the tabernacle, when Moses went in there to speak with the Lordface toface, as a man speaks to
Book XII 467 apostle had a much better and incomparably more thorough knowledge than we do, of what we lesser mortals try in whatever way we can to know about the bodily and non-bodily spheres. So then, if he knew that it is quite impossible to see spiritual things through the body and bodily things when out of the body, why did he not also discern by the very things he saw the manner in which he was able to see them? If, after all, he was certain that they were spiritual, why was he no less certain in consequence that he was out of the body when he saw them? If however he knew that they were bodily, why did he not also know that they could only be seen through the body? So then what makes him uncertain whether he saw them in the body or out of the body, unless perhaps he is also uncertain whether they were bodies or just the likenesses of bodies?
And so let us first see in the context of these words what he has no doubts about, and thus with the things he does have doubts about left over as a remainder, it will become clear, maybe, from what he is sure about how he can still be uncertain about these.
8. / know, he says, a man in Christfourteen years ago, whether in the body l do not know or out of the body ldo not know, Godknows, such a one snatched up to the third heaven (2 Cor 12:2). So then he knows that fourteen years ago in Christ a man was snatched up to the third heaven. This he is not in the least unsure about, so neither should we be. But whether in the body or out of the body he is unsure about; so with him being unsure about it, which of us will have the audacity to know for certain? Surely it does not also follow from this, does it, that we should have doubts about there being a third heaven to which he says a man was snatched up? lf, you see, the real thing itself was shown him, then the third heaven was shown him; while ifsome image in the likeness of bodily things was produced, then it was not the actual third heaven, but the showing was so arranged that he seemed to himself to climb up to the first heaven, above which he saw another, and on again climbing up to that he once more saw another one higher up still, so that when he had reached that he could say he was snatched up to the third heaven. But that what he was snatched up to was the third heaven he neither had any doubts about himself nor wished us to have any. That, I mean to say, is why he began with "l know," putting it first, so that the only ones who do not believe there is any truth in what the apostle says he knows are those who do not believe the apostle.
4, 9. So then, he knows that a man was snatched up to the third heaven; hence what he was snatched up to really and truly is the third heaven, not some bodily sign, like the one that was shown to Moses.5 He for his part was so conscious of the difference between the very substance of God and the visible creature in
5. He means the pillar ofcloud, the cloud of God's glory which came down to stand at the door of the tabernacle, when Moses went in there to speak with the Lordface toface, as a man speaks to hisfriend. Ex 33:7-11.