60. So that which is spoken physiologically by Plato in Plato's^
Plato s doctrine of the Creation, and of the Son of God.
own hands: but such as rise to the contemplation of celestial Apol. subjects, they thwart; and if they have not sober thought- -' ^^' fuhiess, and do not lead a life pure, and free from passion, plunge them mto ungodliness.
59iAnd that you may learn that Plato borrowed from Plato's our teachers, (I mean the account which is given by the ^°„\""'"
Prophets,) when he said that God altered shapeless matter, from and created the world; hear how the same things are expressly taught by Moses, who has been mentioned before as the first Prophet, and older than the Greek writers; by whom the Spirit of Prophecy, declaring how, and from what,
God in the beginning created the world, spoke thus: In Gen.
\, the heginning God created the heaven and the earth; and the earth ivas invisible, and unfurnished, and darkness ivas upon • the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved over the waters. And God. said, Let there he light, and it was so.
So that both Plato, and those who agree with him, and we ourselves, have learnt, and you may be persuaded, that by the Word of God, the whole world was created from subject matter which was described before by Moses.
That too which your poets call Erebus, we know to have beenl>eut.
•^ ^ .
< 32, 22. previously mentioned by Moses.^ 60. So that which is spoken physiologically by Plato in Plato's^ his Timaeus about the Son of God, when he says, He placed of the Him in the universe after the manner of the letter x^y he^^^' likewise borrowed from Moses; for it is related in the Mosaic writings, that at the time when the Israelites went out of Egypt, and were in the desert, venomous beasts, vipers, and asps, and every kind of serpents, assailed them, and destroyed the people: on which Moses, from the inspiration and direction communicated from God, took brass, and formed it into the shape of a cross", and placed it on the holy tabernacle, and said to the people, "If you ^oo^.^ee^^ upon that figure, and believe, you shall be saved;" and when 21, 8.' this was done, he related that the serpents died ; and ret exiWev avThv eV t^ irat/Ti.
Said letter.
See hi>! Timsus. by Plato of the soul of the Universe, " Ed. Ben. observes, that the word in (which he calls the Son of the Creator,) the LXX is anfietov, which St. Justin with reference to the inclination of the would understand of the figure of the Ecliptic and the Equator, which cross Cross, one another at the Equinoxes like that
46 Christians' knowledge isfrom God. Regenerationhy Bajptism.
Just, corded, that by tliis means, the people escaped death.
Plato ^^•^^^ then read this ; and not accurately knowing or perceiving that it was a figure of the cross, but seeing only the form of the Letter x^ ^^ ^^i^j ^^^^^ *^^^ power next to the first God, was in the Universe in the shape of a %; and his mention of a third, is derived, as I have already said, from his reading the words of Moses, The Spirit of God ynoved above the waters: for he gives the second place to the Word of God; Who, he says, is placed after the manner of a ;(; in the Universe; and the third, to the Spirit, Who is said to move above the water; saying, "The Third about the Third''."
And hear how the prophetic Spirit declared by Moses, that there should be a conflagration; he spoke as Deut. follows; A71 everlasting fire shall descend, and hum to the pit
^^' ^^' heloiv.
It is not then that we hold the same opinions as others, but that all men imitate and repeat ours ; for you may hear and learn these things among us, from those who do not even know the shape of their letters, but who are ignorant and rude in speech, though wise and faithful in mind; some too are blind, or deprived of their eyes; thus you may perceive, that these things have not been by human wisdom", but are uttered by the power of God.
Chris61. How we dedicated ourselves to God, being new Baptism ^^^^^ through Christ, I will explain, lest, if I omit this, I appear to be cheating in my explanation.
All then who are persuaded, and believe, that the things which are taught and afiirmed by us are true; and who promise to S. Cyril, be able to live accordingly; are taught to pray, and beg ^^''
^* God with fasting, to grant them forgiveness of their former sins; and we pray and fast with them.
Then we bring them where there is water; and after the same manner of regeneration as we also were regenerated ourselves, they are regenerated ; for, in the Name of God, the Father and Lord
S.Cyril, of all things, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Lect.20. jjQJy Ghost, they then receive the washing of water
: for, " The Third, ra Se rplra Trepi rhv Benedictine does not think it necessary rpiTov.
In the second Epistle of Plato to alter the text of St. Justin ; as Proit is read, rbv rpiroj/ Trepl ra rp/ra, and clus' version proves that there must also by St. Clement of Alexandria and have been copies which contained the others ; but as Proclus, lib.
