the virgin who would bear Emmanuel. Wherefore Joseph, persuaded without doubting, took Mary to himself, and in all the rest of Christ's upbringing gladly rendered his service, even undertaking the journey into Egypt, and returning from there, and the removal to Nazareth. In fact, those who did not know the Scriptures, nor God's promise, nor the arrangement concerning Christ, called him, as a boy, the son of Joseph. For this reason too the Lord himself, in Capernaum, read out Isaiah's prophecies: The Spirit of the Lord rests upon me, and for this cause he has anointed me; he has dispatched me to bring good news to the destitute, to mend the brokenhearted, to announce liberty to those held captive, and sight restored to those who cannot see. And showing himself to be the one foretold by the prophecy of Isaiah, he said to them: Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.
Because of this Philip too, when he found the Ethiopian queen's eunuch reading the passage that stands written: "Like a sheep he was brought to slaughter, and like a lamb voiceless before the one shearing it, in this way he did not open his mouth; in his lowly state his sentence was carried off" — and everything further that the prophet had recorded touching his suffering, his arrival in the flesh, and the contempt shown him by those refusing to believe — had no trouble bringing him to faith that this was Christ Jesus, crucified under Pontius Pilate, who bore all that the prophet had announced beforehand, and who is the Son of God granting life without end to mankind. The moment he baptized him, he withdrew from his side. Nothing further remained wanting for one already schooled in advance by the prophets: he was not short of acquaintance with God the Father, nor with the ordering of his own behavior, but simply had not yet learned of the Son of God's arrival; and having grasped it in short order, he continued his journey rejoicing, appointed to proclaim Christ's arrival in Ethiopia. On this account Philip needed little effort over him, since the prophets had already made him ready beforehand in reverence for God. And on this same account the apostles too, collecting the scattered sheep of Israel's house, spoke to them from the Scriptures, demonstrating that this crucified Jesus is the Christ, God's living Son; and they won over a vast crowd who already, all the same, held reverence for God — and in a single day three thousand, then four thousand, then five thousand persons received baptism.

======== Book IV — Chapter 38 ========

Why Paul says that he labored more than all.
For this reason Paul too, since he was the Apostle of the Gentiles, says: "My labors outdid those of them all." For the others found the catechesis easy, holding as they did proofs drawn from the Scriptures, and those who heeded Moses and the prophets promptly accepted the one first raised from among the dead, the prince who holds God's own life — him who, by the stretching-out of his hands upon the tree, was recognized through the plague that struck Egypt and through the crossing of the Red Sea accomplished by trust in him. The Apostle, by contrast, had first to instruct the Gentiles — as we showed in the previous book — to turn away from the superstitious worship of idols and to reverence the one God, maker of heaven and earth and fashioner of every created thing; and to teach that this God's Son is his Word, by whom he framed all things, and that this Word, in the final age, became a man among men, and remade the human race, ruined and defeated man's enemy, and handed to his own creature the victory over the one opposing it. Even so, although those of the circumcision did not scorn the words of God, they had already been taught not to commit adultery or fornication, not to steal or cheat, and that whatever brings ruin upon one's neighbors counts as evil, hateful to God. For this reason they willingly agreed to hold back from such things, having already had it taught to them beforehand.
But the Gentiles had to learn this very point on its own, that deeds of that sort are wicked, ruinous, and worthless, and do harm to those who commit them. For this reason the man entrusted with the apostolate to the Gentiles toiled harder than those proclaiming the Son of God to the circumcised. For the latter had the Scriptures to back them — Scriptures the Lord bore out and brought to completion when he arrived in the very manner foretold of him — while for the Gentiles this amounted, so to speak, to an unfamiliar course of instruction and a novel doctrine: that the nations' gods are not merely non-gods but idols standing for demons; that there exists one God, set above every rule, authority, power, and every title that can be named; that this God's Word, unseen by its own nature, was rendered tangible and visible among mankind, and went down even into death, and a death by crucifixion at that; and that those trusting in him will be free of decay and suffering in the last age, and will inherit the heavenly kingdom. All this was proclaimed to the Gentiles by spoken word alone, apart from the Scriptures — which is why those who brought the message to the Gentiles bore the heavier labor. And once more, the faith held by the Gentiles proves the nobler, since they took hold of God's Word without any prior grounding from the

======== Book IV — Chapter 39 ========

How, both in circumcision and outside it, a single Father is disclosed through faith. It was fitting that the sons of Abraham — whom God raised from stones and set beside him as leader and forerunner shaped for our belief (who also took on the covenant of circumcision after that justification which had already come by the trust of the uncircumcised, so that both covenants could find their pattern in him, so that he might stand as ancestor to everyone who traces God's teaching and passes through a temporary stay in this present world — meaning both those faithful out of circumcision and those faithful without it, just as Christ likewise is the cornerstone upholding the whole) — and drawing into a single trust of Abraham those from either covenant fit for God's building. Yet this trust found outside circumcision, since it links the finish back to the start, came about as both first and last. It existed in Abraham prior to circumcision, and in the other righteous men pleasing to God, as we have already demonstrated; and it rose up again among mankind in the final age through the Lord's arrival. Circumcision, however, along with the Law of works, held the middle stretch of time. Among many other proofs, this is shown figuratively also through Tamar, the daughter-in-law of Judah. Once twins had formed in her womb, one child pushed out a hand first, and the midwife, taking him for the firstborn, tied a scarlet cord about his wrist. But once this was done and he pulled his hand back in, his brother Perez emerged before him; only afterward came the second child, marked by the scarlet cord, Zarah — Scripture thereby plainly showing that the people bearing the scarlet mark, that is, the trust found apart from circumcision, appeared first among the patriarchs in a foreshadowing, then was withdrawn so its brother could be born, and that the one who was first would be born second, made known by the scarlet token upon him, which stands for the suffering of the Just One, prefigured from the start among the fathers in the Son of God. Certain matters had to be foretold, for a seed was cast; "in this," it states, "the proverb holds good, that the people is one who scatters seed and another is the reaper; yet a single God supplies each with what fits — seed to the sower and bread for the reaper to consume." Just as one plants and a different one waters, yet God alone grants the growth. For the patriarchs and prophets cast the seed of the message concerning Christ, while the Church has gathered it in — that is, has taken the harvest. For this reason they too pray for a tent within her, as Jeremiah says: "Who would grant me a lodging place out in the wilderness," so that sower and reaper together might celebrate in Christ's kingdom, he being present to everyone toward whom God was favorably disposed from the beginning, granting that his Word should dwell among them. So then, whoever gives the Scriptures a careful reading will discover in them an account concerning Christ, and a foreshadowing of the summons now newly given.

======== Book IV — Chapter 40 ========

What the treasure buried in the field is, and that only the Church reads the Scriptures correctly. This, then, is the treasure buried in the field — namely, buried in this present world (since the field stands for the world) — and buried within the Scriptures lies the treasure, Christ, seeing that he was pointed to through figures and parables. So this element, bound up with what pertains to man, could not be grasped before the fulfillment of the things destined to be fulfilled arrived — that is, before Christ's arrival. And for that reason the prophet Daniel was told: "Close up the words and seal the scroll until the season of the fulfillment, until many gain understanding and knowledge is made complete. Once the scattering has run its course, they will know all these matters." Jeremiah likewise states: "In the final days these things will be grasped." For any prophecy, before its fulfillment arrives, remains puzzling and unclear to men. But once the season comes and what was foretold takes place, the prophecies then receive their plain and settled interpretation. This is why, when the Law is read among the Jews in the present age, it comes across like an idle tale, since they lack the interpretation of everything bound up with the arrival of the Son of God pertaining to man. Yet when it is read among Christians, it is a treasure — buried in a field, yet uncovered and made clear through Christ's cross — enriching the minds of men, displaying God's wisdom, laying bare his purposes concerning humanity, foreshadowing Christ's kingdom, announcing beforehand the inheritance belonging to holy Jerusalem, and declaring that a man who loves God will progress until he even beholds God and listens to his speech, and that from hearing his word he will be glorified to such a degree that others will not be able to look directly at his glorious face — just as Daniel stated: "Those with understanding will gleam like the splendor of the sky, and like the stars, forever and beyond," as we have already demonstrated, for anyone who reads the Scriptures. For in this way the Lord enters into his glory, and the release of sins is proclaimed in his name across the whole world. And the disciple will be brought to completeness, becoming like a householder who draws from his storehouse both fresh and long-kept things. For this reason it is right to obey those elders within the Church who trace their line from the Apostles, as we have shown — men who, alongside the line of bishops, have received the certain gift of truth by the Father's kind will; but the rest, who break away from that original line and gather wherever they please, ought to be regarded with suspicion, whether as heretics of corrupt purpose, or as schismatics swollen with pride and self-satisfaction, or yet again as hypocrites acting for profit and empty glory. All of these have drifted away from the truth. And the heretics, carrying unauthorized fire to God's altar — meaning foreign doctrines — will be consumed by fire descending from above, just like Nadab and Abihu. But those who set themselves against the truth and stir others up against God's Church stay below in the world, swallowed into the earth's chasm, like the company of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. And those who fracture and tear apart the Church's unity will suffer from God the very punishment given to Jeroboam.

======== Book IV — Chapter 41 ========

But as for those regarded by many as elders, who nonetheless indulge their own desires and do not place reverence for God above everything in their hearts, but hold the rest in contempt, and swell up with conceit at occupying the leading seat, and commit wrongdoing behind closed doors, telling themselves "No one is watching" — these will be exposed by the Word, who judges not by outward appearance nor by looking at the face, but examines the heart; and they will hear the very sentence pronounced through the prophet Daniel: "Offspring not of Judah but of Canaan, loveliness has led you astray, and craving has twisted your heart. You who have grown decrepit in wickedness, the misdeeds you committed long ago have now overtaken you, handing down crooked verdicts, clearing the guilty and condemning the innocent," even though the Lord commands, "You shall not put to death the innocent and the righteous." Concerning such men the Lord likewise stated: "But should that wicked servant think within himself, 'My master is slow in coming,' and take to striking the male and female servants, and to eating and drinking and getting drunk, that servant's master will arrive on a day he is not looking for and at an hour unknown to him, and will cut him apart and give him his share among the faithless." One must therefore steer clear of all such people, and instead hold fast to those who, as already stated, keep watch over what the Apostles taught, and who together with the rank of elder display sound teaching and conduct free of reproach, for instructing and setting straight everyone else.
Just as Moses, entrusted with so weighty a charge, standing on a clear conscience, vindicated himself before God, saying, "I have not desired even a single thing belonging to any of them, nor done wrong to a single one of them." So too Samuel, having governed the people across so many years and led Israel free of any haughtiness, vindicated himself at the close, saying, "I have gone about among you from my early years until this day; testify against me now, in front of the Lord and his Anointed: whose ox or whose ass have I taken, whom have I wronged, from whose hand have I accepted a payoff, even so much as a sandal? Accuse me, and I will pay it back to you." And when the people answered, "You have not wronged us nor taken a thing from anyone's hand," he summoned the Lord as witness, declaring, "The Lord stands witness, and so does his Anointed, on this day, that you have found nothing at all in my possession." And they told him, "He stands witness." So too the Apostle Paul, holding a clear conscience, wrote to the Corinthians: "For we are not, like the many, peddling God's word for profit, but speaking with sincerity, as men sent from God, in the sight of God, in Christ; we have injured no one, ruined no one, exploited no one." Elders of this kind the Church raises up, concerning whom the prophet also declares: "I will appoint your leaders in peace and your overseers in justice." Of these the Lord likewise said: "Who, then, is the trustworthy and prudent servant whom his master will place in charge of his household, to distribute their food at the proper time? Fortunate is that servant whom his master finds so occupied when he arrives."

======== Book IV — Chapter 42 ========

Which teachers are to be followed: concerning those sins which were committed by men of old.
When someone wishes to find such men, Paul, teaching us, says: teachers. In every place where the Lord's gifts have been set down, it is there that truth must be learned — namely among those in whom the Church's succession from the apostles can be traced, together with a manner of life that is sound and free of reproach, and speech that is pure and uncorrupted. These are the ones who guard for us the faith in the one God who fashioned all things, and who deepen that love for the Son of God, the one who carried out such mighty dispensations on our behalf; and they set forth the Scriptures for us safely, neither blaspheming God, nor dishonoring the patriarchs, nor holding the prophets in contempt.
As I heard from a certain elder, who in turn had heard this from men who themselves had looked upon the apostles and had been taught directly by them: it was enough for the men of old, concerning the things which they did without the counsel of the Spirit, to receive the correction that comes from the Scriptures. For since God is no respecter of persons, he brought fitting correction to bear on deeds not done according to his good pleasure. So it was under David: while he suffered persecution from Saul for the sake of righteousness, and fled from King Saul, and did not avenge himself on his enemy, he chanted of Christ's coming, taught wisdom to the nations, and carried out everything as the Spirit guided him, and so pleased God. But when, through lust, he took Bathsheba the wife of Uriah for himself, Scripture says of him: "The thing that David had done displeased the Lord greatly"; and Nathan the prophet was sent to him, showing him his sin, so that David, pronouncing sentence upon himself and condemning himself, might obtain mercy. Nathan told him of a rich man who had very many flocks and herds, and a poor man who had nothing but one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and reared, and which had grown up in his household beside his own children; it fed from his bread, drank from his cup, and was like a daughter to him. And a traveler came to the rich man, and the rich man spared his own flocks and herds and would not take from them to prepare for his guest; instead he took the poor man's one lamb and served it to the man who had come to him. And Nathan said: "As the Lord lives, the man who has done this is a son of death; he must repay the lamb four times over, since he did such a deed and showed the poor man no mercy." And Nathan said to him, "You are the man who did this"; and he went on to reproach him further, listing God's benefits toward him, and telling him that he had provoked the Lord by doing this, for such deeds do not please God, and great wrath was hanging over his house. David was pierced to the heart at this, and said, "I have sinned against the Lord," and sang the psalm of confession, anticipating the arrival of the Lord, who bathes clean and purifies the man held fast by sin. And likewise concerning Solomon: as long as he persevered in judging rightly, he glorified God and set forth his glories, and expounded, in the manner of natural philosophy, the peace to come for the nations, speaking of every tree and every plant, and of all the birds, and of the four-footed beasts, and of the fishes; and he was pleasing to God, and all men marveled at him, because his wisdom submitted itself to the wisdom that had been announced through God's servant; whereas those who received the wisdom given through the Son of God despised it instead. For Solomon held the rank of servant, whereas Christ is God's own Son and Solomon's Lord. So then, as long as he served God without offense and ministered to his dispensations, he was glorified; but once he took to himself wives out of every nation, and permitted them to erect the shrines of their women, and brought foreign wives into his own household, it came about that, by Solomon's old age, his heart no longer stood whole before the Lord his God. The foreign wives had drawn his heart toward other gods, and Solomon acted wickedly in the Lord's eyes, failing to follow the Lord as David his father had followed him. So the Lord grew angry with Solomon, since his heart was no longer whole toward the Lord, as the heart of David his father had been. Scripture rebuked him sufficiently, as the elder said, so that no flesh should boast in the sight of the Lord.
And for this reason the Lord descended to the regions under the earth, preaching the good news of his coming there also, and offering the forgiveness of sins to those who believe in him. Now all believed in him who had hoped in him — that is, who had announced beforehand his coming and had served his dispensations: the righteous, and the prophets, and the patriarchs. To these he remitted their sins just as he did to us, sins which we ought not hold against them, unless we mean thereby to despise the grace of God. For just as they did not hold against us the incontinent deeds we committed before Christ was manifested in us, so it is not right for us to hold against those who sinned before the coming of Christ. For all men lack the glory of God, and are justified not by themselves but by the coming of the Lord, who is their light. Their deeds have been recorded for our correction, so that we might know, first, that our God and their God are a single, identical God, who takes no delight in sin even when committed by illustrious men; and second, so that we might abstain from evil. For if those who went before us, the ancients endowed with spiritual gifts, for whose sake the Son of God had not yet suffered, were struck with such disgrace when they sinned in some matter and served the lusts of the flesh, what will happen to those who now live, who have despised the coming of the Lord and given themselves over to their pleasures? For those men of old, healing and forgiveness of sins will come at death, for death will no longer have dominion over them; but the Son shall arrive in his Father's glory, calling to account his stewards and overseers for the money entrusted to them, together with its interest; and from those to whom he gave the most, he will require the most. We ought not, therefore, said that elder, to be proud or to find fault with the men of old, but rather to fear ourselves, lest, after coming to the knowledge of Christ, we do something displeasing to God and no longer have forgiveness of our sins, but instead be shut out from his kingdom. And for this reason Paul said: for he did not spare the natural branches, lest perhaps he not spare you either, who, being a wild olive shoot, were grafted into the richness of the olive tree and made a partaker of its richness. Likewise you see that the transgressions of the people have been recorded, not on account of those who transgressed at that time, but for our correction, so we would recognize that a single, identical God was sinned against then, and is sinned against now by some who profess belief.
And that the Apostle made this very plain in writing to the Corinthians, saying: "I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that all our fathers were beneath the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from a spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. Yet with the majority of them God was not pleased, for they were laid low in the desert. These things took place as warnings to us, so that we would not crave evil things as they craved them; nor become worshippers of idols, as some of them did, as the record states: 'The people took their seats to feast and to drink, then rose up to revel.' Neither should we practice sexual immorality, as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand died in a single day. Nor should we put the Lord to the test, as some of them tried him and perished by serpents. Nor should we murmur, as some of them murmured and were slain by the destroyer. These things befell them as a pattern, and were set down in writing for our instruction, we upon whom the culmination of the ages has arrived. So then, let whoever supposes he is standing firm watch that he does not fall."

======== Book IV — Chapter 43 ========

Since, then, the Apostle demonstrates, without hesitation or inconsistency, that a single, identical God both judged the men of former times and now scrutinizes those presently living, and shows why their deeds were set down in writing, it is only the ignorant, the reckless, and indeed the thoughtless, who are found — because of the wrongdoing of those who lived long ago, and the disobedience of many — asserting that one deity belonged to those men, one who is a lesser maker of the world, while a different Father was given to us by Christ, this second one being merely an invention conjured up privately by each of them; failing to grasp that just as, in the earlier instance, God found no pleasure in most of those who sinned, so likewise here many are summoned but few are picked out; and just as there the unjust, the idol-worshippers, and the sexually immoral forfeited their lives, so also here — the Lord himself declaring that such people are thrown into unending fire, and the Apostle stating: "Or do you not realize that wrongdoers will have no share in God's kingdom? Do not be misled: fornicators will not, nor idol-worshippers, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor men who lie with men, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor swindlers — none of these shall possess God's kingdom." For he says this not about outsiders, but about us: "and such were some among you; but you have been cleansed, you have been made holy through the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God."
And just as in that former time those who did evil were condemned and cast out, and destroyed the rest, so also here the eye that causes offense is plucked out, and likewise the foot and the hand, lest the whole body perish along with them. And we possess this instruction: "If someone called a brother is sexually immoral, or greedy, or worships idols, or is a slanderer, or a drunk, or a swindler, do not so much as share a meal with that person." And elsewhere the Apostle states: "Let no one lead you astray with hollow arguments, for it is on account of these very things that God's wrath falls upon the disobedient. Do not, then, join yourselves with them." And just as there the sentence against sinners was carried out before everyone else, so too here "a small amount of yeast works through the whole batch of dough." And just as there the wrath of God broke out against the unjust, so likewise here the Apostle declares: "For God's wrath is disclosed from heaven upon every kind of godlessness and injustice among men who suppress the truth by their injustice." And just as there God took vengeance upon the Egyptians for their unjust treatment of Israel, so also here, the Lord himself says: "Will God not bring justice for his chosen ones, who call out to him night and day? I tell you, he will bring it about for them without delay"; and the Apostle, writing to the Thessalonians, proclaims the very same thing: "since it is only just for God to repay affliction to those who afflict you, and to give rest to you, the afflicted, along with us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed coming down from heaven with his powerful messengers, in blazing fire, dealing out punishment to those who do not acknowledge God and who refuse to obey the good news concerning our Lord Jesus — these will suffer the penalty of everlasting ruin, banished from before the Lord's face and from his mighty splendor, on the day he comes to be honored among his holy ones and admired by all who have put their faith in him."

======== Book IV — Chapter 44 ========

A demonstration that the Word of God, who sets all things in order, is one and the same in the old covenant and the new.
Since, then, the justice of God is the same in his judgments in both cases — in the former case, in a typical way, temporarily, and with a certain mildness; in the latter, truly, forever, and with greater severity, for the fire is eternal, and the wrath of God that shall be revealed from heaven comes from the presence of the Lord, just as David likewise states: "But the Lord's face is set against those who work evil, to erase all memory of them from the earth" — this entails a heavier penalty for those who fall under it. The elders pointed out how thoroughly foolish are those who, drawing on what befell men of old who once disobeyed God, try to introduce a second Father, setting against this how much the Lord accomplished, coming as he did to rescue those who welcomed him, moved by compassion for them, while passing over in silence his judgment, and what awaits those who heard his words yet failed to act on them, and how it would have gone better for such people had they never come into existence, and how the day of judgment will go easier for Sodom and Gomorrah than for the town that refused to welcome the message brought by his followers.
For just as in the New Testament the faith of men toward God has been increased, receiving the addition of the Son of God, so that man too might become a partaker of God, so also the diligence required in conduct has been increased: we are directed not merely to refrain from wicked acts, but even from wicked thoughts themselves, and from careless words, hollow talk, and coarse jesting; likewise the penalty facing those who refuse belief in God's Word, and who scorn his coming, and fall back, has grown harsher — no longer temporary but made everlasting. For to whomever the Lord pronounces, "Away from me," that very God, the Father, together with his Word — who has stood beside humankind throughout every age, active in manifold dispensations and rescuing, from earliest times onward, those destined for rescue (namely, those who cherish God and hold fast to his Word each according to their own capacity) — this same God is also the one who passes sentence on the condemned, namely those who have forgotten God, and blaspheme, and violate his Word.
For these very ones whom we have already named above as heretics have fallen out with themselves, accusing the Lord in whom they claim to believe. For the very things they point to in God — that he then, at that time, temporarily saved the obedient while leaving the disbelievers and the Egyptians to their fate — these same things will nonetheless recur with regard to the Lord: he who eternally condemns those he condemns, and eternally releases those he releases, will be found, according to their own words, to have become the cause of the greatest sin for those who seized him and drove the nails through him. Had he not come to them in that manner, they surely would never have turned into killers of their own Lord; and had he not dispatched prophets to them, they surely would never have put those men to death, nor the apostles either. If, then, God was unable to save his own people because those pursuing Israel drowned in the sea, the same complaint applies here: unless the Jews had turned into murderers of the Lord (which indeed stripped them of eternal life), and unless, by killing the apostles and persecuting the Church, they had sunk into the depths of wrath, salvation would never have come to us. For just as they obtained salvation through that event, so too we obtained salvation through the Jews' blindness: since the Lord's death means, for those who nailed him up and refused belief in his coming, condemnation, but for those who believe in him, salvation. For to some he is a fragrance from death leading to death, and to others a fragrance from life leading to life. To whom then does he prove a fragrance from death leading to death, if not to those who refuse belief and will not submit to God's Word? And who are they who at that time handed themselves over to death? Plainly those who refuse belief and will not yield themselves in obedience to God. And once more: which are the ones who were saved and received the inheritance? Clearly those who believe God and have kept the love that is owed to him — such as Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun, and the innocent children who had no sense of wickedness. And who are they who are saved in this case, and receive eternal life? Are they not those who love God, and who...

======== Book IV — Chapter 45 ========

In what way God made Pharaoh's heart obstinate, and the hearts of his servants as well. "The Lord made Pharaoh's heart obstinate, and the hearts of his servants," so they claim. Yet those who bring this accusation fail to read, in the Gospel, the passage where the disciples questioned the Lord, "Why do you address them in parables?" and he replied: "To you it has been granted to know the secret of the kingdom, but to those others I speak in parables, so that looking they will not perceive, and listening they will not comprehend or grasp the meaning — so that what Isaiah foretold about them would come to pass, namely: The heart of this people has grown thick, their ears are stopped, and their eyes shut; yet your eyes are blessed, since they perceive what you perceive, and your ears, since they hear what you hear." For it is the very same God who casts darkness over those who refuse belief and count him as nothing — much as the sun, itself his creation, darkens the vision of those whose eyes, weakened, cannot bear its brightness — whereas to such as trust him and walk in his way he supplies a richer, deeper light for the mind. Along these same lines the Apostle likewise states, writing to the Corinthians a second time: "In whose case the god ruling this present age has darkened the thinking of those without faith, so that the radiance of Christ's glorious gospel might not dawn upon them." And once more, in his epistle to the Romans: "And just as they refused to keep God present in their understanding, God gave them over to a worthless mind, to carry out things unfitting." And in his second letter to the Thessalonians he states outright, referring to the Antichrist: "And so God will dispatch to them a deluding power, so that they will put faith in a falsehood — so that every one might be condemned who refused to trust what is true and instead consented to wrongdoing."
If, then, even now, as many as God — who foreknows all things — knows will never believe, he hands over to their own unbelief, and turns his face away from such people, leaving them in the darkness which they themselves have chosen, what wonder is it if, at that time too, he handed Pharaoh over to his own unbelief, along with those who were with him, knowing that he would never believe? As the Word said of the burning bush to Moses: "But I am aware that Egypt's king will not release you, except under compulsion of a mighty hand." And by the same reasoning that the Lord spoke in parables and brought blindness upon Israel, so that looking they would fail to perceive — knowing their unbelief in advance — by that same reasoning he also made Pharaoh's heart obstinate, so that, though he perceived that it was God's own finger guiding the people's departure, he would not believe, but would be plunged into the sea of his own unbelief, supposing that their departure came about through magical working, and that it was not by the power of God that the Red Sea provided a passage for the people, but that it simply happened to be so by nature.

======== Book IV — Chapter 46 ========

Why, by the command of God, the people took vessels from the Egyptians at the exodus, and made the tabernacle in the wilderness out of them. Those who reproach and charge that the people, about to depart at God's command, received vessels of every kind and garments from the Egyptians and so departed, and that the tabernacle in the wilderness was made out of these — such people, ignorant of the just dealings of God and his dispensations, condemn themselves, as the presbyter used to say. For if God had not consented to this in that figurative departure, then today, in our true departure — namely the faith wherein we presently stand, by which we have been drawn out from the number of the Gentiles — no one could be saved. For all of us are followed by some possession, small or great, which we acquired from the mammon of unrighteousness. For where do the houses in which we dwell, and the clothes we wear, and the vessels we use, and all the rest of the provision for our daily life come from, except from those things which, when we were pagans, we acquired out of greed, or received from pagan parents or relatives or friends who had acquired them unjustly? Not to mention that even now, while standing in the faith, we still acquire such things. For who sells and does not want to profit from the buyer? And who buys and does not want to be dealt with to his advantage by the seller? And what merchant does not trade for the sake of his own livelihood? And as for those believers who are in the imperial court, do they not have among their goods things that belong to Caesar, and does not each of them, according to his own ability, provide for those who have need? The people of Israel were debtors not only of goods but of their very lives, because of the earlier kindness of the patriarch Joseph; but in what way are the Gentiles debtors to us, from whom we receive gains and benefits? Whatever they acquire with labor, we, though in the faith, enjoy without labor. For this reason the people served the Egyptians in the harshest slavery, as Scripture says: "And they exercised power over them harshly, in all the labors with which they oppressed them by force; and they built fortified cities for them, laboring greatly, and increasing their wealth for many years, and through every kind of servitude" — while the Egyptians, far from being grateful toward them, even wished to destroy them all. What injustice, then, was done if they took a few things out of many, when those who could have had great wealth had they not served them, and could have departed rich, instead departed poor, having received the smallest wage for such great servitude? It is as if some free man, seized by force and made to serve another across many years while enlarging that man's wealth, afterward obtained some small assistance and were thought to have received only a modest portion — when in fact, out of his many labors and his master's great gain, he departs having received only his due — and this were then charged against him as though he had done wrong: the one who had dragged him into servitude by force would rather appear the unjust party in this case. So it is, then, with those who charge the people with taking a little out of much, and yet do not charge those who rendered no gratitude owed for the benefit received from their forefathers — who, indeed, having reduced them to the harshest servitude, gained the greatest advantage from them. These men say that the Israelites, in receiving unmarked gold and silver in a few small vessels for their labors, as we have said, acted unjustly; but they themselves — for it must be said, though it may seem laughable to some — while carrying on their own belts marked gold and silver and bronze coin stamped with Caesar's inscription and image, acquired from the labors of others, say that they themselves act justly. But if a comparison is made between us and them, which will appear to have received more justly — the people from the Egyptians, who were debtors to them in every way, or we from the Romans and the other nations, to whom nothing of the sort is owed us? Yet the world has peace through them, and we walk and sail the roads without fear, wherever we wish. Against such people, then, the Lord's saying will be fitting: "Hypocrite, first take the beam out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the splinter out of your brother's eye." For if the one who brings this charge against us, and boasts of his own knowledge, is himself entirely separated from fellowship with the Gentiles, and has nothing belonging to others, but lives simply, naked and barefoot and without a house, in the mountains, like one of those animals that feed on grass, he will deserve pardon, since he is ignorant of the necessities of our way of life. But if he himself shares in the things said to belong to others, and yet condemns their type, he proves himself most unjust of all, turning the very accusation back upon his own head. For he himself will be discovered hauling around what belongs to others, and lusting after what is not rightfully his; and it was for this reason that the Lord said: "Judge not, that you be not judged; for with what judgment you judge, you will be judged." Not, of course, that we should not rebuke sinners, nor that we should consent to things done wrongly; but that we should not unjustly judge God's arrangements, since he has provided all things justly for our benefit. For since he knew that we, using what we received from another, would act well with our own substance, he said: "Whoever possesses two tunics should share with the one who has none; and whoever has provisions should act in the same way." And: "I was starving, and you fed me; I had no clothing, and you dressed me." And: "When you give alms, let not your left hand know what your right hand is doing." And whatever other such sayings there are by which, doing good, we are justified — as it were redeeming what is ours out of what belongs to others. And I say "out of what belongs to others" not as though the world were alien to God, but because we possess such gifts by receiving them from others; and through this very practice we construct within ourselves God's dwelling-place — since God resides among those who act rightly — just as the Lord says: "Make for yourselves friends by means of the mammon of unrighteousness, so that when you fail, they may receive you into eternal dwellings." For whatever we acquired unjustly while we were pagans, this, once we had believed, we converted to the Lord's use, and were thereby justified: it was therefore necessary that these things be foreshadowed in the type, and that the tabernacle of God be built out of such things — the Israelites justly receiving them, as we have shown, while for us it was shown beforehand in them, that we too should begin to serve God by means of what belongs to others.

