Clement of Alexandria · a new plain-English translation from the original language
But just as the proclamation has now come in its proper season, so too in their proper season the law and the prophets were granted to the barbarian peoples, while philosophy came as a gift to the Greek nation, preparing their ears for what was to be proclaimed. At any rate the Lord who rescued Israel says: "In an acceptable time I heard you, and in a day of salvation I helped you; I gave you as a covenant to the nations, that you might inhabit the earth and inherit a desolate inheritance," saying to those in bonds, "Come out," and to those in darkness, "Be revealed." For if the Jews were the prisoners — of whom also the Lord said, "Come out from your bonds, you who are willing" — meaning those who had bound themselves willingly and, through human presumption, had loaded upon themselves burdens hard to bear, then it is plain that those in darkness would be those who had their governing faculty buried in idolatry. For those who were righteous under the law, faith was lacking, and it was for this reason that the Lord, healing them, said, "Your faith has saved you." But for those who were righteous under philosophy, what was missing was more than trust in the Lord alone; a departure from idol-worship was needed as well. So as soon as the truth was revealed, they too repented of what they had done before; and this is why the Lord preached the good news even to those in Hades.
At any rate Scripture puts it this way: "Hades speaks to Ruin: 'His shape has not appeared before us, yet the sound of him has reached our hearing.'" Surely it was not the region itself that acquired a voice and uttered those very words; rather, it was those ranked within Hades who had surrendered themselves to ruin, much as men who had leapt of their own accord from a vessel into the deep — it is these who caught the sound and force of what is divine. For what person of sound mind would imagine that the souls of the righteous and of sinners lie under one and the same condemnation, thereby pouring injustice upon Providence? What then? Do these texts not make clear that the Lord preached the good news to those who perished in the flood, or rather to those held fast in bonds, and to those confined in prison and under guard? It has also been shown in the second Stromateus that the apostles, following the Lord's example, likewise preached the good news to those in Hades. For it was fitting, I believe, that just as it happened in this world, so likewise in that other realm, the finest among the disciples should model themselves upon their teacher, so that one might lead to conversion those from among the Hebrews, and others the nations — that is, those who had lived their lives in righteousness according to law and according to philosophy, yet not perfectly but sinfully bringing their life to its close. For this was fitting to the divine dispensation: that those who had shown themselves worthy in righteousness and had lived their lives well in the main, and who had repented of their transgressions, even if they happened to be making their confession in another place, being among those belonging to God the Almighty, should be saved according to each one's own knowledge.
And the Savior, I think, is at work in this too, since to save is his work. And this indeed is what he has done: he drew to salvation, through the proclamation, those who were willing to believe in him, wherever they happened to have lived. If, then, the Lord went down into Hades for no other reason than to preach the good news, as indeed he did go down, then either he preached to all, or only to the Hebrews. If, then, to all, then all will be saved who believed, even those who happen to be of the nations, once they have made their confession there — since the punishments of God are salutary and disciplinary, leading to conversion, and choosing the sinner's repentance rather than his death, and this all the more since souls freed from bodies are able to see more clearly, even if they are still overshadowed by their passions, because they are no longer obstructed by the flesh. But if he preached the good news only to the Jews, who lacked the knowledge and faith that come through the Savior, then it is plain, since God shows no partiality, that the apostles too, just as here, so there also preached the good news to those of the nations who were fit for conversion; and the Shepherd says well: "They went down with them into the water, but these went down alive and came up alive; whereas those others, who had fallen asleep before, went down dead and came up alive."
Indeed, the Gospel also says that many bodies of those who had fallen asleep were raised up, clearly having been transferred to a better rank. There has come to be, then, a certain universal movement and transposition according to the dispensation of the Savior. A righteous man, therefore, does not differ from a righteous man insofar as he is righteous, whether he lives under the law or is a Greek; for God is Lord not of the Jews only, but of all men, and more intimately still, Father of those who have come to know him. For if to live well is to live lawfully, and to live reasonably is to live according to law, and since those whose conduct was upright before any law was given were counted among believers and deemed just, then it is plain that those too who found themselves outside the law, because of the particular character of their soul, having lived rightly — even if they happened to be in Hades and under guard — upon hearing the voice of the Lord, whether his own direct voice or that working through the apostles, would be converted and believe with all speed. For we keep in mind that the Lord embodies God's power, and no power can ever be feeble. In this manner, I believe, it becomes clear both that God is good and that the Lord holds the strength to save, dealing justly and evenly with all who convert to him, be it in this world or another. For the power that is at work does not reach only to this place, but is everywhere, and works always.
