Commentary on Matthew, Book 17

Origen · a new plain-English translation from the Greek and Latin

And when he had come into the temple, the people's chief priests and elders came up to him as he was teaching, saying: 'By what authority do you do these things?' and so on, up to 'Nor will I tell you by what authority these things are done by me.' Since three evangelists have, as it were necessarily, recorded this passage before us, it is worth seeing what on earth the chief priests and elders

of the people had in mind in questioning the Savior — not putting one question, but bringing him two: one, 'By what authority do you do these things?', and the other, 'And who gave you this authority?' And with what purpose did the Savior, on this matter alone, ask a question in return, so as not to answer their question? For he saw that they were not worthy of the answer

to their question, or of the explanation of the problem it raised. But that the matters of this passage are not, as some suppose, simple and easily grasped, but mystical and requiring a deep heart, will be clear from what follows. Let us then plead the case for the plausibility of those who take the matters of this passage more simplistically; for they will say that, knowing two general <authorities>, one better, namely that of God,

the worse being that of the devil, the people's chief priests and elders were asking the Savior by which of these two authorities he was working his wonders, and from whom he had received it. Then Jesus, so as not to have to dispute the point, asked a question in return, at the same time wishing to expose those who were questioning him as having acted contrary to right reason in having disbelieved John the

Baptist. And his counter-question served a double purpose: both a rebuke for their unbelief toward John, and a diversion of the questioners, so that it might seem to them that they had good reason not to answer. But someone might say in response to this that it would have been absurd to ask by what authority Jesus was doing these things; for they would not have answered that it was by that

authority [of the devil] — and I do not say that the Savior would not have given this answer — but rather that not even 'the man of sin, the one opposed and exalted above everything called god or object of worship' would say to those who questioned him the truth: that he does every work of power by the authority of the devil, and 'signs by which he will astound and lead astray, if possible, even the elect.' But if

not even that one would say that he does his signs and the wonders of his 'falsehood,' which are worked 'in every deceit of wickedness for those who are perishing,' by the authority of the devil, how much more would the Savior — even if he did not ask a counter-question — have answered nothing else than that it was by the authority of God? And that, in the face of so evident an answer, they should go on questioning, and

the Savior not answer, seems to me foolish. Perhaps, then, the matters of this passage are as follows. In the wisdom of God, which encompasses the knowledge of divine and human affairs and of their causes, there are 'treasures' of the kind that the treasures 'of wisdom' and 'of knowledge' ought to be, and these are 'hidden'; and if there is anyone found worthy to know the 'unspeakable

"words which it is not permitted for a man to speak" would know that "wisdom hidden in a mystery," "foreordained by God before the ages, unto glory" of the righteous. There are, then, in the hidden treasures "of wisdom and knowledge," deep and unspeakable words concerning various authorities — generically two, but specifically, under each of the two, more numerous and hard to discover.

The two generic authorities are of this kind: some belong to the better order, and just as there are men of God who are not the ordinary sort, and blessed angels of God, and prophets of God who are God-borne, so too there are certain authorities of God, concerning whom the apostle, glorifying Christ in his letter to the Colossians, says that the Savior is "the image of the

invisible God, the firstborn of all creation," in whom all things were created, in the heavens and on the earth, whether visible or invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities — "all things have been created through him, and unto him they belong, and he himself is prior to all things." One class, then, among those under God, are the authorities created in Christ, distinct from

the principalities and the thrones and the dominions; and each exercises authority over certain beings, appointed by God according to some ineffable rank to exercise authority over those deemed worthy, according to the distinction among them, under each of these authorities. And "the discussion would be long and hard to interpret" concerning the matters pertaining to these authorities and the affairs governed by them. And just as there are

certain authorities of God, so too there are opposing ones, corresponding to the men of sin and to the angels of the devil. And indeed, for those who no longer wrestle "against blood and flesh," but, because they have advanced in power to what lies beyond these things, contend further, "the wrestling" is "against" the authorities that contend against the athletes of piety. And just as there were several orders under

God, so too in the opposing region there are not only authorities but also world-rulers "of this darkness" and "spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places," and perhaps also principalities — and I for my part think that all of them even bear the same names as those of God, by way of opposition. Those, then, who had been allotted the distinguished names in Israel, that is, the

chief priests and the elders of the people, moved by many considerations concerning the authorities <and the mysteries in heaven>, whether by traditions [or also] or also out of hidden sources (I do not know whether reasonably or unreasonably), saw Jesus accomplishing his prodigious deeds not apart from some authority present with him. They wanted, then, to learn from Jesus the nature <and the peculiar character> of this, or of the

knowledge that seemed to them to be in him. Now if those who then questioned the Savior had been certain holy and blessed chief priests (of the sort Aaron was, or Eleazar, or Phinehas, or as many as administered the tasks of the liturgy in a praiseworthy manner), and elders comparable to those whom, at God's command, Moses chose, it would be reasonable to suppose that, since they were not testing him but were eager to learn and worthy of such great

...of teachings, the Savior would have set forth an account, one that not even the whole world could have contained. And having begun, he would have handed down the knowledge concerning the blessed authorities and their differences and the reason they came to be authorities, and of those under them, whether souls or any kind of rational beings whatsoever; and he would also have gone through the account concerning

the opposing authorities, and would have set forth their differences. And it is likely that he would have taught something analogous to "the law" "ordained through angels" and to "if the word spoken through angels proved firm" (I mean analogous to an account concerning the angels who served the law and the authority according to the scriptures) — such as, by what authority serving God, or

by what opposing authorities, the wonders in Egypt came about, and what the authority was that served in the transformation of Moses's rod into a serpent, and what authority, opposed to this one, served in the transformation of the Egyptians' rods into serpents; and he would have told the power of the authority by which Aaron's rod swallowed those of the Egyptians. And he would also have told what the

authority was of the transformation of Moses's hand into snow, and from among the opposing ones, what authority worked in concert, in each case, with the enchanters of the Egyptians, when they seemed to imitate the signs of God. And thus he would have gone through the ten plagues of the Egyptians and their infliction upon them, also through evil angels. And he would also have told what authority ministered to the

crossing of the Red Sea by the people and the drowning of the Egyptians, and what authority ministered to the transformation, by means of wood, of bitter water into sweetness. And he would also have told the authority that ministered the water from the rock. And he would have set forth either this same authority or another for the rain of manna and the coming of the quail.