======== Book IV — Chapter 47 ========

How one and the same departure of the people out of Egypt is shown to be a figure of the departure of the Church out of the Gentiles. For the entire departure of the people out of Egypt was, by God's design, a type and image of the departure of the Church which was to come from among the Gentiles; and for this reason too, at the end, he leads her out from here into his own inheritance, which not Moses the servant of God, but Jesus the Son of God will give as an inheritance. And if anyone attends more carefully to the things said by the prophets concerning the end, and to whatever things John the Lord's disciple received... the nations will receive, which Egypt then received only piece by piece. The presbyter, relating certain such things about the men of old, used to refresh us with these words, and would say: "As for those sins for which Scripture itself censures the forefathers and prophets, it is not for us to cast reproach upon them for such things, nor become like Ham, who mocked his father's shame and fell under a curse; but rather give thanks to God on their behalf, since at the coming of our Lord their sins were forgiven them" — for he said that they gave thanks and gloried in our salvation. "But as for those things which the Scriptures do not rebuke, but simply record, we ought not to become their accusers; for we are not more scrupulous than God, nor can we set ourselves above our Master, but ought rather to seek out the underlying type. For nothing among the things set down beyond reproach in the Scriptures is set down idly." Chapter 31. A demonstration concerning the begetting of children by Lot from his daughters. Just as Lot, who brought his daughters out from Sodom — daughters who bore children by their very own father — and who left his wife standing at the boundary, turned into a pillar of salt, remaining so to this very day. For Lot did not accomplish this type by his own will, nor out of any carnal desire of his own, having no sense or thought of any such act. As Scripture says: "And the elder went in and lay with her father that night; and Lot did not know when she lay down or when she rose." And likewise of the younger it says: "And he did not know when she had lain with him, nor when she had risen." Since the man, then, was unaware, and was not a slave to lust, the dispensation was accomplished whereby the two daughters — that is, the two synagogues — receiving offspring from one and the same father, were prefigured apart from any fleshly desire. For no one else remained who might grant them living seed and offspring, just as Scripture records: "And the older daughter told the younger: Our father has grown old, and no man remains anywhere on earth to approach us in the manner customary everywhere; come, let us give our father wine to drink, and sleep with him, so that we may produce offspring by our father." They indeed, in their simplicity and innocence, supposing that all mankind had perished, as had the Sodomites, and that wrath had come upon the whole earth, said these things. For this reason they too are excusable, believing themselves alone left with their father so that humankind might not die out entirely, and it was on this account that they devised their plan concerning their father. And by their words was signified that there was no one else who could furnish the begetting of children to the elder and the younger synagogue...
The Word of God is the Father of the human race, as Moses shows when he says: Is not this your Father who possessed you, and made you, and created you? When, then, did he pour out this life-giving seed — the Spirit that grants remission of sins, by whom we are quickened — into the human race? Was it not when he shared a table with men, and drank wine here on earth? For it is written that the Son of Man came eating bread and drinking wine; and once he had reclined, sleep overtook him, and elsewhere it is written: sweet was the sleep given to me. Now all this was foreshadowed through Lot, since the seed of the Father of all — the Spirit of God, the agent by which everything came into being — was blended and joined together with flesh, namely with his own creature; and out of this blending and joining arose the two congregations, the synagogues, who bear children alive to the living God, their Father. And meanwhile his wife in Sodom turned, not into perishable flesh any longer, but into a pillar of salt lasting forever — showing thereby, through what is ordinary and familiar to mankind, that the Church too, that same salt of the earth, still stands abandoned at the world's edge, bearing what is proper to human beings; and although her members are frequently torn away from her, that pillar of salt still stands, the very bedrock of faith, giving strength and sending the children onward to their Father.

======== Book IV — Chapter 49 ========

A demonstration that the God of the Fathers and of others is one and the same.
The senior disciple of the Apostles likewise argued concerning the two Testaments, showing that both come from one and the same God. For there is no other God besides the one who made and formed us, nor does the word of those have any firmness who say that this world which is around us was made either by angels, or by some other power, or by another god. For if one is once moved away from the Maker of all things, and concedes that the creation which is around us was made by some other, or through another, he necessarily falls into much incongruity and very many contradictions, for which he will be able to give no account, either in likelihood or in truth. And for this reason those who introduce foreign teachings conceal, in dealing with us, the view they themselves privately hold about God, aware how feeble and empty their doctrine is, and afraid that, once shown to be wrong, they would risk forfeiting their own salvation. [The statue of salt remains forever. So too Clement of Rome writes... and Josephus, in the Antiquities, in the chapter on the same matter. Compare the poem on Sodom among the works of Tertullian and Cyprian. It is said also that, still living, in another body, she distinguishes the customary courses of women with her own blood.]
But if anyone puts faith in the single God, the one who fashioned everything through his own Word — as Moses states: God spoke, let light come to be, and light came to be; and as the Gospel tells us: through him everything came to be, and apart from him nothing came to be; and as the Apostle Paul likewise declares: a single Lord, a single faith, a single baptism, a single God and Father, who reigns above all, works through all, and dwells in us all — that person will grasp the head above everything else, the one from whom the entire body, fitted together and bound by every connecting ligament, in proportion to each member, brings about the body's growth, so as to build itself up in love. After that, every word will hold firm for him, if he reads the Scriptures diligently among those who are presbyters in the Church, with whom is the apostolic teaching, as we have demonstrated. For all the Apostles taught that the two Testaments existed among two peoples, yet a single identical God set both in place for men's benefit, according to how the Testaments were given to those who were beginning to believe God — as we have demonstrated from the very teaching of the Apostles in the third book; and that the first Testament was given not idly, nor in vain, nor as it happened to fall out, but bending those to whom it was given into servitude to God for their own benefit — for God does not need servitude from men — while showing the pattern of heavenly things, because man was not yet able to see with his own sight the things of God; and prefiguring the images of the things that are in the Church, so that the faith which is ours might be made firm; and containing a prophecy of the things to come, so that man might learn that God is the foreknower of all things.

======== Book IV — Chapter 50 ========

Who is the spiritual disciple, who judges all things but is himself judged by no one; and who are those who are judged. How the Gentiles will be judged. How the Jews will be judged. A demonstration that the prophets announced two comings of Christ. Such a spiritual disciple, truly receiving the Spirit of God, who from the beginning has been present with men in all the dispositions of God, and has announced the things to come, and shown the things present, and told the things past, judges all, but is himself judged by no one. He passes sentence on the Gentiles, since they render service to what was made rather than to the Maker, and, their minds gone corrupt, spend their whole energy on emptiness. He judges also the Jews, who do not receive the word of freedom, nor wish to depart free, though they have the liberator present with them; but, out of season, pretend to serve a law that needs nothing, while God needs nothing, and do not recognize, nor wish to understand, the coming of Christ, which he brought about for the salvation of men — namely, that all the prophets announced two comings of his: one, in which he was made a man of suffering, knowing how to bear weakness, and sitting upon the colt of an ass, and the stone rejected by the builders, and led as a sheep to the sacrifice, and by the stretching out of his hands dissolving Amalek, and gathering together the scattered children from the ends of the earth into the fold of the Father, and of his dead who had fallen asleep before, and descending to them, that he might rescue them; and the second, in which he will come upon the clouds, bringing on the day that burns like an oven, and smiting the earth by the utterance of his mouth, and by the breath of his lips putting the ungodly to death, and holding the winnowing-fork in his hand, and clearing out his threshing floor, gathering the grain into the storehouse but consuming the husks in fire that cannot be put out. How those who follow Marcion will be judged. How those who follow Valentinus, and the rest of the Gnostics, will be judged. For how does Marcion's doctrine allow for two deities, set apart from one another by a boundless gulf? Or how will that god count as good, seeing he draws men away from the one who fashioned them, summoning them instead into a kingdom of his own? And why does his goodness fail, in that he does not save all? And why does he appear good toward men, while toward the very one who made men he appears most unjust, taking away from him what is his? And how is the Lord just, if he belongs to another father, if, taking the bread of this creation which is around us, he confessed it to be his body, and affirmed the mixed contents of the cup to be his own blood? And on what basis did he name himself Son of Man, unless he had truly undergone the birth that comes by way of man? And how could he forgive us our sins, which we owe to our Maker and God? And how, if he did not have flesh, but appeared as a man in seeming only, was he crucified, and did those who buried him lay him in a tomb? And what was that which rose from the dead? He will likewise judge every follower of Valentinus, because on their lips they profess a single God who is Father, and say all things stem from him, while in the same breath calling the very maker of everything the offspring of a defect or a fault; and on their lips too they profess a single Lord, Jesus Christ, God's Son, while in their private teaching they assign a distinct emanation to the Only-begotten, another to the Word, and another to Christ, and yet another to the Savior; so that, according to them, all things are said to be as if one, while each of them is understood separately, and has its own emission according to its own conjunction. Thus their tongues alone come together into one confession, while their opinion and understanding — those things that are, as they say, profound — being searched out, fall away from that unity, and fall into the manifold judgment of God, when they will be questioned by Christ about the things which they have devised for themselves — Christ, whom they say was born after the Pleroma of the Aeons, and whose emission came after a diminution or defection, and on account of that suffering which occurred in Sophia; they affirm that they themselves have been delivered by that very travail. But their own poet, Homer, from whom, having been schooled, they have invented such things, will accuse them, saying these very words of him: for he is hateful to me even as the gates of hell, who hides one thing in his heart and speaks another. He will judge also the empty talk of the wicked Gnostics, showing them to be disciples of Simon Magus. How the Ebionites will be judged. How those who say the Lord appeared only in seeming will be judged. How the false prophets will be judged.

======== Book IV — Chapter 52 ========

He will judge also the Ebionites: for how could they possibly be saved, were it not God himself who brought about their salvation here on earth? And how will man pass over into God, if God has not first come into man? And how will he escape the birth of death, unless by a new birth, given wondrously and unexpectedly by God as a sign of salvation — the birth that comes through faith, from a Virgin? [Yet they say he had no more than Solomon, nor more than Jonah.] But the Lord came from David, sharing the very same nature as they did. And how could he who was strong against men — who not only conquered man but also held him under his own power — be conquered, unless he who conquered him was himself conquered by one stronger; and he indeed who had conquered was conquered, but the man who had been conquered was set free — unless he had been superior to that man who had been conquered? And how is he better than that man who was made after the likeness of God, unless he who was made in the likeness became man? And for this reason, at the end, he himself showed the likeness: the Son of God became man, taking into himself the ancient formation, as we have shown in the book that precedes this one.
He will judge also those who introduce a Christ who appeared only in seeming. For how can they truly think themselves to be arguing, when their teacher was only a seeming teacher? Or how can they hold anything firm from him, if he was only appearance and not truth? And how can they themselves truly share in salvation, if he in whom they say they believe showed himself to be only an appearance? Everything among them, then, is appearance, and not truth; and now the question must even be asked whether they themselves are not men at all, but dumb animals, presenting to the many mere shadows of men.
He will judge also the false prophets, who never obtained the prophetic gift from God at all and hold no fear of God, but instead, whether chasing hollow renown, or after some profit, or else moved by an evil spirit's influence, pretend to speak prophecy, lying in God's name. How those who work schisms, and all who separate themselves from the Church, will be judged; and how all things hold together for the one who belongs to the Church.

======== Book IV — Chapter 53 ========

He will judge also those who cause schisms, hollow men lacking God's love, who weigh their own advantage above the Church's unity; and who, over slight causes, whatever they may be, rend apart and sunder the vast and radiant body of Christ, and, so far as lies in their power, deal it death — talking of peace even as they wage war, indeed filtering out the gnat while gulping down the camel. For no remedy they can offer matches the destruction schism brings about. He will judge as well every one standing apart from the truth — that is to say, apart from the Church; yet he himself answers to no one's judgment. For all things hold together for him: both an integral faith in one almighty God, from whom are all things — [and, to complete the sense, one may add:] the Son of God, Christ Jesus our Lord, through whom are all things, and his dispositions, through which he became man, the Son of God — a firm judgment, which is in the Spirit of God, who supplies the knowledge of truth, who has set forth the dispositions of the Father and the Son, according to which he was present with the human race, as the Father wills.
True knowledge is the teaching of the Apostles, and the ancient constitution of the Church throughout the whole world, and the distinctive stamp of the body of Christ preserved through the successions of the bishops, to whom the Apostles handed over the Church that exists in each place, which has come down even to us, guarded and handed on without falsification, admitting neither addition nor subtraction; and the reading of the Scriptures unaltered, along with a rightful and careful setting-forth of them consistent with what the Scriptures themselves say, free of peril and free of blasphemy; and above every other thing, the surpassing gift of love, worth more than mere knowledge, more splendid than prophecy, and higher than all the remaining charisms.

======== Book IV — Chapter 54 ========

A demonstration that the Church not only possesses perfect love, but that the Spirit of God also rests upon her. For this reason the Church in every place, on account of the love which she has toward God, sends forth in every age a multitude of martyrs to the Father, while all the rest not only have nothing of this sort to show among themselves, but do not even hold that such a thing is necessary — except that, once or twice, throughout the whole time since the Lord appeared on earth, someone has, as it were, obtained mercy along with our martyrs, and has borne the reproach of the Name together with them, and been led away with them, as though granted to them as a kind of addition. For the disgrace borne by those hunted down on account of righteousness, who withstand every punishment and are killed for love directed toward God and the confessing of his Son — this the Church alone bears in its purity; often weakened, yet at once increasing her members and becoming whole again — just as her figure, the type in the case of Lot's wife, the fashioning of salt, likewise shows; even as the ancient prophets endured persecution, as the Lord says: For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. For it is the same Spirit, though new in time, resting upon her, that undergoes persecution at the hands of those unwilling to accept the message God speaks. And this too the prophets foretold, among the other things they announced: that whoever had God's Spirit resting upon them, and heeded the Father's utterance, and served him in a life of virtue, would be hunted down, stoned, and put to death. For in themselves the prophets prefigured all these things, on account of the love of God and on account of his word.

======== Book IV — Chapter 55 ========

How the prophets are members of Christ, and how each of them, according to what member he was, prophesied accordingly; and how the prophets foretold everything that Christ did; and that the prophets and Christ are from one and the same God.
Since they themselves, each one, belonged as members to Christ, every one of them, in keeping with whatever member he was, displayed openly that arrangement of God's plan, all jointly prefiguring one single man and heralding matters belonging to that one. For just as through our various bodily members the activity of the entire body becomes visible, while the shape of the complete man appears not through a lone member but through the whole together, so likewise the whole company of prophets pictured beforehand one and the same Christ; yet each one, matching the member he stood for, also carried out his portion of the arrangement, foreshadowing that particular work of Christ answering to that member. Some, beholding him in splendor, saw his glorious abode at the right hand of the Father; some other prophets beheld him arriving upon the clouds as Son of Man, and, speaking of him, said, "they shall gaze upon him whom they stabbed," pointing to his arrival, concerning which he himself asked, "yet when the Son of Man arrives, will he discover faith upon the earth?" Regarding this Paul likewise declares that it is a just thing before God to repay affliction to those who afflict you, and to give rest, alongside us, to you who are afflicted, at the unveiling of the Lord Jesus out of heaven together with the messengers of his might, amid blazing flame. Still others, styling him Judge, and the day of the Lord as a scorching furnace, one who gathers the grain into his storehouse yet consumes the husks with unquenchable flame, spoke warnings against the unbelieving, of whom the Lord himself likewise declared, "go from me, you accursed, into fire without end, made ready by my Father for the devil and his messengers." And the Apostle in turn states that such persons will pay the penalty of everlasting ruin, banished from the Lord's presence and from his mighty splendor, at the hour when he arrives to be exalted amid his holy ones and marveled at among every believer. And those texts declaring, "you surpass in beauty the sons of men"; and, "God, your God, has poured upon you the oil of joy beyond your companions"; and, "strap your blade upon your hip, O mightiest one, in splendor and majesty; ride onward in triumph and rule," for the sake of truth, gentleness, and justice — together with whatever else of this kind is spoken concerning him — pointed to the loveliness and radiance of his reign, its unmatched brilliance, and its lifting above all those governed beneath him, so that hearers might yearn to have their place there, doing what pleases God. And those who further ask, "who is this one, and who will recognize him?" together with, "I approached the prophetess, and she conceived and gave birth to a son, whose name is proclaimed Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God," along with those who foretold his birth from a Virgin, Emmanuel, disclosed the joining of God's Word to his own creation: that the Word would take on flesh, becoming Son of God and Son of Man — the Pure One purely unlocking the pure womb that brings men to rebirth for God, a womb he himself rendered pure — and, having taken on this very condition that we too share, he remains Mighty God, possessed of an origin beyond description. Those texts saying, "the Lord has spoken forth out of Zion, and raised his voice from Jerusalem"; and, "God is made known throughout Judah," pointed to his arrival within Judea. Yet those declaring that God would come from the south, from the shaded and wooded mountain, spoke of the arrival of him who hails from Bethlehem, as we have already demonstrated in the preceding volume. From there, too, came the one appointed to shepherd and nourish his Father's people. And those describing his arrival thus — that the lame would bound like a deer, and the tongue of the mute would speak with ease, and the eyes of the sightless would open, and the ears of the deaf would perceive sound, and slack hands and weakened knees would be made firm; and that those lying in the tombs would rise again from among the dead; and that he himself would carry off our weaknesses and bear our sicknesses — these foretold the cures that he would perform.
Others again foretold that a man, weak and without glory, one who knew how to bear infirmity, riding upon a colt, the foal of an ass, would come to Jerusalem; that he would offer his back to the scourges and his cheeks to the palms of the hand; that he would be led like a sheep to the slaughter, given vinegar and gall to drink, forsaken by his friends and by those nearest to him; that he would stretch out his hands all the day long, be mocked and reviled by those who beheld him, that his garments would be divided and lots cast upon his vesture, and that he would be brought down into the mire of death. All these things, and all such as are foretold, they prophesied concerning his coming according to the flesh: how he entered Jerusalem, and in it suffered and was crucified, enduring everything that had been foretold. Others, saying, "The Lord, the Holy One, remembered his dead who had fallen asleep in the earth of clay, and descended to them, that he might raise them up to save them," gave the reason for which he suffered all these things. And the text declaring, "on that day, declares the Lord, I will make the sun go down while it is still noon, and I will bring darkness over the land in broad daylight; and I will turn your festivals into grief, and every one of your songs into a dirge," openly foretold that darkening of the sun which occurred at his crucifixion, beginning at the sixth hour; and that, once this had come about, the festivals and songs of those living under the Law would start being changed into grief and mourning, since they were given over into the hands of the nations. Jeremiah brings out this identical matter even more plainly, speaking thus concerning Jerusalem: "she who gave birth grew weak, her spirit failed within her; her sun set while daylight yet remained; she is covered in disgrace and bears scorn — those who remain of them I will hand over to the blade before their foes."
Others, again, who said that he fell asleep and took his rest and rose again, since the Lord received him, and who foretold, along with proclaiming his glory, his resurrection from among the dead by the Father, also foretold his reception into the heavens. And in that they said, "His going forth is from the end of heaven, and his circuit unto the end of it again, and there is none that can hide himself from his heat," they meant that he was taken up to that place from which also he had descended, and that there is none who can escape his just judgment. And the text stating, "the Lord rules, let the nations rage; he who is enthroned upon the cherubim, let the ground shake," foretold in one sense the hostility toward the Church that would arise, following his ascension, among all nations, and the trembling of the whole ground against her; and in another sense, that when he arrives from the heavens accompanied by the messengers of his might, the entire ground will be shaken, just as he himself declares: "a mighty shaking of the ground will occur, unlike anything since the world began." And again where it is written: "let whoever stands condemned come forward; and let whoever is declared righteous approach the Servant of God"; and, "grief awaits you, for every one of you will wear away like a robe, and moths will consume you"; and, "every living thing will be brought low, while the Lord alone will be lifted on high" — this signifies that, following his suffering and ascent, God will place beneath his feet all who opposed him, and that he himself will be raised above every other, with none left who could be reckoned righteous beside him or set alongside him.
And the texts declaring that God would set up a fresh covenant with mankind, unlike the one made with the fathers upon Mount Horeb; and, "I will grant mankind a renewed heart, and a fresh spirit within them"; and once more, "Give no thought to what came before; behold, I bring about new things, soon to appear, and you shall come to recognize them; and I will open a path through the desert, and streams within the parched land, to give drink to the people I have chosen for myself, whom I have won as my own, so that they might tell of my wondrous deeds" — these openly proclaimed the liberty belonging to the New Covenant. And that fresh wine poured into fresh skins represents the trust placed in Christ, through which he made known the road of righteousness that has emerged in the desert, and the flowing streams of the Holy Spirit in a waterless region, giving drink to the people God has chosen and won for himself, so that his wondrous deeds might be told — yet not so that they should speak evil against him, the God responsible for these things.
And all the other things which we have shown throughout so long a course of Scripture that the prophets said, the man who is truly spiritual will interpret, discerning for each of the things spoken to what feature of the Lord's disposition it refers, and displaying the entire unified structure of the Son of God's undertaking — ever acknowledging the one same God, and ever recognizing the one same Word of God, notwithstanding that he has only now been disclosed to us, and ever recognizing the one same Spirit of God, notwithstanding that in these latter days he has been poured forth upon us in a manner not seen before, having nonetheless been present, from the world's founding clear through to its close, within the human race itself. It is from him that those trusting God and holding fast to his word obtain the deliverance that comes from him. But those who turn away from him, and hold his commands in contempt, and through their deeds dishonor the one who fashioned them, and through their thinking speak evil of the one who sustains them, pile up against themselves a most fitting sentence. He, then, examines all, but he himself is examined by no one; neither blaspheming his own Father, nor making void his dispositions, nor accusing the fathers, nor dishonoring the prophets, nor saying that they are from another God, nor again that the prophecies were of one substance and another, and another still. We shall speak, then, against all the heretics, and first of all against those who follow Marcion, and against those like them, who say that the prophets are from another God: read more carefully the Gospel that has been given to us by the Apostles, and read more carefully the prophets, and you will find the whole course of action, and the whole doctrine, and the whole passion of our Lord foretold in them.

======== Book IV — Chapter 56 ========

Against those who say, "What new thing did Christ bring by his coming?"; and, that Christ fulfilled all the things which the prophets foretold. But if this kind of thought occurs to you, so that you say, "What new thing, then, did the Lord bring by his coming?" — know that he brought all newness by bringing his own self, who had been foretold. This very thing was the life-giving of man. For the coming of a king is announced beforehand by those who are sent as his servants, for the preparation and readiness of those who are about to receive their Lord. But once the King has arrived, and his subjects have been filled with the gladness that was promised beforehand, and have obtained the liberty coming from him, and take part in beholding him, and have listened to his sayings, and have delighted in his gifts, no one keeps asking what fresh thing the King has brought beyond what his heralds already proclaimed — that is, no one among those with understanding. For he brought his own self, and the good things already foretold; and Christ, arriving in the manner he had been announced, brought their sayings to completion. For this reason he stated: "do not suppose that I arrived to tear down the Law or the prophets — I did not arrive to tear down but to bring to completion. Truly I tell you, until sky and ground give way, not a single letter or stroke will ever give way from the Law and the prophets, until every part is accomplished." For by his own arrival he brought all things to completion, and continues bringing to completion within the Church, right up to the final consummation, the fresh covenant that the Law had foretold. Just as his Apostle Paul likewise states in the letter to the Romans: "but now God's righteousness, apart from the Law, has been revealed, attested by both the Law and the prophets — for the righteous one will live by trust." This same point — that the righteous one will live by trust — had already been foretold by the prophets.
But how could the prophets have foretold the coming of the King, and have preached beforehand the freedom that was to be given by him, and have announced beforehand all that was done by Christ, and foretold his word and his work and his passion, and foretold the new covenant, if they had received prophetic inspiration from another God — being ignorant, according to you, of the ineffable Father and his kingdom and his dispositions, which the Son of God, coming in the last of days, fulfilled on earth? For you cannot say that these things happened by some chance, as though spoken by the prophets of one person, but happening, as it turned out, to the Lord by coincidence. For every prophet declared the very same matters; yet none of these events befell any man of ancient days. Had any of these events befallen one of the ancients, then those who prophesied at a later time surely would not have gone on foretelling these same events as still lying ahead in the final age. Furthermore there exists no one — not among the patriarchs, not among the prophets, not among the kings of old — concerning whom any of these matters was rightly and precisely brought to pass. For while every one of them indeed foretold the sufferings belonging to Christ, they themselves stood far removed from suffering in the fashion these things had been described. And likewise the signs foretold regarding the Lord's suffering were realized in no one else at all. The sun did not darken at noon over the death of any man of former ages, nor was the temple curtain torn apart, nor did the ground quake, nor did boulders split open, nor did the dead come back to life, nor did any such man rise up on the third day, nor was any such man carried up into heaven, nor did the sky open at his ascent, nor did the nations put faith in any other's name, nor did any of them, once having died and been raised, inaugurate a fresh covenant of liberty. It was not, therefore, of another, but of the Lord, in whom all the foretold signs met together, that the prophets spoke.
But if someone, pleading the Jews' case, should say that this new covenant is the rebuilding of the temple that took place under Zerubbabel after they had been carried away into Babylon, and the departure of the people that took place after seventy years, let him understand that at that time only the stone temple was rebuilt (for the Law that had been written on stone tablets was still being kept), but no new covenant was given; rather, they continued to use the law that had been given through Moses right up to the Lord's coming. But from the Lord's coming there went out into all the earth a new covenant that reconciles to peace, and a law that gives life, just as the prophets declared: "From Zion a law will issue, and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem, and he will correct many nations; and they will beat their swords into plough-blades, refashion their spears as pruning-hooks, and no longer learn the ways of combat." If, therefore, this other law and this message, having its source in Jerusalem, conferred such abundant peace upon the nations that welcomed it, and thereby corrected a vast multitude for their folly, it is plain the prophets were speaking of a different law altogether.
But if it was the law of freedom, that is, the word of God announced by the apostles who went out from Jerusalem into all the earth, that produced so great a change that men forged their swords and spears of war into ploughshares, and turned the sickles given for reaping grain into instruments of peace, and no longer know how to fight but, when struck, offer the other cheek as well — then the prophets were not speaking of some other, but of him who brought these things about. And this is our Lord, and in this the word is true: for he it is who made the plough and set the sickle to work — that is, the first sowing of man, which was the formation of man according to Adam, and, in the last times, the fruit gathered through the Word. And because he joined the beginning to the end, being Lord of both, at the end he displayed the plough — wood joined to iron — and thus cleansed the earth: because the steadfast Word, united to flesh and fastened in its frame, purified the wild earth. In the beginning he prefigured the sickle through Abel, signifying the gathering-in of the righteous human race; for it says, "Behold, the just man is perishing, and none takes it to heart; and upright men are being swept away, and no one gives it a thought." These things were foreshadowed in Abel, proclaimed beforehand by the prophets, brought to completion in the Lord, and in us the very same thing continues, the body following its own head. Against those, then, who say that the prophets came from one god and our Lord from another, a different Father, such arguments are fitting — if by any means they might at last rest from so much unreason. For this is why we take pains to bring forward proofs from the Scriptures, that by refuting them from their very words, so far as lies in us, we may restrain them.

======== Book IV — Chapter 57 ========

Against those who say that some things were spoken by the prophets from the height above, and others by the maker of the world; and how, on these very points, the followers of Valentinus disagree among themselves.
Against those again who follow Valentinus, and the rest of the falsely so-called Gnostics, who say that some of the things set down in the Scriptures were spoken sometimes from a certain height above, on account of the seed that comes from there, sometimes from the middle region, on account of their bold mother Prunicus, and many things from the maker of the world, by whom also the prophets were sent — we say it is exceedingly unreasonable to reduce the Father of all to such poverty, as though he possessed no instruments of his own through which the realities within the Pleroma could be proclaimed unmixed. For whom did he fear, that he should not, freely and without any admixture, let the spirit that came into being in diminishment and ignorance proclaim its own will separately and on its own? Or did he fear that too many would be saved, if a great many heard in purity the things that belong to truth? Or again, was he himself powerless to prepare in advance those who would announce the coming of the Savior?
But if, when the Savior came here, he sent out his own apostles into the world to announce his coming in purity and to make known the Father's purpose, sharing nothing at all with the doctrine of the Gentiles or of the Jews — how much more, dwelling within the Pleroma, would he have set up messengers of his own, to declare to this world his approaching arrival, sharing nothing at all with those prophecies which come from elsewhere? But if, while still within the Pleroma, he employed those prophets who belonged to the Law, and displayed through them what was his own, far more, upon his arrival here, would he have employed these same persons as instructors, and through them made the Gospel known to us. Let them, then, cease claiming that it was Peter, Paul, and the remaining apostles who proclaimed the truth, while the scribes and Pharisees, along with the rest who served as heralds of the Law, did not do likewise. But if he dispatched his own apostles at his own coming under the impulse of the truthful spirit, rather than a deceiving one, he acted identically through the prophets as well — for the Word of God is one and unchanging. And granting, on their own premise, that the ruling Spirit was a spirit of illumination, of veracity, of completeness, and of understanding, while the spirit belonging to the Demiurge was one of unknowing, deficiency, and delusion, a child of darkness — how could completeness and deficiency, understanding and unknowing, delusion and veracity, illumination and darkness, reside in a single being at once? But if this could not possibly hold true among the prophets, who instead proclaimed the message of the Lord as coming from a single God, and foretold the arrival of his Son — still less could it hold that the Lord himself should sometimes speak from the ruling source and sometimes from the lesser deficiency, becoming simultaneously an instructor of understanding and of unknowing, glorifying now the world's maker, now the Father set above him — even as he himself declared: "No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth onto a worn garment, nor does anyone pour fresh wine into worn-out skins." Let them, then, either abandon the prophets entirely, treating them as obsolete, and stop claiming that some portion of what the newness belonging to the ruling source spoke was uttered beforehand by the Demiurge — or else let the Lord's own words refute them, since he stated that fresh wine is not poured into worn-out skins.
How, then, could the seed of their mother know the mysteries that lie within the Pleroma, and speak of them? For if the mother, existing outside the Pleroma, gave birth to this very seed, and they say that whatever is outside the Pleroma is outside knowledge, that is, in ignorance — how then could that which was conceived as a seed of ignorance announce knowledge? Or how did the mother herself know the mysteries of the Pleroma, she who was shapeless and formless, cast outside like an abortion, and there fitted and given form, and forbidden by Horos to enter within, and remained until the consummation outside the Pleroma, that is, outside knowledge? And again, saying that the Lord's passion was a type of the extension of the higher Christ, by which extension Horos formed their mother, they are refuted in the remaining details, no longer able to show any resemblance: for where above was Christ given vinegar and gall to drink? Or where were his garments divided? Or where was his side opened, letting blood and water flow forth? Or where did drops of blood fall from him in his agony? — and all the other events undergone by the Lord, which the prophets had foretold. From what source, then, did the mother, or her seed, foretell things that had not yet happened at that time, but were only beginning to happen?
Beyond this, moreover, they say that some things were spoken from the principal source, yet are refuted by what is recorded in the Scriptures concerning the coming of Christ. And as to what these things are, they do not even agree among themselves, but different ones give different answers on these very points. For if someone, wishing to test them, questions separately, in some particular saying, those among them who are considered eminent, he will find one saying that the matter in question concerns the Forefather, that is, Bythos; another that it concerns the Only-begotten, that is, the Word; another again will say it is spoken of one of the Aeons who are within the Pleroma; others of Christ, and another of the Savior. And whoever among them is more expert, after a long silence, will finally venture that the saying refers to Horos; another that it points to Sophia within the fullness; another that it announces the Mother who is outside the fullness; while yet another will say it points to the maker of the world, God himself. So great are the divergences among them about one and the same matter, holding varied opinions about the very same Scriptures; and when one and the same passage is read, all of them, with knitted brows, cast about for some conjectural interpretation — as though none of them were capable of grasping the magnitude of the understanding that is contained there, and for this reason silence is reckoned among them a very great thing, since that Sige who is above must, they say, be represented by the silence that is practiced among them. So they all depart, however many they are, carrying about such varied opinions on one and the same matter, each bearing his own subtlety hidden within himself. So then, when they come together about the same matter... for, not agreeing well among themselves, they meanwhile refute themselves, not agreeing on the very same words. But we, following the one and only true God as our teacher, and holding the rule of truth in his words, say the same things always about the same matters, all of us alike, acknowledging one God, maker of this whole universe, who dispatched the prophets, who brought the people forth out of Egyptian bondage, who in the last times revealed his Son, that he might confound unbelievers and seek out the fruit of righteousness.

