Chapter 26. John and Daniel Predicted the Fall of the Roman Empire.
Chapter 26
1. Still more clearly in the Apocalypse has John, the Lord’s disciple, pointed out the things about the last times, and the empire which now reigns will be divided among the ten kings. He explained what the ten horns seen by Daniel were. He affirmed that this is what was said to him: And the ten horns that you saw are ten kings who have not yet received royal power, but they are to receive authority as kings for one hour together with the beast. These are of one mind and give over their power and authority to the beast; they will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those with him are called and chosen and faithful. Hence, it is evident that he who is to come will kill three of these, and the rest will be made subject to him; he himself will be the eighth among them. They will lay Babylon waste, and will burn her with fire, and will give her kingdom to the beast, and will put the Church to flight. After that they will be destroyed by the Lord’s coming. In fact, the Lord said that the kingdom must be divided and thus perish: Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and no city or house divided against itself will stand. So it is necessary that the kingdom and city and house be divided into ten parts. For this reason he already prefigured the partition and division.
Daniel, too, said carefully that the end of the fourth kingdom is the toes of the statue that was seen by Nebuchadnezzar, against which the stone cut off without hands fell. He says: And its feet were partly iron and partly clay, till the stone that was cut off without hands smote the statue on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces completely. Then for the interpretation he said: And as you saw the feet and the toes partly of potter’s clay and partly of iron, it shall be a divided kingdom; but some of the firmness of iron shall be in it, just as you saw the iron mixed with miry clay. And the toes of the feet were indeed partly iron and partly clay. So the ten toes are the ten kings among whom the kingdom will be divided, of which some are strong and energetic, while others will be weak and idle, and they will not agree among themselves. Of this Daniel said: The Kingdom shall be partly strong and partly brittle. And as you saw the iron mixed with miry clay, so will they mix with one another in marriage, but they will not hold together, just as iron does not mix with clay. And that the end will come he tells us: And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, nor shall his sovereignty be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand for ever, just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no hands, and that it broke in pieces the clay and the iron and the bronze and the silver and the gold. The great God has made known to the king what shall be hereafter. The dream is true and its interpretation sure.
2. If, therefore, the great God pointed out future things through Daniel, and confirmed them by his Son; and if Christ is the stone which was cut off without hands who will destroy the temporal kingdoms and bring on the eternal kingdom, that is, the resurrection of the just—Scripture says: In those days God will set up a kingdom of heaven, which shall never be destroyed—then let those who reject the Creator and do not agree that the Prophets have been sent in advance by the Father (from whom also the Lord came), but affirm that the prophecies came from various powers, let them come to their senses, since they have been put to shame.
Certainly, the things that were in like manner predicted by the Creator through all the Prophets, these Christ brought to completion in the end, ministering to the Father’s will and fulfilling the economies regarding the human race. Therefore, those who blaspheme the Creator either in so many words and openly, as the Marcionites do, or by twisting the thought, as do the Valentinians and all falsely so-called Gnostics, should be recognized by all God-fearing people as tools of Satan, through whom Satan at present, and not before, is seen to blaspheme God who has prepared the eternal fire for every rebellion. For he does not dare by himself to blaspheme his Lord openly, just as in the beginning he deceived man by means of the serpent, as if being hidden from God.
3. Justin has said correctly that before the Lord’s coming into the world, Satan never dared blaspheme God, since he did not yet know about his own condemnation, because the Prophets spoke of him in parables and allegories. However, after the Lord’s coming he ascertained clearly from the words of Christ and of the apostles that eternal fire had been prepared for him who of his own will departed from God and for all who unrepentant continue in rebellion. By means of such men he blasphemes God who sets the sentence, as if he were already condemned, and he imputes the sin of rebellion to his Creator and not to his own free choice. That is how those act, too, who transgress laws and then when they suffer punishment they blame the lawgivers but not themselves. In the same manner these men, who are full of the diabolical spirit, make innumerable accusations against their Creator—who gave us also the Spirit of life, and made a suitable law for all—and who deny that God’s judgment is just. Wherefore, they concoct some other Father, who does not care for or provide the things that concern us, or who even approves all sin.