And he would also have told what the authority was that turned that same manna, on the six days, into worms and a foul smell, but preserved it on the day of the Sabbath. And why should I need to go on listing the wonders in the wilderness up to the death of Moses, to show that the Savior would have spoken about the matter of authority, as to whether the chief priests and the

elders of the people were worthy of an answer to their question? And it is possible for you too, as you go through the whole of scripture, to see the analogous thing — what the authority was for the sun to stand still over Gibeon and the moon over the valley of Elom, and much earlier, for the Jordan river to be crossed and for the manna to cease. And in the book of Judges too,

many such things might be sought out and found, such as the extraordinary things concerning Gideon and Samson; and also, from the Kingdoms, the things concerning Samuel and Elijah and Elisha and Hezekiah. And thus, going through all this and expounding the mystery according to the different authorities, the Savior would have taught by what authority, and how it surpassed

he was doing the marvels that the people saw, this power having been given to him not from some angel or minister of God, nor through some being lesser than God, but from the Father himself. But since the ruling priests and the elders governing the people here were in no way worthy of such spectacles, for this reason he does not answer them but questions them in return, so that by their not answering,

he too might reasonably persuade those inquiring, with respect to the matters concerning John, that he did not answer them in vain, saying: "nor will I disclose to you the authority by which I act in this." Now I inquire, with regard to this passage, whether each of those who have worked wonders by some authority has always worked them in one and the same authority, or whether some, having begun in this one at first, advanced to some greater one. However,

the Savior appears to have done these things by one authority, which he received from the Father; for the statement "nor will I disclose to you the authority by which I act in this" was teaching that he had acted by a single authority, but he did not make plain to them by which one, nor did he unfold its distinctive character, nor set forth whatever he might have determined concerning it, so as to display its preeminence over the rest

of the authorities by which the prophets before him had worked. And even now, in the temple, that is, in the church, Christ is present and teaches in it, and certain people similar to those chief priests and elders of the people inquire of him but do not obtain the answer, being unworthy to know the things they wish to learn. But one might inquire whether, wishing to shake them off,

he asked about John by way of a random lot, as though he had asked about some other such matter, or whether he asked about John of necessity, so that in answer to the question about him he might answer the following question about the authority as well. To me it seems that the matter in this passage is not by lot, since John was "a voice crying aloud: in the desert make ready the Lord's path," and

this was he of whom the prophet said, "behold, I send my messenger before your face, who shall prepare your way before you." For this reason, I think, he inquires about him, not being ignorant that, upon reflection, they will say "we do not know," on account of the things that had been written, but he would have spoken hypothetically, so as to draw out, in answer concerning the baptism of John being "from heaven," the authority consequent upon its being

from heaven. "But what do you think? A man had two children; he came to the first and said, 'Child, go work today in my vineyard,'" and so on, down to "but you, when you saw it, did not afterward repent so as to believe in him." Matthew alone has recorded this parable, as it seems to me, containing

the account concerning the Israel that disobeyed the word, and the account concerning the people from the nations who would believe -- for these are the two children whom he had, who as a man "bore the manner of his Son," being God. And he, having come to the first, whom he "acquired" "from the beginning," whom he "foreknew and predestined," said to him: "Child, go work today in the vineyard,"

...of mine. And he put it off, fleeing this place because of the “scorching heat” in it and the labors, and said, ‘I do not want to.’ But later, at last, having repented of having said to the father, ‘I do not want to,’ he went into the vineyard and did the will of the father. When, however, the first said, ‘I do not want to,’ the father approached the other and

said the same. Then, in answer, the second said, ‘I will, lord,’ but did not go to the vineyard of the word and to the field of the father. And it is clear that the one who said ‘I do not want to’ and afterward repented and went off and worked in the vineyard did the will of the father <not in word, but> in deed. For the one who made a promise in word

but did not carry it out in deeds refused to do the will of the father. Observe, if you can, whether the parable can also be applied to those who promise less, or nothing at all—neither virginity nor any other <spiritual> practice according to the gospel—yet by their deeds display the opposite, things which not even at the outset did they promise by mere utterances of words of good deeds; and further

to those who promise great things but accomplish nothing in keeping with the promise. For one, as it were, says: ‘This is too great for me—I do not want this virginity,’ and, ‘It is better, given my worth, to renounce this life and devote myself to leisure for the word.’ But another, hearing of each of the great deeds in scripture, says: ‘I will, lord.’ And it is possible to see, as it were,

some who, out of repentance, advance toward the better and take care of themselves for the better beyond their original expectation, while others, having rashly promised many things, act by their deeds contrary to their promises. After the parable it is added, concerning the one who said ‘I do not want to’ and afterward repented and went, ‘Amen I say to you that the tax collectors and the prostitutes

go before you into God’s kingdom’; but to the one who said ‘I will, lord,’ and did not go, ‘For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him.’ And again, to the former: ‘But the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him’; but to the one who said ‘I will, lord,’ and did not go, also

‘you, however, having seen this afterward, did not repent so as to believe in him.’ Now if one attends to those who, from a most wretched life, come to the word and believe in Christ, and to those who boast in the law and the prophets yet disbelieve the Son of God, and live licentiously, and turn out to be harsher toward their own kin, he will see the word of Jesus to be true, that

the tax collectors and the prostitutes go before Israel into the kingdom of God. But that Israel who saw Jesus does not repent even to this day, so that it might at some point later believe the truth. But observe also the phrase ‘go before… into the kingdom of God,’ which does not shut Israel out from entering at some point into that of God; for no one

leads on the one who will in no way be in that place to which he led the way. Consider, then, whether it is not indicated that, when “the fullness of the nations has come in,” then “all Israel will be saved.” Let Israel be understood not as the one “according to the flesh,” but as the one characterized by nobility of soul, possessing a good nature for understanding and insight, yet not

raised up in a manner worthy of that good nature, in faith and a good life. “Hear another parable. There was a man, a householder, who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it,” and so on, up to “and it will be given to a nation producing its fruits.” To one who does not probe the details of the parable further, nor examine each word, it will seem quite clear

if it received such an explanation: the people before us, who were God's “portion,” were the vineyard planted by the householder of the parable, and God's protection around it was the fence, and the tower was the temple, and the winepress was the place of libations, and the farmers were the elders and wise men of the people, and the departure of the

master was when the Lord, who was with them in a cloud “by day” and a “pillar of fire” by night, until he planted them, bringing them in “to his holy mountain and to his dwelling places,” no longer appeared to them in that way. And the approaching time of the fruits was the time of the prophets demanding the fruit from the farmers and the vineyard, so that they might now show

that, having received the law, they had lived according to it. The servants sent to the farmers to receive the fruits were the first prophets, whom the rulers and wise men of the people abused, beating them, and some they even killed, and others they had stoned. And other servants after these, more numerous than the first, were the time of the many prophets, whose names are written in the

second book of Chronicles, and in Jeremiah and the Twelve and Daniel; for one might also say that Ananias, Azarias, and Misael were prophets. So then, they treated these, who were more numerous than the earlier prophets, in the same way, beating and killing and stoning them. Finally, the householder sent his son, our Lord Jesus Christ, to shame

the vineyard and the farmers, being able to do so. But the chief priests and the elders and the wise men of the people, when they saw the son — not being entirely unaware of his superiority — supposed him to be the heir. And they dared even to kill him, so that they themselves might become lords of the vineyard, and, casting him out and judging him outside the affairs of Israel, they killed him. And

immediately the lord of the vineyard, whom they had killed, comes among them, having risen from the dead, and he destroys those wicked farmers wickedly, and hands over to other farmers, his apostles, from among the people who would come to believe — that is, the vineyard — who render the fruits to the householder in their proper seasons. Then, when those mentioned above who had asked the earlier question spoke, after the parable, the [saying] concerning