======== Book IV — Chapter 58 ========

A demonstration, from the Lord's own words, that he confessed himself sent by God the Father, from whom also the prophets came and the fathers were chosen.
For whom does the Lord not show to have spoken the prophets from any other God, but from his own Father, nor from any other substance, but from one and the same Father — and that no one else made the things that are in this world, but his own Father — teaching in this manner: "A certain man, master of an estate, laid out a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug within it a wine-vat, raised a watchtower over it, leased it to farmers, and journeyed abroad. When harvest-time approached, he dispatched his slaves to the farmers to collect his share of the produce. The farmers, laying hold of his slaves, flogged one, hurled stones at another, and put a third to death. He dispatched further slaves, greater in number than before, and they treated these the same way. Finally he dispatched to them his own son, thinking, 'They will surely show my son deference.' Yet on seeing the son the farmers said to one another, 'Here is the one who will inherit; come, let us do away with him and seize his inheritance.' So they laid hold of him, threw him outside the vineyard, and killed him. When, then, the vineyard's master arrives, what will he do to those farmers?" And they answered him: "He will bring those villains to a wretched end, and lease his vineyard to other farmers, who will pay him the produce at the proper seasons." The Lord then continues: "Have you not read this: 'The stone the builders discarded has become the very cornerstone; this has come about from the Lord, and it is marvelous in our sight'? Therefore I tell you, God's kingdom will be taken away from you, and handed to a people who will yield its produce." By these words he showed his disciples plainly that the estate's master was one and the same — namely, the one God and Father, who fashioned all things through his own agency — while the cultivators varied: some arrogant, insolent, and barren, murderers of their own Lord; others yielding produce at the proper seasons with full obedience; and that this same master at one point dispatched slaves, and at another his own Son. It is from that identical Father, then, from whom the Son was dispatched to those farmers who murdered him, that the slaves too had been dispatched. Yet the Son came from the Father bearing supreme authority, saying, "But I tell you"; whereas the slaves, speaking merely as slaves on their master's behalf, did not for that reason declare, "Thus says the Lord."
The Lord, then, whom those tenants were proclaiming to unbelievers, is the very one whom Christ delivered over to those who obey him; and those whom God had earlier called first — first through the servile legislation — this same God took up afterward, later, through adoption. For God laid out the vineyard, that is, the human race, first through the shaping of Adam and the choosing of the patriarchs; and he handed it over to tenants through that legislation which came through Moses; and he set a hedge around it, that is, he marked out the bounds of their cultivation; and he built a tower, choosing Jerusalem; and he dug a winepress, preparing a receptacle for the prophetic Spirit; and thus he sent prophets before the deportation into Babylon, and after the deportation others again, more than the first, seeking the fruits, saying to them: "Thus says the Lord: Make your hearts clean, and show mercy each to his brother; do not oppress the widow and the orphan and the sojourner and the poor, and let none of you remember in your hearts the malice of his brother, and do not love a false oath. Wash yourselves, be clean, put away your wicked deeds from your hearts, learn to do good, pursue justice, rescue the one who is wronged, render judgment for the orphan, take up the cause of the widow, and come, let us settle the matter together, says the Lord." And again: "Guard your tongue against evil, and let your lips speak no falsehood. Depart from wickedness and do good; look for peace and go after it." These things the prophets proclaimed, seeking the fruit of righteousness. But when the people did not believe them, at last he dispatched his own offspring, our Lord Jesus Christ, and him too, once the wicked farmers had put him to death, they threw outside the vineyard. For this reason the Lord God handed the vineyard over — no longer walled about, but spread out over the whole world — to other tenants, who render the fruits in their seasons, the tower of election now raised up and made glorious everywhere. For everywhere the Church is renowned, and everywhere the winepress is dug round about; for everywhere there are those who receive the Spirit. For since they spurned the Son of God and, having killed him, flung him outside the vineyard, God justly spurned them in turn, and gave to the nations, who were outside the vineyard, the fruit of its cultivation. As also the prophet Jeremiah declares: "The Lord has spurned and abandoned the nation that acts in such a way: for the people of Judah have committed evil before my eyes, says the Lord." And Jeremiah again: "I stationed lookouts over you; listen for the trumpet's blast"; and they replied, "We will not listen." Therefore it was the nations who listened, together with those among them who shepherd flocks. There is, then, a single God and Father — the very one who laid out the vineyard, who brought forth the people, who commissioned the prophets, who afterward commissioned his own offspring, and who granted the vineyard to other farmers, to those who yield its fruits in their proper seasons.
And for this reason the Lord said to his disciples, preparing us to be good workers: "Take heed to yourselves, and watch always at every season, lest your hearts be weighed down with surfeiting and drunkenness and the cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly. For it will come as a snare on everyone who dwells across the whole earth's surface. Gird your loins, then, and keep your lamps burning, and be like servants awaiting the return of their master from the marriage feast. For as it happened in the days of Noah: they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, marrying and given to marriage, unaware of anything until Noah went into the ark; then the flood arrived and swept every one of them away. And as it happened in the days of Lot: they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building, until Lot went out from Sodom; it rained fire from heaven and destroyed them all: so shall it be also at the coming of the Son of Man. Watch, therefore, since you do not know on what day your Lord will come." He is proclaiming a single, identical Lord, one who in Noah's era, on account of humanity's rebellion, brought the deluge; and in Lot's era, owing to the great mass of Sodomite wrongdoing, rained down fire from the sky; and who, in these last times, owing to that very rebellion and comparable wrongdoing, shall usher in the reckoning day, concerning which he declared that things will go easier for Sodom and Gomorrah than for whatever town and household refuses the message brought by his Apostles. And: "You shall go down even unto hell. For if the mighty works that were done in you had occurred instead within Sodom, that city would still be standing today. Nevertheless I say to you, things will go easier for Sodom on the reckoning day than for you."
Since the Word of God remains ever one and unchanging, giving to those who believe in him a spring of water unto eternal life, but immediately withering the barren fig tree; and in the days of Noah justly bringing on the flood, that he might blot out that most wicked generation of men then living, who could no longer bear fruit for God, since the transgressor angels had mingled themselves with them; and yet, so as to restrain their sins, preserving the type of the shaping of Adam: and I find this passage so allegorized by the Father of the Greek interpreters of Irenaeus. In the days of Lot, then, who rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah fire and brimstone from heaven, an example of the just judgment of God, that all might know that every tree failing to yield good fruit gets felled and thrown on the blaze: and in the universal judgment it will be more tolerable for Sodom than for those who saw his mighty works and did not believe in him, nor received his teaching. For as he gave greater grace through his coming to those who believed in him and do his will, so he signified that a greater punishment in the judgment awaits those who did not believe in him, being himself just and equal toward all, and requiring more from those to whom more was given — more, not because he thereby shows the knowledge of another Father, as we have shown at such length elsewhere, but because he poured out through his coming a greater gift of the Father's grace upon the human race.
But if what we have already said does not suffice for anyone to believe that the prophets were sent by one and the same Father from whom our Lord also was sent, let him open the ears of his heart, and calling upon Christ Jesus the Lord as his teacher, hear him say: "The kingdom of heaven resembles a certain king who arranged a wedding banquet for his son, and dispatched his servants to summon the invited guests to the celebration. And they would not come. Again he sent other servants, saying, Tell those who are invited: See, my banquet stands ready, my bulls and fattened animals are slaughtered, everything is prepared; come to the celebration. But they shrugged it off and went their own ways, one to his field, another to his trade; while the rest laid hold of his servants and abused some and murdered others. But when the king heard of it he was angry, and sending his armies he destroyed those murderers and burned their city, and said to his servants: Everything is ready for the feast, but those invited did not deserve it. Go out, then, to the open roads, and bring in whomever you find to the celebration. So his servants went out and gathered everyone they could find, both wicked and worthy, until the hall was packed with those attending. Yet once the king entered to look over those attending, he noticed among them a man not dressed for the wedding, and asked him: Friend, how did you get in here lacking wedding clothing? And he said, 'Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the outer darkness: where there will be wailing and the grinding of teeth. Many receive the invitation, yet few are among the chosen."
For by these words the Lord clearly showed both that all things and one King and Lord of all are the Father, of whom he had also said before: "Do not swear an oath by Jerusalem, since it belongs to the great King as his city"; and that from the beginning he prepared the wedding for his Son, and because of his immense goodness called the first through his servants to the wedding banquet; and when they would not obey, again he sent other servants calling them, and even so they did not obey him, but stoned and killed those who announced the invitation: those he destroyed, sending his armies, and burned their city; and from all the roads, that is, from all the nations, he called men to the wedding banquet of his Son, just as he also said through Jeremiah: "I sent to you my servants the prophets, saying: Turn, each of you, from your most wicked way, and make your works better." And again through the same: "I have sent," he says, "to you all my servants the prophets, day and night, and they did not obey me, nor did they incline their ears; and you shall say to them this word: This is the nation which did not obey the voice of the Lord, nor received discipline; faith has perished from their mouth." He, then, who called us through the Apostles from every quarter, is the same who through the prophets called those who lived long ago, as is shown from the words of the Lord; and it is not that the prophets were from one, and the Apostles from another, even though they preached to different nations; but from one and the same, some announced the Lord, others preached the gospel of the Father, some foretold the coming of the Son of God in advance, others proclaimed him already present to those who were far off.
Further, he also made clear that we must be adorned both with the calling and with upright deeds, so that God's Spirit might come to dwell within us; for this, as also in Jeremiah, or so the interpreter of Irenaeus wrongly has it, is the wedding garment of which the Apostle also speaks... immortality. But those who were called to God's supper and, on account of their evil manner of life, did not receive the Spirit — for the same king who called the faithful together from every quarter to the wedding of his Son, and granted the incorruptible banquet, commands that the man who has no wedding garment, that is, the scorner, be cast into outer darkness. For just as in the former Testament he was not well pleased with many of them, so here too, invitations go out widely though the chosen are few. There are not, then, a God who passes judgment and a separate Father extending the call to salvation; nor a giver of everlasting light distinct from the one ordering that those lacking wedding garments be thrown into the outer dark. Rather, a single, undivided God is at work, the Father of our Lord, by whom also the prophets were sent: calling the unworthy on account of his immense goodness, yet examining those who have been called, to see whether they have a garment fitting and suitable for the wedding of his Son; since nothing unfitting, nothing evil, is pleasing to him. Just as the Lord told the man he had cured: "Behold, you are made whole: sin no more, lest something worse happen to you." For he who is good, and just, and clean, and unblemished will tolerate nothing evil, nothing unjust, nothing abominable in his own bridal chamber.
He, then, is the Father of our Lord, the one whose foresight sustains everything in existence and whose ordinance governs it all; who freely gives to those to whom it is fitting, but according to merit most justly distributes retribution against the ungrateful, who do not perceive his goodness, being a most just rewarder. And for this reason he says: "Sending his armies he destroyed those murderers and burned their city." His armies, moreover, are said to be all men of God: since the whole earth belongs to the Lord, together with everything filling it, the world and all its inhabitants. And for this reason the Apostle Paul, in the epistle to the Romans, says: "For there is no power but from God. But the powers that are, are ordained by God. Therefore whoever resists the power resists the ordinance of God; and those who resist bring judgment upon themselves. For rulers are not a terror to good works but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the power? Do good, and you will have praise from it: for it is God's minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword without cause. For it is God's minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who does evil. Therefore be subject, not merely out of fear of retribution, but for the sake of a clear conscience. For this reason you also pay tribute; since they serve as God's officers, devoted persistently to this very task." So the Lord and the Apostles alike proclaim one God the Father, who established the law, who sent the prophets, who made all things; and for this reason he says: "Sending his armies," since every man, insofar as he is a man, is his own creation, though he may not know his God. For he himself provides for all that they should exist, he who makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.
And not only through what has already been said, but also through the parable of the two sons, of whom the younger squandered his substance in riotous living, dwelling with harlots, he taught that the Father is one and the same, refusing even a kid to the elder son, but for the sake of him who had been lost, his younger son, commanding the fatted calf to be killed and the first robe to be given to him. And through the parable of the laborers who at various times were sent into the vineyard, one and the same Lord is shown: calling some at the very beginning of the world's fashioning, others afterward, others about the middle of the times, others when the times had already advanced, and yet others at the end; so that there are indeed many laborers according to their own respective times, but one who calls them together, the master of the household. For there is one vineyard, since there is also one righteousness, and one steward: since a single Spirit belonging to God orders all things; and likewise one reward, for all received a single denarius each — the image and inscription of the King, that is, the knowledge of God, which is incorruption. And for this reason he began to give the reward from the last, because in the last times the Lord was manifested, presenting himself to all.
And the publican too, who in prayer surpassed the Pharisee, got the Lord's own witness that he left more justified, not because he worshiped another Father, but because with great humility, without arrogance and without boasting, he made confession to that same God. And the parable of the two sons who were sent into the vineyard, of whom one refused his father and afterward repented — when his repentance profited him nothing — while the other promised to go, at once assenting to his father, but did not go (since every man is a liar, and the will indeed lies ready at hand, but he does not find the means to carry it out) — this too shows one and the same Father. And the parable of the fig tree also, of which the Lord says, "Behold, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none" (signifying by this his coming through the prophets, through whom he came on many occasions in search of the upright fruit they owed him, and did not discover it), openly made clear that the fig tree would be cut down for the reason stated: "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those sent to you, how often would I have gathered your children as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not! Behold, your house is left to you desolate." For what was said in the parable, "Behold, for three years I have come seeking fruit," and again plainly, "How often would I have gathered your children," would be a falsehood unless we understand it of his coming through the prophets; given that he visited them just the once, and that being his first appearance among them in person. But since it is the same Word of God who chose the patriarchs, and who always visited them through the prophetic Spirit, and who has now called us together from every quarter through his own coming, he was truly speaking of these very things when he said: "Many shall arrive from east and from west, taking their place at table alongside Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob within the kingdom of heaven; while the heirs of the kingdom will be driven out into the darkness beyond, a place of wailing and the grinding of teeth." If, then, those who through the preaching of his Apostles have believed in him from the east and the west, and shall take their place at table alongside Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob within the kingdom of heaven, sharing the feast with them, then one and the same God is shown, who chose the patriarchs, visited the people, and called the Gentiles.

======== Book IV — Chapter 59 ========

A demonstration that man is free and his own master, so that he can choose the better things or their opposites; and concerning the saying: How often would I have gathered your children together, and you would not? (Matt. 23) This makes plain the ancient law of man's freedom, because God made him free from the beginning, having his own power, just as he also has his own soul, so that he might use the sentence of God voluntarily, and not be compelled by God. For force is not found in God, but a good will is always present with him. And on this account he gives good counsel to all. But he placed in man the power of choice, just as he did also in the angels (for the angels too are rational beings), so that those who obeyed might justly possess the good — given indeed by God, but preserved by themselves. Those, however, who did not obey are justly found without the good, and receive their deserved punishment, since God kindly gave the good, while they did not carefully keep it, nor did they esteem it precious, but despised its surpassing worth. Casting away the good, then, and as it were spitting it out, all rightly incur the just judgment of God, just as the Apostle Paul also testified in the epistle to the Romans, saying: 'Or do you despise the riches of his goodness, and forbearance, and long-suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? But according to your hardness and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself against the day of wrath and of the revelation of the just judgment of God. But glory and honor,' he says, 'to everyone who works good.' God therefore gave the good, as the Apostle also testifies in the same epistle; and those who do it will receive glory and honor, because, being able not to do it, they did the good anyway; while those who do not do it will meet with God's righteous verdict, seeing that they left the good undone though it lay within their power. This is a demonstration that it is not the case that some are good and some evil by nature, but that the good lies in man's own choice.

======== Book IV — Chapter 60 ========

For if some had been made good by nature and others evil, neither would the good be praiseworthy, since they had been made such, nor would the others be blameworthy, since they too had been so constituted. But since all are of the same nature, capable both of holding fast to the good and doing it, and again capable of losing it and not doing it, so justly even among sensible men — how much more before God! — some are praised and receive the fitting testimony of a good choice and perseverance, while others are accused and receive the fitting condemnation, because they rejected what is just and good. And for this reason the prophets exhorted men to do good and to work righteousness, as we have shown through many examples: because this lies within us, yet through much negligence we fall into forgetfulness and need good counsel; wherefore the good God supplied good counsel through the prophets. For this reason too the Lord declared, 'So let your light shine in front of men,' in order that they, beholding your upright deeds, may render praise to your heavenly Father. And: 'Watch yourselves closely, in case your hearts grow heavy with excess and with wine and the anxieties of this present life.' And: 'Keep your waists girt and your lamps alight, and be as men awaiting their master's return from the marriage feast, so that when he arrives and knocks, they may at once open the door for him. Happy is that servant found so occupied when his master arrives.' And again: 'The servant who is acquainted with his master's wish and yet does not perform it will receive a great many blows.' And: 'Why do you address me as Lord, Lord, and yet not carry out what I tell you?' And again: 'But should that servant tell himself, My master is slow in coming, and start striking his fellow-servants, eating and drinking to the point of drunkenness, that servant's master will arrive on a day he does not look for him, and will cut him asunder, assigning him his lot among the pretenders.' All such utterances demonstrate that man is free and his own master, and that God guides him through counsel, urging us toward submission to himself and drawing us back from faithlessness, without ever resorting to compulsion.
Indeed, should someone choose not to embrace the Gospel at all, that choice is open to him, though nothing good comes of it. For disobedience to God and the loss of the good lie within man's power, yet it inflicts no small injury and loss. And for this reason Paul says: 'All things are lawful, but not all things are expedient' — thereby setting forth man's freedom, since all things are lawful to him, God not compelling him; and showing 'it is not expedient,' so that we should not abuse our liberty as a cloak for wickedness, for this is not expedient. And again he says: 'Let every man speak truth with his neighbor.' And: 'Let no evil word proceed out of your mouth, nor filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not fitting, but rather thanksgiving.' And: 'For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord; walk as children of light — not in reveling and drunkenness, not in... but you were washed clean, you were made holy through the name of our Lord.' Now if doing these things or refraining from them did not lie within our own power, what reason would the Apostle have had — and much earlier the Lord himself — to give counsel to do certain things and to abstain from others? But since man is of free judgment from the beginning, and God, in whose likeness he was made, is of free judgment, counsel is always given him to hold fast to the good, which is accomplished through obedience toward God. And not only in works, but also in faith, the Lord preserved man's judgment free and his own master, saying: 'According to your faith be it done to you' — showing that man's faith is his own, since he has his own judgment. And again: 'Everything can be done for one who trusts,' and, 'Go your way, and let it happen to you as you have trusted.' And all such sayings show man to be his own master according to his faith. And for this reason, 'he who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not believe the Son does not have eternal life, but the wrath of God remains upon him.' According to this reasoning, then, the Lord, showing forth his own goodness and signifying man's freedom of judgment and his own mastery, said to Jerusalem: 'How often would I have gathered your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not! Therefore your house is left to you desolate.'

======== Book IV — Chapter 61 ========

What was the reason that man was not made perfect from the beginning. Those who say the contrary to this represent the Lord as powerless — as though he had not been able to bring about what he willed — or again as ignorant of nature, as they themselves say, and of those who are not able to receive his incorruptibility. But, they say, he ought not to have made angels of such a kind that they could transgress, nor men who would immediately turn out ungrateful toward him, since they were made rational, capable of examination and judgment, and not like irrational or inanimate beings, which can do nothing by their own will, but are drawn to the good by necessity and force, having but one disposition and one character, inflexible and without judgment, and able to be nothing other than what they were made. In that case, goodness would give them no pleasure at all, nor would communion with God hold any value, nor would virtue seem worth pursuing, since it would have reached them apart from any motion, concern, or exertion of their own, but would have been implanted in them idly and without cost — so that they would have been of no account for goodness, being such by nature rather than by will, and possessing the good spontaneously but not by choice; and for this very reason they would not even understand that the good is beautiful, nor enjoy it. For what enjoyment of the good is there among those who do not know it? What glory belongs to those who have not striven for it? What crown belongs to those who have not obtained it, as victors do in a contest? And for this reason the Lord said the kingdom of heaven is taken by violence, and 'those who use force,' he says, 'seize it' — that is, those who by force and struggle, watching earnestly, lay hold of it. For this reason too the Apostle Paul says to the Corinthians: 'but one receives the prize. So run that you may obtain it. Now everyone who competes is temperate in all things: they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible. So I run, not without a clear goal; thus I box, not merely striking at empty air; rather I bruise my body and master it fully, for fear that, having proclaimed the message to others, I myself might end up disqualified.' The good contender, then, exhorts us to the contest for incorruption, that we may be crowned and may esteem the crown precious — namely, the one acquired for us through the contest, not one grown up in us of itself. And the more it comes to us through struggle, the more precious it is; and the more precious it is, the more we should always love it. Nor indeed are things loved in the same way when they come to us spontaneously as when they are found with much anxious effort. Since, then, it was for our benefit to love God the more by finding this out for ourselves through this struggle, both the Lord taught it and the Apostle handed it down. And besides, our good would surely have been unreasoning had it been unexercised. But not even sight would be so desirable to us, had we not known how great an evil it is not to see; and the experience of sickness makes health the more honorable; and light is made honorable by comparison with darkness, and life by comparison with death. So too the heavenly kingdom is the more honorable to those who have known the earthly. And the more honorable it is, the more it draws our love; and the more we love it, the greater the glory awaiting us before God.
For our sake, then, the Lord endured all these things, so that, being instructed through all things, we might in future be cautious in all things, and might persevere in the full love of him, having been reasonably taught to love God — God indeed displaying magnanimity in the face of man's apostasy, and man being instructed through it, just as the prophet also says: 'Your own falling away shall correct you' (Jer. 2) — God having foreordained all things for the perfecting of man, and for his edification, and for the manifestation of the divine dispositions, so that his goodness might be shown and his justice accomplished, and the Church might be conformed to the image of his Son, and man might at last become mature, ripening through so many things toward the seeing and comprehending of God. In what respect all things that have been made stand in need of one who is perfect, and whence that need arises.

======== Book IV — Chapter 62 ========

But if someone should say to this: What then? Could not God from the beginning have made man perfect? Let him understand that God, being always the same and, in respect of himself, without origin, has every capability open to him. But the things that were made by him, since they had, as things afterward made, a beginning, must for this very reason be inferior to him who made them; for things which have only just been made could not be uncreated. And precisely because they are not uncreated, for this very reason they also fall short of the perfect. For inasmuch as they are more recent, to that extent they are also childlike; and inasmuch as they are childlike, to that extent they are likewise unused to, and untrained in, mature discipline. For just as a mother is able to supply perfect food to an infant, but the infant is not yet able to receive food too strong for it, so also God himself was indeed able from the beginning to grant man perfection, but man was unable to receive it, for he was an infant. And for this reason our Lord in the last times, recapitulating all things in himself, came to us, not as he himself was able, but as we were able to see him. For he in his own ineffable glory could have come to us, but we could not have borne the greatness of his glory. And for this reason he, who is the Father's fully-matured bread, offered himself to us as milk fit for infants — this was his arrival in human form — so that, nourished as it were at the breast of his flesh, and through such nursing made accustomed to take in and consume the Word of God, we might come to hold within ourselves him who is the bread of immortality, who is the Spirit of the Father. What is meant by what is said by Paul: 'I have given you milk to drink, not solid food.'

======== Book IV — Chapter 63 ========

'I have given you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet able to receive it' — that is, you had learned the coming of the Lord according to the flesh, but the Spirit of the Father did not yet rest upon you, because of your weakness. 'For where there is envy and strife and dissensions among you,' he says, 'are you not carnal, and do you not walk according to man?' That is to say, the Father's Spirit had not yet come to dwell among them, on account of their incompleteness and the frailty of how they were living. Just as, then, the Apostles were able to give solid food — for whoever the Apostles laid their hands upon received the Holy Spirit, which is the food of life — yet those others could not receive it, since they still had a sense toward God that was weak and unexercised through right living; so also at the beginning God was indeed able to give perfection to man, but man, being then but newly made, could not receive it, or, receiving it, could not contain it, or, containing it, could not keep it. And for this reason the Word of God, though he was perfect, became an infant along with man, not for his own sake, but for the sake of man's infancy, thus made accessible in the measure that man was able to receive him. It is not, then, that there is anything impossible or wanting on God's part, but rather on the part of man, who has but newly been made — since he was not uncreated. But as regards God, power and wisdom and goodness are all shown together: power and goodness, in that he willingly established and made those things which as yet were not; wisdom, in that he made things fitting and harmonious with what exists. And certain things, receiving increase through his immense benignity, and persevering through a long space of time, come to share in the glory of the uncreated, God bestowing without envy what is good. For inasmuch as they were made, they are not uncreated; but inasmuch as they persevere through long ages, they will assume the excellence of the uncreated, God freely granting them everlasting perseverance.
And thus God alone will have the primacy in all things, being alone uncreated, prior to all, and the cause that all things exist; while all the rest remain in subjection to God. Now subjection to God is the perseverance of incorruption, and incorruption is the splendor belonging to the Uncreated One; through this ordering, then, and this sort of fitting arrangement, and through this guidance, man, having been made and formed, is fashioned after the pattern and semblance of that uncreated God — the Father approving and commanding, the Son ministering and forming, the Spirit nourishing and increasing, and man himself gradually advancing and arriving at perfection, that is, coming near to the Uncreated. For the Uncreated is perfect; and this is God. Man, however, had first to come into being, and having come into being, to grow, and having grown, to be strengthened, and having been strengthened, to be multiplied, and having been multiplied, to grow vigorous, and having grown vigorous, to be glorified, and having been glorified, to behold his Lord; for it is God who is to be seen, and beholding God brings about incorruption, and incorruption makes one near to God.
Utterly unreasonable, then, are those who do not wait for the time of growth, and who ascribe the weakness of their own nature to God. For, knowing neither God nor themselves, insatiable and ungrateful, they are unwilling first to be what they were indeed made to be, men capable of feeling; but, overstepping the law of the human race, and before they even become men, they already wish to be like God their maker, and claim there is no difference between the uncreated God and man who has only now been made — men who are thereby more unreasonable than dumb animals. For animals do not blame God for what they are, since he did not make them men; rather, each of them, for what it was made to be, gives thanks. We, however, blame him because we were not made gods from the beginning, but first men, and only afterward gods — even though God did this according to the simplicity of his own goodness, so that no one might suppose him to be jealous or grudging. 'I have said,' he declares, 'you are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High'; but since we could not bear the weight of divinity, he adds, 'but you shall die like men,' referring to both things: the kindness of his gift, and our weakness, and the fact that we possessed our own power of choice. For according to his kindness he freely gave what is good, and made men like himself, possessed of their own power; but according to his foreknowledge he knew the weakness of men, and what would come of it; and according to his love and power he will master and subdue the very substance of what is created; for it was needful that created nature should first come to light, and only afterward that what is mortal should be conquered and swallowed up by immortality, and what is corruptible by incorruptibility, so that man might be brought into conformity with God's image and pattern, taking on for himself the knowledge of good and evil.

