Chapter 8. The Gifts of the Holy Spirit Make Us Spiritual and Prepare Us for Imperishability.
Chapter 8
1. At present we receive a certain part of his Spirit for the perfection and preparation of imperishability, so we may gradually become accustomed to receiving and bearing God. The Apostle also called this a pledge, that is, a part of the honor that was promised us by God. In his Letter to the Ephesians he says: And in him you also who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the pledge of our inheritance. So that by thus dwelling in us, this pledge already makes us spiritual, and what is mortal may be swallowed up by the immortal. He says, For you are not in the flesh, you are in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God dwells in you. But this does not take place by the boasting of the flesh, but by communion with the Spirit. For those to whom he wrote were not without flesh; but they had assumed God’s Spirit, through whom we cry, Abba, Father. If, therefore, at present with the aid of the pledge we cry Abba, Father, what will happen when on rising we shall see him face-to-face, when all the members will overflow with a hymn of joy, glorifying him who raised them from the dead and gave them the gift of eternal life? For if the pledge, by assuming man to itself, already makes us say Abba, Father, what will the entire grace of the Spirit do, which will be given to man by God? It will make us like him and will perfect us by the Father’s will; for it will make man according to God’s image and likeness.
2. The Apostle rightly calls those spiritual who have the pledge of the Spirit, because God’s Spirit dwells in them, and they do not serve the lusts of the flesh but subject themselves to the Spirit and live according to reason in every respect. Now, incorporeal spirits cannot be spiritual men; our substance, however, that is, the union of soul and body, receiving God’s Spirit, does constitute the spiritual man. On the other hand, the Apostle rightly calls those carnal who reject the counsel of the Spirit but serve the lusts of the flesh, and live senselessly and without restraint give themselves over to their own lusts, since they have no inspiration from the divine Spirit, but live like pigs and dogs, because they think of nothing but carnal things.
The Prophets, too, for the same reason, likened them to irrational animals, because of their irrational mode of living. They said, They have become like lusty stallions toward women, each neighing for his neighbor’s wife. And again, When man was in honor he was like the beasts. That is, because of his own fault, since he imitates their irrational life, he is likened to beasts. And even we customarily call such men beasts and irrational brutes.
3. Now, the Law predicted all these things in types, describing man by means of animals. It proclaims clean whatever have a cloven hoof and chew the cud; but whatever lacks both or either of those, it sets aside as unclean. Who, then, are clean? Those who through faith securely journey toward the Father and the Son. This is the security of those who have the cloven hoof, and meditate on the words of God day and night, in order to be adorned with good works, because that is the power of those who chew the cud. Contrariwise, the unclean animals, which have neither the cloven hoof nor chew the cud, that is, who neither have faith in God nor meditate on his words—these are [a type] of the loathsomeness of the Gentiles. Those, however, who chew the cud but do not have the cloven hoof, are also unclean—these are a figurative description of the Jews, who certainly have the words of God in their mouth but do not have their root firmly fixed in the Father and the Son. For that reason their race is liable to slip. Animals, namely, that have an uncloven hoof easily fall; those that have the cloven hoof are more secure, because their cloven hooves succeed each other as they step along, and so one hoof gives support to the other. Equally unclean are those who have the cloven hoof but do not chew the cud—this [type] manifests nearly all heretics and those who do not meditate on the words of God and are not adorned with works of righteousness. Of them the Lord said, Why do you call me, “Lord, Lord,” and do not do what I tell you? Such people indeed say that they believe in the Father and the Son but never meditate on the words of God as is proper and are not adorned with the works of righteousness; but, as we have said, they have lived the life of pigs and dogs, giving themselves over to uncleanness and gluttony and the rest of the carefree life. Rightly, then, does the Apostle call carnal and animal all such who on account of their unbelief and licentious living do not obtain the divine Spirit, and cast away, by their various traits, the Word that gives life, and live irrationally in their lusts. The Prophets, however, called them beasts and wild animals. Custom styled them brutes and irrational [animals], but the Law pronounces them unclean.