Clement of Alexandria · a new plain-English translation from the original language
But who are the two or three who are gathered together in the name of Christ, among whom the Lord is in the midst? Does he not mean by the three a man, a woman, and a child, because a wife is joined to a husband through God? But even if someone wishes to be unencumbered, not choosing childbearing because of the preoccupation involved in childbearing, let him remain, says the apostle, unmarried as I am. For they explain that the Lord means to say that with the majority he is the Demiurge, the god who is the author of generation, but with the one, the elect, he is the Savior, being manifestly the son of another god, the good one. But this is not so; rather, God is present, through the Son, both with those who have married and had children with self-control, and likewise the same God is present with the one who has practiced continence rationally.
There would also be another way to take the three: passion, desire, and reason; or, according to another account, flesh, soul, and spirit.
Perhaps also the aforementioned triad hints at calling, and election, second, and third, the race that is ranked into the first honor; with these the all-surveying power of God is divided without being divided. He, then, who uses the natural activities of the soul as is fitting, desires what is suitable and hates what is harmful, just as the commandments direct: for it says, you shall bless the one who blesses and curse the one who curses. But when, having also risen above these — passion and desire — he loves creation in deed for the sake of the God and maker of all things, he will live gnostically, having acquired an effortless habit of self-control through his assimilation to the Savior, having united knowledge, faith, and love, being from that point on one in judgment and truly spiritual, in every way wholly unreceptive of reasonings that follow passion and desire — he who is brought to completion according to the image of the Lord by the Artificer himself, a perfect man, already worthy to be called brother by the Lord, being at once both friend and son. Thus the two and the three are gathered together into one, namely the gnostic man.
The concord of the many might also be reckoned from the three with whom the Lord is present: the one church, the one man, the one race. Or was it not the case that with the one, the Jewish people, the Lord was giving the law, while already prophesying and sending Jeremiah to Babylon, and also calling those from the nations through prophecy, gathering together the two peoples, and a third was being created out of the two, one into a new man, in whom indeed he walks about and dwells, in the church itself? Law and prophets together with the gospel are gathered into one knowledge in the name of Christ. Therefore those who do not marry out of hatred, or who indiscriminately abuse the flesh out of desire, are not numbered among those who are saved, among whom the Lord is.
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