======== Book IV — Chapter 64 ========

What the knowledge of good and evil is; and how, after man had heard the command and disobeyed it, God ordained that man should become better through obedience.
Now man came into possession of the knowledge of good and evil. To obey God, to trust him, and to hold fast his commandment — this is good, and this constitutes man's life. Conversely, disobedience toward God is an evil, and this brings about his death. Because God, then, granted him this greatness of soul, man came to know both the good of obedience and the evil of disobedience, so that the eye of his mind, having received experience of both, might make the choice of the better with judgment, and might never become slothful or negligent of God's precept — learning by experience that what takes life away from him, namely not obeying God, is evil, and never attempting it at all; and that what preserves his life, namely obeying God, is good, and diligently keeping it with his whole intent, knowing that it is good. For this reason also he had two senses, possessing knowledge of both, so that he might make the choice of the better with discipline. But how could he have had the discipline of the good, without knowing what is contrary to it? For the grasp of things directly present is firmer and beyond doubt, compared to that which comes by conjecture and supposition. For just as the tongue receives, through taste, the experience of sweet and bitter, and the eye, through sight, discerns black from white, and the ear, through hearing, knows the differences of sounds, so too the mind, receiving the discipline of the good through the experience of both, is made firmer for its own preservation, obedient to God — first rejecting disobedience through repentance, because it is bitter and evil; and then, by understanding what it is that is contrary to the good and to sweetness, never even attempting to taste the disobedience of God. But if anyone flees from the knowledge of both of these, and from the twofold sense of that knowledge, he unknowingly destroys the man within himself.
How, then, will he be God, who has not yet even become man? How will he be perfect, who has only just been made? How will he be immortal, seeing that in his mortal state he did not obey his Maker? For you must first keep the order proper to man, and only then share in the glory of God. For you do not make God; rather, God makes you. If, then, you are the work of God, wait for the hand of your artificer, who makes all things in due season — in due season, that is, as far as concerns you who are being made. Present to him a heart that is soft and pliable, and keep the form in which the artificer has shaped you, having within yourself the moisture he gave you, lest, hardened, you lose the imprint of his fingers. By preserving this framework you will ascend to perfection, for the clay that is in you is hidden by the artistry of God. His hand fashioned your substance; he will overlay you, inside and out, with gold and silver refined and pure, and will adorn you so greatly that the King himself will desire your beauty. But if you immediately harden yourself and reject his art, and become ungrateful toward him — since, having been made man, you become ungrateful to God — you have at once lost both his art and life. For to make is proper to the kindness of God; to be made is proper to the nature of man. If, then, you hand over to him what is yours, that is, faith in him and submission, you will receive his art, and will be the perfect work of God. But if you do not believe him, and flee his hands, the cause of your imperfection will lie in you, who did not obey, not in him who called you. For he sent word inviting people to the wedding feast; but those who refused to heed him thereby forfeited that royal banquet for themselves.
The art of God, then, does not fail; for he is able to raise up children of Abraham from stones. But whoever does not attain that art is himself the cause of his own imperfection. Nor does the light fail on account of those who have blinded themselves; rather, the light remaining what it is, those who have been blinded through their own fault are set in darkness. Neither will the light, by any great necessity, subject anyone to itself — God will not force one who is unwilling to hold fast to his art. Those, then, who have withdrawn from the Father's light and transgressed the law of freedom have done so through their own fault, having been made by their own free will and their own power. But God, foreknowing all things, prepared fitting dwellings for both: for those who seek the light of incorruptibility and turn to it, kindly granting them the light they desire; but for others, who despise it and turn away from it and flee it, and who thereby blind themselves as it were — for these he has prepared a darkness fitted to those who set themselves against the light, and has subjected those who flee from being subject to him to a fitting punishment. Now subjection to God is eternal rest; so that those who flee the light have a place fitting to their flight, and those who flee eternal rest have a dwelling fitting to their flight. Since all things with God are good, those who by their own choice flee God rob themselves of all good things; and once stripped of all the good things that come from God, they consequently fall under God's just judgment. For those who flee rest will justly dwell in punishment, and those who flee the light will justly dwell in darkness. And just as with this light of the present age, those who shun it consign themselves to darkness, so that they themselves become the cause of being deprived of light and dwelling in darkness, and it is not the light itself that causes such a condition for them, as we have already said — so too, in the case of God's eternal light, which contains in itself all good things, those who flee it are themselves the cause of dwelling in eternal darkness, deprived of all good things, having made themselves the cause of such a dwelling. What, then, is meant by what was said through the prophet: 'I am God, a zealous God, making peace and creating evils'? There is, then, one selfsame God, the Father, who prepares good things for those who desire fellowship with him and persevere in subjection to him; but who prepares eternal fire for the prince of apostasy, the devil, and for the angels who apostatized with him — into which fire, the Lord says, those who are set apart on the left hand will be sent. And this is what was said through the prophet: 'I am God, a zealous God, making peace and creating evils' — making peace and friendship and forming unity for those who repent and turn to him, but preparing eternal fire and outer darkness for those who do not repent but flee his light — things which are indeed evils for those who bring them upon themselves. [Chapter title:] A demonstration that it is not one being, the Father, who grants rest, and a different being, God, who has prepared the fire, but one and the same.
But if the one who grants rest were the Father, and a separate being, God, the one who prepared the fire, then the offspring of each would likewise differ from one another — one sending people into the Father's kingdom, the other into eternal fire. But since it is one and the same Lord who declared he would separate the whole human race in judgment, just as a shepherd separates the goats from the sheep, and will say to some, 'Come, you blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom prepared for you,' and to others, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire which my Father prepared for the devil and his angels' — it is most clearly shown that it is one and the same Father who makes peace and creates evils, preparing for both what is fitting for each; just as it is one and the same judge who sends both parties to their fitting place. The Lord likewise made this plain through his parable about the tares sown among the wheat, when he said: 'Just as the tares are collected and consumed by fire, so too will it happen when this age reaches its close. The Son of Man will dispatch his angels, and out of his kingdom they will gather everything that causes offense, along with those who practice lawlessness, and will throw them into the blazing furnace; there will be weeping and the grinding of teeth. Then the righteous will blaze forth like the sun within their Father's kingdom.' That very one, then, who as Father made ready the kingdom belonging to the righteous — the kingdom into which the Son led those found worthy — is the same one who likewise made ready the fiery furnace, the place into which those angels sent by the Son of Man, acting on God's command, will throw those who deserve it. For it is he who sowed the good seed within his field; and that field, as he says, represents the world. Yet during the hours when people lay sleeping, the enemy arrived and scattered tares among the wheat, then departed. For from that time this angel became an apostate and an enemy, ever since he grew jealous of God's creature and set about making him God's enemy. Therefore God separated from his own fellowship the one who secretly sowed the tares — that is, the transgression which he himself brought about; but on the man who accepted disobedience carelessly, though wrongly, God had mercy, and turned back upon the very author of the enmity the hostility which that one had wished to create between man and God — removing his own enmity, which was against man, and turning it back and directing it instead against the serpent. As Scripture records God's word to the serpent: 'Enmity I will establish between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will lie in wait for his heel.' And the Lord took up this enmity into himself, having been made man of a woman, and bruising its head, as we showed in the book before this one. Since he identifies some of the devil's angels as those for whom eternal fire has been prepared, and again, within his parable of the tares, states that 'the tares are the sons of the evil one,' it must be concluded that he attributes all who belong to the apostasy to him who is the prince behind this transgression. But that one did not, by nature, make either angels or men. For the devil is found to have made nothing at all, since he himself is a creature of God, just as the rest of the angels are. For God made all things, as David likewise affirms concerning all such things: 'He spoke, and it came to be; he gave the command, and it stood created.'

======== Book IV — Chapter 67 ========

For this reason angels bear the name sons of the devil, and sons of wickedness. Since, then, everything was made by God, and the devil turned himself, and the rest who fell away alongside him, into the cause of their own revolt, Scripture correctly declares that those persisting in revolt remain, without exception, offspring of the devil and messengers belonging to the wicked one. For the term "son," as one of our predecessors has likewise noted, carries two senses: one by nature, whereby a son is born; the other by what someone becomes, whereby he is reckoned a son — though a distinction stands between being born and being made. For one springs from the very substance of another, while the other is fashioned by him, whether through creation or through the imparting of teaching. For whoever receives instruction in the word from someone is termed the son of the one instructing him, and that instructor in turn is termed his father. Thus by nature — that is, by the fact of creation, if one may put it that way — every one of us counts among God's sons, since God made us all. Yet in terms of obedience and doctrine, not everyone is a son of God, but only those who trust him and carry out his will. Those, on the other hand, who withhold trust and refuse his will belong instead among the sons and messengers of the devil, in that they carry out what belongs to the devil. And that matters stand thus, he declared through Isaiah: "I have begotten and exalted sons, but they have despised me." And again, elsewhere, he names them estranged sons: "Strange children have dealt falsely with me." For by nature they remain sons, since he made them; yet by their deeds they are not.

======== Book IV — Chapter 68 ========

On what sort of persons, and for what cause, are called a brood of vipers — namely, those who do not obey the Gospel.
For just as among men, sons disobedient toward their fathers are disowned — sons by nature they remain, but estranged by law, since they no longer stand as heirs of their natural parents — so likewise, before God, those who refuse him obedience, once disowned by him, cease to count as his sons. Hence they cannot lay claim to his inheritance either; as David says, "Sinners are estranged from the womb; they go astray, in the likeness of a serpent." Because the Lord knew this to be the human condition, he therefore called them a brood of vipers, in that, resembling these creatures, they roam about in their varied ways, doing harm to others; for he says, "watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees." And also, speaking of Herod, he says, "Tell that fox" — pointing to his crafty malice and treachery. For which reason the prophet David declares, "Man, set in honor, has become like the beasts." And again Jeremiah says, "They have become like maddened horses after their neighbors' wives, each one after his fellow's." And Isaiah, preaching in Judea and disputing with Israel, calls the rulers Sodom's and the people Gomorrah's — meaning by this that a like transgression, the very sins found among the Sodomites, were discovered among them, addressing them under that same title on account of their matching conduct. And because they had not been shaped that way by God, by nature, but were capable also of righteous action, he further offered them this sound counsel: "Wash yourselves, be clean, put away your wickedness from your souls before my eyes, cease from your iniquities." Clearly, because they themselves, upon transgressing and sinning, drew the very rebuke the Sodomites had received. For had they turned back and repented and abandoned wickedness, they might have become sons of God, and gained the inheritance of incorruption bestowed by him. On this reasoning, then, he termed them angels of the devil and sons of the evil one, since they trust the devil and do what belongs to him. For indeed, all were fashioned from the beginning by one and the same God. But when they trust and submit to God, persevering and holding fast his teaching, they are sons of God; yet when they fall away and transgress, they are reckoned to the devil as their prince, who first made himself, and then the rest, the cause of falling away.
Since, moreover, the Lord's sayings are many indeed, yet every one proclaims one and the same Father, the maker of this world, it was fitting that we too, for the benefit of those entangled in manifold errors, refute them through many arguments, so that, being refuted at many points, they might somehow turn to the truth and find salvation. It is necessary, however, in this treatise, once the Lord's sayings are covered, to add also Paul's teaching, and to weigh his meaning, and to set forth the Apostle's sense, and to explain whatever readings the heretics — failing utterly to grasp what Paul said — have wrested to their own use, and to lay bare the folly of their want of sense; and, from that very Paul from whom they draw their objections against us, to demonstrate that they lie, while the Apostle proclaims the truth, teaching everything in agreement with the truth's proclamation: that the God who spoke to Abraham, who issued the law, who dispatched the prophets in advance, and who in the last times sent forth his own Son and grants salvation to his own creation — the substance which is flesh — is one God, the Father. The remaining of the Lord's sayings, then — those he taught not through parables but plainly, in unadorned words, concerning the Father — together with a treatment of the letters of the blessed Apostle, we shall lay out, with God's aid, in another volume, and so furnish you the full work of exposing and overturning that falsely so-called knowledge, and shall train ourselves and you against all the heretics, across five books.

======== Book V — Preface ========

Having, in the four books already published to you, beloved, refuted all the heretics and exposed their teachings, and having overthrown those who devised irreligious opinions — some points drawn from each one's own doctrine as they left it in their own writings, others from the reasoning that proceeds from the demonstrations taken as a whole — and the truth having been shown, and the manifest proclamation of the Church made clear, which the prophets indeed proclaimed beforehand, as we have shown, which Christ fulfilled, and which the Apostles handed down, from whom the Church, receiving it, alone preserves it well throughout the whole world and has handed it on to her children; and all the questions which are raised against us by the heretics having been resolved, and the teaching of the Apostles explained, and the further matters which were both said and done by the Lord through parables having been set forth — in this fifth book of the whole work, which concerns the exposure and overthrow of falsely called knowledge, we shall attempt to draw demonstrations from the remaining teaching of our Lord and from the apostolic epistles, just as you asked of us, we obeying your request, so as both to refute and to bring back to the Church of God, and also to strengthen the understanding of the newly baptized, that they may keep a stable faith, well preserved as they received it from the Church, and may in no way be turned aside by those who strive to teach them ill and lead them away from the truth. You, however, and all who are to read this writing, ought to read all the more carefully what has been said beforehand by us, so that you may know the very arguments against which we direct our contradictions. For in this way you will both rightly contradict them and, being prepared, will receive from us arguments against them — casting away their opinions, like refuse, by means of the heavenly faith, and following only the true and steadfast Master, the Word of God, Jesus Christ our Lord: who, because of his immense love, became what we are, that he might make us to be what he himself is. Christ alone was able to teach us divine things and to redeem us; and he it was who, that he might restore us — not in appearance but in reality — took flesh from the Virgin Mary by the working of the Holy Spirit: against the vanities of Valentinus and of Ebion.
For there was no other way by which we might have come to know the things of God, had not our Master, being the Word, taken on manhood. For no one else was able to make known to us the Father's realities, save his own proper Word. For who else has grasped the Lord's mind? Or who else became his counselor? Nor again might we have come to know in any other manner, except by beholding our Master and, through hearing, taking in his voice, so that, becoming imitators of his deeds and doers of his sayings, we might share fellowship with him — drawing increase from him who is perfect and precedes all creation, we who have only now been fashioned by him alone who is good and best and who holds the gift of incorruptibility, into that likeness directed toward him. We were indeed marked out beforehand, that we should become what we were not yet, according to the Father's foreknowledge; but having been made the starting-point of what takes form, we received, in the times appointed beforehand, through the Word's ministry — who is complete in every respect, being the mighty Word and true man — being ransomed by his blood according to reason, he gave himself in redemption on behalf of those carried off into captivity. And because apostasy unjustly ruled over us, and though we belonged by nature to almighty God, it estranged us against nature, turning us into its own followers — the Word of God, mighty in all things and never falling short in his justice, turned justly also against that very apostasy, ransoming from it what was his own; not by force, in the manner apostasy had at the beginning held sway over us, insatiably grasping what was not its own, but through persuasion, as befit God to win over rather than compel, so as to secure what he willed; so that neither should justice be trampled, nor should God's ancient handiwork perish.
Since, then, the Lord bought us back at the cost of his own blood, laying down his soul in place of ours and offering his flesh in place of ours, and pouring forth the Father's Spirit to bring about the joining and fellowship of God and man — drawing God down to men through the Spirit, and in turn lifting man up to God through his incarnation, and, truly and steadfastly, in his coming, granting us incorruptibility through fellowship with God — all the heretics' teachings have crumbled. For empty are those who claim he appeared only in semblance. For these events did not occur as mere appearance, but in truth's very substance. But if, while not truly man, he appeared as man, then neither did the Spirit of God truly remain what he actually was, since the Spirit cannot be seen, nor was there any truth whatsoever in him, for he would not have been what he seemed to be. We have already stated that Abraham and the rest of the prophets beheld him prophetically, foretelling by vision what was to come. If, then, even now he appeared in such a manner, not being in reality what he seemed, then it was merely a prophetic vision granted to men, and one must still wait for another coming of his, in which he will be such as he was seen prophetically now. But we have shown that to claim he was seen only in appearance amounts to saying he took nothing from Mary. For he could not truly have possessed blood and flesh, by which he ransomed us, unless he had recapitulated in himself Adam's ancient handiwork. Empty, therefore, are those who follow Valentinus in teaching this, so as to shut out the salvation of the flesh and reject the handiwork wrought by God.
Empty also are the Ebionites, who do not admit into their souls the union of God and man through faith, but cling to the old leaven of their birth; nor are they willing to grasp that the Holy Spirit descended upon Mary, and that the might of the Most High overshadowed her, covering her as with a cloud: for which reason the holy one born from her is God's own Son, the Highest's offspring, begotten of the Father of all, who brought about his incarnation and disclosed a new sort of generation; so that, just as through the earlier generation we inherited death, so through this generation we might inherit life. These people, then, spurn the mingling of the heavenly wine, and want there to be only the world's water, refusing to admit God into their own blend; persisting instead in the state Adam was in, when he was overcome and cast out of paradise — failing to consider that just as, from the start of our formation in Adam, the breath of life that came from God, joined to the thing formed, gave man animation and showed him a rational animal, so too, in these last days, the Word belonging to the Father, together with God's Spirit, was joined to that same ancient substance formed in Adam, and thereby rendered man alive and whole, fit to receive the Father in his perfection: with the result that, just as we all perished in the man of soul, so we might all be granted life in the man of spirit. For Adam never at any point escaped his Maker's grasp, that One to whom the Father spoke thus: "Let us fashion man after our image, in our likeness." And for this reason, at the close, not by fleshly will, nor by any human will, but by the Father's good pleasure, his hands brought a living man to completion, so that Adam might turn out fashioned after the image and resemblance of God.

======== Book V — Chapter 2 ========

Christ did not come into what was alien to him, but visited us with his own grace; and he made our flesh capable of receiving salvation, truly shedding his blood for us, and truly presenting to us his own flesh in the Eucharist.
Empty, too, are those who say that God entered into what belonged to another, as though he coveted what was not his, so as to present to God, as man, one made by another — one he himself had neither made nor formed, and who indeed had, from the outset, been forsaken by his own proper Maker of men. His coming, then, on their account, into what belonged to another, was not just; nor did he truly ransom us by his blood, if he did not truly become man, restoring to his own formed creature what had been proclaimed at the outset — that man was fashioned to resemble and mirror God's own likeness — not deceitfully snatching what belonged to another, but justly and generously taking up what was his own: justly, insofar as it concerns the apostasy, ransoming us from it by his own blood; generously, insofar as it concerns us who have been ransomed. For we had given him nothing beforehand, nor does he crave anything from us, as though he were lacking; rather it is we who lack that fellowship which comes from him. And for this reason he poured out himself. Such people, then, hold in contempt the entire dispensation of God, and deny the flesh's salvation, and reject its renewal, claiming it incapable of incorruptibility. But if this flesh is not to be saved, then the Lord did not ransom us by his blood, nor is the Eucharist's cup the fellowship of his blood, nor is the bread we break the fellowship of his body. For blood comes only from veins and flesh, and from the remaining elements belonging to man's substance — which the Word of God truly became, and by his own blood ransomed us. As his own Apostle likewise puts it: "In him our ransom is secured by his blood, and with it the release of our sins."
And since we are his members, and are nourished by the creation — and it is he himself who supplies the creation to us, making his sun rise and sending rain as he wills — he has confirmed as his own blood that cup which is a creature, the cup which was poured out, from which he increases our blood; and as his own body that bread which is from the creation, from which he increases our bodies. When, therefore, the mixed cup and the bread that has been made receive the Word of God and become the Eucharist of the blood and body of Christ, and from these the substance of our flesh is increased and made to stand — how can they say that the flesh is incapable of the gift of God, which is eternal life, when it is nourished by the blood and body of Christ, and is his member? As the blessed Apostle says in the Epistle to the Ephesians: For we belong to his body, formed from his flesh and drawn from his bones — the Apostle is not here describing some intangible and unseen being (since a spirit possesses neither bone nor flesh), but rather that genuine bodily frame composed of flesh and tendon and bone, sustained by the cup that is his blood and built up by the loaf that is his body.
And just as a shoot cut from the vine, set into the soil, yields fruit at the proper season, and a kernel of wheat, cast into the earth and broken down, springs up manifold through the Spirit of God who upholds all things — these elements, then, by wisdom pass into the service of man, and once they take on the word of God become the thanksgiving-offering, that is, Christ's blood and flesh — so likewise our bodies, fed by this, laid in the ground, and there dissolved, will be raised again at their appointed hour, the divine Word conferring on them a rising to the honor of God the Father, who arrays the mortal in immortality and freely grants incorruption to that which decays, since God's strength comes to fullness amid frailty. This is so that we should not, as though we possessed life from ourselves, ever grow inflated and set ourselves up against God, taking on a thankless disposition; but instead, discovering through experience that endurance unto eternity comes from his greatness and not from anything native to us, we should never be defrauded of the glory that truly belongs to God, nor stay uninformed about our own condition; but rather that we should recognize both what God is capable of and what benefit accrues to man, and never depart from a true grasp of the things that exist, and of their manner of existing — namely, of God and of man. And is it not perhaps, as we said before, for this reason that God allowed the dissolution to take place in us — that, being instructed in every respect, we might be careful in all things, ignorant neither of God nor of ourselves? In the frailty of the flesh God's might and splendor are displayed openly, since he will render our body, which he shaped from the clay of the ground, a sharer in rising again and in immortality, and will grant it enjoyment of life without end — he who gives even this brief, ordinary life we now have.

======== Book V — Chapter 3 ========

... to man in his frailty, lest he should ever grow inflated and slip away from the truth, writing thus to the Corinthians in his second letter to them: lest an excess of revelations should puff me up beyond measure, a thorn was given me in my flesh, an emissary of Satan sent to strike me. Concerning this matter I pleaded with the Lord on three separate occasions that it be taken away from me; and he answered me, my favor suffices for you, for strength reaches its fullness within frailty. All the more gladly, then, will I boast in my own frailties, so that Christ's strength might take up residence in me. What follows from this? [text obscure here] Did the Lord truly wish his own Apostle to be handled in such a manner, and to bear such frailty? So the text affirms — for strength comes to fullness within frailty, this making the man better, since through his own frailty he arrives at knowledge of God's strength. For how else could man have discovered that he is by nature frail and mortal, while God alone is deathless and mighty, had he not come to know by experience the truth of each? For a man's learning his own weakness by endurance is no evil thing; rather it is even good, so as not to err about his own nature. But to be exalted against God, and to assume presumption of one's own glory, rendering man ungrateful, brought much evil — and it would have stripped him at once of both truth and love, and of that love which is owed to him who made him. But the experience of both conditions instilled in him a true knowledge of God and of man, and increased his love toward God. And where love is increased, there the glory of God is made greater by the power at work in those who love him.
Thus they reject God's might, giving no thought to what the passage actually conveys, fixing their gaze solely on the frailty of the flesh while disregarding the might of him who restores it from death. For if what is mortal is not given life, and the corruptible is not called back to incorruption, then God is no longer powerful. But since he is powerful in all these things, we ought to consider our own beginning: that God took mud from the earth and formed man. And indeed it is much more difficult and incredible to make, out of bones and sinews and veins and the rest of the human constitution that did not exist, something so as to bring it into being — and moreover to make man an animate and rational being — than it is, once made and afterward dissolved into the earth for the reasons we mentioned before, to restore it again, even though it has passed away into that state from which, in the beginning, man not yet made, was made. For he who in the beginning made what did not exist to exist, when he willed it, will much more restore again, when he wills, those who have already existed, into that life which is given by him. And the flesh will be found to be receptive and capable of the power of God, since from the beginning it received the artistry of God: one part was made an eye that sees, another an ear that hears, another a hand that touches and works, another sinews stretched throughout and holding the members together, another arteries and veins, the channels of blood and breath, another the various internal organs, another blood, the bond joining soul and body. What then? It is beyond number to describe the whole structure that corresponds to the members of man, which was made by no small wisdom of God. And those who share in the wisdom of the Lord share also in his power.
The flesh, therefore, is not without a share in the wisdom and power of God. For his power, which grants life, is made perfect in weakness, that is, in the flesh. But let those who say the flesh is not capable of that life which is given by God tell us this: are they living now, and do they say they share in life, or do they in fact confess that, having no life at all, they are presently dead? And if indeed they are dead, how is it that they move and speak and do the other things that belong not to the dead but to the living? But if they are alive now, and their whole body shares in life, how do they dare to say that the flesh does not share in life, while confessing that they have life in the present? It is as though one were to hold up a saturated sponge, or a burning brand, and insist that the sponge cannot share in the water it holds, nor the brand in the flame that lights it. In the same way these people, saying that they live and that they carry life, and exulting in their own members, afterward contradict themselves by saying that their own members are not capable of receiving life. But if this present, temporal life — though far weaker than that eternal life — is nevertheless powerful enough to give life to our mortal members, why will not that eternal life give life to flesh which has already learned and become accustomed to bearing life? That the flesh does share in life is shown by the very fact that it lives: for it lives to the extent that God wills it to live. And that God is able to grant it life is manifest. For it is he who gives life to us while we live; and so the Lord, being able to grant life to that which he himself has made, and the flesh being suited to receive life, what then stands in the way of its obtaining that incorruption — life granted by God, everlasting and without limit?

======== Book V — Chapter 4 ========

They are deceived who invent, besides the maker of the world, another God the Father — one who must necessarily be weak and useless, or malicious and envious, if he either cannot or will not grant eternal life to our bodies. They call the Demiurge good, while making him out to be weak and useless and negligent — not to say, as they in effect do say, envious and grudging, in that they claim our bodies are not given life by him. For when they claim that those things which everyone acknowledges as plainly lasting and deathless — spirit, soul, and the like — receive life from the Father, yet another element, unable to receive life by any means except through that God, is left without life, they thereby expose their so-called father as either feeble and lacking strength, or grudging and jealous. For since the Demiurge gives life to our mortal bodies and promises them resurrection through the prophets, as we have shown, which of the two is shown to be more powerful, stronger, and truly good — the Demiurge, who gives life to the whole man, or their falsely-named father? The one who pretends to give life to those things which are by nature immortal, to which living belongs from their own nature, but who does not graciously give life to those things which need his help in order to live, but negligently abandons them to death? Does their father, then, not grant life to these also, though able to, or because he is not able to? If indeed he is not able, then he is no longer powerful, nor is he greater than the Demiurge; for the Demiurge does grant it, just as he is able to grant sight, which that other cannot grant. But if he is able to grant it and does not, then he is shown to be not good but envious and malicious as a father. And if they should give some reason why their father does not give life to bodies, that very reason must necessarily appear greater than the father, since it overpowers his benevolence, and his benevolence is weakened on account of that reason which they themselves allege. But that bodies are capable of receiving life is evident to everyone: for they continue living precisely insofar as God chooses that they should live; hence these people can no longer claim that flesh is wholly unfit to receive life. If, then, they are not given life on account of some necessity or some other cause, even though they are capable of sharing in life, their father will be shown to be a servant of necessity and of some external cause, and no longer free and master of his own will.

======== Book V — Chapter 5 ========

The long life of the ancients, the translation of Elijah and Enoch together with their own bodies, and the preservation, along with Jonah, of Ananias, Azarias, and Misael amid the greatest dangers, clearly show that God is able to raise our bodies to eternal life. As for the extent to which God was pleased to permit this, one need only turn to the sacred writings, where it will be discovered that those who came before us exceeded spans of seven, eight, even nine centuries, their bodies reaching such a vast number of days and sharing in life exactly as far as God willed them to live. But what shall we say of those two? Enoch, pleasing God in the very body in which he pleased him, was translated, thereby foreshowing the translation of the righteous. And Elijah, just as he was in the substance of his created form, was taken up, prophesying the assumption of the fathers; and in neither case did the body hinder their translation and assumption. For it was by those same hands by which they were formed in the beginning that they received their assumption and translation. For the hands of God had grown accustomed, in Adam, to fitting together, holding, and bearing up his creature; and since their bodies persevered a long time in that same created form, those hands could carry it and set it wherever they wished. Where, then, had the first-formed man been set? In paradise, naturally, just as the writing has it: God planted an orchard in Eden toward the sunrise, and there he set the man he had fashioned; and out of that place he was driven into the world on account of his disobedience. On this account the elders, being disciples of the Apostles, hold that those who were carried off were carried off to that same place (since a garden of that kind stands ready for the just and for those bearing the Spirit — the very place to which the Apostle Paul too was caught up, and there heard sayings not fit to be spoken, at least as far as concerns our present condition); and that those thus removed remain there until the final consummation, tasting incorruption in advance.
But should anyone deem it impossible for men to survive across so vast a stretch of time, and imagine instead that Elijah was not carried up bodily but that his body burned away in the chariot of fire, let him recall that Jonah was thrown into the deep and taken into the sea-creature's belly, and afterward, at God's bidding, was cast out unharmed onto dry land. Ananias too, and Azarias, and Misael, were cast into a furnace of fire heated sevenfold, and yet suffered no harm at all, nor was even the smell of fire found upon them. What, then, was that hand of God at work among them, bringing about things beyond expectation and beyond the reach of human nature — why should we be astonished at it, seeing it acted according to the Father's own intent? And this figure is the Son of God, as the writing records king Nebuchadnezzar's own words: Was it not three men we threw bound into the furnace? Yet look — I behold four moving about within the flames, unbound, and the fourth has the appearance of a son of the gods.
Neither, then, will the nature of anything that has been made, nor the weakness of the flesh, prove stronger than the will of God. For God does not belong to the things that have been made; rather, the things that have been made are subject to God, and all things serve his will. Wherefore the Lord also says: What cannot be done by men can be brought about by God. Just as it now seems incredible and impossible to people ignorant of God's arrangement that a man could live so many years, and yet those who lived before us did live so, and those who were translated live on as an example of the length of days to come; and that men came forth safe from the belly of the whale and from the furnace of fire — and yet they did come forth, led out as if by the hand of God for the display of his power — so also now, even though some, ignorant of the power and the promise of God, contradict their own salvation, judging it impossible for God, when raising up bodies, to grant them everlasting continuance, nevertheless the unbelief of such men will not nullify the faithfulness of God.

======== Book V — Chapter 6 ========

God will save the whole and perfect man, made up of body and soul joined together, once the Word has taken possession of him and adorned him with the gifts of the Holy Spirit — for our bodies are temples, and God fits and conforms his own handiwork to his own child. For it is through the Father's own hands — meaning by the Son together with the Spirit — that man comes to be shaped after the likeness of God, and not merely some part of man. Soul and spirit can be a part of man, but they are by no means the whole man; the perfect man is the mingling and union of the soul, which receives the spirit of the Father, together with the flesh that was fashioned according to the image of God. Perfect is the title given to those who have taken in God's Spirit and, through that same Spirit, speak in tongues, just as the Apostle says: We speak wisdom among the perfect — he himself was speaking this way. In the same manner we have heard of many brothers in the Church who possess prophetic gifts, and who through the Spirit speak in every kind of tongue, and bring men's hidden things to light for their benefit, and expound the mysteries of God; these the Apostle calls spiritual, in that they are spiritual by participation in the Spirit, not by any defrauding or removal of the flesh. For if someone takes away the substance of the flesh, that is, the created handiwork, and understands the spirit alone by itself, what remains is no longer a spiritual man but merely a human spirit, or else the divine Spirit itself. Yet once that spirit is blended with the soul and joined to the created handiwork, then, through the Spirit's outpouring, a spiritual and complete man results — and it is this man who bears the image and takes on the likeness of God. But if the Spirit is lacking to the soul, such a one remains merely a natural man and, being left carnal, will be imperfect: possessing the image in his created form but not receiving the likeness through the Spirit. In the same way, if someone takes away the image and rejects the created handiwork, he can no longer be understood to mean a man, but only some part of man, as we said before, or something other than man altogether. For the mere fashioning of the flesh by itself is not a perfect man, but only the body of man, a part of man. Nor is the soul by itself a man, but the soul of man, a part of man. Nor is the spirit man, for it is called spirit, not man. It is the mingling and union of all these that makes the perfect man. For this reason the Apostle, explaining himself, set forth the perfect and spiritual man of salvation in his first letter to the Thessalonians, saying: May your whole spirit, soul, and body remain without fault until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. And what reason would he have had to pray for the whole and perfect preservation of these three — soul, body, and spirit — at the coming of the Lord, unless he knew that their reunion and union into one was one and the same as their salvation? For this reason he calls those perfect who present all three blameless to the Lord. Those, then, are perfect who both have the Spirit of God abiding steadfastly in them, and have kept their souls and bodies blameless — keeping, that is, their faith toward God and their charity toward their neighbor.
For this reason he also says that this created handiwork is God's temple: Do you not know, he says, that you are God's temple, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, and that temple is you — plainly calling the body a temple, since the Spirit dwells in it. In the same way the Lord also said of himself: God of peace sanctify you wholly and blamelessly in spirit and soul and body; and again: Tear down this sanctuary, and within three days I will build it up again. And this, he adds, he said of his own body. And it is not only that our bodies are called a temple, but also the temple of Christ, as he says to the Corinthians: Do you not know that your bodies belong to Christ as limbs belong to a body? Am I therefore to strip Christ of his limbs and hand them over to a prostitute? He is not talking here about some separate, spiritual man, since such a man could never join himself to a prostitute. What he means is that our body — the flesh that abides in purity and holiness — belongs to Christ, and that once it joins a prostitute it becomes hers instead. This is exactly why he said: If anyone tears down God's sanctuary, God will bring ruin on him. So then, to claim that the dwelling-place of the Father's Spirit, the very limbs of Christ, have no part in salvation and are handed over to destruction — could anything be more blasphemous? And since it is not by their own inherent power but through God's might that our bodies are raised, he tells the Corinthians: The body exists not for fornication but for the Lord, just as the Lord exists for the body. And God has raised up the Lord, and he will also raise us up by his power.

