9. The Latin sine opere virili is almost untranslatable. Cf. Lk 1.34. (continued)
TRACTATE 4 95 did he confess? "And he confessed, 'I am not the Christ.'"
4. "And they asked him, 'What then? Are you EHas?'" For they knew that Elias was going to precede the Christ. For the name of the Christ was not unknown to anyone among the Jews. They did not think that this man was the Christ; but they did not at all [think] that the Christ would not come. At the very time when they were looking for him to come, they so stumbled against him when he was present, as if they stumbled against a low stone.' For that stone was as yet small, recently indeed hewn from a mountain without hands, as the Prophet Daniel says that he had seen a stone hewn from a mountain without hands.
(2) But what follows? "And that stone," he says, "increased, and became a great mountain, and filled the whole face of the earth. "^ See, then, beloved people, what I am saying. Before the Jews Christ had already been hewn from a mountain.
[Daniel] intends the mountain to be understood as the kingdom of the Jews. But the kingdom of the Jews had not filled the whole face of the earth. That stone was hewn from it because from it the Lord was born in his life here [on earth]. And why without hands? Because a virgin gave birth to Christ without involving any man.** Already, therefore, that stone had been hewn without hands before the eyes of the Jews, but it was a low [stone]. And not improperly so, since that stone had not yet increased and filled the earth. He showed this in his own kingdom, which is the Church, by which he has filled all the face of the earth.
(3) Because, then, he had not yet increased, they stumbled against him as if against a stone, and in them there was brought about what was written, "Whoever will fall upon that stone will be smashed to pieces; but upon whomever that stone will fall, it will grind them to powder." First they fell upon him in his lowliness; in exaltation he will come upon them. But in order that when he will come in exaltation he may grind them
7. Cf. Rom 9.32-33. 8. Cf. Dn 2.34-35. 9. The Latin sine opere virili is almost untranslatable. Cf. Lk 1.34. 10. Cf. Lk 20.18.