Straightaway, in the Preaching of Peter, we find the Lord addressing the disciples once he had risen: "You twelve I selected, deeming you disciples fit for myself, chosen by the Lord's own will, and reckoning you trustworthy emissaries, dispatching you across the world to bring the good tidings to mankind everywhere it dwells, so that people everywhere might come to know that God is one, making clear through faith in Christ the things that are to come, through my agency, so that those who hear and believe may be saved, and those who hear and do not believe may bear witness, having no defense to offer by saying, 'We did not hear.'" What then? Was not the same dispensation carried out in Hades as well, so that there too all souls, upon hearing the proclamation, might either show forth their repentance, or acknowledge that the punishment they suffer for their unbelief is just? For it would be an act of no ordinary unfairness that those who departed life before the coming of the Lord, without having had the good news preached to them, and without having furnished from themselves any occasion, by believing or not believing, should nonetheless share in either salvation or punishment. For it is surely not right that some should be condemned without a trial, while only those who lived after the Lord's coming should enjoy the benefit of divine justice. And to all rational souls from of old it has been said: "Whatever any of you did in ignorance, not knowing God clearly, if he comes to recognize this and turns from it, every one of his offenses shall be pardoned." "See," the text declares, "before you I have placed both death and life, so that life may be your choice" — God speaking here of setting before us a comparison for choice, not of having made both.
And elsewhere in scripture he declares: "Should you heed me and consent, the earth's fine yield will be your food; but refuse to heed and withhold consent, and you will be consumed by the blade — for such is the pronouncement issued by the Lord's own mouth." And once more, unmistakably, David — or better, the Lord speaking through the figure of his holy one (this holy one being one continuous identity stretching back to the world's origin, namely each person across the ages who has found salvation or will find it through belief) — declares: "Gladness filled my heart, and my tongue broke into song; my very flesh, too, shall rest in expectation," since, as he says, "my soul you will not leave abandoned in Hades, nor let your holy one witness decay. The road to life you have shown me plainly; your presence will fill me with joy."
Just as, then, the people is precious to the Lord, so too the entire holy people consists, together with the Jew, of the one from the nations who turns to conversion — the proselyte who was prophesied of old. Fittingly, then, the text tells us that ox and bear will share one dwelling place together; the ox stands for the Jew, since it is judged clean under the law as an animal fit for the yoke, because the ox both has a divided hoof and chews the cud; whereas the Gentile is signified by the bear, an unclean and wild beast. This animal bears its offspring as flesh without form, which it then shapes into the likeness of the beast by licking it with its tongue alone; for by reason the one who turns to the faith from among the nations is shaped so as to be tamed from a beast-like life, and having already been domesticated, he too, like the ox, is made clean. Straightaway the prophet declares: "Sirens shall speak well of me, and daughters of sparrows too, and every beast that roams untamed in the open country." Reckoned among unclean creatures are these roaming beasts of open country — meaning of the world at large — since by "beasts" he designates those who, wild in their approach to faith and foul in their manner of life, have not even been purified by the righteousness under the law. Yet by changing, through faith in the Lord, from being wild beasts, they become men of God, having begun by willing to change, and thereby making progress toward becoming so. For the Lord exhorts some, while toward others who have already applied themselves to the effort he extends his own hand as well and pulls them upward; for the Master over all shows no favoritism toward persons, nor will he be put out of countenance by greatness, since he himself made small and great alike, and cares for all in the same manner.
And David says: "But if even the nations were caught fast in the ruin that they themselves made, in the very snare which they hid was their own foot taken, yet the Lord became a refuge for the poor man, a helper in due season and in affliction." It was, then, in due season that those in affliction had the good news preached to them. And it is for this reason that he says: "Proclaim among the nations what he has done, so that they escape an unfair sentence." If, then, the good news was preached to those still in the flesh precisely so that no unfair condemnation would fall on them, how could it fail, for that identical reason, that the good news was also preached to those who had departed life before his coming? For "the Lord is righteous and loved righteousness; his face beheld uprightness." And "he who loves injustice hates his own soul."
If, then, in the flood all sinful flesh perished, the punishment having become for them a discipline, then we must believe, first, that the will of God, being disciplinary and active, saves those who turn to it; and second, that the finer element, the soul, could never suffer anything terrible from the coarser element, water, since it is not held fast by such a thing on account of its fineness and simplicity — for which reason it is also called incorporeal. But whatever coarser element happens to have been made coarse by sin, this is cast off along with the fleshly spirit that lusts against the soul. And already Valentinus, the leader of those who advocate a common ground, writes word for word in his Homily on Friends: "A great deal of what stands recorded in books meant for the general public turns up recorded within the assembly of God too; for these common things are the words that come from the heart, the law written in the heart. This is the people of the beloved, who is loved and who loves him."
By "public books" he means either the Jewish scriptures or those of the philosophers, thereby making the truth common property.
And Isidore, the son and also the disciple of Basilides, likewise writes word for word in the first book of his Exegetica on the Prophet Parchor: "The Attics say that something was revealed to Socrates by a spirit that accompanied him, and Aristotle says that all men make use of spirits that attend them from the time of their embodiment. This teaching he took over from the prophets and set down in his own books, without acknowledging the source from which he had stolen this doctrine." And again, in the second book of the same treatise, he writes somewhat as follows: "Let none imagine that the doctrine we hold to be distinctive of the elect was announced already, in earlier times, by various philosophers; for it is not their discovery, but having appropriated it from the prophets, they attached it to a wisdom which, on their own showing, does not exist." And again, in the same work: "For it seems to me that those who pretend to philosophize, in order to learn what the winged oak is and the many-colored robe upon it — all that Pherecydes, allegorizing, made into theology — took their material from the prophecy of Ham."
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