Clement of Alexandria · a new plain-English translation from the original language
Such fear, then, leads on both to repentance and to hope. And hope is the good expectation of a good thing not yet present, held with good confidence. Indeed, even a readiness to fall into trust is taken up into hope, which we have learned is led by the hand toward love. Love would be concord among those who share the same reasoning, the same life, and the same character, or, to put it concisely, a partnership of life, or an intensity of friendship and affection joined with right reason concerning the use one makes of a companion. And the companion is another self; by which we also call brothers those who have been regenerated by the same word. Bordering on love is hospitality, being a kind of skill in the use of strangers; and strangers are those to whom worldly things are strange. For by "worldly" we understand those who hope in earth and in fleshly desires; "do not be conformed," says the apostle, "to this age, but be transformed by the renewal of the mind, so that you may test what the will of God is, the good and acceptable and perfect." Hospitality, then, is occupied with what is beneficial to strangers, and strangers are guest-friends, and guest-friends are friends, and friends are brothers; "dear brother," says Homer; and there is also love of humanity, on account of which there is likewise affection, being a friendly use of human beings; and affection, being a kind of skill in the cherishing of friends or kin, accompanies love together with these.
But if the true human being within us is the spiritual one, then brotherly love is love-of-humanity toward those who share in the same spirit; and cherishing, in turn, is the preservation of goodwill or of loving, and loving is complete approval, and to love is to be pleased with one's own character, being both drawn and led away; and they are drawn into sameness through concord, which is a knowledge of common goods; for likemindedness is a harmony of judgments. And, it says, "let love among us be without hypocrisy; let us ourselves become those who abhor what is evil, clinging to what is good, in brotherly love," and so on down to "as far as it is possible, so far as depends on you, being at peace with all men." Then it says, "be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." The same apostle also confesses that he bears witness for the Jews, that they have a zeal for God, but not according to full knowledge; for not knowing God's righteousness, and striving to set up a righteousness of their own devising, they refused to yield in submission before what God accounts righteous; for they never came to grasp and carry out what the law requires, but imagined that whatever notion they themselves had taken up was likewise the law's own intention; nor did they place trust in the law as something prophetic, but followed it with bare word and fear, not with disposition and faith; for the end of the law is Christ, unto righteousness, he who was prophesied by the law, for everyone who believes.
Hence it was said to these people through Moses: "I will provoke you to jealousy over a people that is no people, and I will anger you over a foolish nation," that is, over the nation that had become prepared for obedience. And through Isaiah it says: "I was found by those who were not seeking me, I became manifest to those who were not asking after me" -- this evidently spoken before the coming of the Lord, after which those same things prophesied are now said fittingly of Israel too: "I have stretched out my hands the whole day toward a disobedient and contradicting people." Do you see the reason for the calling from among the nations, plainly stated by the prophet as the people's disobedience and contradiction? Then the goodness of God is shown even in these matters; for the apostle says, "but by their trespass salvation came to the nations, so as to provoke them to jealousy and to make them willing to repent." And the Shepherd, simply applying the term to those who have fallen asleep, knows that there are certain righteous ones among the nations and among the Jews, not only before the Lord's coming, but even prior to the law, in keeping with what pleases God -- for instance Abel, or Noah, or whatever other righteous figure one might name.
It says, then, that the apostles and teachers who proclaimed the Son of God's name, once fallen asleep, proclaimed with power and with faith to those who had fallen asleep ahead of them. Then it continues: "and they themselves conferred on those the seal of the proclamation. Down into the water, then, along with these others they descended, and rose up once more. But the living descended alive and likewise rose up alive; whereas those already asleep went down dead and rose up alive; through this means, then, life was given them, and they came to recognize the Son of God's name. On this account they too rose up together with the others and were joined into the tower's structure, built in together unhewn; for their sleep had come while righteous and exceedingly pure, only this single seal was lacking to them." For when nations lacking the law nonetheless carry out its requirements as though by instinct, such people, though the law is absent, stand as a law unto themselves, so the apostle teaches.
As to how the virtues follow one upon another, what need is there to speak, since it has already been shown that faith rests upon repentance and hope, and reverent caution upon faith, and that perseverance and discipline in these things, together with learning, are brought to completion in love, which in turn is perfected by knowledge? But this must necessarily be noted besides: that only the divine is to be understood as wise by nature; wherefore wisdom too is a power of God that has taught the truth, and it is here, in some sense, that the perfection of knowledge is grasped. And the philosopher loves and cherishes the truth, having, from being a genuine servant, now come through love to be reckoned a friend. The beginning of this is wonder at things, as Plato says in the Theaetetus, and as Matthias in his Traditions exhorts, "wonder at the things present," laying this down as the first step of the knowledge beyond; wherefore also in the Gospel according to the Hebrews it is written, "he who has wondered shall reign, and he who has reigned shall rest." It is impossible, then, for the unlearned person, so long as he remains unlearned, to philosophize; nor can one who has not grasped the notion of wisdom philosophize, since philosophy is a longing for that which truly is, and for the studies that stretch toward this. And even if doing well has been practiced by some, still there remains knowing how one ought to use it and do it and labor it out together, by which one is also made like God -- I mean God the Savior -- worshiping the God of the universe through the Word who is high priest, through whom what is truly beautiful and just is beheld. Piety is action that follows and accompanies God.
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