======== Book V — Chapter 7 ========

Since Christ rose again in our flesh, it follows that we too will rise again in the same flesh; for the resurrection promised to us ought not to be referred to spirits, which are immortal by nature, but to bodies, which of themselves are mortal.
Just as, then, Christ rose again in the substance of flesh, and displayed to his disciples the wounds of the nails together with the pierced place in his side — proof that this very flesh had come back from death — so, Paul says, will he likewise raise us through that same power. And in another place, in his letter to the Romans, this is his statement: yet if the Spirit of him who woke Jesus from among the dead has its dwelling within you, then the one who woke Christ from death will bring your mortal bodies, too, to life. What, then, is meant by these mortal bodies? Could they be souls? Yet souls, set beside mortal bodies, are without body themselves; for it was into man's face that God blew the breath of life, and so man turned into a living soul, and that breath of life has no bodily substance. Yet they cannot even call the breath of life itself mortal. And for this reason David says: My soul shall live to him, as though its substance were immortal. Nor again can they call the spirit a mortal body. What, then, remains to be called a mortal body, except the created handiwork, that is, the flesh, of which scripture likewise says that God shall grant it life? It is this alone that perishes and comes apart, not the soul, and not the spirit either. To die means to forfeit the power of living, to be left thereafter without breath, without life, unable to stir — and none of that befalls the soul, since it is itself the breath of life, nor the spirit, since the spirit is simple, without composite parts, incapable of coming apart, and is itself the source of life for whoever possesses it. What is left, then, is that death touches the flesh alone, which, once the soul has withdrawn, stops breathing and is slowly resolved back into the ground it was taken from.
This mortal flesh, then, is sown in corruption and rises in incorruption. For, he says, what you sow is not brought to life unless it first dies. And what does this mean? He has taught unmistakably that he is speaking neither of the soul nor of the spirit, but of bodies that have been put to death. For these are the natural bodies, that is, bodies that share in the soul; when they lose the soul they are put to death, and afterward, rising through the Spirit, they become spiritual bodies, so that through the Spirit, who abides forever, they may have life. For at present, he says, our knowledge is partial and our prophecy is partial, but afterward we shall behold him directly, face to face. This is also what was said by Peter: Whom, though you have not seen, you love; in whom, though you do not now see him, you believe, and believing you rejoice with joy unspeakable. For then our own face shall look directly upon the Lord's face, and it shall exult with a gladness beyond words, seeing at last its own true joy.

======== Book V — Chapter 8 ========

The gifts of the Holy Spirit that we receive prepare us for incorruption and make us spiritual, and set us apart from carnal men — a distinction signified in the Law by the clean and unclean animals.
For now we receive some part from his Spirit, toward the perfecting and preparing of incorruption, growing gradually accustomed to receive and to bear God; this is what the Apostle called a pledge, that is, a part of the honor that has been promised us by God, in the letter to the Ephesians, where he says: In him you too, after listening to the message of truth — the good news of your salvation — and after coming to believe, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit, the down payment on our inheritance. This pledge, then, dwelling in us, already makes us spiritual, and what is mortal is swallowed up by immortality. For, he says, you exist not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit, given that God's Spirit makes its home in you. And this comes about not through any loss of the flesh, but through communion with the Spirit. For those to whom he wrote were not without flesh, but had received the Spirit of God, in whom we cry, Abba, Father. If, then, having the pledge now, we cry, Abba, Father, what will happen when, rising again, we shall see him face to face — when all our members shall pour forth a hymn of exultation, giving glory to the one who brought them back from death and granted them life without end? For if the down payment, taking hold of man from within, already prompts him to cry out, Abba, Father, what will the entire grace of the Spirit accomplish, once it is bestowed on humanity by God? It will conform us to himself, and bring us to completion in accord with the Father's purpose; for it will shape man into the divine image and its likeness. Those, then, who have the pledge of the Spirit, and do not serve the desires of the flesh but subject themselves to the Spirit, will not for that reason be men without the Spirit; rather, our substance — that is, the union of soul and flesh receiving the Spirit of God — makes the spiritual man complete. But those who cast aside the counsel of the Spirit and serve the pleasures of the flesh, living without reason and, unrestrained, plunging into their own desires, having no aspiration at all to the divine Spirit but living after the manner of pigs and dogs — these the Apostle rightly calls carnal, because they perceive nothing but carnal things.
And the prophets, for this same reason, compare such people to irrational animals, because of their irrational way of life, saying: They turned into lust-crazed stallions chasing women, each one whinnying for his fellow's wife. And elsewhere: Man, though set in a place of honor, made himself no better than cattle. This is because he made himself like the beasts, imitating their irrational life. And in our own common speech we too call such men beasts and irrational cattle. The Law foretold all this in the same manner, sketching out man by means of animals: whatever animals, it says, have a cloven hoof and chew the cud, it declares clean; but whatever animals lack one or both of these traits it marks off as unclean. Who, then, count as clean? Those whose faith carries them steadily toward the Father and toward the Son — this is what the split hoof stands for — and who ponder God's sayings continually, so that they come to be clothed in upright deeds; this is what chewing the cud represents. The unclean, on the other hand, are those who neither have the cloven hoof nor chew the cud, that is, who neither have faith in God nor meditate on his words; this is the abomination of the pagans. But those who do chew the cud yet do not have the cloven hoof, and are themselves unclean, are a figure of the Jews: they have the words of God on their lips, but they do not fix the stability of their root in the Father and in the Son; and for this reason their kind is also slippery. For animals with a single, undivided hoof easily slip, while those with the cloven hoof are more stable, since the divided parts of the hoof support one another in succession as they walk. Unclean in the same way are creatures with the split hoof that do not chew the cud; this pictures every heretic, along with all who never ponder God's sayings and are not clothed in righteous deeds — people of whom the Lord likewise said: Why do you address me as Lord, Lord, yet fail to do what I tell you? Such people claim to trust in the Father and the Son, yet they never dwell on God's sayings as they should, nor do they wear the clothing of righteous deeds; instead, as noted earlier, they have adopted the manner of life of pigs and dogs, surrendering themselves to filth, gluttony, and every sort of recklessness. Rightly, then, does the Apostle brand every such person carnal and merely natural, since their disbelief and self-indulgence keep them from the divine Spirit, and through their assorted errors they fling away the life-giving Word from within themselves, wandering senselessly after their own cravings; the prophets called them beasts and wild animals; common speech has understood them as cattle and irrational creatures; and the Law pronounced them unclean.

======== Book V — Chapter 9 ========

How the apostle's saying, which the heretics abuse, ought rightly to be taken: 'Flesh and blood cannot lay claim to God's kingdom.'
This is likewise what the Apostle states in another place: 'a body of flesh and blood has no share in inheriting God's reign' (1 Cor. 15:50). This is the passage that every heretic drags forward as tinder for their raving, and by it they likewise attempt to restrain us and to argue that saving God's handiwork lies beyond possibility — failing to notice that man, as we have already demonstrated, is composed of three parts: flesh, soul, and spirit. Of these, one, namely the Spirit, gives shape and salvation; a second, joined to it and thereby shaped, is the flesh; and standing between the pair is the soul, which at times, following the spirit's lead, is drawn upward by it, and at other times, siding with the flesh, slides down into earthbound cravings. All those, then, who lack the shaping, saving element unto life will thus be, and will be named, flesh and blood, seeing they hold none of God's Spirit within. For that reason such people are termed 'dead' by the Lord as well: 'Leave the dead,' he says, 'to bury their own dead,' inasmuch as they lack the Spirit who confers life on man. Yet those who revere God and trust in his coming, and who fix God's Spirit in their hearts by faith, will rightly be termed men — pure, spiritual, and alive unto God — because they possess the Father's Spirit, who purifies man and raises him into God's own life.
For just as the Lord testified, 'the flesh is feeble, though the spirit stands eager.' This eagerness of the Spirit is what has the power to bring about whatever lies within its readiness. If, then, this eagerness of the Spirit is joined as a kind of goad to the feebleness of the flesh, it follows of necessity that the stronger thing must overpower the weaker, so that the flesh's feebleness gets absorbed into the Spirit's might; and thus does the man, carnal no longer but now spiritual, come to be through fellowship with the Spirit. In just this way the martyrs give their testimony and scorn death — not on the strength of fleshly feebleness, but through the Spirit's eagerness. For once absorbed, the flesh's feebleness reveals how mighty the Spirit is; and the Spirit, absorbing that weakness in turn, claims the flesh as its own possession; and from the union of both a living man results — living through sharing in the Spirit, man through the substance of the flesh. Flesh, then, apart from God's Spirit, is a corpse, devoid of life, and it cannot lay claim to God's kingdom: its blood runs senseless, like water spilled upon the ground. Hence his words, 'such as the earthly one, so likewise those who are earthly' (1 Cor. 15:48). But wherever the Father's Spirit dwells, there stands a living man, blood kept sensible for God's approval, flesh taken over by the Spirit — unmindful, granted, of its own nature, yet assuming the Spirit's character, brought into conformity with God's Word. Hence, too, his statement: 'just as we carried the likeness of the man made of earth, so let us also carry the likeness of the one from heaven' (1 Cor. 15:49).
What, then, belongs to earth? The handiwork. And what belongs to heaven? The Spirit. Just as, then, he states, apart from the heavenly Spirit we once dwelt in flesh grown stale, disobedient to God, so now, having taken the Spirit, let us walk in a renewed life, obedient to God. Since, then, salvation apart from God's Spirit is impossible for us, the Apostle urges us to guard God's Spirit through faith and a pure course of life, so that, having failed to share in the Holy Spirit, we might not forfeit heaven's reign; and he pronounced that flesh and blood by themselves cannot lay claim to God's kingdom. For, in truth, the flesh does not claim possession but is itself claimed as a possession; just as the Lord likewise stated: 'Happy are the gentle, for the earth shall come to them as their portion' — as though the earth were held as a portion inside the kingdom, from which the very stuff of our flesh is taken. And so he intends the world to serve as a temple, so that in it God's Spirit might find delight, as a groom delights in his bride. Just as, then, the bride cannot seize the groom on her own initiative, but is instead taken hold of once the groom arrives and receives her, so too can this flesh never, by itself alone, lay claim to God's kingdom as a portion; yet it can be held as a portion within the kingdom by the Spirit. For it is the living one who claims as a portion the things that are dead; and there is a difference between holding something as a portion and being held as a portion oneself. The one who holds rules, presides, and disposes of his portion as he chooses; those held are subordinate, obedient, governed by him, and under the sway of their possessor. What, then, is the living thing here? Plainly, God's Spirit. And what are the dead things? Plainly, the parts of man, which likewise decay back into the earth. These are claimed by the Spirit and carried over into heaven's reign. For this cause Christ also died, so that the Gospel's testament, unsealed and proclaimed before all the world, might first set his servants free, and afterward install them as heirs of what belongs to him — the Spirit claiming them as its portion, as we have already shown. For the living one claims a portion, whereas the flesh is what gets acquired as a portion. So that we might not, by losing the Spirit who claims us, forfeit life — the Apostle, urging us toward fellowship with the Spirit, following the argument already laid out, said: 'flesh and blood cannot lay claim to God's kingdom.' It is as though he said: Do not wander astray; for unless God's Word makes its home in you, and the Father's Spirit resides in you, and instead you drift along emptily however chance carries you, being nothing but flesh and blood, God's kingdom cannot become yours...

======== Book V — Chapter 10 ========

He confirms what precedes through an analogy taken from a wild olive shoot, whose character alone, not its underlying nature, gets altered by grafting; he goes on to show that man without the Spirit can neither yield fruit nor lay claim to God's reign — so that, rather than indulging the flesh, we should not spurn the Spirit's grafting-in. 'You,' he states, 'a wild olive shoot yourself, were grafted onto the cultivated olive, and came to share in the olive's own richness' (Rom. 11:17). Just as, then, the grafted wild shoot, should it cling to its former character, stays a wild olive, gets lopped off, and lands in the fire; yet if it holds firm and turns into a cultivated olive, it grows fruitful, as though set in a king's garden — so too with men: should they progress toward the better through faith and take on God's Spirit, they will yield its fruit and turn spiritual, as though set within God's own garden. But should they spurn the Spirit and cling to their former character, choosing to belong to flesh rather than Spirit, it is entirely just to say of such people that flesh and blood have no claim on God's reign — much as one might say the wild shoot is not admitted into God's garden. Marvelously, then, does the Apostle lay out our nature, and God's entire arrangement, through this discussion of flesh, blood, and the wild olive. For exactly as the wild shoot, tended and grafted, recovers the fruitfulness proper to it, so too men, left in carelessness and carrying fleshly cravings like feral fruit, render themselves fruitless of righteousness through their own fault. For it is precisely while men are asleep that the enemy scatters the weed-seed; and for that reason the Lord charged his followers to stay watchful. And again, those fruitless of righteousness, and, so to speak, choked round with brambles — should they receive tending, and, so to speak, accept the grafting-in of God's word, they are restored to man's original nature, the nature shaped after God's image and likeness. Yet just as the grafted wild shoot keeps the wood's underlying substance while its fruit's character changes and it takes a new name, no longer termed wild but a fruit-bearing olive — so too man, grafted in through faith and taking on God's Spirit, keeps the substance of his flesh, yet the character of his works' fruit changes, and he receives a new name marking that turn for the better: no longer termed flesh and blood, but now standing as a spiritual man.
But conversely, just as a wild olive shoot, left ungrafted, stays worthless to its keeper on account of its untamed character, and gets lopped off as a fruitless tree and thrown into the fire — so too the man who fails to accept the Spirit's grafting through faith stays what he was before, remaining flesh and blood, and cannot obtain God's kingdom as his portion. Rightly, then, does the Apostle state: 'flesh and blood have no claim on God's reign'; and, 'those existing in the flesh are unable to please God' — not disowning the substance of the flesh, but pressing the need for the Spirit's infusion. Hence his words: 'this mortal frame must be clothed with immortality, and this perishable one clothed with imperishability' (1 Cor. 15:53). And elsewhere he states: 'yet you exist not in flesh but in Spirit, provided God's Spirit truly dwells within you' (Rom. 8:9). He makes this yet clearer, saying: 'the body, granted, lies dead on account of sin, yet the Spirit is life on account of righteousness. And should the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from among the dead dwell within you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will likewise bring your mortal bodies to life through his Spirit dwelling in you' (Rom. 8:10-11). And again, in that very letter to the Romans, he states: 'for should you live according to the flesh, you are bound to die' — not disowning the manner of existence lived within the flesh (seeing that he himself, while yet in the flesh, addressed them), but severing the cravings of the flesh, which bring man to death. Hence he adds: 'yet should you, through the Spirit, put the flesh's deeds to death, you will live. For those guided by God's own Spirit — these are God's children' (Rom. 8:13-14).

======== Book V — Chapter 11 ========

On the deeds of the flesh and of the spirit, and that the washing he speaks of concerns not the body's substance but one's former conduct. He himself also spelled out plainly which deeds he labels carnal, anticipating the slander of the faithless, and clarifying himself so no room for dispute would remain for those who argue against him in bad faith, in that letter addressed to the Galatians, stating thus: 'now the deeds of the flesh lie in plain view, namely these: adultery, fornication, impurity, wantonness, idol-worship, sorcery, quarrels, envyings, fits of rage, rivalries, dissensions, factions, jealousy, drunken bouts, carousing, and matters of this sort, which I warn you of beforehand, just as I warned you previously, that those practicing such things will have no share in God's kingdom' (Gal. 5:19-21). He announces still more openly to his hearers the meaning of 'flesh and blood having no claim on God's reign.' For those who practice such things, genuinely conducting themselves according to the flesh, cannot live unto God. And again he laid out the spiritual deeds that confer life on man, namely the Spirit's grafting-in, stating thus: 'but the Spirit's fruit is love, gladness, peace, patience, generosity, goodness, faithfulness, mildness, mastery of self, purity; against things of this kind there exists no law' (Gal. 5:22-23). He, then, who progresses toward the better and yields the Spirit's fruit is wholly saved through his fellowship with the Spirit; whereas whoever remains among the aforementioned deeds of the flesh, rightly counted carnal since he has not taken on God's Spirit, will be unable to obtain heaven's reign. As the Apostle again attests, writing to the Corinthians: 'do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit God's kingdom? Be not misled: neither the sexually immoral, nor idol-worshippers, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor those who lie with their own sex, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor swindlers will obtain God's kingdom. And such, indeed, some of you once were; but you were cleansed, but you were made holy, but you were made righteous, invoking our Lord Jesus Christ's name and resting on the Spirit belonging to our God' (1 Cor. 6:9-11). He demonstrates with utter clarity by what means man perishes, should he persist living according to the flesh, and by what means, conversely, he is saved. And the elements that bring salvation, he states, are our Lord Jesus Christ's name, together with the Spirit belonging to our God.
Having, then, catalogued the deeds of the flesh that lack the Spirit and lead to death, following on what he had already stated, at the letter's close he declared in summary: 'just as we carried the likeness of the man made of dust, let us likewise carry the likeness of the heavenly man. This I tell you, brothers, that flesh and blood have no claim on God's kingdom' (1 Cor. 15:49-50). Now this phrase, 'just as we carried the likeness of the man made of dust,' echoes that other statement: 'and such, indeed, you once were; but you were cleansed, but you were made holy, but you were made righteous, invoking our Lord Jesus Christ's name and resting on the Spirit belonging to our God.' When, then, did we carry the likeness of the dust-made man? Plainly, while those aforementioned deeds of the flesh were being worked in us. And when, conversely, did we carry the heavenly likeness? Plainly, at the point he describes: 'you were cleansed, trusting in the Lord's name, and taking on his Spirit.' We were cleansed, not with respect to the body's substance, nor to the handiwork's image, but with respect to our former, empty way of living. Concerning the distinction between death and life, the breath of life and the life-giving Spirit, and how that very substance of flesh, once dead, is brought back to life.

======== Book V — Chapter 12 ========

In the very members by which we were perishing, working the things of corruption, in these same members we are made alive, working the things of the Spirit. For flesh is capable both of corruption and of incorruption, just as it is capable both of death and of life; and these give way to one another, and neither of the two remains fixed in place forever, but each expels the other in turn, and while one holds sway, the other fades away. If, then, death, seizing hold of a man, chased life out of him and left him showing as a corpse, how much more does life, taking possession of a man, expel death from him and bring the living man back to God? For if death caused a man to die, why should life, once it arrives, fail to quicken the man? As the prophet says, "Death has been swallowed up unto victory," and again, "God shall wipe every tear away from off every countenance." That earlier life was granted not through the Spirit but through the breath. For the breath of life, which also renders man a living creature, is one matter, while the life-giving Spirit, which renders him a spiritual creature, is quite another. And on this account the same Isaiah declares, "Thus speaks the Lord, who stretched out the heaven and set it firm, who founded the earth and all that fills it, and who gives breath to the folk upon it, and Spirit to them who tread upon it" — meaning breath as granted in common to every person dwelling on earth, while Spirit belongs properly to those who trample earthly cravings beneath their feet. For this cause the same prophet, marking out these foretold matters, again declares: "A Spirit shall issue forth from before me, and I have fashioned all breath." Here he assigns the Spirit as belonging properly to God, whom in the latter days he poured forth upon mankind by the adoption of sons, while showing the breath to belong in common to whatever has been shaped and formed. Now the thing formed is one matter, and its former is another. The breath, then, is fleeting, but the Spirit endures without end. And the breath swells briefly, lingers a season, then withdraws, abandoning its former dwelling wholly bereft of spirit. But the Spirit envelops man both inwardly and outwardly, abiding continually and never departing from him. Yet, as the apostle states, "that which is first is not the spiritual, but rather the natural" — addressing this, so to speak, to us mortals — "and only afterward the spiritual," following reason's order. For man had first to be shaped, and, once shaped, to receive a soul, and only thereafter to receive fellowship with the Spirit in this manner. And for this cause the first Adam was fashioned by the Lord into "a living soul," while the second Adam became "a spirit that gives life." So then, he who was fashioned a living soul, by turning toward the worse, forfeited life; while conversely that same man, on returning toward what is superior and taking on the life-giving Spirit, shall recover life.
For it is not one thing that perishes and a different thing that revives, just as it is not one thing lost and a different thing recovered; rather it was that identical sheep once lost which the Lord set out to seek. What, then, was undergoing death? Surely the substance of the flesh, which had forfeited the breath of life and had turned breathless and lifeless. This, then, is what the Lord came to revive, so that, just as in Adam we all perish being natural creatures, in Christ we might live being spiritual ones — casting off not God's own handiwork but the cravings of the flesh, and putting on the Holy Spirit, as the Apostle writes in his letter to the Colossians: "Mortify, therefore, whatever in you belongs to the earth." And he himself spells out what these are: "fornication, impurity, passion, base desire, and covetousness, which amounts to idol-worship." The Apostle declares that such things must be discarded, and states that those practicing them, being mere flesh and blood, are unable to inherit God's kingdom. For their soul, tilting toward the worse and sinking into earthly cravings, has taken on the very label of those cravings — which he tells us to strip away when he states again within that same letter: "Putting off from yourselves the old self together with its practices." Yet in stating this he was not annulling the ancient handiwork; otherwise we would have had to destroy ourselves outright to be freed from that earlier manner of living.
But the Apostle himself, this very man shaped within the womb who had emerged out of the womb, addressed us — and having acknowledged that abiding in the flesh is fruitful labor for him, in his letter to the Philippians he declares the same thing, saying, "the fruit of my labor is bodily wellbeing." For what other fruit could there be of the Spirit, who does not himself appear, than to ripen the flesh and render it fit for incorruption? "To go on living, then, in the flesh — that, for me, is fruitful labor." He was certainly not disdaining the substance of the flesh in saying this, any more than when he wrote, "Putting off from yourselves the old self together with its practices," he was clarifying the discarding of our earlier way of living, the part that ages and decays; and for that reason he continued, "and clothing yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed toward full understanding after the likeness of its maker." In stating, then, "which is being renewed toward full understanding," he indicated that this same man, formerly held in darkness — that is, without knowledge of God — is now renewed through the understanding granted him; for acquaintance with God restores man. And in stating "after the likeness of its maker," he clarified the recapitulation of that same man who from the start had been shaped after God's likeness. And that it was this identical Apostle who had emerged from the womb — namely, the same primeval substance of flesh — he states himself in his letter to the Galatians: "But when God, who set me apart even from my mother's belly and summoned me through his favor, was pleased to unveil his Son within me, so that I might announce him among the nations." It was not one man who had emerged from the womb, as noted above, and a separate man who announced God's Son; rather that same man, once held in darkness and once a persecutor of the Church, after a disclosure had reached him out of heaven and the Lord had conversed with him — as we set out in the third book — went on to announce God's Son, Christ Jesus, executed beneath Pontius Pilate's authority, his earlier darkness having been dispelled by the understanding that followed. It is exactly like those sightless men whom the Lord restored: their blindness was taken away, yet they got back the very same sound eyes, and through those identical eyes with which they had previously failed to see, they now gained sight, only the darkness being lifted from their vision while the substance of the eyes remained intact; so that by the very eyes through which they had not seen, now seeing once more, they gave thanks to the one who had given their sight back to them. So too with the man whose shriveled hand he restored, and indeed with everyone he healed without exception: they did not swap out the members granted them from the womb at their beginning, but recovered those very same members, made sound again.
For the Word of God, craftsman of all things, who also shaped man at the beginning, on finding his own handiwork wrecked by wickedness, restored it in every respect — sometimes touching each single member, exactly as it exists within his handiwork, and sometimes by setting the whole man right at once, whole and complete, readying him perfect for himself unto rising again. For what purpose would he have needed to mend the bodily members and bring them back to their true character, if those pieces mended by him were destined never to be saved? For had the benefit he bestowed lasted only a season, he would have accomplished nothing of consequence for those he restored. Or how could the flesh be incapable of the life proceeding from him, once it obtained restoration at his hands? For life arrives by way of restoration, and incorruption arrives by way of life. He, then, who grants restoration, that same one likewise grants life; and he who grants life, that same one likewise bestows incorruption upon the work of his own hands.

======== Book V — Chapter 13 ========

We possess the foremost illustration of resurrection in those Christ raised up from among the dead, and our hearts are proven capable of unending life by the very fact that they now welcome the Spirit of God. Let those who claim otherwise — namely, who work against their own deliverance — answer us this: in what bodies did the deceased daughter of the high priest, and the widow's son being borne out lifeless near the gate, and Lazarus, already four days in the tomb, rise once more? Clearly, in those exact bodies in which they had perished. For if it were not in those identical bodies, then those who rose were not the same persons who had died. For, as it is written, the Lord grasped the dead girl's hand and told her, "Little one, I tell you, get up," and the dead girl rose and sat, and he directed that she be given something to eat, and restored her to her mother. And he summoned Lazarus in a great voice, saying, "Lazarus, out here," and the dead man emerged, we are told, his feet and hands wrapped in burial bands — a figure of the man bound fast by his own sins. And on this account the Lord said, "Untie him and let him go free." Just as those healed were healed in those very same limbs which had suffered beforehand, so too the dead were raised again in those same bodies, their own limbs and frames receiving the cure and that life granted by the Lord — the Lord thereby foreshadowing the eternal by means of the temporal, and demonstrating that he alone is able both to bring restoration to his handiwork and to grant it life, so that his promise concerning rising from death might likewise be trusted. In the same way, at the last, when the Lord's final trumpet is sounded, the dead lying within their tombs shall rise up, and shall hear the summons of the Son of Man, and shall step forward — those who have practiced good, unto a rising into life, and those who have practiced evil, unto a rising into condemnation.
Empty, then, and truly pitiable are those who refuse to view matters so plain and evident, but instead run from truth's light, blinding themselves as tragic Oedipus did. And just as wrestlers untrained in the sport, grappling an opponent, grab hold with both hands of some single part of the body, and by gripping it fall over, and while falling suppose themselves victorious, because they cling stubbornly to that one limb first seized, even while beaten in every other respect and made a mockery — so likewise the heretics, asserting that "what is fleshly and bloody is unable to obtain a share in God's kingdom," wrench these few words free from Paul, and grasp neither the Apostle's intent nor weigh the force of his language, but, clutching the bare wording by itself, expire still gripping it, upending, insofar as it rests with them, God's entire design. For they insist this was spoken specifically of the flesh as such, rather than of fleshly deeds, as if the Apostle were at odds with himself. For he states directly afterward within that same letter, speaking pointedly of the flesh: "For this decaying thing must be clothed with the undecaying, and this dying thing must be clothed with deathlessness. And once this dying thing has been clothed with deathlessness, then the saying inscribed shall come to pass: Death has been swallowed into triumph. Where, O death, is your sting? Where, O death, is your triumph?" These words will be spoken fittingly at that moment, when this dying and decaying flesh, over which death likewise exerts a sort of rule, rising into life, shall have been clothed with the undecaying and the deathless. For only then will death truly be overcome, once the flesh held under its rule has escaped that rule entirely. And again, addressing the Philippians, he states: "Yet ours is a homeland in the heavens, out of which we likewise look for a Deliverer, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall reshape the body belonging to our lowly state, making it match the body of his splendor, through the operation whereby he can subdue all things beneath himself." What, then, is this lowly body that the Lord will reshape, making it match his glorious body? Though mortal and decaying, it turns deathless and undecaying — not by virtue of its own nature, but through the Lord's operation, who has power to dress the dying in deathlessness and the decaying in the undecaying. And for this cause he states in his second letter to the Corinthians: "So that what is mortal may be engulfed by life. Now the one preparing us precisely for this is God, who has furnished us the down payment of the Spirit" — speaking here quite unmistakably of the flesh, since neither soul nor spirit is subject to death. But the mortal is engulfed by life once the flesh, no longer a corpse but living and undecaying, persists, chanting praise to the God preparing us for this very purpose. That we might be made ready for it, he rightly tells the Corinthians: "Honor God through your body." For God is the source of the undecaying.
And that it is not some different body, but the fleshly body itself, of which he speaks here, he affirms clearly, unmistakably, and free of all doubt to the Corinthians: "Always carrying in our own body the death that Jesus underwent, so that the living power of Jesus too might be disclosed through our body. For we, the living, are constantly handed over unto death on account of Jesus, so that the living power of Jesus too might be disclosed within our perishable flesh." And that the spirit takes hold of the flesh, he states within that same letter: "For you yourselves are Christ's letter, drafted through our service, inscribed not with ink but by the Spirit of the God who lives, not upon slabs of stone, but upon fleshly slabs — the heart itself." If, then, hearts made of flesh already now become fit to hold the Spirit, what marvel is it should they, at the rising, obtain that life the Spirit bestows? Regarding this rising the Apostle, within that very letter to the Philippians, states: "Taking the shape of his dying, if somehow I might arrive at the rising up that comes out from among the dead." In what substance, then, besides this one, can life be understood to show itself within perishable flesh, other than in this identical substance likewise given over to death for the sake of the confession made toward God? As he himself declared, "If, speaking as men do, I contended with wild beasts in Ephesus, what benefit is that to me, should the dead not be raised? For unless the dead are raised, Christ too has not been raised; and unless Christ has been raised, our proclamation is hollow, and your trust is likewise hollow. We are found, besides, to be liars regarding God... for unless the dead are raised, Christ too has not been raised. And unless Christ has been raised, your trust is hollow, for you remain still bound in your sins. Then also those who have died within Christ are lost forever. If our hope set on Christ reaches only this present life, we are of all people the most to be pitied. Yet now Christ has been raised from among the dead, the first portion of the harvest of those who have died; for since death entered through a man, so too through a man comes the rising of the dead."
In all these matters, then, as we have already noted, they must either concede that the Apostle is at odds with his own words when he declares, "Flesh and blood are unable to inherit God's kingdom"; or else they will be driven to twisted and forced readings of everything he says, so as to bend and reshape its sense. For what sensible answer could they give if they tried reading otherwise the words he sets down: "this decaying thing is destined to be clothed with what does not decay, and this dying thing is destined to be clothed with deathlessness," together with, "that what dies may be consumed by life" — sayings in which the Apostle openly and unmistakably declares the raising up and incorruptibility of the flesh? They are thus driven to distort so very many weighty statements, all because they will not consent to grasp even this single one correctly.