2. Theosame reading, logise Platonicie, reads it as above, the
Man, horn in the Flesh, needs a new Birth of the Word. 47 indeed, Christ also said, Except ye he horn again, ye shall Apol. not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
And tliat it is im- /i ^'!' possible for those who are once born to enter into their 3. mothers' wombs, is plain to all.
And it is declared by the Prophet Isaiah, as I have already written, in what way those who have sinned, and who repent, shall escape their sins.
It is said as follows; Wash ye, make you clean, put away the la. i, ^^~''^^' evil of your doings from your souls; learn to do ivell, judge the fatherless, and plead for the widow.
And come and let us reason together, saith the Lord; and though your sijis he as scarlet, I ivill make them luhite like tvool; though they he red like crimson, I will make them white like snow.
But if ye will not hear me, a sword shall devour you; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.
And we have received the following reason from the Apostles for so doing ; since we were ignorant of our first birth, and were born by necessity of the moist seed through the mutual union of our parents, and were brought up in evil customs and wicked training; in order that we might not remain the children of necessity and ignorance, but of choice, and of knowledge; and that we might obtain remission of the sins we had formerly committed; in the water >', there is called over him who chooses the new birth, and repents of his sins, the name of God the Father and Lord of all things; and calling Him by this name alone, we bring the person to be washed to the laver": for no one can declare the name of the ineffable God, but if any one presumes to say that He has any, he commits an act of incurable madness.
Now this washing is called illumination ', because they who learn i <^ctJT((rthe meaning of these things are enlightened in their mind. ^'^^• And in the name of Jesus Christ, Who was crucified under Pontius Pilate ; and in the name of the Holy Ghost, Who foretold, by the Prophets, all these things about Jesus; does he who is enlightened receive his washing. y ' In the water,' may perhaps be notice the principal argument for it, taten, as in £d. Ben. with the previous namely, that tovtou makes no sense words. whatever; ' iiriXeyouTos tov rhu Aova6~ ^ avrh TOVTO iJ.6vov iiriKeyovTes, TOVjx^vou^'yovTos.^
' The person who leads rov \ova6jj.€voV oLyofTes iirl rb XovrpSv. him who is to be washed to the laver Ben. doubtfully rejects the obvious saying this and no more.' emendation of Thirlby, hut does not
; ;
48 Rites of initiation.
It was Christ JVho spohe to Moses.
Just.
6.^. And the devils, hearing of this baptism which was taus-ht by the Prophet, instigated those who enter into their
Satanic o ^ i i i ^ i imitatemples, and who are about to come beiore them ; paying tions of jjj^.jj-^]^ offerings, and burnt offerings, also to sprinkle themtisra. selves : and they cause men to go and wash their whole persons before they come to the temples where they are enshrined ; and the command given by the priests, to those who enter the temples and worship in them, to put off their shoes, the devils have learnt, and imitated, from what happened to Moses, the Prophet whom I have mentioned.
For, at the time when Moses was commanded to go down into Egypt, and bring out the people of Israel who were there, as he was feeding the sheep of his uncle on the mother's side^ in the land of Arabia, our Christ held converse with Exod.8, him in the shape of fire from a bush, and said. Put off thy ^' shoes, and draiv near and hear : and when he put off his shoes, and drew near, he heard that he was to go down into Egypt, and bring out the people of Israel who were there and he received a mighty power from Christ, Who spoke to liim in the shape of fire : and he went down, and led out the people, having wrought great and wonderful things which, if you wish to know, you may learn them accurately from his writings.
TheSon, 63. But all the Jews teach even now, that the unnamed JFather ^^^ spoke with Moses.
Whence the Spirit of prophecy, spake to when blaming them by Isaiah, the before-m.entioned Prophet,
Is.
1, 3, spoke as I have already related.
The ox knowetli his owner, and the ass his master s crib, hut Israel doth not know Me, My people hath not understood Me.
And Jesus the Christ, because the Jews knew not what the Father was and what Mat. 11, the Son, upbraids them in like manner, and says, No man knoweth the Father, hut the Son: nor the Son, hut the Father, and those to whom the Son will reveal Him.
But the Word See§.46. of God is His Son, as I have already said; and He is called
Ma].3,].j47igel and Apostle, for He declares all that ought to be ' known, and is sent to proclaim what is told, as indeed our i/ * Mother's brother.
