Irenaeus of Lyons · a new plain-English translation from the original language
Chapter 27. In what manner one ought to resolve difficulties. A sound mind, free from danger, reverent and a lover of truth, will readily meditate on those things which God has placed within human power and subjected to our understanding, and will make progress in them, rendering the knowledge of them easy through prolonged study. These are the things that lie plainly before our eyes, and whatever is stated openly and without ambiguity in the very words of the Scriptures; and for this reason the parables ought to be fitted to what is unambiguous. For thus whoever unravels them does so safely, and the parables will be given one consistent unraveling by everyone alike; and the body of truth remains whole and undamaged, with the members fittingly joined together and in harmony — (this makes their meaning easy to grasp; here Irenaeus indeed compares the Gnostics, on account of their pride, to the Giants of Phlegra). But those things which are not stated openly, and which are not set plainly before the eyes, ought to be linked to the resolutions given by the parables that are clear — not the reverse, setting up doctrines contrary to one another, as the questions of pagan philosophers do. According to this method, then, a man will always be seeking but will never find, because he has cast aside the very discipline of finding. And when the bridegroom comes, the one whose lamp is unready, shining with no clear light, runs back to those who deal out resolutions of the parables in darkness, abandoning the one who freely grants entrance through his plain proclamation, and is shut out from his bridal chamber. Since, then, the whole of Scripture, both the prophecies and the Gospels, can be heard plainly and without ambiguity, and alike by all, even though not all believe it, they proclaim — in order to exclude other gods — that the one and only God made all things through his Word, whether visible or invisible, whether heavenly or earthly, whether of the waters or beneath the earth, just as we have demonstrated from the very words of the Scriptures; and the created world in which we ourselves live testifies to this same truth through the things that come into view, namely that there is one who made it and governs it. Very dull indeed will those appear who close their eyes to so clear a disclosure, and who do not wish to see the light of the proclamation, but instead constrain themselves, and through the murky resolutions of parables each one supposes he has discovered a god of his own. For since nothing is said openly, in plain words and without dispute, anywhere at all in Scripture, about the invented Father imagined by those who hold contrary opinions, they themselves testify to this by saying that the Savior taught these same things in secret, not to all, but only to some of the disciples who were able to grasp them, and that he did so through hints, riddles, and parables to those capable of understanding what was signified. They come, then, to the point of saying that the God who is openly proclaimed is one, and the Father who is signified through parables and riddles is another.
But since parables admit of many possible resolutions, who that loves the truth will not confess that it is the mark of people rushing headlong into danger, and acting irrationally, to make assertions about the search for God based on such things, while abandoning what is certain, undoubted, and true? And is this not building one's house not upon rock, firm and solid and set in the open, but upon shifting sand poured out uncertainly? For which reason the overthrow of such a building is easy.