======== Book V — Chapter 14 ========

Had the flesh not been meant for salvation, the Word could never have assumed flesh sharing our own substance; otherwise our reconciliation through him could not have come to pass.
But because the Apostle was not disputing the underlying reality of flesh and blood themselves when he stated that such cannot inherit God's realm, this very Apostle elsewhere applies the phrase "flesh and blood" directly to the Lord Jesus Christ — in part to establish his true humanity, seeing that he named himself the Son of Man, and in part to guarantee that our flesh would indeed be rescued. Had flesh not been intended for rescue, the Word of God could never, in any manner, have become flesh at all; and had the blood of just men not been destined to be avenged, the Lord could never, in any manner, have possessed blood himself. Yet blood has carried a voice from the very first, as God told Cain once he had slain his brother: "Your brother's blood calls out to me from the ground." And because the blood of the righteous was appointed to be avenged, he told those who stood with Noah: "I will demand a reckoning for the blood of your lives from every beast." And further: "Whoever pours out the blood of a man, that man's own blood shall in turn be poured out." So too the Lord spoke, addressing those who were soon to pour out his own blood: "Every drop of innocent blood spilled upon the earth will be avenged — beginning with righteous Abel's blood and reaching to the blood of Zechariah son of Barachiah, murdered by you between the sanctuary and the altar. I tell you truly, all of this will fall upon the present generation" — thereby revealing that in his own person there would occur a gathering-up of the bloodshed of every righteous man and prophet since the beginning, and that a reckoning for their blood would be demanded through him. Yet no such reckoning could be demanded unless that blood were also destined for rescue; nor could the Lord have gathered these things into himself unless he had truly taken on flesh and blood according to man's original making, thereby rescuing within himself, at history's close, that which had been lost long ago in Adam.
But if the Lord took on flesh through some different scheme, drawing his body from a different substance, then he did not gather man up into himself, and could not truly be termed flesh in any real sense. For flesh is, in truth, nothing else than the ongoing continuation of that primal shaping out of clay. Yet had he needed to draw his matter from some other substance, the Father would from the outset have fashioned his whole composition out of that other substance instead. As matters stand, however, the Word became the deliverer of that very man who had gone astray, establishing fellowship with him and pursuing his rescue himself. Now the one who had gone astray was possessed of flesh and blood. For the Lord shaped man by taking clay out of the earth, and the entire design of the Lord's arrival was undertaken for that man's benefit. He himself, then, likewise possessed flesh and blood — no other kind, but that self-same lineage stretching from the first man, gathering into himself the Father's original handiwork, in pursuit of what had gone astray. It is for this reason that the Apostle, writing to the Colossians, states: "And you, once estranged and hostile in thought through wicked deeds, he has by now made peace with in the body of his flesh, through death, so as to set you before him holy, without fault, and beyond accusation." "In the body of his flesh," so he says, "made peace" — meaning that his own righteous flesh made peace with that flesh held captive by sin, drawing it into fellowship with God.
Now if someone claims that the Lord's flesh is unlike ours only in that his committed no sin and no falsehood was discovered in his heart, whereas we ourselves are sinners, he speaks truly. But should he instead attribute to the Lord an entirely separate kind of flesh, then the very notion of "making peace" no longer applies to him at all. For only what was once hostile can be brought back into peace. Yet if the Lord's flesh came from some other substance, then it was never the thing that had turned into God's enemy through wrongdoing that has now been reconciled. As things truly stand, though, through the fellowship he forged with us, the Lord has brought man back into peace with God the Father, reconciling us to himself by means of his fleshly body, and buying us back through his own blood — just as the Apostle writes to the Ephesians: "in whom we hold our ransom by way of his blood, namely the forgiveness of trespasses." And once more, to that same congregation: "You," he writes, "once distant, have now been drawn close through the blood of Christ." And further: "doing away, in his flesh, with the hostility, the law consisting of commandments expressed in decrees." Throughout this whole letter the Apostle openly attests that we owe our rescue to our Lord's flesh together with his blood.
Given, then, that flesh and blood are what grant us life, the statement was never truly aimed at flesh and blood in themselves as unfit for God's kingdom, but rather at those carnal practices mentioned earlier which, by pulling a man toward wrongdoing, rob him of life. This is likewise why, in writing to the Romans, he states: "Do not, then, let sin rule your mortal body so that you submit to its desires; do not offer your body's parts to sin as tools of wickedness, but offer yourselves to God as men brought to life out of death, and your body's parts to God as tools of righteousness." Just as we formerly served wrongdoing with these very limbs and produced a harvest leading to death, so now he wants us to serve righteousness with these same limbs, that we may produce a harvest leading to life. Bear in mind, then, dearest friends, that you were bought back through the flesh of our Lord and ransomed by his blood, and that you cling fast to the Head from which the entire body of the Church, knit together, grows — namely, the fleshly arrival of the Son of God — acknowledging him as God while fully embracing his human nature; and by drawing further on these scriptural proofs, you will readily, as already demonstrated, overturn every opinion later invented by the heretics.

======== Book V — Chapter 15 ========

By the testimonies of Isaiah and Ezekiel he proves the resurrection, and that it is the same God who created us who will raise us up.
That he who shaped man in the beginning also pledged him a second beginning once he had dissolved back into earth — Isaiah declares it in these words: "The dead will be raised up, and the ones lying in the tombs will stand, and every one dwelling in the ground will exult. For the dew coming from you brings them healing." And again: "I will summon you, and you will be summoned in Jerusalem, and you will see, and your heart will exult, and your bones will sprout up like new grass, and the hand of the Lord will be shown to his worshippers." Ezekiel speaks likewise: "A hand of the Lord settled upon me, and the Lord brought me out by the Spirit, and set me down within a plain, and it was covered with bones; he took me around them on every side, and there they lay, exceedingly numerous across the plain's surface, utterly withered. And he asked me: Son of man, is there life still possible for these bones? And I answered... And he told me: Speak a prophecy to these bones, telling them: Withered bones, listen to what the Lord says. This is what the Lord tells these bones: Look, I am bringing breath of life into you; I will fasten sinews onto you, cause flesh to grow over you, stretch skin across you, and place my breath within you, and you will live, and you shall recognize that I am the Lord. So I prophesied exactly as commanded. And while I was prophesying, a rumbling arose, and the bones drew together, joint to joint; I watched as sinews and flesh grew over them and skin covered them, yet no breath was within them. He then said: Prophesy to the breath, son of man; tell the breath: This is what the Lord says: Come from the four directions, and breathe life into these slain, that they may live. I prophesied just as commanded, and breath came into them, and they came alive and stood upright, a vast multitude. And again he declares: This is what the Lord says: See, I will throw open your graves, and raise you up out of them, and lead you into the land of Israel; you shall recognize that I am the Lord, when I unseal your tombs to bring my people out from their graves, and place my breath in you, and you live, and I settle you upon your own soil, and you shall recognize that I am the Lord. I have declared it, and I will accomplish it, says the Lord." It is thus the Demiurge who once more restores life to our dead bodies, evidently promising them a rising and a lifting out of tombs and graves, and granting them incorruption. "For their days shall answer to the tree of life," so it says — he alone stands revealed as the God who does these things, the good Father, freely bestowing life on those who by themselves possess none.
This is exactly why the Lord disclosed both his own identity and the Father's with such clarity to his disciples — so they would look for no other divinity apart from the one who shaped man and breathed life into him, and would not lapse into the folly of inventing some additional father alongside the Demiurge. Accordingly he cured, by a mere word, everyone else whose ailments had befallen them on account of wrongdoing, telling them: "Look, you have recovered; sin no further, or something worse may come upon you" — showing plainly that these ailments had come upon men through the sin of rebellion. Yet to the man born sightless he restored vision not by word but through a deed, and this not casually or by chance, but to exhibit God's own hand, the very hand that had shaped man from the start. Which is why, when his disciples inquired what had caused this man's blindness from birth — his own fault, or that of his parents — he replied: "This man sinned not, nor did his parents; rather, it was so that God's works could be displayed openly in him." Now God's work consists in man's shaping. For he accomplished this through a deed, exactly as Scripture states: "And the Lord gathered clay out of the ground and shaped man." It is for this same reason that the Lord spat upon the ground, made clay from it, and spread it across the man's eyes, thereby displaying the ancient act of shaping and how it came about, revealing God's hand to those capable of grasping by which hand man had been shaped from clay. For what the Word, the Craftsman, had left incomplete in the womb, he now brought to open completion, so that God's works might be shown forth in him, and that we would no longer look elsewhere for the hand that shaped man, nor for another father — recognizing that the very hand which shaped us at the start, and continues shaping us in the womb, is that same hand of God which, in these final days, went searching for us in our lost state, lifting the strayed sheep onto its shoulders and bringing it joyfully back to the fold of life.
As proof that it is the Word of God who shapes us while still in the womb, consider what he told Jeremiah: "Before shaping you within the womb I already knew you, and before you emerged from the womb I set you apart, appointing you a prophet unto the nations." Paul says something similar: "But when it seemed good to the one who marked me out even from within my mother, so that I could proclaim him among the nations..." Given, therefore, that the Word shapes us within the womb, this very Word restored sight to the man blind since birth, thereby bringing into the open the one who secretly fashions us — since the Word had by now become visible among men — and displaying the ancient shaping of Adam, the manner and instrument of his making, revealing the whole by means of a single part. For the one who shaped this man's sight is none other than the one who shaped the entire man, acting in accordance with the Father's will. And because, in that shaping accomplished in Adam, man had lapsed into transgression and stood in need of the washing that brings rebirth, after spreading clay across his eyes he told him: "Go and wash in Siloam" — thereby restoring to him at once both his primal shaping and that rebirth granted through washing. This is why the man who had washed left seeing, able both to recognize his own maker and to discover who had granted him life.
Those who follow Valentinus, then, are mistaken when they say that man was formed not from this earth but from some fluid, diffused matter. For from whatever earth the Lord formed the man's eyes, it is clear that man was likewise formed from that same earth in the beginning. For it would be absurd that his eyes came into being from one origin while the remainder of his frame came from a different one, just as it would be absurd that one power shaped the rest of him while a separate power shaped his eyes alone. Rather, it is the very same one who from the beginning formed Adam — with whom the Father also spoke, saying, "Let us make man according to our image and likeness" — who, in these last times, revealing himself to men, formed sight for him who had been blind since Adam. And for this reason Scripture, signifying what was to come, says that when Adam had hidden himself because of disobedience, the Lord came to him in the evening, and called him, and said: "Where are you?" That is, in these last times this same Word of God came to summon man, reminding him of his own deeds, among which he had lived while hidden from the Lord. For just as then God came in the evening seeking out Adam, so in these last times, by that same voice, he visited and sought out Adam's race.

======== Book V — Chapter 16 ========

That our bodies return to the earth follows from the fact that it is from there that they have their substance; and that at the coming of the Word the image of God appears more clearly in us.
And since Adam's formation was taken from this earth, which belongs to us, Scripture records that God spoke thus to him: by the sweat of your brow you will earn your bread, till you go back into the ground out of which you were drawn. If, then, our bodies pass after death into some other soil, it would follow that their substance too comes from that other place. But if they are returned to this same earth, it stands clear that they were fashioned out of this earth — exactly as the Lord likewise demonstrated, when he shaped a man's eyes from that identical clay. And thus, by a wholly transparent proof, the hand of God is displayed — the hand by which Adam was indeed shaped, and by which we ourselves have likewise been shaped; and because the Father is one and unchanging, whose voice attends his handiwork from start to finish, and the material of our making is disclosed openly in the Gospel, there is no further cause to search out some second Father beyond him, nor a different substance for our making apart from what has already been proclaimed and revealed by the Lord, nor a separate hand of God apart from this one, which shapes and joins us together for life from start to finish, remains present to its own work, and brings it to completion after the pattern and resemblance of God. This Word, then, appeared openly at that moment when the human being turned into the Word of God made human, drawing man near to himself and himself near to man, so that through his kinship to the Son, humanity might come to be held dear by the Father. In earlier ages it had indeed been declared that man was fashioned after God's pattern, yet this had not been made evident, for the Word — after whose pattern man had been shaped — remained still unseen; and for that very reason man readily forfeited the resemblance. Yet once the Word of God took on flesh, he secured both: he displayed the genuine pattern by himself becoming exactly what his pattern was, and he firmly restored the resemblance, causing man to resemble the unseen Father by means of the Word now made visible. And it was not only through these matters already noted that the Lord disclosed both the Father and himself, but through his suffering as well. For by undoing the disobedience of man that had first taken place through a tree, he was made obedient all the way to death, even the death on the cross, curing through the obedience shown upon a tree the disobedience that had been committed upon a tree. Nor would he have set out to reverse, by that very means, the disobedience once directed against our Maker, had he been proclaiming some other Father. Rather, it was precisely through the same things by which we had defied God and refused to trust his word that he introduced this matching obedience and the assent belonging to his Word — through which he clearly revealed himself as God: him whom, in the first Adam, we grieved by refusing his command; in the second Adam we are restored to friendship, having been rendered obedient right up to death. For our debt was owed to no one else but him whose command we had broken from the start. One God and Lord alone exists, the Father and Maker of all things, who loved us in Christ, laid commandments upon us, and released us from our sins — the very one whose Son and Word Christ demonstrated himself to be, at the moment he pronounced sins forgiven.

======== Book V — Chapter 17 ========

This Demiurge, then, who by love is Father, by power is Lord, and by wisdom is our Maker and Shaper, is the one whose command we broke and so turned into his foes. For this cause, in these final times, the Lord brought us back into friendship through becoming incarnate, standing as go-between for God and men; making peace on our behalf with the Father whom we had wronged, and soothing our defiance through his own compliance, while granting us that turning and yielding toward our Maker. It is for this reason he instructed us to pray thus: and release us from our debts — seeing that he is our Father, to whom we owed a debt, having broken his commandment. But who is meant here? Some unknown figure, who never once gave a command to anyone as a father would? Or rather the God announced through the Scriptures, to whom our debt was owed, having broken his commandment? Now this command reached man through the Word, for Scripture tells us Adam heard the sound of the Lord God's voice. Does his Word, then, say to a man, your sins stand forgiven, while it was some different being who issued the command? No such being could be called good, true, or upright. For how is one good who hands out what does not belong to him? Or how is one upright who lays claim to another's possession? How, then, could sins be genuinely released, unless the very one we had wronged granted that release, out of the depths of our God's compassion, wherein he came to us through his Son?
For this same reason, when the paralyzed man was cured: the multitude, we are told, upon witnessing this, praised God, who had granted such authority to human beings. Which God, then, was the surrounding crowd praising? Some unnamed Father dreamed up by heretics, perhaps? And how could they praise a being wholly unfamiliar to them? Plainly, then, the people of Israel were praising the God announced through the law and the prophets, who is likewise the Father of our Lord; and it was for this reason he instructed men, by means of the signs he worked, to give praise to God with their minds. But had he in fact descended from some different Father, while those onlookers, upon seeing his mighty deeds, praised a separate Father, he would then have made these people ungrateful toward the very Father responsible for the cure — since it was from him who is God that the only-begotten Son had come forth for man's rescue, and through the mighty deeds he performed he was summoning the unbelieving to give praise to the Father; and to those who did not accept his Son's arrival, and consequently placed no trust in the pardon that came through him, he declared to the Pharisees: so that you may know the Son of Man holds authority to release sins; and having said this, he directed the paralyzed man to lift up the mat on which he had lain and return home — thereby confounding the doubters, and showing that he himself is the voice of God, the voice through which man was given the commandments he broke and by that breaking became a sinner; for it was from sin that the paralysis had originally sprung.
By releasing sins, therefore, he cured the man, yet also openly revealed who he was. For seeing that none but God alone can release sins, and it was the Lord who released these and cured the men, it stands clear that he himself was the Word of God turned Son of Man, taking from the Father the authority to release sins, being at once both man and God — so that as man he felt pity for us, and as God he might extend mercy and cancel the debts we owe to God our Maker. It was for this reason David spoke beforehand: fortunate are those whose wrongs are pardoned, and whose sins lie hidden. Fortunate is the man against whom the Lord has counted no sin — foretelling that pardon which arrives through his coming, whereby he wiped away the record written against us for our debt, nailing it fast upon the cross, so that just as through a tree we became indebted to God, so through a tree we might obtain release from that debt.
This truth was likewise displayed, meaningfully, through many other figures, and now also through the prophet Elisha. For when the prophets accompanying him were felling timber to build a dwelling, and the iron head, having slipped free of the axe, dropped into the Jordan where they were unable to recover it, Elisha came to that spot, and upon learning what had occurred, threw a piece of wood into the water; and once he had done so, the axe-head rose up to the surface, and those who had lost it earlier retrieved it from the top of the water — the prophet demonstrating through this deed that the reliable word of God, forfeited by us so carelessly through wood and impossible for us to recover, we would obtain again through the fitting of a tree. And that the word of God resembles an axe, John the Baptist attests, saying: even now the axe lies ready at the root of the trees. And Jeremiah says something similar: the word of the Lord is like an axe splitting a rock. This Word, then, once concealed from us, was disclosed, as noted earlier, through the fitting of the tree. For since it was by means of a tree that it was lost, so by means of a tree it has been disclosed again to everyone, revealing in itself its height, its length, and its breadth; and, as one of the elders remarked, by the extending of hands it draws the two peoples together into a single God. For there were two hands, because the two peoples had been dispersed to the far corners of the earth; yet one head in the center, because there is a single God over everything, working through everything, and dwelling within all of us.

======== Book V — Chapter 18 ========

All the creatures that God the Father and his Word employ, they established through their own inherent power and wisdom — not out of any deficiency; otherwise the Son of God, having taken all authority from the Father, would never have put on flesh.
And so vast and so orderly an arrangement he carried out, not by means of things belonging to another, but through what he himself had made; not through things arising from ignorance and deficiency, but through things whose being came from the wisdom and might of his Father. For he is neither unfair, that he would desire what is not his, nor lacking, that he could not, by putting to use what is genuinely his own, achieve what belongs to him through his own creation, for man's rescue. His creation would never have carried him, had it sprung from the release of ignorance and deficiency. That the Word of God, having become flesh, hung upon a tree, we have already demonstrated by numerous proofs, and even the heretics themselves acknowledge him crucified. How, then, could a product of ignorance and deficiency carry him who holds within himself the knowledge of everything, and who is genuine and whole? Or how could creation, concealed from and far removed from the Father, carry his Word? Suppose, further, this were achieved by angels — whether ignorant of the God who reigns over all, or aware of him — given that the Lord said, I dwell in the Father, and the Father dwells in me, how could an angelic fabrication uphold Father and Son together? And how would creation situated outside the Pleroma receive him who holds the entire Pleroma within himself? Since, then, none of this is workable or provable, only one claim stands as the Church's genuine proclamation: that his own fitting creation, which derived its existence from God's power, skill, and wisdom, carried him — bearing him according to his hiddenness from the Father, yet according to his visible side, conversely, being carried by his own Word; and this is the truth. For the Father, carrying together the creation and his own Word, and the Word, being carried by the Father, grants to all things according to the Father's purpose — to some by creation, belonging to what has been made, and to others by adoption, coming from God — who reigns above everything, works through everything, and lives within all of us. Above all indeed stands the Father, and he is Christ's head; working through all is the Word, and he is the Church's head; and living within all of us is the Spirit, the living water the Lord grants to those who properly trust him and love him, and who recognize the single Father, who reigns above everything, works through everything, and dwells within all of us.
To these matters John too, the Lord's disciple, gives testimony in the Gospel, speaking thus: at the origin existed the Word, and the Word was present with God, and the Word was divine. This one existed at the origin, present with God; every single thing came into being through him, and apart from him not one thing came into being. Then, speaking further of this same Word, he said: he existed within this world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world failed to recognize him. He arrived among his own people, and his own people did not accept him. Yet to whichever ones did accept him, he granted the right to become children of God — to those trusting in his name. And once more, indicating his arrangement in becoming man, he said: and the Word turned into flesh, and made his home among us. And again he adds: and we looked upon his splendor, splendor fitting the Father's only-begotten, filled with kindness and truth. He is plainly showing to any willing to listen — that is, to those with ears open — that there exists a single God, the Father, above everything, and a single Word of God, working through everything, through whom every single thing came into being; and that this world is his own possession, coming into being through him by the Father's design, not through angels, nor through falling away, defection, and unknowing, nor through any capacity of Prunicus, whom some likewise term the Mother, nor through some different fashioner of the world unaware of the Father. The genuine fashioner of the world is rather the Word of God; and this one is our Lord, who in these final days took on humanity, present within this world, and, in his hidden aspect, holding together every made thing, woven throughout the whole of creation, since he is the Word of God directing and arranging all things; and for this reason he entered his own realm unseen, took on flesh, and was hung upon a tree, so as to gather every single thing into himself. Yet his own people did not accept him, just as Moses himself foretold this very matter to the people: your life will hang suspended before your eyes, and you will not trust in your life. Those, then, who did not accept him did not gain life. Yet to whichever ones did accept him, he granted the right to become children of God. For it is he who holds authority over everything from the Father, being the Word of God and genuine man — fittingly imposing order on unseen things, so each thing might hold to its proper rank, while over the seen and human realm he governs openly, bringing on everyone a judgment fitted and deserved; as David also plainly foretold, saying: our God will arrive openly, and will not stay silent. He then also made plain the judgment brought upon them through him, saying: fire will burn in front of him, and a fierce storm will surround him. He will summon the sky overhead, together with the earth, so as to pass judgment on his people.

======== Book V — Chapter 19 ========

The Blessed Virgin Mary is compared to the disobedient and transgressing Eve, as her advocate; and the various and dissenting heresies are recounted. For the Lord came manifestly to what was his own, and was borne about by that creation of his own which he himself bears up, and he brought about the recapitulation of that disobedience which had occurred at a tree by means of the obedience which was accomplished upon a tree, and the seduction was undone by which that evil-doer had been seduced, she who was already betrothed to a man, the virgin Eve; for through the truth she was well evangelized by the angel, she who was, already under a man, the Virgin Mary. For just as the former, through an angel's utterance, was led astray into fleeing from God, having overstepped his word, so the latter too, through an angel's utterance, received the glad tidings that she would carry God within her, in submission to his word. And if the former was disobedient toward God, yet the latter was persuaded to obey God, so that the Virgin Mary might become the advocate of the virgin Eve. And just as the human race was bound over to death through a virgin, so it is saved through a virgin, the disobedience of a virgin being balanced in the opposite scale by the obedience of a virgin. For indeed the sin of the first-formed man received amendment through the correction wrought by the Firstborn, and the serpent's cunning was overcome by the simplicity of the dove, and those chains were loosed by which we had been bound over to death.
All heretics are unlearned, and ignorant of the dispensations of God, and unacquainted with his economy that accords with humanity; and being blind as to the truth, they work against the salvation that is their own. A number of them bring in a different Father apart from the Demiurge. Others say the world and its substance were made by certain angels. Others again say it flourished by itself, quite apart from him who according to them is the Father, and was born of itself. Others say that among those things contained by the Father, its substance came from a Defect and from Ignorance. Others despise the manifest coming of the Lord, not accepting his incarnation. Others again, ignorant of the dispensation of the Virgin, say he was begotten from Joseph. And some say that neither soul nor body can receive eternal life, but only the inner man; and they hold that this is the intellect that is in them, and that this alone, they decree, ascends to perfection. Others hold that the soul is saved, but that their body does not share in the salvation that comes from God, as we said in the first book, in which we also set out all their arguments, and in the second we showed how weak and unstable they are.

======== Book V — Chapter 20 ========

The shepherds to whom the apostles committed the churches, who all hold one and the same doctrine of salvation, must be heeded; heretics, on the other hand, must be shunned, and we must be sound-minded regarding the mysteries of the faith. For these men come long after, in point of time, the bishops into whose hands the apostles delivered the churches, a matter we have laid out with full care in the third book. The aforesaid heretics, then, since they are blind to the truth, are of necessity compelled to wander off, one down this path and another down that; and because of this the tracks of their teaching are scattered inconsistently and incoherently. But the path of those who belong to the Church goes around the whole world, since it holds a firm tradition from the apostles, and lets us perceive that a single, identical faith belongs to all, seeing that every believer alike acknowledges one selfsame God the Father, and holds the identical arrangement concerning the Son of God's becoming flesh, and recognizes the identical gift of the Spirit, and practice the same commandments, and keep the same form of order with respect to the Church, and await the same coming of the Lord, and hold to the same salvation of the whole human being, that is, of both soul and body. And what the Church proclaims stands true and firm, seeing that a single, unvarying road to salvation is displayed by it across the whole earth. For the light of God has been committed to the Church's keeping, and hence God's wisdom, through which he brings all men to safety, rings out at her going forth and cries aloud in her streets — while Valentinus and Marcion and the rest are proclaimed on the tops of the walls and speak with confidence at the gates of cities. For the Church everywhere preaches the truth, and it is the seven-branched lamp that bears the light of Christ. Those, then, who abandon the preaching of the Church accuse the ignorance of the holy presbyters, not considering how much more valuable a devout simple believer is than a blasphemous and shameless sophist. Such are all the heretics, and all who think they have discovered something more than the truth, following the paths already described, walking their way in various, manifold, and feeble fashion, never holding the same opinions about the same things, but, like blind men led by the blind, they will justly fall into the pit of hidden ignorance that lies concealed beneath them, always seeking and never finding the truth. It is fitting, therefore, to flee their opinions, and to watch closely lest we be troubled by them; and to take refuge in the Church, and to be brought up in her bosom, and to be nourished by the Scriptures of the Lord. For the Church stands in this world as a paradise that has been set down within it. "Of every tree of the paradise you shall eat," says the Spirit of God, that is, eat of every scripture of the Lord; but do not eat with a proud mind, nor touch any heretical dissension. For such people claim to have knowledge of good and evil, and against the God who made them they hurl their impious opinions. They think, then, above the measure of the dispensation given to them. Hence the Apostle likewise declares, "Set your mind on nothing loftier than sound measure allows, but keep your wisdom within the bounds of sobriety," so that, refusing to taste that knowledge which oversteps due measure, we might not find ourselves driven from the paradise of life, into which the Lord brings those who obey his preaching, recapitulating in himself all things that are in the heavens and that are on earth — but the things in the heavens are spiritual, while the dispensation with regard to the things on earth is according to man. He therefore recapitulated in himself these things, uniting man to the Spirit, and placing the Spirit in man; he himself came to be the head over the Spirit, and made the Spirit the governing head over man. It is through him that we have sight, hearing, and speech.

======== Book V — Chapter 21 ========

Christ is the head of all the things spoken of above: it was necessary that he, sent forth as man by the Father who fashioned all things, should himself undergo Satan's temptation, so that he might fulfill the promises and carry off a glorious and complete victory.
Recapitulating all things, then, he also recapitulated the war he had provoked against our enemy, and crushed him who at the beginning had led us captive in Adam, treading upon his head, just as you find God saying to the serpent in Genesis: "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall watch for your head, and you shall watch for his heel." For from that seed which was to be born of the Virgin, according to the likeness of Adam, from the woman, it stood foretold that he would lie in wait for the serpent's head; and it is this offspring of whom the Apostle speaks in writing to the Galatians, that a law of deeds was laid on us as a guardian, right up to the coming of the offspring to whom the promise belonged. And he sets this out with yet greater clarity in that same letter, stating: once the appointed time had run its full course, God dispatched his Son, born from a woman. For the enemy would not have been justly conquered, unless it was a man born of a woman who conquered him. For through a woman he had gained dominion over man from the beginning, setting himself up as man's adversary. For this reason the Lord too confesses himself to be the Son of Man, recapitulating in himself that original man from whom the formation of the woman was made, so that just as through a man who was conquered our race descended into death, so again through a man who is victorious we might ascend into life; and just as death carried off the palm of victory over us through a man, so again through a man we might receive the palm of victory over death.
Now the Lord could not have taken up again within himself that old, original hostility toward the serpent, so bringing to pass the Demiurge's promise and fulfilling his ordinance, had he sprung from some separate, alien father. But since he who from the beginning formed us is one and the same as he who at the end sent his Son, the Lord fulfilled his commandment, being made of a woman, and destroying our adversary, and bringing man to completion after God's own image and resemblance. And it was for this cause that he brought him to ruin by nothing else than the very sayings contained in the Law, using the Father's own commandment as his ally for the destruction and refutation of the apostate angel. First, indeed, fasting for forty days, just as Moses and Elijah had done, afterward he hungered, so that we might understand him to be a true and steadfast man; for it is proper to man not to doubt, lest he transgress. For since in the beginning the serpent seduced man, who was not hungry, to transgress the commandment of God by means of food, so at the end he could not persuade the hungry Christ to partake of the food that belonged to God. For as he tempted him, he spoke thus: "If you are God's Son, command these stones to become loaves," the Lord drove him back with a precept drawn from the Law, declaring: it stands written that man does not live on bread by itself alone. To that saying, "you are the Son of God," he said nothing, but blinded him by his confession as a man, and by his Father's word he foiled the devil's first assault. For that repletion which man had experienced in Paradise through the double taste was undone by the hunger which he now endured in this world. But the devil, beaten back by the Law, made a second attempt to draw near lawfully, this time through a precept. Bringing him up to the topmost point of the temple, he said: "If you are God's Son, throw yourself down. For it is written, that God has given his angels charge concerning you, and in their hands they shall bear you up, lest at any time you dash your foot against a stone" — concealing a lie beneath Scripture, as all heretics do. That saying, "he has given his angels charge concerning him," was indeed written; but "cast yourself down" was said by no Scripture at all — that suggestion the devil brought forward on his own. The Lord therefore lawfully confuted him, saying, "Again it is written, You shall not tempt the Lord your God" — by that word which is in the Law showing what pertains to man, namely that man must not put God to the test — and, applying it to his own case, that as the man now visible before him, he too would refrain from testing his God and Lord. Thus the pride of mind that had been in the serpent was undone by the humility that was now in the man; and the devil had already twice been defeated by Scripture, being convicted of urging things contrary to God's precept, and shown by his own judgment to be an enemy of God. He, however, though thoroughly refuted, and as if gathering himself together, directing all the power he had into a lie, showed him a third time all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, saying, as Luke records: "All these will I give you, since they have been delivered to me, and I give them to whomever I wish, if you will fall down and worship me." The Lord, therefore, exposing him for what he was, said: "Go, Satan; for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him alone shall you serve" — stripping him bare by this very title, and showing what he really was. For "Satan" is a Hebrew word meaning "apostate." And thus, having conquered him a third time, he drove him from him for good, as one lawfully defeated; and so the breach of God's ordinance that had taken place in Adam was set right through the Law's own ordinance, which the Son of Man kept faithfully, refusing to overstep what God had commanded.
Who, then, is this Lord and God, to whom Christ testifies — the one no man may put to trial, whom all owe worship, and him only must be served? Without question he is that same God who gave forth the Law as well. For these matters stood already foretold within the Law, and it was by the Law's own wording that the Lord made plain how the Law proclaims the Word of the Lord as issuing from the Father, while that same voice brings the apostate angel to ruin, exposing him for what he was and overcoming him through the Son of Man's obedience to God's ordinance. For since at the outset he talked man into overstepping his Maker's ordinance, he thereby gained mastery over him; his mastery lies in nothing but revolt and disobedience, and it was by these that he held man fast in chains. It was fitting, therefore, that man himself, through man, should again be delivered from the very things by which he had been bound, that is, from transgression. For the binding of that one became the loosing of man, since no one can enter into the house of a strong man and plunder his goods unless he first binds the strong man himself. The Lord, therefore, exposing him who had spoken contrary to God who made all things, and subjecting him by a commandment — the commandment of God being the Law — showed him to be a fugitive from man and the Law, a transgressor and an apostate from God, and thereupon plundered his goods, that is, the men whom he had held in his power, whom he used unjustly. And he who had unjustly led man captive was himself justly led captive; while the man who had earlier been dragged off captive was freed from the grip of his captor, through God the Father's own compassion, who took pity on the creature that was his own and granted him deliverance, restoring him through the Word, that is, through Christ, so that man might learn by experience that he receives incorruptibility not from himself, but as a gift of God.