"By what authority are you doing these things?" To this the Savior answers with the words "he will destroy those wicked men wickedly," teaching them from the prophecy that he was rejected by <the builders>, but is honored by God and is head of the whole building and of its cohesion, and indeed a head marvelous in the eyes of those who know how to see it. Then, prophesying about

the calling from the nations, he says to the teachers of the Jews who do not believe in him: "the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing its fruits." But, as we said before, such an exposition is somewhat general and not according to the letter; concerning which anyone who is "spiritual" and able to "examine all things" would raise many questions, knocking on the obscurity

of it — that is, on the closed door of the thoughts hidden here — and, having sought rightly, would find, and having asked, would receive from God. And we too, according to our modest measure, form such an impression regarding this passage: that the master of the house, the man, is God, about whom it is written: "the LORD your God bore you as a man would bear his son,

his own son." For it is in this way, because of bearing and carrying, in a human manner, the one who benefits people, that he who benefits people is said in some parables to be a man. And here he is called a man, master of the house, because of the vineyard and the hedge placed around the vineyard and the winepress which he dug and the tower which he built and the servants whom he owns and whom he sends

to the farmers, and a second time he sends more. And as master of the house he leased the vineyard out to farmers, from whom, taking it away, he gives it to others. Further, above, "a man, master of a house" is spoken of in these words: "the heavens' kingdom, indeed, resembles a man who is master of a house, and who set out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard"; and as master of a house

indeed he has a vineyard and hires farmers, and he also has a steward to whom he says: "call the workers and pay the wage, beginning from the last to the first." But in the parable about the dinner and the wedding of his son and the calling, he is spoken of not as master of the house but as king; for he is greater than a master of the house, sending

an army as a king and destroying those who seized "his servants" and insulted and killed them, and by royal authority, not merely as master of the house, "he said to the attendants" to bind "the feet and hands" of the one who entered the wedding feast without a "wedding garment," and to cast "him into the outer darkness." But when above it is said: "a man

had two children," he is named neither master of the house nor king but simply man. There are, then, just as there are many conceptions of God according to the divine scriptures, so too differences in his being named man — either simply, or master of the house, or king. This is according to Matthew; but according to Luke, the parable similar to the one set forth named him a man in the passage:

"A man planted a vineyard, and gave it out to farmers." But Mark too says: "A certain man planted a vineyard, and put a fence around it." And again Luke, setting out the parable of the calling, says, "A certain man" made a great dinner, and invited many." You too, then, should gather together wherever God is called "man," and comparing "spiritual things with spiritual" in the discourse concerning this,

and searching out the relevant passages rightly, you would find, in proportion to your inquiry, a good many more instances where God is called "man." This householder-man, then, planted a vineyard, which one must investigate more carefully, not passing over so great a parable without examination. What, then, is this vineyard, distinct from the first farmers and the second, which the

householder-man planted? Now this vineyard is first let out to insolent farmers, and second, according to those who answered concerning the vineyard, let out to other farmers, who will give its fruits in their seasons, in keeping with what the Savior says: "the kingdom of God will be taken away from you, and given to a nation producing its fruits." Will it then be necessary

to say that the kingdom of God is the vineyard, taken away from the former <farmers> and given to a nation producing its fruits, or that the vineyard is one thing and the kingdom of God another? Let us first see, having established from Scripture that the vineyard is called "the people," whether everything in the passage can be fitted to

such an interpretation. Isaiah, then, says: "Let me sing now for the beloved a song of the beloved concerning my vineyard. A vineyard came to be for the beloved on a horn, in a fertile place. And I put a fence around it and hedged it, and I planted a choice vine" and so on, down to "but it wrought lawlessness and not righteousness, but a cry." I have set out this song from Isaiah wishing to

examine it together with this parable, since the vineyard is understood, in each of the two Scriptures, of the same thing signified. And observe what points the passages set out have in common and what points they do not, so that, seeing the differences of the similar points from the dissimilar, you may in this way fix your mind on the sense of the Scripture. Similar, then, is "he planted a vineyard, and put a fence around it," and "he dug"

"a wine-vat in it and built a tower," to "a vineyard came to be for the beloved on a horn, in a fertile place. And I put a fence around it and hedged it, and I planted a choice vine, and I built a tower in the middle of it, and I dug a wine-vat before it in it." For compare "he planted a vineyard" with "I planted a choice vine," and "he put a fence around it" with "I put a fence around it," and

"he dug a wine-vat in it" with "and I dug a wine-vat before it in it," and "he built a tower" with "and I built a tower in the middle of it." But in both passages something dissimilar is said concerning the fruits of the vineyard: in Isaiah, that "I waited for it to produce a grape-cluster, and it produced thorns," whereas in the parable of the gospel it is clearly not the

The vineyard is accused of not having given its fruits when their season had drawn near, but the farmers, who took the householder's servants, beat one, killed another, and stoned another. And when he sent other servants, more than the first, again the farmers are accused of having done the same to them. And a third time the farmers are accused, saying: This is the

heir; come, let us kill him and have his inheritance — and casting him out of the vineyard, and killing him. And in Isaiah the word itself threatens the vineyard, saying: »I will take away its hedge and it will be for plunder, and its wall will be for trampling. And I will let my vineyard go, and it will not«

be pruned nor dug, and thorn will come up on it as on barren ground.« But also when it declares that it will command »the clouds« »to rain rain upon the vineyard,« it is threatening the vineyard, which the prophet said to be the house »of Israel« and the man of Judah, since it has not produced the fruit — »judgment« and righteousness — but has produced thorns,

