Clement of Alexandria · a new plain-English translation from the original language
To begin with, that which is 'up to us' is that of which we are equally masters, both of it and of its opposite — as, for instance, whether to philosophize or not, and whether to believe or to disbelieve. For it is precisely because we are equally masters of each of two opposed things that what is 'up to us' is found to be possible at all. And indeed the commandments are such as can either be kept or not kept by us, and on this reasonably follow both praise and blame; while those who are punished for the sins they have committed are punished on account of those very acts alone. For what has happened has passed, nor could a thing that has happened ever become as though it had not happened. The sins committed before faith are, at any rate, remitted by the Lord — not so that they should not have happened, but as though they had not happened. Yet not even all of them, says Basilides; rather, only the involuntary ones and those committed through ignorance are remitted, as might be done by some man, though not by God, who confers so great a gift. To such a one Scripture says: 'You supposed, lawless one, that I would be like you.' But even if we are punished for voluntary sins, we are chastised not so that the deeds already done might not have been done, but because they were done. Punishment does not benefit the sinner by undoing what he has done, but toward his no longer sinning, nor indeed toward anyone else falling into similar wrongs.
Here, then, the good God disciplines for these three causes: first, that the one being disciplined may become better than himself; then, that those who can be saved through examples may be forewarned by being admonished; and third, so that the one wronged may not be held in contempt and thus liable to further wrong. And the modes of correction are two: the one instructive, the other punitive, which we have also called disciplinary. It is to be understood, however, that those who fall into sins after the washing are the ones being thus disciplined; for the sins done beforehand were remitted, but those that arise afterward are being purged away. Concerning the unbelieving it has been said that they count for no more than husks a gust scatters off the surface of the ground, or a single drop spilled out of a pail.
← All of Clement of Alexandria: Exhortation, Instructor & Miscellanies