" This," says wrote mother's brother, for father-inthe Benedictine, '' is a strange mistake law.
Thirlby supposes him to have of St. Justin," and be thinks, that the confused the accounts of Moses and holy Martyr, by a slip of the memory, Jacob.
The Jews ]:erceiv:'d not that the Son spoke to Moses.
Lord Himself said, He that heareth Me, heareth Him that Apol. sent Me.
And this will be clear from the writings of j^^^q Moses, in which it is said as follows:
Arid the Angel of God^^spake unto Moses in a fiame of fire out of the midst of «2.u.i5'. hush, and said, I Am That I Am, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of thy fathers; go down into Egypt, and bring up My people.
And what followed, 3^ou who wish may learn from them; for it is not possible to write all the events in this book, but thus mu'ch has been said to prove that Jesus, the Christ, is the Son and Apostle of God, being formerly the Word; and at one time appearing in the form of fire, and at another in the image of incorporeal beings^; but now, by the will of God, being made man for the human race, He endured also to suffer all that the devils caused to be inflicted on Him by the senseless Jews; who, having it expressly said in the Mosaic writings. And the Angel of God spake with Moses ^^^^-'^^ in a flame of fire in the bush, and said, I Am That I * * '
Am, the God of Abraham^ the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; affirm that it was the Father, and Maker of all things, Who spoke thus.
Hence also the Spirit of prophecy upbraids them as follows:
Israel hath not known Me, ili?/Ts. 1,3. people hath not understood Me.
And again, Jesus, as we have shewn, when with them, said, No one knoweth the^^^^^^-> Father but the Son, nor the Son but the Father, and those to whom the Son will reveal Him.
The Jews then always thinking that the Father of all things spoke to Moses; He Who spoke to him being the Son of God, Who is called both
Angel and Apostle ; are rightly upbraided both by the Spirit of Prophecy, and by Christ Himself, as knowing neither the Father, nor the Son: for they who say that the Son is the • Father, are proved neither to know the Father, nor that the Father of all things has a Son, Who, being moreover the First-born Word of God, is also God, and Who forinerly, through the shape of fire, and through an incorporeal image, appeared to Moses, and the other Prophets
; but now, in the time of your government, as I said before, was made man of a Virgin, according to the counsel of the Father, for the * Perhaps, as Ben. prefers, ' an inunderstand it a few lines below, corporeal image;' for so it is easier to
50 Mifierva and Proserpine imitations of the Word and Spirits Just, salvation of those who believed on Him, and endured to be
—^^^ set at nought, and to suffer ; that by dying, and rising again, He might overcome death : but that which was spoken from the bush to Moses, I Am That I Am, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, and the God of thy fathers; is significant that they, though dead, remain in existence ; and are the men of this very Christ ; for these are the first of all men who were employed in the search after God.
Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac of Jacob, as Moses also wrote.
Fables 64. And, that the devils incited them to place the image serpine of her who is called Proserpine', at the fountains of waters; and Miguying, that she was the daughter of Jupiter, in imitation of » Yi6p7i'! what was spoken by Moses ; you may perceive from what 2 §. 9. has been already said ^ : for Moses declared, as I have Gen. 1, previously written. In the beginning God created the heavens
^~^* and the earth ; and the earth was without form and void, and the Spirit of God moved upon the ivaters.
In imitation then of the Spirit of God, which was said to be borne upon the water, they declared that Proserpine was the daughter of Jupiter.
Minerva, too, in like manner, they craftily afiirmed to be the daughter of Jupiter; not from sexual ?or union, but when they knew that God, by His Word^, con- «Eeason ^.gjyg^j ^nd made the world, they described Minerva as the ^rwoio first conception^; which we consider to be most ridiculous, to adduce the female form as the image of the conception : and in like manner their actions convict the others who are called the sons of Jupiter.
The 65, But after thus washing him who has professed, and Euchagiven his assent, we bring him to those who are called risL brethren; where they are assembled together, to offer Lectr'/ prayers in common both for ourselves, and for the person xxiij./ ^yY^Q i^j^g received illumination, and all others every where, with all our hearts, that we might be vouchsafed, now we have learnt the truth, by our works also to be found good Acts 23, citizens and keepers of the commandments, that we may Phil.
obtain everlasting salvation.
We salute one another with 27a kiss when we have concluded the prayers: then is brought •'' irpoto the President^ of the brethren, bread, and a cup of water
^'^^T'^.and wine^ which he receives; and oflfers up praise and rus