»lawlessness« and »outcry.« But in the gospel we find the vineyard suffering nothing at all; rather (if one must put it so) it is being cared for, so that it may bear its own fruits for the householder. For this man, caring for the vineyard, takes it away from the former farmers, who answer the Savior when he asks and says: When, then, the lord of the vineyard comes, what will he do

to those farmers? And they say — whether compelled by the argument and its logical sequence, or even unwillingly, so to speak, prophesying about themselves — that the lord of the vineyard, when he comes, will destroy those evil men evilly, and, caring for the vineyard, will hand it over to other farmers, who will render him the fruits in their seasons. But

also in Jeremiah, consistent with »for the vineyard of the Lord Sabaoth is the house of Israel, and the man of Judah his beloved new planting,« it is said to the sinning people: »But I planted you a fruit-bearing vine, wholly true,« and, corresponding to »I waited for it to make grapes, but it made thorns,« and to »I waited for it to do judgment, but it did lawlessness, and not

righteousness but outcry,« the saying »How have you turned to bitterness, you strange vine?« Do you see, then, that in the prophetic sayings the people is said to be the vineyard, and the one who planted it threatens it and says to it: »I will take away its hedge, and it will be for plunder,« and so on, whereas in the gospel sayings no blame at all is brought against the vineyard, but the whole of it

is brought against the farmers; and besides there being no threat at all to the vineyard, there is care taken for it, so that it may give the householder the fruits in their seasons. And you could not, wishing to preserve the precision of the gospel writing, clearly establish that the vineyard was the people. But perhaps the vineyard according to the gospel is the kingdom of God, the

this (I think) is the very same as the teaching of those who have God's oversight. For the statement "the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing its fruits," being attached to the parable of the vineyard, clearly (I think) shows that the mysteries of the kingdom of God are said to be the vineyard which the man, the master of the house, planted. This vineyard, then, being

(as I think) the law and the prophets and all of divine scripture, the lord of the vineyard let out to farmers - to the former ones, namely to that people (for they were the first to be entrusted with the oracles of God), and to the latter, namely to the nation producing its fruits, the church from the nations. But it is a task to smooth out, when the vineyard according to the gospel is understood in this way, the fence placed around it

which experiences nothing like the fence in Isaiah, the fence concerning which it is written: "I will take away its fence and it will be given over to plunder," and the winepress dug within it, and the tower that was built. And see whether we are able to say that the vineyard, according to divine scripture, is the natural science, while the life that follows true natural science, bearing fruit in virtue and in the finest character,

we may call the fruit of the vineyard, while the domain of reasoning and the whole letter of scripture is the fence lying around the vineyard from outside, so that the vineyard is not seen by those outside, and especially its fruit hidden within; and the depth *** of the soul that receives these fruits, having cast off everything superficial, is the winepress dug within

the vineyard. And the tower built in the vineyard, having height and elevation and loftiness above the vineyard and the fence and the winepress, is (I think) the discourse concerning God, being a temple of the mind that dwells within it. And I think it is concerning such a tower that it was said by the savior: "Which of you, wishing to build a tower, does not

first calculate whether he is able to lay the foundation and complete it, so that those watching may not begin to mock him for not finishing?" For there too, I think, it is being said through a parable that when you are about to speak of God, consider whether you are able, once you have begun, to complete everything that the discourse concerning God requires of you, so that, having begun the doctrines of piety, you may not leave the tower concerning God unfinished and

fail to build the cornice upon it; for if you do not build the cornice upon it, someone will fall from his conception of God and die. This vineyard, then (as we have said), God let out to farmers, to the people before us, and went away to his own watchtower, giving the farmers the means, from what he himself had planted and fenced and dug and built, to bring forth

the fruits in their seasons. Now the seasons of the fruits drew near for each one individually, and I think also, generally, for the whole people. But to explain precisely what it is for the seasons of the fruits to draw near belongs to a state greater than ours, and to a heart much purer and more perceptive than ours. Nevertheless, to the best of our ability we shall apply ourselves to the passage in this way,

starting from each one individually. And let the word be understood, in every soul, as a vine planted by the master of the house, and the vineyard as the starting points of all the problems necessary for salvation. Just as with vines there is a season when it puts out leaves, and another when it shows the first beginnings of fruit, still small, and another when what has been shown begins to take on color, and another

when it turns into an unripe grape, and another, and another, when it is the season to harvest the fruits now fully formed and ready to yield the quality of wine — so let the first season of a human being's life, that of infancy, have the vine with nothing yet attached to it, possessing only its vital principle. Then, when the word begins to be completed, let that be the season

of the first flowering; and to the degree that the soul, being cultivated, makes progress, to that same degree the cultivated vineyard yields samples of the clusters to come, at first taking on color and a fragrance of the excellence that is to come, but later already turning into unripe grapes, when a certain vice is present in youth — not the kind that remains, but the kind that necessarily arises and never inclines toward the worse, but always

(if I may put it this way) journeys on toward virtue. But if the vice remains, and we do not take another path leading always toward progress in virtue, it becomes an unripe grape, which, according to the prophet, sets the teeth of anyone who eats it on edge. But one who progresses further has, as it were, a cluster that is turning color but not yet fully ripened. And there is also

a serious condition after this progress, when the cultivated vine bears its fruit — a cluster, perfected, of love and joy and peace and patience and the rest that are listed by the apostle and in countless other scriptures. For there is a cluster corresponding to "blessed are the poor in spirit," and another corresponding to "blessed are those who mourn," and another corresponding to

"blessed are the meek," and another corresponding to "blessed are the peacemakers," and another corresponding to "blessed are the pure in heart." And why should I need to list the clusters that are the causes of the beatitudes? I have examined these things at greater length, wanting to understand and clarify them, inasmuch as it was the time when the season of the fruits had drawn near. But it belongs to the master of the house alone, and to his divine knowledge,

to know the season proper to each of the human beings — when it has drawn near, and when the season of the fruits is still far off. And we too, if we attend more closely, comparing the time since we were called with the whole span of our faith, will be able to see how some, though by rights they ought, because of the time that has passed, to be teachers, again have need to be taught

"what the elements" of the oracles of God are — thus, though some ought, as far as the time of God's dispensation and the calling of all is concerned, already to be bearing fruit, either they do not have it at all, or, though they ought to have it, they have it only as untimely coloring grapes and unseasonably unripe ones. If then you have grasped this in each case, how one ought to understand

