34. De catechizandis rudibus 4.8 (CCL 46:128); my trans. (continued)
Against the Manichees 227 veyed that, once interpreted, force those who wanted beforehand to condemn rather than learn to confess their own misery.36
Christ's Refreshing Presence in the
Old Testament
Faustus had dismissed the Old Testament as unworthy of and worthless to true Christians. This attitude exasperated Augustine. In his Against Faustus, he spends more energy answering this objection than any other. Why? Because, as time went on, he became deeply convinced that the Old Testament did not simply offer scattered predictions about Christ's coming; it itself contained the story of Christ. To reject the Old Testament was to reject Christ. He tells Faustus at one point: "Everything contained there in the texts [of the Old Testament] is said either of Christ or on account of him."37 In the following passage, one sees how Augustine sensed Christ's "refreshing" presence everywhere in the pages of the Old Testament. From Against Faustus the Manichee, Book 12: (25) You say that Christ was not predicted by the Israelite prophets— Christ, the One for whom all those [Old Testament] pages keep vigil, looking out so as to predict him. If only you would just piously scrutinize things rather than superficially rail against them. Who else left his own land and his own kinsmen in the person of Abraham in order to grow rich and prosperous among outsiders (Gn 12:1–3) but the One who, as we see, abandoned the land and kin of the Jews—from which He was born according to the flesh— and flourished and prevailed among the Gentiles? Who else carried wood for sacrifice in the person of Isaac (Gn 22:6) but the One who Himself carried the cross for His own Passion? What other soon-to-be-immolated ram got His horns snagged in a thornbush (Gn 22:13) except the One who got fastened to the cross-beam of the cross as an offering on our behalf?
(26) Who else wrestled with Jacob in the person of the angel when, on the one hand, He blessed—as the weaker to the stronger and the conquered to the conqueror—the one who overcame him and yet, on the other hand, He rendered [Jacob's] thigh bone lame (Gn 32:24–31), but the One who, having allowed the people of Israel to overcome Him, blessed those among them who believed in Him? Jacob's thigh, however, became lame, as it were, in the multitude of the people of His flesh. What other stone was placed at Jacob's head and was even anointed (Gn 28:11) but Christ, the head of the [new] man? (This happened so that, in some way, it would be named and expressed. For
36. De utilitate credendi 3.9 (CSEL 25.1:12–13); my trans., based on Meagher, FOTC 4:400–402. 37. Contra Faustum 12.7 (CSEL 25.1:335); my trans.