4.9 The Church, the Spirit, and the Knowledge of God: Haer. 3.24.1–2
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Gen 3:23–24 to prepare them for salvation (C and C′).124 Throughout the course of the divine economy, the serpent has been striving to impede the progression of salvation for God's people (Gen 3:15). In the climax of the chiasm, Irenaeus compares the antithetical actions of Cain and Adam in response to God
(D and D′).125 When God questioned Cain, he was obstinate (Gen 4:9), but Adam's humbling actions were in every way contrary (Gen 3:7–8). In the same way, Irenaeus implores the faithful not to be obstinate before God like Cain, but humble as Adam. In doing so, he argues, the faithful will find salvation from the one who has trampled upon the serpent's head and restored the lost sheep of humanity to the fold of life.
For Irenaeus, Gen 3 could only be properly read within carefully constructed scriptural networks of interrelated texts. These networks include theological arrangements of the narrative in Gen 3, as well as tissues of texts spanning both testaments. These networks are bound together by the common imagery of Christ's recapitulation of Adam's disobedience. This includes the terms that correspond to Adam's formation such as the terms "first Adam" (1 Cor 15:47),
"vessel" (Matt 12:29), and "sheep" (Luke 15:4–7), as well as the eschatological use of the language "image" and "likeness." The discussion of Adam's disobedience draws together other terms such as: "life" (Rom 6:10), "serpent," (Luke
10:19, Ps 90(91):13), "enemy" (Luke 10:19), "dragon" (Rev 12:9/20:2), and "seed"
(Gen 3:15, Gal 3:16, 19), Irenaeus will also reorder the events in the text, such as the curses in Gen 3:14–19, in order to emphasize a particular theological point.
He also utilizes typological relationships when he frames an Adam-Cain typology. The relationship is primarily contrastive as Adam's actions are in every way dissimilar to Cain. Finally, Irenaeus readily applies the narrative of Adam's disobedience to the polemical context of his own community, and the theological challenges of his opponents.
4.9
The Church, the Spirit, and the Knowledge of God: Haer. 3.24.1–2 In the closing chapters of Haer. 3, Irenaeus is confident he has exposed the errors of his opposition and defended nature of God as Creator, Christ as fully divine and human, and the comprehensive salvific work of Christ epitomized in the preaching of the church. He also believes he has done so from the whole testimony of the apostles and prophets in the scriptures including the 124 Haer. 3.23.3, 6.
125 Haer. 3.23.4–5.
Reading Genesis From Creation To Incarnation "beginning, the middle and the end" (per initia et medietates et finem).126 The Bishop of Lyons identifies the content of the apostolic testimony as the unfolding of the redemptive history, which he describes as a perfect process that guides the faithful towards salvation. This imagery leads to an illustrative application of Gen 2:7 to the work of the Spirit in the church. Conflating Gen 1:26,
Gen 1:28, and Gen 2:7, he also characterizes the knowledge of God as Creator as the fundamental feature of the preaching of the church.
4.9.1
The Church, the Body and the Spirit: Haer. 3.24.1 (Gen 2:7) In the closing chapters, Irenaeus adds the pneumatological conclusion to Christ's recapitulative work. Christ unites God to the human formation in himself and then imparts the Spirit as the means to vivify the mortal flesh of all the faithful in the church.127 He imagines the human person as a "vessel"
(vaso, Matt 12:29) containing the "precious deposit" (eximium . . . depositum) of the faith of the church.128 The change of the inflection in the participles from perfect passive to present active signifies the tension in Irenaeus' thinking between the faith of the church that has been entrusted and the Holy Spirit that has been deposited with the people of God who are receiving them. By means of the Holy Spirit, the faith of the church continually renews the life of the vessel preserving the youthful nature of the vessel itself. Conflating the language of the "gift of God" (Dei munus) from Eph 2:8 with the creation scene of Gen 2:7, Irenaeus imagines the impartation of the breath of God in Gen
2:7 as the same manner of the gift of the Holy Spirit being imparted to the church.129 Just as the breath of God enlivened the formation of Adam in Gen
2:7, the gift of faith entrusted to the church enlivens the faithful.130 This life is also sustained through the operations of the Spirit in 1 Cor 12:11, who are the apostles, prophets and teachers mentioned in 1 Cor 12:28. Those who remain outside the church, again echoing the imagery of Gen 2:7, "defraud themselves of life" ( fraudant a uita).131
126 Haer. 3.24.1. In the context the "beginning middle and end" appear to be the Old
Testament, the Apostolic writings and the Church.