As for 'when the season of the fruits drew near, pass, if you can,' in your reasoning to those who received the law through Moses, noting that for them too the season of the fruits once drew near, and he sent his own servants to the farmers who had first been entrusted with 'the oracles of God,' in order to receive the fruits of the vineyard in each case. Now it is easy

to say that by 'servants' he means the prophets. But one must inquire how they are sent to the farmers to receive the fruits of the vineyard. For someone might say that the prophets are not sent in order to receive the fruits, but rather to cultivate the ground and to work together with the fruits. See then whether we can say that the spiritual fruits and the divine offerings are given by

those who cultivated the vineyard to the servants who are sent, so that they might bring forward, as priests, to God the fruits of the people who make the offering. But the farmers, having seized among the people the servants who were sent to receive the fruits of the vineyard, beat one of them, as 'Zedekiah son of Chanaan struck Micaiah on the jaw,' when the false prophet also said to him as he prophesied: 'What sort of spirit

of the Lord is it that has spoken in you?' And another they killed, as they killed Zechariah 'between the temple and the altar'; and another they stoned, as they stoned Azariah son of Jehoiada the priest, just as it is written in the second book of Chronicles. For when 'the Spirit of God clothed Azariah son of Jehoiada the priest, and he stood up above the people and said: Thus

says the Lord: Why do you transgress the commandments of the Lord? You will not prosper, because you have forsaken the Lord, and he will forsake you' — they set upon him, and by order of Joash the king they stoned him in the courtyard of the house of the Lord. And Joash did not remember the mercy that Jehoiada his father had shown him, and he put his son to death. And as

he was dying, he said: 'May the Lord see and judge.' Next in the parable is that again he sent other servants, more than the first, and they did the same to them. Now Scripture is full of the things that happened to the prophets, whom he sent on behalf of the people, so that they might offer up their fruit as holy priests to God through their prayers. But afterward he sent his son

after the prophets — Christ. But you will ask how he who sends the son says: 'They will respect my son,' as though he said this without having foreknown what was going to happen to him — for according to the letter, they do not appear to have respected him. And to claim on this basis that the Father of the son who was sent did not foreknow the future, but was mistaken, saying one thing when other things

turned out to happen, is impious. And again to say that the farmers did respect him runs contrary to what is plainly evident; for the farmers, on seeing his son, said among themselves: 'This is the heir,' and so on. Now someone will say to these points that it was necessary for 'they will respect my son' to come to pass, even if it did not come to pass at that time. But

But someone will say that the father, in sending the son, did not say, "My son will receive the fruit from the tenants," but rather, "They will respect him." For they did respect him, in that they knew this was the son and had said among themselves that this is the heir; but it is not altogether the case that, if they showed respect and were struck with awe at the beginning, they had already also done what those who show respect do.

At the same time one will also ask who these tenants were who said, "This is the heir; come, let us kill him." For the Jews do not appear to have killed him as the son of the master of the house. And to this too someone will say that, when they were arguing among themselves as to who he was, some said that this is the Christ, to whom

others answered, "When the Christ comes, no one knows where he is from; but we know where this man is from." Then, since they were struck by the signs and the marvels and the divine powers, they thought in their minds that he was the Christ of God, but did not confess it, and it is true both that "they will respect my son" and also that (they having despaired that he was the

son) it was said, "This is the heir; come, let us kill him." For this reason the Savior says, "You know me, and you know where I am from." And if one attends to what is written concerning Herod, when he learned from the magi that the "king of the Jews" had been born, he will see that those who killed the Savior, though they knew he was the son, could nonetheless have plotted against him. For

indeed Herod, having learned from the scribes that "the Christ is born" "in Bethlehem," and having agreed that the one being born was the Christ, sends them off, saying, "Go and search out carefully concerning the child, that I too may come and worship him"; and nonetheless, when they had returned, he plotted against the child, not disbelieving that he was the Christ. For he would not, if wholly disbelieving,

have killed all the children "in Bethlehem and in its territory, ages two and younger, reckoning by the time he had precisely learned from the magi"; but he even believed him to be the Christ who was prophesied, and wished to kill him, and, so far as it depended on him, did kill him. Thus, then, those who plotted against the Savior can also have known him to be the son but not

so as to have their word reach others too — for they said among themselves, "This is the heir" — and nonetheless to have destroyed him. For they thought that by killing the Christ, and not understanding his resurrection ("had they known it, never would they have nailed the Lord of glory to a cross"), they themselves would be masters of affairs, since their wickedness had blinded them and they did not

know the mysteries of God, and, as not knowing them, they cast the son out of the vineyard and killed him. Now the phrase "they cast him out of the vineyard" seems to me to mean something like this: so far as depended on them, they judged him to be a stranger even to the vineyard of the tenants, when they passed against him the sentence of death. And upon these things the Savior inquires of the

and of those wicked vine-dressers, saying to them, ‘When therefore the lord of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine-dressers?’ And they say to him—being about to be judged out of their own mouth and condemned as evil men, and to perish evilly, and no longer to have “the oracles of God”—‘He will destroy those evil men evilly, and will hand over the vineyard to other vine-dressers,’ who

will render to him the fruits in their seasons. And they prophesy, as it were, in the same way as Caiaphas the high priest “of that year,” who spoke the truth not “of himself,” but prophesied because he was “high priest”—prophesying concerning the nations, that they would give the master of the house the fruits in their seasons. Then the Savior, upon these words, puts them to shame from the Scripture,

since they supposed themselves to be builders of the people as well, showing that he, being a stone and rejected by them, the Father would set as the head of the whole building, holding together the two corners of the old and the new covenant and the buildings of the two peoples. For this is what is meant by ‘Have you never read in the Scriptures: The stone which the builders rejected, this has become the head of the corner; this came about from the Lord,

and it is marvelous in our eyes’? Now this saying is found in the hundred and seventeenth Psalm, which is placed before the Psalm with the greatest number of verses, and the text runs thus: ‘The stone which the builders rejected, this has become the head of the corner; this came about from the Lord, and it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day which the Lord has made;

let us exult and be glad in it.’ And if anything else among the things prophesied concerning Christ can put to shame the one who examines the Scriptures ungratefully, this too would be counted among them. For if the prophet is not speaking these words about a senseless stone—as some foolish man might say—it would be clear that the one rejected by the wise men among that people,

and by the chief priests and elders and scribes—Jesus—truly became, as the head of the church, the head of the corner, uniting and gathering together into one the two covenants. And this head is a gift given by the Lord to the whole building, and a marvelous head in our eyes, for those able to see it. And this is so precisely because the builders rejected this

stone, “the oracles of God,” in which was the kingdom of God, were taken away from those vine-dressers and those builders, and given to a nation producing its fruits. But if it is true that ‘the kingdom of God will be taken away from you, and’ will be given to a nation producing its fruits, it is clear that the kingdom of God is given to none of those who do not produce the fruits of the

kingdom of God; for the kingdom of God is given to no one who is ruled by sin. But someone will say: how, if the kingdom of God is given to no one who does not produce its fruits, was the kingdom of God given to those from whom it was taken away, according to what was said: ‘the kingdom of God will be taken away from you’?