======== Book V — Chapter 22 ========

The true Lord, who alone is God, is proclaimed within the Law and made known in the Gospel by way of Christ his Son; him alone we must worship, and from him alone expect all good things, not from Satan. Since the Lord thus manifestly showed that the true and one God, who had been declared by the Law — for the God whom the Law had proclaimed, him Christ showed to be the Father, whom alone the disciples of Christ ought to serve — and since, by the very sayings that are in the Law, he brought our adversary to nothing, while the Law bids us praise the Demiurge as God and to serve him alone: it is no longer fitting to go searching for some other father, either alongside this one or ranked over him, since God is one, and he justifies both the circumcised and the uncircumcised alike by faith. For if there had been some other, more perfect father above this one, he would never have destroyed Satan by means of this God's own words and precepts. For ignorance cannot be dissolved by another ignorance, just as a defect cannot be removed by another defect. If, then, the Law comes from ignorance and defect, how could the sayings contained in it dissolve diabolical ignorance and conquer the strong one? For the strong man cannot be conquered by one who is weaker or even equal to him, but only by one who is more powerful. And more powerful than all is the Word of God, who in the Law indeed proclaims aloud: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one God"; and, "You shall love the Lord your God with your whole soul"; and, "him you shall worship, and him alone shall you serve." And in the Gospel, by these very same sayings, destroying the apostasy, he conquered the strong one by the voice of the Father, and confessed the precept of the Law to be his own sayings, saying: "You shall not tempt the Lord your God." For it was not by some alien saying, but by the very saying of his own Father, that he destroyed the adversary and conquered the strong one.
But he taught us that we are set free through this very precept: those who hunger are to endure the food that is given by God, while those who stand in the loftiness of the whole gift of grace, or who trust in works of righteousness, or who are adorned with pre-eminence of ministry, are by no means to be puffed up or to tempt God, but to be lowly-minded in everything and to hold ready the word, "You shall not tempt the Lord your God" — just as the Apostle also taught, saying, "not minding high things, but condescending to the lowly," and not to be taken captive by riches, nor by glory, nor by present show, but to know that one must worship the Lord your God and serve him alone, and not believe him who falsely promised what were not his own to give, saying, "All these things I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me." By his very own admission, then, bowing before him and carrying out his bidding amounts to a plunge downward, away from God's splendor. And what agreeable or worthy thing could a fallen being possibly share in? What else remains for such a one to hope for or look forward to, besides death? For death stands nearest to whoever has already fallen. Nor, further, will he ever make good on what he pledged. How, indeed, could a fallen creature bestow such gifts? Moreover, granted that it is over mankind that he claims lordship, it is in reality God — against the will of our heavenly Father, apart from whom no sparrow drops to the earth — whose sovereignty holds; so that his boast, "All these have been handed to me, and I give them to whomever I choose," was uttered out of sheer swollen conceit. For the created order does not lie beneath his authority, since he is himself nothing more than one among the created things. Nor is it he who apportions the rule of men to men; on the contrary, every arrangement touching mankind proceeds according to the ordinance laid down by God the Father. Yet the Lord tells us that the adversary is untruthful by nature and has never once taken his stand in what is true. Given, then, that he is untruthful and does not stand in what is true, it is obvious that he spoke falsely in claiming, "All these have been handed to me, and I give them to whomever I choose" — he was uttering a falsehood.

======== Book V — Chapter 23 ========

That the devil is accustomed to lies, by which Adam, seduced, sinned on the sixth day of creation, and was at length restored through Christ.
For he was already practiced in lying against God for the deception of men. For from the beginning, though God had given man abundant food, and had commanded that he should not eat from one tree only — as Scripture says God said to Adam, "You shall eat food from every tree that is in paradise, but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat; for on the day you eat from it, you shall die the death" — that liar, speaking against the Lord, tempted the man; as Scripture says the serpent said to the woman, "Why then did God say, You shall not eat from every tree of paradise?" And once she had passed along the falsehood, and had plainly reported the command, saying, "From every tree of paradise we may eat, but as for the produce of the tree standing at paradise's center, God said we are not to eat of it, nor even touch it, or we will die" — having thus drawn the command of God out of the woman, he turned crafty and deceived her a second time with a fresh lie, saying, "You will not die the death." For God knew that on the day you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be as gods, knowing good and evil. At first, then, he was disputing about God in God's own paradise, as though God were absent; for he did not know the greatness of God. Then, having learned from the woman herself that the Lord had said they would die if they tasted of the aforesaid tree, he spoke a third lie, saying, "You shall not die the death." But since God is truthful and the serpent a liar, this was shown by the outcome, death following upon those who had eaten. For together with the food they took on death as well, since they ate in disobedience; and disobedience to God brings death. For this reason they were delivered over to death, having become debtors to it.
In the very day, then, on which they ate, they died, and became debtors to death, since the day of creation is one. For it is said, "And evening came, and morning came, one day." On this very day they ate, and on this very day also they died. But according to the cycle and course of the days, according to which one is called first, another second, and another third, if anyone wishes carefully to learn on which of the seven days Adam died, he will find it from the Lord's own arrangement. For recapitulating in himself the whole of man from the beginning to the end, he recapitulated also his death. It is manifest, then, that on that day the Lord underwent death, obedient to the Father, on which Adam died, disobedient to God. And on the day on which he died, on that same day he had also eaten. For God said, "On the day on which you eat from it, you shall die the death." Recapitulating this day, then, in himself, the Lord came to his passion on the day before the sabbath, which is the sixth day of creation, the day on which man was formed — granting him, by his own passion, a second formation, that which is from death. But there are yet others who place Adam's death within the span of the first thousand years, holding, as Scripture attests, that a single day belonging to the Lord equals a thousand years — and he did not pass beyond that first millennium, but died while still within it, so fulfilling the sentence pronounced on his transgression. Whichever way, then, one chooses to count it — whether by the disobedience, which is itself death; or by the fact that from that moment they were handed over and made debtors to death; or by the single identical day on which they both ate and died, the day of creation being one; or by this weekly cycle, in that they died on the same day they had eaten, namely the Preparation, called "pure supper," the sixth weekday, which the Lord likewise marked out by suffering upon it; or by the fact that he did not outlast the first thousand years but died inside them — by every one of these reckonings, God is proven truthful, since those who tasted of the tree did indeed die; whereas the serpent stands exposed as a deceiver and killer, just as the Lord says of him: he was murderous from his origin and never took his place within the truth.

======== Book V — Chapter 24 ========

On the devil's perpetual lying, and on the powers which we ought to obey, and on earthly rule, in that it is established by God and not by the devil.
As, then, he lied in the beginning, so also he was lying at the end, saying, "All these things have been delivered to me, and to whomever I will, I give them." It was not he, after all, who fixed the boundaries of the world's realms, but God; for the ruler's heart rests in God's own hand. And speaking through Solomon, the Word likewise declares that through him kings hold their reign and the powerful hand down verdicts, that through him rulers are lifted up and those who wield tyranny possess the land. The Apostle Paul affirms this same point when he writes: submit yourselves to every governing authority set above you, for authority exists nowhere except from God, and whatever authorities do exist have been established by him. And he goes on to say of them that the ruler does not carry the sword idly, for he serves as God's minister, one who brings down retribution on the wrongdoer. And because he was speaking not of angelic powers or unseen princes, as some presume to explain it, but of the authorities that belong to human affairs, he adds: it is for this reason that you render tribute also, since these are God's officers, continually devoted to this very task. The Lord himself confirmed as much — not by acting on the devil's suggestion, but by directing that tribute be paid, both for himself and for Peter, to those who collected it — inasmuch as they too are God's officers, continually devoted to this very task.
For since man, in departing from God, had grown so savage that he even regarded his own kinsman as an enemy, and lived in every kind of turmoil, murder, and greed, without fear, God imposed upon him the fear of man — for men did not know the fear of God — so that, brought under human authority and bound by human statute, they might arrive at some degree of uprightness and hold one another in check, dreading the blade set over them — just as the Apostle says that the ruler does not carry the sword idly, for he serves as God's minister, one who brings down retribution on the wrongdoer. And on this account those same officials, wrapped in the mantle of justice through the laws, will never be called to account or punished for whatever they do rightly and lawfully. But whatever they carry out unjustly, impiously, against the law, and tyrannically, to crush the innocent — for these very deeds they too will be undone, God's righteous verdict falling equally on all and missing nothing. It is, then, for the good of the nations that earthly government has been set up by God rather than by the devil, who never once knows rest, and who does not even want the nations to enjoy calm — so that, out of dread of human rule, they would not swallow one another whole like fish, but through the setting up of laws might hold back the countless wrongs the nations commit against each other. And it is in this same sense that the collectors of our tribute, too, count as God's officers, continually devoted to this very task.
The powers that exist, then, have been ordained by God; it is plain, therefore, that the devil lies when he says, "They have been delivered to me, and I give them to whomever I will." For by whose command men are born, by his command also kings are appointed, fitted for those who at that time are ruled by them. Some rulers, indeed, are raised up to reform and profit those under them and to safeguard what is right; others, to instill dread, to chastise, and to rebuke; and still others, for scorn, disgrace, and arrogance — each according to what they merit, by God's own righteous verdict — while he, being the rebel angel he is, remains able only to repeat that same act he committed at the outset: to lure and steer the human mind off course into breaking God's precepts, and little by little to darken the hearts of those laboring to serve him, until they lose sight of the true God and bow to him as a substitute deity.
It is much as when some rebel, having seized a territory by force, harasses its inhabitants so as to snatch for himself royal splendor among people unaware that he is a renegade and a brigand; so too the devil — one of those angelic beings holding dominion over the aerial realm, as the Apostle Paul made known when writing to the Ephesians — turned, through envy of mankind, into a deserter from the law of God, since envy has no place in God. And because it was through man that his revolt and its sentence were exposed, he grew still more hostile toward man, begrudging him his life, and desiring to keep him locked within his own rebel dominion. But the Word of God, craftsman of all things, defeated him through man and unmasked him as a deserter, turning him back, in his turn, against man, and declaring: "See, I have granted you authority to trample serpents and scorpions, and the whole strength of the foe underfoot" — so that just as the enemy had won mastery over man through his own revolt, so, conversely, through man's return to God, that revolt might be reduced to nothing.

======== Book V — Chapter 25 ========

The deceit, pride, and tyrannical rule of the Antichrist, as described by Daniel and Paul.
And it is demonstrated not merely by what has already been said, but equally by the events yet to unfold under the Antichrist, that this figure, a deserter and a plunderer, craves to be honored as God, and although a mere bondservant, longs to be hailed as sovereign. Arrogating to himself the devil's entire strength, he will arrive not as a legitimate king, nor as one properly submitted to God, but godless, unjust, and lawless, a renegade, wicked, and murderous, drawing into his own person the devil's whole revolt; and sweeping idols aside, so as to convince mankind that he himself is God, replacing the countless deceptions of idolatry — so that those who once bowed to the devil through many vile rites might, through this single image, serve him alone. It is of him that the Apostle speaks in his second letter to the Thessalonians, writing that the appointed day will not arrive until the great rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is unveiled, the child doomed to ruin, who defies and lifts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, even taking his seat in God's own sanctuary, presenting himself as though divine. The Apostle thus openly reveals his rebellion, and shows that he raises himself above everything called God or worshiped — meaning above every idol, since these are called gods by human beings though they are not gods at all — and that he will, tyrant that he is, attempt to pass himself off as God.
He also, further, confirmed what we have already established in several places, namely that the sanctuary at Jerusalem was raised up by the appointment of the one true God. The Apostle himself, speaking on his own authority, flatly names that sanctuary the temple of God. And we showed as well, in our third book, that not one of the apostles, speaking in his own voice, calls anyone God except him who alone truly is God, the Father belonging to our Lord — it was by his decree that the Jerusalem sanctuary was constructed, for the reasons already given; and it is there that the adversary will take his seat, striving to pass himself off as the Christ, exactly as the Lord himself warns: when you catch sight of the devastating abomination foretold through the prophet Daniel standing in the holy place — let the one reading take note — then those in Judea must flee for the hills, and whoever is on the rooftop must not descend to fetch anything from inside the house. For at that time distress will come such as the world, from its founding until now, has never known, and never will again. And Daniel, gazing forward to the close of the final kingdom — to the last ten monarchs among whom that kingdom is parceled out, the ones upon whom the doomed son will come — reports ten horns sprouting from the beast, with yet another, a small horn, rising among them, uprooting three of the earlier horns before it. "And I looked," he writes, "and this horn had eyes resembling a man's, and a mouth uttering boastful words, its appearance more imposing than its fellow horns... As I watched, that horn waged battle against the holy ones and overpowered the holy people of the Most High, until the appointed moment arrived and they took possession of the kingdom." Later, as the visions continued to unfold, he was told: the fourth beast will be a fourth kingdom on earth, surpassing every kingdom before it, devouring the whole earth, trampling it, and crushing it to fragments. Its ten horns represent ten kings still to come; and following them another will arise, more wicked than any who came before, who will bring down three kings, hurl insults at the Most High, wear down the holy people of the Most High, and scheme to alter seasons and law; and dominion will be granted to him for a time, times, and half a time — that is, three and a half years, during which span he will hold sway over the earth. Concerning this same figure, the Apostle Paul, in his second letter to the Thessalonians, likewise describing how he will appear, writes: and then the lawless one will stand revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the breath from his mouth, annihilating him by the splendor of his own arrival — this lawless one whose coming follows Satan's own workings, accompanied by every kind of power, sign, and false wonder, and by every deceit of wickedness aimed at those headed for destruction, because they refused to welcome the love of truth that would have saved them. And for this very reason God will send upon them a deluding influence, so that they come to believe a falsehood, that every one of them might be condemned who refused to believe the truth and instead took pleasure in wrongdoing.
The Lord himself likewise said this to those who did not believe him: "I have arrived bearing my Father's name, yet you did not welcome me; but should another arrive bearing merely his own name, that one you would welcome" — calling that other one Antichrist, because he is a stranger to the Lord. He is also that "unjust judge" spoken of by the Lord, who "did not fear God, nor respect man," to whom the widow fled who had forgotten God — that is, the earthly Jerusalem — to be avenged of her adversary. This he will indeed do in the time of his own kingdom: he will transfer the kingdom to that city, and will sit in the temple of God, seducing those who worship him into thinking that he himself is the Christ. Wherefore Daniel says again: "And the sanctuary shall be made desolate, and the sin was given for a sacrifice, and righteousness was cast down to the ground, and he did his pleasure and prospered." And the angel Gabriel, explaining this same vision, said: "And at the last of their kingdom there shall arise a king of fierce countenance, and understanding riddles; and his power shall be mighty, and he shall be marvellous, and shall corrupt, and shall prosper, and practise, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people; and his yoke shall be made to prosper; there is deceit in his hand, and in his heart he shall magnify himself, and by deceit he shall destroy many, and he shall stand up for the destruction of many, and shall crush them as eggs in the hand." Then he also indicates the time of his tyranny, during which the saints who offer God a pure sacrifice shall be put to flight: "And at the halfway mark of that week," he states, "sacrifice and offering will come to an end, and upon the temple the desolating abomination shall be placed, and the desolation shall persist all the way to the fixed close of that appointed time"; and the half of the week is three years and six months. From all of this is manifest not only what belongs to the apostasy, and to him who recapitulates in himself the whole diabolical error, but also that a single selfsame God stands behind both the prophetic proclamation and the manifestation accomplished through Christ. For if the Lord confirmed the things prophesied by Daniel concerning the end, saying, "When you shall see the abomination of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet" — and to Daniel it was the angel Gabriel who supplied the meaning of those visions, this same angel being the archangel of the Demiurge, and this same one announced to Mary the manifest coming and incarnation of Christ — then it becomes utterly plain that a single God stands revealed: sender of the prophets, forerunner-sender of his own Son, and caller of us into the knowledge of himself.

======== Book V — Chapter 26 ========

Because John and Daniel together foretold the breakup and ruin of Rome's empire, an event that must come before the world's close and before Christ's unending reign; a chapter that answers other interpreters.
Moreover John, the disciple of the Lord, in the Apocalypse further pointed to the final age and to those ten kings not yet in existence, among whom the currently ruling power shall one day be parceled out, thereby explaining the ten horns that Daniel had seen; for it was told him in these words: "The ten horns you observed are ten kings who have not yet taken up a kingdom, but who will receive royal authority for a single hour, jointly with the beast. These share a single purpose, and they will hand over their might and dominion to the beast; these will wage battle against the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, since he is Lord over lords and King over kings." So it is plain that among these ten, the one still to come will destroy three, the remainder will submit to him, and he himself will stand as the eighth; and this group will reduce Babylon to ruin, consume her by fire, hand their realm over to the beast, and drive the Church into flight — after which they in turn will be brought down at our Lord's arrival. For since a kingdom split against its own self is bound to fall, the Lord declares: "A kingdom torn by internal division comes to ruin, and no city or household split against itself can endure." Kingdom, city, and household, then, must undergo this tenfold splitting; and he had already foreshadowed such a partition beforehand. Daniel, moreover, states plainly that the fourth kingdom terminates in the toes of the statue's feet, seen broken apart "apart from any hand," as he himself puts it: "The feet were partly iron, partly clay, until a stone was hewn free without a hand touching it, and it struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay, feet that were partly iron, partly clay." These ten toes of the feet, then, represent the ten kings among whom the realm will be split; some of them will be forceful and capable, others feeble and worthless, unable to hold together — just as Daniel likewise says: "Part of the realm will be firm, part of it fragile. Since you saw iron blended with clay, there will be mixtures within the human line, and they will fail to cohere with one another, exactly as iron does not fuse with clay." And regarding the coming end, he states: "In the era of those kings, the God of the heavens will raise up a realm that will never fall, a dominion that passes to no other nation. It will crush and bring to nothing every one of these kingdoms, while itself standing forever. Even as you saw the stone hewn free from the mountainside without a hand touching it, and how it crushed the iron, bronze, clay, silver, and gold — so the great God has revealed to the king the events yet to unfold; the dream is certain, and its meaning trustworthy.
If, then, the great God made known future things through Daniel, and confirmed them through his Son — and Christ is the stone hewn out apart from hands, who shall bring the temporal kingdoms to nothing and usher in the everlasting one, namely the rising of the righteous — then let those who reject the Demiurge be confuted and come to a better mind, since they do not concede that the prophets were sent beforehand by the same Father from whom the Lord also came; instead they assert that the prophecies were made by differing powers. For the things that were foretold by the Demiurge through all the prophets, these Christ brought to their fulfillment, ministering to the will of his own Father. (The text here bears the marks of a later, disordered hand, and what follows cannot be reconstructed with confidence.) Let it be recognized by all who worship God that these are the organs of Satan, through whom Satan is now — and not before — seen to blaspheme God, and who has prepared eternal fire for the whole apostasy. For he himself, of himself, openly, did not dare to blaspheme his own Lord; just as at the beginning also, through the serpent, he seduced man, as if hiding from God.
Justin rightly said that, before the coming of the Lord, Satan never dared to blaspheme God, since he did not yet know his own condemnation, because it had been spoken of him by the prophets only in parables and allegories. But after the coming of the Lord, learning plainly from the words of Christ and of his apostles that eternal fire has been prepared for him by his own will, in that he departed from God, and for all who without repentance persist in the apostasy — through such men he blasphemes that God who brings judgment, as one already condemned, and imputes the sin of his own apostasy to his Maker, and not to his own will and choice; just as those who transgress the laws, and are afterward punished, complain against the lawgivers and not against themselves. So too these men, filled with a diabolical spirit, bring countless accusations against our Maker, who has both granted us the life-giving Spirit and set in place a law suited to all; and they will not concede that God's judgment is righteous. For this reason they also devise a certain other father, who neither cares for nor exercises providence over the things that concern us, nor even over all sins whatsoever. For if the father does not judge, either it does not pertain to him, or he consents to everything that is done by everyone; and if he does not judge, all will be on equal footing, and reckoned in the same condition. The coming of Christ, then, will be superfluous, and indeed contrary to reason, if he does not judge.

======== Book V — Chapter 27 ========

Concerning the future judgment through Christ, the divine communion and separation, and the eternal punishments of the unbelieving.
For he came to "set a son apart from his father, a daughter against her mother, and a bride against her husband's mother"; and "of two sharing one bed, one shall be taken and the other left behind; and of two women turning the millstone together, one shall be taken and the other left"; and at the last he will order the reapers to first collect the weeds and "tie them into sheaves for burning in unquenchable fire," while bringing the grain itself into the storehouse; and he will summon the sheep into the realm made ready for them, while dispatching the goats to the everlasting fire "made ready for the devil and his messengers." For what does he say? "The Word arrived so that many might fall and many might rise" — the falling belonging to those who refuse to trust him, against whom he warned of a harsher sentence at the judgment than fell upon Sodom and Gomorrah; the rising belonging to those who trust him and carry out the will of the Father in the heavens. If, then, the Son's coming reaches everyone equally, yet is a coming that judges, separating the believing from the unbelieving — since believers embrace the Son's will freely, and unbelievers by their own free choice keep their distance from his teaching — then plainly the Father likewise treats everyone equally, each person retaining free choice and free judgment; yet he oversees and supplies for all, "causing his sun to shine on the wicked as well as the good, and pouring rain on the righteous together with the unrighteous." 
And upon all who persevere in loving him, he confers fellowship with himself. Now fellowship with God amounts to living and shining, together with delight in every blessing found in him. But upon all who, of their own accord, withdraw from him, he lets fall the very separation from himself that they have chosen. For estrangement from God is dying, estrangement from radiance is gloom, and estrangement from God means forfeiting every blessing found in him. Those, then, who through falling away have squandered these things, stripped of every blessing, undergo punishment of every sort — not that God is the direct agent striking them, but rather punishment overtakes them precisely because every blessing has been stripped away. And since the blessings issuing from God are unending and eternal, their forfeiture is likewise unending and eternal; much as, with an overwhelming brightness, persons who have made themselves sightless, or been made sightless by others, are permanently shut out from delighting in that brightness — not because the brightness itself dealt them the misfortune of sightlessness, but because sightlessness itself dealt them the misfortune. For this reason the Lord declared: "Whoever trusts in me faces no condemnation" — meaning, is not cut off from God, since through faith he is joined to God. "But whoever refuses to trust," he continues, "stands condemned already," since he has withheld trust from the title of God's only-begotten Son — meaning, he has cut himself off from God by his own free decision. "And this is the condemnation: that radiance entered into this world, yet people preferred gloom to radiance. For everyone practicing wickedness detests the radiance and avoids approaching it, so his actions will not be laid bare. But whoever practices truth approaches the radiance, so that his actions may be shown plainly to have been accomplished in God." Concerning the divide between the devout and the wicked, the apostasy still to come under Antichrist, and the world's final consummation.

======== Book V — Chapter 28 ========

Since, then, in this present world some hasten toward the light and, by faith, join themselves to God, while others draw back from it and cut themselves off from God, God's Word arrives bringing to every one a dwelling suited to him: for those dwelling in the light, that they might delight in it and its blessings; but for those dwelling in darkness, that they might share in its miseries. For this reason, he says, those on the right hand will be summoned into the Father's kingdom, while those on the left will be dispatched into everlasting fire, since they have stripped themselves of every blessing.
And for this reason the Apostle states: "Because they refused affection for the truth, [God will dispatch upon them a deluding influence], so that they would put faith in a falsehood, so that every one might stand condemned who withheld belief from the truth and instead approved wickedness" — for at his arrival, gathering apostasy up within himself, accomplishing by his own will and choice whatever he undertakes, and taking his seat within God's temple so that those he has led astray revere him as though he were Christ, he will rightly be hurled into the lake of fire; while God, through his foreknowledge, having foreseen everything, and dispatching at the proper moment the one destined to be exactly this, so that "they would put faith in a falsehood, so that every one might stand condemned who withheld belief from the truth and instead approved wickedness." John pointed to this figure's arrival in the Apocalypse in these terms: "And the beast I beheld resembled a leopard, its feet like a bear's paws, its jaws like a lion's maw; and the dragon handed over to it his own power, his throne, and vast authority; and one of its heads appeared struck unto death, yet its fatal injury was healed, and the whole earth marveled and followed after the beast; and they bowed down to the dragon, since he had granted authority to the beast; and they bowed down to the beast, saying, Who compares to the beast, and who is able to fight against it? And it was given a mouth that uttered arrogant words and slander, and it was granted authority for forty-two months. It opened its jaws to slander God, reviling his name, his dwelling-place, and those residing in heaven. And it was granted dominion over every clan and populace and tongue and nation. And everyone dwelling on the earth bowed down to it, everyone whose name is absent from the book of life belonging to the Lamb slaughtered since the world's founding. Whoever has an ear should listen. Whoever leads others into captivity goes into captivity himself; whoever kills by the sword must himself be killed by the sword. Here lies the endurance and the fidelity of the saints." After this he also describes its weapon-bearer, whom he names the false prophet: "It spoke," he says, "like a dragon, and it exercised the whole authority the first beast possessed, doing so right before that beast, compelling the earth and its inhabitants to bow down to the first beast, the one whose fatal injury had healed. And it will perform astonishing signs, even bringing fire down out of the sky onto the earth while people watch, and thereby misleads earth's inhabitants." Let no one imagine it performs these signs by divine power, but rather through sorcery. Nor is it strange that, with demons and rebellious spirits assisting it, it produces signs through them by which it misleads earth's inhabitants. "It will order," he says, "that a statue be fashioned, and will grant breath to the statue so that the statue can even speak, and will bring about the death of any who refuse to bow down to it. And it will cause a brand to be imprinted," he says, "upon the forehead and the right hand, so that no one may buy or sell unless bearing the brand of the beast's name, or the numeral of its name; and the numeral is six hundred sixty-six" — that is, six hundred, sixty, and six — signaling the summing-up of the entire apostasy accomplished across the six thousand years.
Corresponding to the number of days in which this world took shape, it reaches its completion after that same count of thousand years. For this reason the Scripture of Genesis states: 'The heavens and the earth were brought to completion, along with their whole array. God concluded on the sixth day the whole of the work he had made, and on the seventh day he rested from all the work he had done.' This is at once an account of what already happened and a foretelling of what is still to come. Since 'with the Lord a day carries the weight of a thousand years,' the works that came into being across six days reach their fulfillment together; their completion, then, plainly falls in the six thousandth year. On this account, across the whole span of time, man — shaped at the outset by God, namely through the Son and the Spirit — arrives at conformity with God's image and resemblance: with the chaff, standing for the falling-away, discarded, and the wheat, standing for those who yield fruit to God through faith, brought into the storehouse. Hardship, therefore, must fall upon those destined for salvation, so that once they have, so to speak, been pressed, purified, and blended together by patient endurance under the Word of God, and proven by fire, they might be made ready for the King's feast. As a certain one among us declared, upon being condemned to face the beasts for testifying to God: 'I am wheat belonging to Christ, and I am milled by the jaws of beasts, so that I might turn out to be bread fit for God, unmixed with anything else.'

======== Book V — Chapter 29 ========

That all things were made for the benefit of man; and concerning Antichrist, the idols, and the wickedness and power of the apostasy, from the Flood onward, prefigured also in the persecution of Ananias, Azarias, and Misael.
We have given, in the books preceding this one, the reasons for which God allowed these things to happen as they did, and we have shown that all such things were made for the sake of the man who is being saved, so as to bring to maturity that which belongs to his own free will and power, toward immortality, and to prepare him to be more fittingly disposed for eternal subjection to God. And for this reason creation is expended for man's sake, for man was not made for creation's sake, but creation for man's. But the nations, who did not so much as lift up their eyes to heaven, nor gave thanks to their Maker, nor wished to see the light of truth, but, like blind mice hidden in the depths of folly, are justly reckoned by the Word as a drop from a bucket, and as a grain on the scales, and as nothing — useful and serviceable to the righteous only to the extent that stubble is of use for the growth of wheat, and its chaff for the fire, in the working of gold. And for this reason, when at the end the Church is suddenly taken up, it is said: 'There will be tribulation such as has not occurred from the beginning, nor shall be.' This, indeed, is the final ordeal appointed for the righteous, in which those who prevail receive the crown of incorruption.
And for this reason, when the beast arrives, the whole sum of lawlessness and every deceit is gathered up again, so that the complete apostate power, converging and enclosed within him, might be delivered over to the fiery furnace. It is fitting, too, that his name should carry the number six hundred and sixty-six, for within his single person is gathered together every mixture of wickedness that came before the Flood, evil that sprang from the rebellion of the angels. Noah, after all, had reached six hundred years of age when the waters came over the earth, wiping out the defiant generation of his day. This same number also sums up the whole error of idol-making that arose after the Flood, and the killing of the prophets, and the burning of the righteous. For the image set up by Nebuchadnezzar had a height of sixty cubits and a width of six cubits, and on account of it Ananias, Azarias, and Misael, refusing to worship it, were cast into the furnace of fire, thereby prophesying, through what befell them, the burning of the righteous that is to come at the end. For that whole image was a prefiguration of this coming one, who decrees that he alone be worshipped by absolutely all men. So the six hundred years of Noah, under whom the Flood came because of the apostasy, and the number of cubits of the image on account of which the righteous were thrown into the furnace of fire, signify the number of the name of him in whom is recapitulated the whole apostasy, injustice, wickedness, false prophecy, and deceit of six thousand years — on account of which fire shall also come. [The text here is uncertain in the source and possibly corrupted, involving a note on how the number of cubits was read.] The number of the name of Antichrist is indeed certain, but nothing should be rashly affirmed about it, since it could fit many names; nor is it clear why it was not plainly explained by the Holy Spirit — nor anything about his kingdom or his death.