127 Behr, Asceticism, 66.
128 The term "vessal" uaso is a common Irenaean image: Haer. 3.8.2, Haer. 3.18.6, Haer. 3.23.1,
Haer. 4.33.4, and Haer. 5.22.1.
129 Haer. 3.24.1.
130 In the remaining portion of Haer. 3.24.1 continues to describe the deposit (deposita est) of the Holy Spirit into the church. He characterizes the work of the Spirit with three aspects drawn from other texts: "pledge of incorruption" (arrha incorruptelae) in Eph 1:14, "confirmation" (confirmatio) in Col 2:7, and "ladder of ascent" (scala ascensionis) in Gen 28:12.
131 Haer. 3.24.2.
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4.9.2
The Knowledge of the Creator: Haer. 3.24.2 (Gen 1:26, Gen 1:28, Gen 2:7) Finally, the last allusion to Gen 1–3 comes in Haer. 3.24.2, where Irenaeus makes one last critique of his opponents by suggesting the Gnostics reject a priori any conception of God within grasp of human knowledge. According to Irenaeus, the fundamental knowledge of God accessible to the human mind is the understanding of God as Creator. In making this assertion, Irenaeus implies his
Gnostics opponents reject the basic premise of all reality, the knowledge of the God revealed in the formation of humankind, which Behr terms the "pedagogy of the economy."132 In the midst of this polemic, Irenaeus draws together a network of passages that insist the knowledge of God accessible to all is the knowledge of the God, "who created [Gen 1:26] and formed [Gen 2:7a] and breathed into us the breath of life [Gen 2:7b] and nurtures us through creation [Gen
1:28], strengthening us by His Word [Psalm 32(33):6], and binding all things together in His Wisdom [Prov 8:30], this is who is the one true God" (qui fecit et plasmauit et insufflationem uitae insufflauit in eis et per conditionem nutrit nos,
Verbo suo confirmans et Sapientia compingens omnis, hic est qui est solus uerus Deus).133 For Irenaeus, the concern is the connection between the Creator and the creature and the knowledge of God's act of creation, not necessarily God's
"greatness" (magnitudinem) or even God's "nature" (substantiam).134 Instead, this narratival arrangement of creation texts is bound up with the identity of God and the nature of God's relationship to humanity. The movement from Gen 1:26, Gen 2:7, Gen 1:28, Psalm 32(33):6, and Prov 8:30 is not an unusual cluster of texts for Irenaeus.135 The verb fecit refers to the act of creation in the image and likeness of God (Gen 1:26), while plasmauit depicts the act of forming Adam from the dust (Gen 2:7). The remaining portion of Gen 2:7b is cited in the reference to the breathing in of the breath of life. The phrase "nurtures us through creation" (et per conditionem nutrit nos) is an echo of Gen 1:28 that describes the growth and maturity of humankind in and through what is created.136 This connection points to the creation texts Psalm 32(33):6 and Prov 8:30 and described the "strengthening" (confirmans) of the Word and the 132 Behr, Asceticism, 67.
133 Haer. 3.24.2.
134 Haer. 3.24.2.
135 Cf. Haer. 2.28.1; Haer. 3.3.3.
136 The retroversion parallels the terms "nourish" τρέφοντα and "increase" αὔξοντα the latter of which is the same term used in Gen 1:28 LXX. cf. Epid 11, 14; Haer. 3.10.3; Haer. 3.22.4;
Haer. 4.11.1.