And observe whether we are able, being in so great a difficulty of a problem not at all easy to resolve, by attending to the difference between what was said first concerning the vineyard and second concerning the kingdom of God, to resolve the question at hand. For what was said concerning the kingdom of God was not said concerning the vineyard. For concerning the vineyard it is written in the first instance

that he leased it out to farmers. But concerning the kingdom of God, that it will be given to a nation producing its fruits. Now the point at issue would be unresolvable if, just as it was written of the first, 'he leased it out to farmers,' so also it had been said of the second, 'it will be leased out to a nation producing its fruits,' and if, just as it was said concerning the

second, 'and it will be given to a nation producing its fruits,' it had also been said of the first that he gave it to farmers. These, then, are the difficulties we have raised concerning the passage, and we have stated what appeared to us; but let him who is able to understand and to speak better be heeded rather than us. 'Now once the chief priests and Pharisees had listened to his parables, they recognized'

that he was speaking about them; and seeking to seize him, they feared the crowds, since they held him to be a prophet. Having heard his parables — of which the beginning of the one was, 'A certain man had two children,' and of the other, 'There was a man, a householder, who planted a vineyard' — the chief priests and the Pharisees knew that he was speaking about them, on the one hand according to

the one parable, in that the second son said, 'I will, lord,' and did not go, and on the other, according to the remaining parable, in that, since it had been said, following what was stated concerning the former farmers who sinned, <Jesus said,> 'the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing its fruits.' And knowing that he was speaking about them, they sought indeed to

seize him and do to him whatever they might be able to do; but they were not able, since they were not capable of withstanding the impulse of the crowds who held Jesus to be a prophet. And as many as wish, with hostile intent, to seize the word, so that, once it has been seized by them, they might destroy it, these could never seize it <nor put it to death>, since the crowds on its behalf regard it as a prophet

of God, distracting those who wish to seize him and plot against him. After this it should be understood that there are differences among those who seek to seize Jesus. For the chief priests and the Pharisees sought to seize him in one way, and the bride in the Song of Songs in another — she who, seeking him, and rising up and going about in the city, 'in the marketplaces and'

'in the streets,' scarcely found him at last, when she had gone a little past those keeping watch and going about 'in the city,' and having found him, seized him, when she also says, 'I seized him and will not let him go, until I brought him into my mother's house and into the chamber of her who conceived me.' But this same bride too, according to the Song of Songs,

"I held him fast," she says, "in my mother's house, and in the chamber of her who conceived me"; and toward the end of the same book, as one who has advanced and is now about to hold him in a different way, and better than before, she says: "I said, I will go up into the palm tree, I will take hold of its heights." And so that you may understand those who sought to seize him—the chief priests and Pharisees—and did not seize

him, observe that with regard to other things it is possible, by Christ's own word, to grasp and lay hold <both of the mind (of those who set out doctrines)> and, having contemplated it, to overturn it, and, as scripture named it, to reconcile it. *** For thus the wise man of the gospel, wise in that he, as "spiritual," judges "all things," yet is himself subject to no one's judgment, does judge and test

and refute the other arguments, whether of those wise in the eyes of the world or of those who seem to excel among the heresies; yet the mind of Christ within him is not condemned, nor is it apprehended, nor is it seized by those who set out to overturn it: "for who has known the mind of the Lord, that he will instruct him?" And it is clear that if anyone is going to instruct another's mind, he must first

know it, and only then instruct it. But "the mind" of the Lord—"who" shall know it, "that he will instruct him"? For he will instead be captured by it and yield to it. And let this be said by me because those who sought to seize him also feared the crowds, since they held him to be a prophet. Yet even if the crowds speak well of Jesus, they think something true about him, but they do not

grasp his greatness. For Jesus was indeed also a prophet, as is clear to one who understands the words, "A prophet from among your brothers the Lord your God will raise up for you, as he raised me; to him you shall listen in all that he says," that prophet. And whoever "does not listen to that prophet shall be utterly destroyed." Yet his surpassing greatness did not lie in

his being a prophet, but in his being the firstborn Son of God "of all creation," and the image "of God," he in whom "all things were created, in heaven and on earth, whether visible or invisible," and so on. And still more, his surpassing greatness lay in his being the Wisdom that says, "God possessed me as the beginning of his ways,

for his works," before he made anything, and "before the age he founded me, in the beginning, before he made the earth," and so on. And though these crowds held such thoughts about him and were ready to fight fiercely on his behalf against those warring against him, the chief priests and the Pharisees were afraid, and although they wished to plot in order to seize

Jesus, they were unable to seize him. So here it is written: since they held him to be a prophet. But beyond this you might further observe that the crowds, even if in this expression they hold him as a prophet, whatever they may hold him to be, hold him to be far less than what he is, not even attaining to the "partial" knowledge of those who know him "in part," and

expressing nothing worthy of him. I say this about those who truly think rightly about him. For those who hold false opinions about him, under the impression that they are glorifying him, must not be reckoned as being ‘for’ him — such as those who confuse the concept of Father and Son, and hold that the Father and the Son are one in hypostasis, dividing the one substrate only in thought and in name alone

— that one substrate. And those who come from the heresies, under the impression that they think great things about him, ‘speaking iniquity against the height’ and speaking evil of the Creator, are not ‘for’ him; for they are not ‘with’ him, and for this reason they are ‘against’ him, for he says, ‘whoever is not with me is against me.’ So too, even if they gather together, those who do not

think the truth about the Son in the name of Jesus, scatter rather than gather. For the Savior says: ‘and he who does not gather with me scatters’; and observe that it is not said simply, ‘he who does not gather scatters,’ but with the precise addition ‘with me’ — for the one who gathers must gather with him. And you will understand the one who gathers with him

by attending to the passage: ‘when you are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of the Lord Jesus, to hand such a one over to Satan, for the flesh’s ruin’ — for the phrase ‘when you are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of the Lord Jesus’ shows the one who gathers with him. And you would not say that ‘when you are gathered together in the power of the

Lord Jesus’ fits those who gather, or are gathered, either while living wickedly, or while thinking wickedly and impiously about God or about his Christ. I say these things also because the crowds who thought about Jesus — being for him, yet thinking far less of him than his worth — are said to have held him to be a prophet. And if you examine alongside these the

wording of Luke on similar matters, you will establish, I think, more clearly what has been said above; for he says: ‘and day after day he kept teaching in the temple; but the elders, together with the scribes and the chief priests of the people, kept seeking a way to do away with him, yet could find no course of action, since the whole people clung to him, hanging on what he said.’ For in these words too it is shown

that those who unlawfully preside over the Jewish crowds — called chief priests, and the scribes hostile to Jesus, and the elders of the people — seek to destroy Jesus and to blot out his name from among men, along with the faith concerning him; but they cannot find what to do to accomplish what they wish, since all the people who had come to believe in him had already been won over and were attached

to love for Jesus, and hung upon hearing his teaching and his word. And indeed this may be seen even to this day — the manner in which those who put themselves forward as his high priests in the service of God, and as scribes in the scripture, and as elders of the people by ancient standing, seek to bring him down; and they seek to destroy Jesus

and to make his glory disappear, doing everything toward this end in accordance with the will of their fathers, yet not finding what they might do to separate from Jesus the people attached to him and to erase him from their thinking. Perhaps, indeed, all who hold any opinion whatsoever about the divine and champion it in a manner foreign to the teaching of Jesus

want to destroy Jesus but cannot, since the whole crowd hangs on him as they listen. But also those who devote themselves to the writings of whatever wisdom, and who for this reason are figuratively called scribes, want to destroy Jesus from among men, but they do not find any effective means to accomplish this. And all the elders too, the learned men foreign to the teaching of Jesus,

of the Greeks and the barbarians, want to destroy Jesus, but they cannot, being overpowered by the whole people of Jesus, since that people hangs upon the teacher in hearing and taking in his teaching. And Mark too puts forward similar things, saying: "And the chief priests and the scribes heard it, and were seeking how they might destroy him; for they feared him, because all the people"