======== Book V — Chapter 30 ========

These things being so, and this number being set down in all the ancient, most approved, and old copies, and those who saw John face to face bearing witness to it, and plain logic itself showing us that the numerical value of the beast's name, worked out by the Greek system of letter-counting, totals six hundred and sixty-six — namely, tens matched to hundreds, hundreds matched to units (the digit six, recurring at each stage, signaling the repeated summing-up of that entire apostasy: one at the world's start, one in time's midpoint, one still to come at the close) — it is unclear to me how certain people went astray, following a notion of their own devising and misreading the middle digit, reducing it to fifty, preferring a single ten in place of six tens. [I think this was a copyist's error, as commonly happens, since numbers too are represented by letters, and it is easy for the Greek letter that signifies sixty to be mistaken for the Greek letter iota written out in full.] Afterward, some accepted this without examination; others simply and ignorantly made use of the number ten; while others still, through ignorance, dared even to search out names containing a false and erroneous number. But as for those who did this simply and without malice, we think God will grant them pardon. But as many as, out of vainglory, fix upon names containing a false number, and determine that the name they themselves have invented belongs to the one who is to come — such people will not come off without harm, since they have deceived both themselves and those who trust them. And the first harm is that they fall away from the truth, imagining to be what is not the case; and next, that no small penalty awaits the one who adds to or takes away from Scripture, which such a person must necessarily incur. And another danger, not to be dismissed, will follow upon those who falsely presume to know his name: for if they suppose one name, while he who is coming actually bears another, they will easily be led astray by him, thinking he is not yet present — the very one against whom they ought to be on guard.
It is fitting, then, that such people learn this, and return to the true number of the name, so that they not be reckoned among the false prophets. But, holding fast to the settled figure that Scripture sets down — namely six hundred sixty-six — let them instead wait: first, for the splitting of the realm into ten parts; then, once those rulers have taken their thrones and begun putting their domains in order and expanding their power, for the one who will arrive without warning, claiming the kingdom for himself, and will terrify the aforesaid kings, bearing a name that contains the aforesaid number — let them truly recognize this one as the abomination of desolation. This the Apostle also says: 'When they shall say, Peace and security, then sudden destruction will come upon them.' Jeremiah, moreover, made known not only his sudden coming but also the tribe from which he will come, saying: 'From Dan we shall hear the sound of the swiftness of his horses; at the sound of the neighing of the rush of his horses the whole earth shall be shaken; and he shall come and devour the earth and its fullness, the city and those who dwell in it.' And for this reason this tribe is not numbered in the Apocalypse among those who are saved. It is therefore safer and more certain to await the fulfillment of the prophecy than to guess and divine at random what names might fit, since many names can be found bearing the aforesaid number, and the same question would still remain. For if there are many names found that have this number, which of them will belong to the one who comes? — this is the question.
Now, that we say these things not for lack of names bearing the number of his name, but out of fear toward God and zeal for the truth: EYANTHAS, for instance, has the number in question, but we affirm nothing about it. LATEINOS also has the number six hundred sixty-six, and it is quite plausible, since this is the name of the kingdom that now exists last of all; for it is the Latins who now reign — but we shall not boast in this. TEITAN, too, [its opening syllable spelled with the pair of Greek vowels epsilon and iota], stands out among all the names we have found as the one most deserving of trust. For it contains the aforesaid number, and consists of six letters, each of its three syllables made up of three letters, and it is both ancient and set apart; for none of the kings who have arisen among us has been called Titan, nor does it belong to any of the idols publicly worshipped among Greeks and barbarians. It is thought by many to be a divine name, so much so that the sun itself is called Titan by those who now hold this belief, and it carries a certain semblance of one taking vengeance and exacting retribution, in that he pretends to avenge those who have been ill-treated. Besides this, it is also an ancient, credible, and royal name — indeed, rather a tyrannical one. Since, then, this name Titan carries such persuasive force, it has enough plausibility that we might well conjecture, on many grounds, that perhaps he who is to come will be called Titan; yet we will not run the risk of asserting positively that this will be his name. We know that if it had been necessary for his name to be plainly proclaimed at the present time, it would have been declared by the one who also saw the Apocalypse, for it was seen not very long ago, but almost in our own generation, toward the end of Domitian's reign.
For the present, though, only the numerical value of the name has been disclosed, so that we might recognize and stand guard against him upon his arrival; the actual name he has withheld, since it is not fitting for the Holy Spirit to announce it openly. Had it been announced ahead of time, he might well have persisted that much longer in his deception. As things stand, since he 'existed, and exists no longer, and is to rise up from the abyss on his way to destruction,' being in that sense a non-entity, his name likewise goes unspoken — for what has no being is given no name. Once this Antichrist has ravaged everything within this present world, his rule will last three years and six months, seated in the Jerusalem temple; at that point the Lord will descend from heaven amid the clouds, wrapped in the Father's splendor, consigning him together with his followers to the lake of fire, while granting the righteous the kingdom's appointed seasons — that is, the rest of the hallowed seventh day — and giving back to Abraham the inheritance once promised him. Within that kingdom, as the Lord tells us, a great many will arrive from every direction and take their place at table alongside Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

======== Book V — Chapter 31 ========

The preservation of our bodies is confirmed by the death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ; meanwhile the souls of the saints wait out that time, so that they may receive perfect and complete glory.
Since, however, some of those who are thought to have believed rightly go beyond the order of the advancement of the righteous, and are ignorant of the ways of preparation for incorruption, harboring heretical opinions within themselves — for the heretics, despising the formation wrought by God and not accepting the salvation of their own flesh, and moreover scorning the promise of God, and going altogether beyond God in their thinking, say that as soon as they die they pass beyond the heavens and the Demiurge, and go to the Mother, or to him whom they themselves have fabricated as the Father. Those, then, who reject the resurrection altogether, and as far as lies in them remove it from consideration — what wonder is it if they also do not know the order of the resurrection, refusing to understand that, if things were as they claim, the Lord himself, in whom they say they believe, would not have accomplished his resurrection on the third day, but, breathing his last on the cross, would immediately have gone straight up, leaving his body to the earth? But instead, he passed three days in the realm holding the dead, as the prophet declares concerning him: 'The Lord called to mind his sacred dead, those who had gone to their rest earlier in the ground of burial, and he descended to them, to bring them up and rescue them.' And the Lord himself declares: 'Just as Jonah spent three days and three nights inside the great fish, in that same way the Son of Man will spend time within the earth's depths.' The Apostle likewise states: 'This phrase, He went up — what can it mean, other than that he had first gone down into the earth's lower regions?' David too, speaking prophetically of him, said: 'And you have rescued my soul out of the depths of hell.' And having risen on the third day, when Mary, the first to behold him, bowed before him, he told her: 'Do not cling to me, since I have not yet gone up to the Father; instead go to the disciples and give them this word: I am going up to my Father, who is also your Father.'
If, then, the Lord kept to the rule governing the dead, so as thereby to become the firstborn of the dead, and stayed until the third day within the earth's lower regions, and only afterward, rising bodily — to the point of displaying the nail-marks to his disciples — went up to the Father, how can these people escape shame who claim that this world is indeed the one we inhabit, yet hold that their inner self, abandoning the body here below, rises straight to a region above the heavens? For given that the Lord passed through the very domain overshadowed by death, the place where the souls of the departed dwelt, and only later rose again in bodily form, and after the resurrection was taken up, it is plain that the souls of his disciples too, for whose sake the Lord accomplished these things, will depart to the invisible place appointed for them by God, and will remain there until the resurrection, awaiting the resurrection; and afterward, receiving their bodies and rising completely — that is, bodily, just as the Lord also rose — they will come into the presence of God. 'For no disciple is above his master; but everyone who is fully taught will be like his master.' How, then, could our Master not have gone away at once, flying off, but instead waited out the time of his resurrection appointed by the Father — which was also made known through the sign of Jonah — and, rising after three days, was only then taken up? So we too ought to wait out the time appointed for our resurrection, as foretold by the prophets, and so, having risen, be taken up, as many of us as the Lord shall count worthy of this.

======== Book V — Chapter 32 ========

In the flesh in which the saints endured many hardships here, they will receive the fruit of their labors — especially since the whole creation looks forward to this, and God has promised it to Abraham and his seed. (At this point a manuscript note has crept into the text: only our Codex Vossianus has these five chapters, which I have collated most carefully with the printed editions.) Now the opinions of certain people are carried over from heretical discourses, for they are ignorant of God's arrangements and of the mystery of the resurrection of the just and of the kingdom, which is the beginning of incorruption, through which those found worthy gradually grow accustomed to receive God. It is necessary to speak of these things, because it is fitting that the just should first, in this creation as it is renewed, rise at the appearing of God and obtain the inheritance God pledged of old to the patriarchs, and there hold their reign; only after that does judgment follow. For whatever condition marked their toil or suffering, tested through every kind of patience, justice demands they reap in that very condition the harvest of their patience; and whatever condition marked their death for love of God, in that same condition they are to be raised alive; and whatever condition marked their bondage, in that same condition they shall rule. God, after all, abounds in every good thing, and everything belongs to him. It is fitting, then, that creation itself, brought back to its first state, should wait on the just without let or hindrance; and the Apostle showed as much in writing to the Romans, saying: 'The creature waits eagerly, straining for the unveiling of God's children. For the creature was subjected to futility, not by its own will, but through him who subjected it, in hope; because the creature itself shall likewise be set loose from bondage to decay, into the freedom belonging to the glory of God's offspring.'
Likewise the pledge God gave to Abraham stands unshaken. For he said: 'Raise your eyes and survey, from where you now stand, toward north and south, toward the rising sun and the sea; every stretch of land within your sight I give to you and your offspring, for all time.' And once more he said: 'Get up, walk the land across and along, for I am giving it over to you' — and yet he never took possession of it, not even one footprint's worth, but remained throughout a foreigner and a wanderer there. When his wife Sarah died, although the Hittites offered to let him bury her without charge, he declined the gift and instead purchased a burial plot, paying Ephron the Hittite, son of Zohar, four hundred silver didrachms — clinging to what God had pledged, refusing to seem to take as a gift from men what God had promised to bestow, since God had again told him: 'This territory, from the stream of Egypt to the mighty Euphrates, I give to your offspring.' If, then, the land was promised to him as an inheritance, yet he never held it during all his years of wandering, he is bound to obtain it jointly with his offspring — that is, alongside all who revere God and trust him — once the righteous are raised. His offspring is the Church, which is granted sonship toward God through the Lord, just as John the Baptist declared: 'God has power, out of these very stones, to raise up offspring for Abraham.' The Apostle likewise writes, to the Galatians, 'But you, brothers, in the pattern of Isaac, are children born of promise.' And he states plainly again in that same letter that whoever has trusted in Christ inherits what was pledged to Abraham, saying: 'To Abraham the promises were spoken, and to his offspring — not, note, "and to offsprings," as though meaning many, but in the singular, "and to your offspring," meaning Christ.' And to reinforce this same point he adds: 'Abraham put his trust in God, and it was credited to him as righteousness — know, then, that it is those who live by faith who are Abraham's true sons.' And Scripture, having foreseen that God would justify the nations through faith, told Abraham beforehand: 'Through you every nation on earth will find blessing.' Thus those who live by faith share the blessing given to believing Abraham, and it is they who are truly his sons. Now the land was pledged as an inheritance to Abraham and his offspring; yet neither Abraham nor his offspring — meaning those made righteous through faith — hold that inheritance now; it will come to them once the righteous are raised. For God is faithful and does not lie; and on this ground he pronounced the gentle blessed, since the earth will belong to them.

======== Book V — Chapter 33 ========

He confirms his thesis by the promises in which Christ vowed he would once more taste the vine's fruit within his Father's kingdom, and likewise promised a hundredfold reward and a banquet — things that the blessing of Jacob had long before foreshadowed, as Papias and the Elders interpreted it.
For this reason, when he came to his passion, so as to announce to Abraham and his company the good news that the inheritance was now opening, having given thanks over the cup, drunk from it, and passed it to his disciples, he told them: 'Take this and drink, all of you. This cup holds my blood, sealing the new covenant, poured out on behalf of many, for release from sins. I tell you, from here on I will not taste this vine's fruit again until the day I drink it anew, together with you, within my Father's kingdom.' He will indeed make the earth's inheritance new again and bring back the hidden glory owed his children, exactly as David states: 'the one who renews the surface of the earth.' In vowing to share the vine's fruit with his disciples he pointed to two realities at once: the inherited earth, where that renewed fruit of the vine is tasted, and the rising again of his disciples' flesh. For it is that very risen flesh which takes hold of the new cup. One cannot picture him tasting the vine's fruit while enthroned above, in some realm beyond the heavens, together with his own; nor can those who partake be fleshless, since wine drawn from the vine is proper to flesh, not to spirit.
And for this reason the Lord said: 'When you give a dinner or a supper, do not invite the rich, nor friends and neighbors and kinsmen, lest they in turn invite you and repayment be made to you; but invite the lame, the blind, the poor, and you will be blessed, because they have nothing with which to repay you — for your repayment will come once the just are raised.' And again he said: 'Whoever has left fields, or houses, or parents, or brothers, or children for my sake will receive a hundredfold in this age, and in the age to come will inherit eternal life besides.' For it is not in this age that the hundredfold reward is found, and banquets given to the poor, and suppers repaid. These belong to the times of the Kingdom, that is, to the seventh day, which has been sanctified, on which God rested from all the works that he made — which is the true sabbath of the just, on which they will do no earthly work at all; but they will have a table set beside them, prepared by God, feeding them with every delicacy.
So too the blessing that Isaac gave, when he blessed his younger son Jacob, contains this: 'See,' he said, 'my son's scent is the scent of a lush meadow the Lord has blessed. May God grant you heaven's moisture and earth's richness, plentiful grain and new wine. Let nations be your servants, let rulers bend before you; rule over your brother, and let your father's sons kneel to you. Whoever curses you is cursed, and whoever blesses you is blessed.' Now unless one applies these words to the promised era of the Kingdom, one lands in flat contradiction and confusion, exactly as the Jews stumble at every turn trying to make sense of them. For not only did no nation serve this Jacob during his lifetime, but having received the blessing he went and worked for twenty years under his uncle Laban the Syrian; and far from ruling his brother, it was Esau who bowed before him on his return from Mesopotamia to their father, bringing many gifts. And how did he come to inherit plentiful grain and wine, when famine in his own land forced him down into Egypt, under Pharaoh's rule at that time? This blessing, then, plainly belongs to the era of the Kingdom, when the just, raised from death, will govern; when creation, made new and released, will yield food of every kind in abundance from heaven's moisture and earth's richness — just as the elders who had known John, disciple of the Lord, recalled hearing from him how the Lord taught concerning that era, saying: 'Days are coming when vines will sprout, each bearing ten thousand boughs, and on every bough ten thousand shoots, and on every shoot ten thousand twigs, and on every twig ten thousand bunches, and on every bunch ten thousand grapes, and each grape pressed will give twenty-five measures of wine. And when a saint reaches to grasp one bunch, a neighboring bunch will call out: Take me instead, I am the finer bunch; through me give thanks to the Lord. So too a kernel of wheat will yield ten thousand ears, each ear ten thousand grains, and each grain five double-pound measures of clean, fine flour; and the remaining fruits, seeds, and plants will bear in the same proportion; and every animal, living off this food the earth provides, will grow gentle and live at peace with the others, entirely obedient to mankind.'
Papias, who had heard John and kept company with Polycarp, a man of the old generation, sets down his testimony to these matters in the fourth of his books, of which five survive in all. And he adds: 'These matters can be trusted by those who trust.' When Judas the traitor doubted and asked how the Lord could bring about such things, he reports the Lord's answer: 'Those who live to see those days will witness it.' Speaking beforehand of that era, Isaiah says: 'Wolf and lamb shall feed side by side, leopard shall rest with young goat, calf and young bull and lion shall be fed as one, and a small child shall guide them. Cow and bear shall graze together, their offspring shall lie down as one; the lion shall take straw for food, like cattle. And a nursing child shall reach a hand into the viper's hole, into the den where young serpents lie, and come to no harm, for nothing on my sacred mountain will bring ruin on anyone.' And summarizing this again he says: 'Wolves then, with lambs, shall graze as one, the lion, like an ox, shall eat straw, and the snake shall feed on soil as though it were bread; nothing shall harm or ruin anything on my sacred mountain, declares the Lord.' I am aware that some read these words allegorically, applying them to savage and varied sorts of people — different nations, different trades — who upon coming to believe grow gentle alongside the righteous. Yet even granting this is already so, in some drawn from every nation into a single faith, still, once the just are raised, these words will hold true of the animals themselves as well, exactly as it is written: 'God abounds in every good thing.' It follows that, when creation is set right again, every animal must submit and answer to mankind, returning to the diet God originally gave — the produce of the earth — just as they answered to Adam in obedience. There is no way, otherwise, to show a lion literally grazing on straw in the present age; rather this pointed toward the vastness and richness of what is coming. For if a lion, a flesh-eating beast, is to live on straw, what quality must the wheat itself have, if even its straw becomes food fit for lions?

======== Book V — Chapter 34 ========

He concludes his argument about the temporal and earthly Kingdom of the saints after the resurrection with various testimonies from Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Daniel, and with the parable of the watchful servants, to whom the Lord promises that he himself will minister.
Isaiah, too, plainly announced that such joy would come at the resurrection of the just, saying: 'The dead will rise, and those who are in the tombs will rise, and those who are in the earth will rejoice. For the dew that comes from you is healing for them.' Ezekiel voices the identical thought: 'See, I will throw open your graves and lift you out of them, so as to bring my people up from their tombs; I will place my spirit inside you, and you shall live, and I will settle you upon your own soil, and you shall recognize that I am the Lord.' And elsewhere he says much the same: 'So says the Lord: I will collect Israel out of every nation where they were dispersed, and I will show myself holy among them before the eyes of the surrounding peoples; they shall settle on their own soil, the land I gave my servant Jacob, dwelling there in hope, building homes and planting vines, dwelling in hope once I have judged all who treated them with contempt among the neighboring nations; and they shall recognize that I am the Lord who is their God, and the God their fathers worshipped.' We already showed above that the Church stands as Abraham's offspring; and for that reason — so it may be understood that it is within the new covenant that God draws together, out of every nation, those destined for salvation, raising up sons for Abraham even from bare stones — Jeremiah says: 'See, days are approaching, declares the Lord, when it will no longer be said, "As the Lord lives, who led the sons of Israel up out of the northern land" — instead he will bring them back from every place into which they had been scattered, to the very soil he gave their forebears.'
Since every creature, by God's own will, is destined to expand and flourish, bearing and sustaining fruits of this kind, Isaiah declares: "On every lofty mountain and every high hill, streams of water will run in the day appointed, on that day when multitudes come to ruin, when ramparts crumble down. And the moon's brightness will match the sun's radiance, sevenfold as daylight itself, on the day he binds up his people's wound and cures the hurt they have suffered." This hurt or wound is none other than that by which mankind was laid low at the outset through Adam's transgression — namely death — which God will remedy by raising us from among the dead and giving back to us the possession belonging to the fathers, as Isaiah states elsewhere: "You shall place your confidence in the Lord, and he will lift you above the whole earth, and nourish you with the possession that belonged to Jacob your father... this they ministered to them." This is likewise what the Lord himself declared: "Fortunate are those servants whom the master, upon arriving, discovers alert and watching. Truly I tell you, he himself will put on his apron, seat them at table, and come and wait on them personally. Even should he arrive during the middle watch of the night, or come upon them still so occupied in the third watch, happy are those servants, for their master will seat them and serve them himself." John states this same idea in his Apocalypse: "Fortunate and set apart is the one granted a share in the resurrection that comes first." Isaiah likewise foretold the season in which these events would occur: "And I asked," he writes, "for how long, Lord? Till towns lie empty, stripped bare of any inhabitant, and dwellings stand without a soul in them, and the countryside becomes a wilderness." Following this, God will send mankind into a far country, and the remnant left behind will grow numerous across the land. Daniel states this identical truth: "And rule and dominion and the majesty of every realm beneath the whole sky was granted to the holy ones belonging to God Most High, whose reign endures without end, and to whom every power shall bow in service and obedience." And so that no one should imagine this pledge concerns some other era, it was declared to the prophet: "But as for you, go your way and take up your appointed place at the close of the age."
Now that these pledges were made known not merely to the prophets and the patriarchs, but equally to the assemblies drawn together out of the Gentile nations — whom the Spirit also names "islands," both since they lie amid the turbulent sea and withstand the storm of blasphemous speech, and because they serve as a haven of rescue for those in danger, a shelter for lovers of the deep, striving to flee the Bythos, that is, the abyss of error — Jeremiah speaks in this manner: "Hear the Lord's word, you nations, proclaim it among the distant islands; say: He who dispersed Israel shall bring him together again, and watch over him as a shepherd watches his flock. And should he come during the middle watch of the night, he will wait upon them himself." (Concerning this phrase, "during the middle watch of the night," the ancient Latin rendering agrees with Irenaeus in a number of manuscripts, as does Bede afterward along with other Latin writers, and an even earlier Greek father, Methodius, in the appendix to the newest volume of Combefis's Bibliotheca Patrum, where Luke's words are quoted without this phrase; yet it can be gathered from what follows immediately that the phrase was dropped not by Methodius himself but by a later copyist, for he continues thus:) his hand shall rescue him from one who was mightier than himself. They shall arrive, and exult upon Mount Zion, and come toward the good things — the region of grain and new wine and fruit, of herds and flocks — and their being shall become like a well-watered garden, and hunger shall trouble them no longer. Then young women will delight amid the gathering of young men, and elders will share the delight, and I will turn their grief into gladness, granting them comfort, and I will fill the souls of the priests, Levi's sons, to overflowing, and my people will have their fill of my bounty. We have already established in the earlier book that every one of the Lord's disciples belongs to the priestly line of Levi, having desecrated the sabbath within the temple, yet remain guiltless. Promises of this sort, then, quite plainly point toward a banqueting of this present creation within the kingdom belonging to the righteous, which God pledges that he himself will supply.
Further, regarding Jerusalem and its future ruler, Isaiah declares: "Thus the Lord speaks: Happy is he who possesses offspring in Zion and relatives dwelling in Jerusalem. See, an upright king is coming to reign, and leaders will govern with fairness." And touching the manner in which it will be rebuilt, he says: "Look, I will set your stones in carbuncle, and lay your foundations with sapphire, and fashion your parapets from jasper, your gates of crystalline stone, your surrounding wall of precious stones, and all your children shall be taught by God, and your offspring shall live in abundant peace, and you shall be established through righteousness." And elsewhere he likewise states: "See, I turn Jerusalem into gladness, and my people into delight: the sound of weeping shall never again be heard within her, nor any cry of distress. No longer will there be an infant whose days are few, nor an aged man who fails to complete his years — for the young shall live a hundred years, while the sinner who dies at a hundred shall be counted cursed. They will construct dwellings and live in them themselves; they will set out vineyards and themselves eat what they yield, and drink the wine. They will not build for another to occupy, nor plant for another to consume. For as long as a tree endures, so long shall my people's days extend; the fruit of their toil shall never wear away with age."

======== Book V — Chapter 35 ========

He argues that the testimonies just cited cannot, through allegory, be taken to mean only heavenly blessings, but are destined for fulfillment after Antichrist's arrival and the resurrection, within an earthly Jerusalem; and to the earlier prophecies drawn from Isaiah, Jeremiah, and John's Apocalypse he attaches yet more. But should anyone try to allegorize prophecies of this kind, they will find themselves inconsistent at every turn, and will be answered by the plain wording itself — for it is written that once the nations' cities have been left desolate, empty of any inhabitant, and dwellings stand with no man in them, and the land turns to wasteland. "For look," Isaiah writes, "the Lord's day arrives, past remedy, brimming with wrath and fury, so as to render the earth's city desolate and to blot out its sinners from it." And again he states: "Let it be carried off, so it will not gaze upon the Lord's glory." And once this comes about, he says, God will banish mankind to a distant place, and those remaining will multiply across the land; "and they will raise houses and dwell in them, and set out vineyards and eat their fruit." For all these further sayings speak, without dispute, of the resurrection belonging to the righteous, occurring once Antichrist has come and every nation under his sway has been overthrown; in that resurrection the just will govern the earth, gaining strength from beholding the Lord, and through him growing accustomed to bear the glory of God the Father, and to share fellowship and speech with the holy angels, and to receive into the kingdom the union of spiritual beings — together with those the Lord finds still living in the body, waiting for him out of the heavens, having endured affliction and escaped the grip of the Wicked One. These are the ones of whom the prophet speaks: those remaining shall multiply across the land. And how large a number of believers God has readied for this purpose — to multiply on the earth as the remnant, to fall under the kingdom of the holy ones and serve this Jerusalem, and how a kingdom shall exist within it — the prophet Jeremiah revealed, saying: "Turn your gaze eastward, O Jerusalem, and see the joy God himself brings to you. Behold, the sons you sent away are returning; they gather from sunrise clear to sunset at the Holy One's command, exulting in the glory belonging to your God. Lay aside, O Jerusalem, the robe of your grief and hardship, and clothe yourself in the splendor of God's everlasting glory; wrap about you the double garment of righteousness from God, and place upon your head the crown of unending glory. For God will display your radiance to every nation beneath the sky. For God will forever call you by this name: Peace born of righteousness, glory of worship offered to God. Rise up, O Jerusalem, take your stand on high ground, turn your gaze eastward, and see your children gathered from where the sun rises to where it sets, summoned by the word of the Holy One, exulting in the very memory of their God. For on foot they departed from you, driven off by enemies; but God will bring them back to you borne aloft in glory, as upon a king's throne. For God has ordained that every towering mountain and the age-old hills be brought low, and every valley be raised up, leveling the ground, so that Israel might walk in safety within God's glory. And the forests and every fragrant tree gave Israel their shade at God's bidding. For God himself will go ahead rejoicing in the brightness of his glory, together with the mercy and justice that proceed from him." The prophet inquired how long the people's obstinacy would persist, and God replied: "Until the towns lie desolate" — the very thing the prophet had foretold, showing that its fulfillment lay in the future.
None of this material, then, can be taken as pointing to what lies beyond the heavens; for, he states, "God will display your radiance to every nation beneath the sky" — rather it points toward the age of the kingdom, when the earth has been summoned back by Christ, and Jerusalem raised anew according to the model of that Jerusalem which is on high, of which Isaiah the prophet writes: "See, I have inscribed your walls upon the palms of my hands, and you remain continually in my sight." The Apostle too, addressing the Galatians, states in the same vein: "But the Jerusalem above is a free woman, and she is mother to us all" — meaning by this not some notion of a straying Aeon, nor a power that broke away from the Pleroma along with Prunicus, but that Jerusalem engraved upon the hands of God. And it is this very Jerusalem — the new one — that John beheld coming down to earth in his Apocalypse. For following the age of the kingdom, he writes: "I beheld a vast throne, gleaming white, and one seated upon it, before whose face earth and sky fled away, leaving no place for them." He then goes on to depict what belongs to the universal resurrection and judgment, telling how he saw the dead, both the great and the lowly. "The sea," he writes, "released the dead within it, and death together with hell surrendered the dead they held; then the scrolls were opened. And a further scroll was opened, namely the scroll of life, and the dead were judged according to what was recorded in the scrolls, each by his own deeds; and death and hell were hurled into the lake of fire, which is the second death." This is what bears the name Gehenna, called by the Lord the fire that never ends. "And anyone," he writes, "whose name was absent from the scroll of life was hurled into the lake of fire." Following this he states: "I beheld a new sky and a new earth, for the former sky and the former earth had gone, and the sea existed no longer. And I beheld the sacred city, a new Jerusalem, descending out of the sky from God, made ready like a bride dressed for her groom. Then I heard," he writes, "a loud voice out of the throne, declaring: See, the dwelling place of God is among mortals, and he will make his home among them, and they will belong to him as his people, and God himself will be present with them as their own God. And he will dry every tear from their faces, and death will exist no longer, nor grief nor lament nor any further pain, since what came before has vanished." Isaiah proclaims this identical truth: "For a new sky and a new earth shall come to be, and what came before will not be recalled, nor cross anyone's mind, but instead they will discover joy and delight within it." And this is likewise what the Apostle declared: "For the shape of this present world is passing away." The Lord too states in the same way: "Sky and earth will pass away." These things, then, vanishing from the earth, we shall behold what is new — like a bride dressed for her groom; and this is God's dwelling place, where God will make his home among mortals. Of this Jerusalem, that earlier, earthly one stands as an image, in which the righteous are made ready beforehand for incorruptibility, and prepared for deliverance. And Moses received upon the mountain the model of this same dwelling place: nothing here calls for allegory, but everything stands firm and genuine, possessing real substance, fashioned by God for righteous men to enjoy. For just as surely as God himself raises mankind up, so surely does mankind rise again from among the dead, not in some figurative sense, as we have already demonstrated through many arguments. And just as he genuinely rises again, so will he genuinely be made ready beforehand for incorruptibility, expanding and flourishing throughout the age of the kingdom, until he becomes able to bear the Father's glory. Then, once everything has been made new, he will genuinely make his home in the city of God. For the one seated upon the throne declares: "See, I am making everything new." And the Lord states: "Set down all of this in writing, for these sayings are trustworthy and genuine." And he told me: "It is accomplished." And in this way it stands to reason.

======== Book V — Chapter 36 ========

Men will truly be raised up, and the world will not be utterly destroyed; but there shall be various dwelling-places for the saints, according to each one's worth, and all things shall be made subject to God the Father, and so God shall be all in all.
For since these are true men, their planting must also be true — meaning that it does not pass away into what does not exist, but goes forward in what does exist. For neither the substance nor the material of the created order is destroyed (for he who established it is true and steadfast), but "the fashion of this world passeth away" — that is, the state of things in which the transgression occurred, since man has grown old in it. And for this reason this present fashion has been made temporal, God having foreknown all things; and, as we have shown in the book preceding this one, we have also shown, so far as we were able, the reason for the temporal character of the world's formation. But when this fashion passes away, and man is renewed and flourishes in incorruption in such a way that he can no longer grow old, then there shall come to be a heaven made new and an earth made new, in which the man now renewed will abide without end, forever holding intimate fellowship with God there. And since these realities will remain unceasingly, without any end, Isaiah speaks in this way: "For just as the heaven I am making anew, and the earth made new, abide continually before me — thus, declares the Lord, your offspring and your name shall stand firm." And as the presbyters relate it, those judged deserving of a home among the heavens shall journey there; some others will take delight in the pleasures of paradise; and yet others will hold the glory of the city — for in every place the Savior shall be seen, and to the degree that they are worthy, so shall they see him. They say there is this distinction of dwelling between those who bore fruit a hundredfold, and those a sixtyfold, and those a thirtyfold: the first will be carried up to dwell among the heavens, the second will make his home in paradise, and the third will settle in the city; and that this is why the Lord said that there are many dwelling-places with the Father. For all things belong to God, who assigns a fitting dwelling to all — as his Word says, that a portion is allotted by the Father to all, to each according to what he is worthy of, or shall be found worthy of. And this is the wedding hall, in which shall recline those who are invited and feast at the marriage feast. The presbyters, the disciples of the apostles, say that this is the order and the arrangement of those who are being saved, and that they progress by these degrees, rising by way of the Spirit toward the Son, and by way of the Son toward the Father — with the Son, at the close, handing his finished work over to the Father, just as the Apostle likewise states: "For it is necessary that he reign, till the moment he has placed every enemy beneath his feet; death, the final enemy, will be brought to nothing." For during the era of that kingdom, the just man dwelling on earth will lose all memory of dying. Yet when it states that "everything has been placed beneath him," it is obvious this excludes the one who placed everything beneath him. And once everything has been made subject to him, the Son too will then submit himself to the one who subjected everything to him, so that God may become everything to everyone. John, then, foresaw with clarity the resurrection of the just as first in order, together with their inheritance of the kingdom here on earth; and the prophets prophesied in agreement with this. For the Lord also taught this, promising that he would drink of the new mixture of the cup with his disciples in the kingdom. And the Apostle, too, in the Epistle to the Romans, declares that it is God the Father who is shown, who formed man and promised to the patriarchs the inheritance of the earth, who brought it forth in the resurrection of the just, and fulfills his promises in the kingdom of his Son — thereafter bestowing, as a father, those things "which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man." For there is one Son, who accomplished the will of the Father; and there is one human race, within which the hidden purposes of God reach their fulfillment — purposes that the angels long to gaze upon, yet cannot fathom the depth of God's wisdom, whereby his own handiwork, shaped and joined into a single body together with the Son, comes to its perfection: so that the Word, the offspring first brought forth, may come down into what was fashioned, that is, into the creature, and be held within it; and that the creature, reciprocally, may hold the Word within itself and rise up toward him, passing beyond the angels, and come to bear the likeness and image of God. Here ends the fifth book of the blessed martyr Irenaeus.