"were astounded at his teaching." For all the people of Christ are astounded "at his teaching," and nothing can be accomplished by the aforementioned chief priests and scribes, who are seeking to destroy Jesus from among men and to extinguish the astonishment of all his people. And Jesus answered and spoke to them again in parables, saying: "A man to whom the kingdom of the heavens has been likened"

who was a king, who, when he made a wedding feast for his son, sent his servants," and so on, down to: "for many are called, but few are chosen." And this parable, understood more comprehensively, will appear to be clear, in which the man who is king is said, figuratively, to be God the Father of Christ Jesus, and the wedding feast of the king's son is the restoration

of the bride, the church of Christ, to Christ her bridegroom. And the servants who are sent to call those invited to the wedding feast are the prophets at their various times, turning those from the people, through the prophecies, toward the joy that is brought about at the restoration of the church to Christ. And those who were unwilling to come, though they had previously been called, were those who were not listening

to the words of the prophets, and the other servants who were sent were another gathering of prophets, prophets, and the prepared banquet, in which the king's bulls and his fattened animals had been slaughtered, were the solid and rational foods of the mysteries of God; and in this way all things too are ready, the accounts concerning all the things that exist are ready, to which, when the perfect one

comes, those who have followed the calling will eat and drink. But since, of those called through the prophets, some merely neglected what was said and busied themselves with the affairs of daily life, without indeed acting wickedly against the others, while others also acted wickedly against them, for this reason, wishing to set forth the difference between them, he said: "But those who neglected it went away, one to his own"

the field, and another to his business; and the rest, seizing his servants, insulted and killed them. Then, following <this> more complete account, the wrath of the king is to be understood, which the apostle also, naming it with reference to the Jews, speaks of: "but wrath has come upon them at last." Then the war against the Jews is prophesied, and the capture of Jerusalem, and

the destruction of the people after Christ's coming among them, in the words: and having sent his army he destroyed those murderers and burned their city. And then he says to his servants: the wedding feast is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy; go therefore to the crossroads, and as many as you find, invite them to the

wedding — this could be referred to the apostles of Jesus Christ, who says to the Jews: it was needful for God's word to be declared to you first; but since you judge yourselves unworthy of it, behold, we turn to the nations. The crossroads, then, are the affairs that lie outside Israel, among which those found by the apostles are invited to the wedding, the apostles gathering together all whom

they found. And they found those who were listening and did not concern themselves, in calling them, with whether those called had, before the calling, been wicked or good; for they called all who were found. And here "good" should be understood, in a simpler sense, as referring to the more moderate among those coming to the reverence of God, to whom the following apostolic saying might well apply: whenever the nations, who do not have the law, do by nature the things of the

law... Such people, not having the law, are a law to themselves; they show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, their conscience bearing witness together with them. And indeed the wedding feast of Christ and the church was filled, and those found by the apostles, having been reconciled to God, reclined to make merry at the wedding. Then, since both the wicked and the

good had to be called — not, indeed, so that the wicked would remain wicked, but so that, having changed their clothing and put off the garments that do not belong to the wedding, they might put on the garments of the wedding — "a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience" (for these are the garments of the wedding) — for this reason the king enters to look over those reclining at table, before he sets before them the prepared banquet,

the bulls and the fattened, slaughtered animals, and everything that is ready, so that, having looked them over, he may keep those who have the wedding garment and make them merry, but condemn those who do not. Entering, then, he finds one of those who had been called and had come to the calling without having changed his character or put on a wedding garment, and he says to him: how did you get in here without having a wedding garment? Then

since the one who has sinned and has not been renewed, nor put on the Lord Jesus Christ, is silenced as one who has no ground for a defense, for this reason it is written: but he was silenced. And it is not enough that the one who dishonored the invitation be thrown out of the wedding feast; for he must, bound by the servants of the king who are appointed over the chains, be led away on a path by which he cannot

He used it for what was needed, and the active power by which he accomplished no good deed [caused him] not only to be cast out from the wedding, but also to be condemned to a place foreign to light, where there was a darkness that was, as it were, deeper than in the darkness, and is called the outer darkness. And if any of us, having come to the king's calling to the wedding

of his son, seems indeed to obey and to come along with those who were called, yet is not clothed in the aforementioned wedding garment, he will suffer these things, and, bound hand and foot, will be cast out into the outer darkness, where, in accordance with "Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall weep," the weeping belongs to those who have committed sins worthy of weeping and lamentation; and they will weep, lamenting their

own miseries. Then, so that the discourse might set before us the fear and trembling and the grim circumstances and the toils in which those not clothed with a wedding garment will be, he said that there would be weeping there, and not only weeping but also the gnashing of teeth. And this is added to the whole parable because it had been shown that many were called,

but that not all had come, only a few of them - the words "many are called, but few are chosen." Let this, then, be said concerning the parable in a more general way; but we shall try, returning to it, to search it out according to the power presently available to us, in case, aided by the spirit of wisdom, we may be able, having found certain deeper things in the parable as well, to build upon them, and, as is reasonable, either to keep silent, or

to hint at them, or to set them forth. The kingdom of heaven, then, was likened - as regards the one who reigns, to a man who is king; as regards the one who reigns together with the king, to his son; as regards those who are ruled, to the servants and to those called to the wedding, of whom some were unwilling to enter, while others, neglecting to enter, went away - one to his own field,

and another to his business, while yet others seized the servants, mistreated them, and killed them. Further, among those ruled belongs also the king's army, and those gathered from the crossroads of the streets, both evil and good, until the wedding was filled with those reclining at table; and the one among those reclining who did not have a wedding garment; and the servants who were commanded to bind the one

who did not have a wedding garment, hand and foot, and cast him out into the outer darkness. Now it could have been written, "the kingdom of heaven was likened to a king," without the addition of "man"; but since "man" has also been added, it is necessary to explain this too - in this way, as it seems to me, it may be clarified. One of those before us, having composed books of allegories on the sacred laws,

setting forth expressions that ascribe, as it were, human feelings to God, while expounding upon God and the things that reveal his divine nature, used one saying concerning God being spoken of as a man administering human affairs - namely, "the LORD your God carried you as a man carries his son" - and another concerning God not being as a man - namely, "not as

"a man, God, be torn apart." We ourselves have great abundance from the examples in the gospels about God, in which he was likened, according to certain parables, to a man. We will therefore make use of the parables that name God "man" as a defense against those who say, on the basis of the wording alone, that the Father of Christ is subject to human emotions. And we will say to those of a different persuasion that, because they have not understood the things

said in this way in the old writings, they stumble at the God whom the Law, the Prophets, and the creation of the world proclaim, on the grounds that: if God is likened to a man according to the parables of the gospel, why then, in keeping with these same parables, do you not also accept that his anger and his repenting and the turning away of his face and his sitting and

his standing and his walking are also a parable? For his sleep, which is recorded in the prophecies, they have either failed to notice, or they will have to admit that it too is a parable. And further we will say to them: if you are unwilling, in keeping with God being called "man" in a parable, to hear in a parable also those scriptures that report things about him in human terms, then show us how the God of all things

is, according to the gospel, called God without having, as you suppose, anything human said of him. And from our abundance we will further convict them of not having examined even the writings of the New Testament, in which, according to the parable here, the king who made a wedding feast for his son — himself a man — grew angry at those who were unwilling to come to the wedding at his summons, and at those

who neglected to come to dine at the wedding but went off to their own field or to their business, and he grew angry also at those who seized his servants, mistreated them, and killed them. Let them tell us, then, whether this one who grew angry, in that he was making a wedding feast for his son, is the Father of Christ, or is someone else besides the one who — so far as concerns the parable — grew angry, who is his father.

Either way they will be hard pressed: whether by their unwillingness to have the one who grew angry, the one making the wedding feast for his son, be the Father of Christ, because of the anger; or by being compelled, on account of the wedding feast and the son, to admit that he is indeed the Father of Christ, and that he does grow angry. And if they should attempt to bring some other explanation for his growing angry,

we will say to them: my good sirs, what is the basis for choosing not to flee from the one in the gospel who makes a wedding feast for his son because of the anger, and seeking another, while in the Law and the Prophets, because of that same word "anger" and things resembling it, you seek to fashion some deity other than the one proclaimed by the Law and the Prophets?

Inasmuch, then, as we are men, and it does not profit us to gaze upon the riches "of the kindness" of God and the great abundance of his kindness, hidden by him lest we be harmed, the kingdom of heaven was of necessity likened to a man who is a king, so that he might speak to men as a man and might order the affairs of men who were not able to be ordered by God remaining wholly God and in

by speaking through the prophets and by administering human affairs. And the kingdom of heaven will then cease to be likened to a man, when, jealousy and strife and the rest of the passions and sins and the walking "according to man" having ceased, we become worthy to hear from God: "I said, you are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High," or of his Christ, no longer

doing such things for which it might be said to us: "but you shall die like men." I think, however, that not only will the kingdom of heaven cease to be likened to a human king, but also countless other things that sinful man has need of, as it is written in Hosea: "I am like a panther to Ephraim, and like a lion to the house of Judah," and in

another place he says, "I will meet them like a bear bereaved of her cubs." He will therefore at some point cease being like a panther and like a lion and like a bear bereaved of her cubs, when, because those who have done such things no longer need him as a panther and as a lion and as a bear bereaved, since he no longer has such people needing such a one, he will manifest himself "as he is." I understand in the same way

also the saying, "our God is a consuming fire," since to the extent that there is in us what deserves to be consumed, to that extent our God is a "consuming fire" for those things; but when what is by nature fit to be consumed has been consumed by the consuming fire, then he will no longer be "our God, a consuming fire," but only, as John said, light,

saying, "God is light." Now that these points have been raised, observe, if you can, whether the passage from John's catholic epistle, which reads thus - "Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not yet been made manifest what we shall be. We know that if it is made manifest we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is" - should be understood in this way. For now, even if we are deemed worthy to see

God with the mind and the heart, we do not see "him as he is" but as he becomes to us on account of our condition; but at the end of all things, and of the "restoration of all things which he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old," we shall see him, not as he is now, which he is not, but as befits him then, which he is. Having said this once,

with a view to "the kingdom of heaven was likened to a man, a king," we can also find the reason why the savior repeatedly named himself son of man, or son of a man, making clear that, just as God, in administering human affairs, is said - as though in parables - to be a man, and perhaps in some way even becomes one, so also the savior, being primarily son of God, and being

also "son of his love," and "image of the invisible God," does not remain in that which he primarily is, but becomes, according to the arrangement, the man spoken of in parables, being God, son of man, by imitating, when he administers human affairs, God, who is spoken of in parables and in some way becomes man. And one ought not to look for some [particular] man and say of him

that the Savior is a son, but rather, standing on the concept of God and of the parables that speak of him, understand intelligently that he is a man when he calls himself Son of Man. Now among us human beings the kingdom of heaven has been likened to a human king, but among those called gods according to the scriptures, among whom "God stood in the assembly, in the midst of

gods," passing judgment, the kingdom of heaven is likened, likened to a divine king. But you will ask whether, just as among the lesser beings, so far as their own nature goes—angels and thrones and lordships and rulers and authorities—a human king has been made the likeness by which the kingdom of the heavens is figured, so too among thrones a king who is a throne is the figure of the kingdom of the heavens, and among lordships to a king who is a lordship, and among rulers to

a king who is a rule, and among authorities to a king who is an authority. For someone will say: what is the reason that for the lesser beings the kingdom of heaven should be likened to a human king, while for those greater than human beings nothing analogous to this occurs? This one, then, likened to a human king making a wedding feast for his son, sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding. And

you will consider whether, just as in bodily matters the bride who is being married is distinct from the slaves who call and from those who are invited to the wedding, so too in mystical matters some are taken up into the company of the bride, while others are assigned to the rank of the slaves sent to call those who have been invited to the wedding, and a third group besides these are

those invited to the wedding. God alone would know the different ranks of souls, or of the powers together with them, and the reason why some are taken up into the company of the bride, while others are assigned to the slaves who minister to this calling, and others to those who are called. And in spiritual marriages, understand the fellowship of the word as bridegroom, the reception,

and the offspring rightly produced as belonging to the bride-soul, who is married to the word and is not corrupted by him, but rather at each act of fellowship with him receives a share of incorruption and gives birth—to whatever rational offspring might come from such marriages. And in such marriages understand the breakfast that is being prepared as consisting of solid food among spiritual sayings. And understand the solid part of the food, interpreted allegorically for me,

not in the bulls, but also the spiritual sense of the same contemplation in the fattened animals that are sacrificed, and the rest of the variety as well, the spiritual contemplation analogous to the bodily things, in the fact that all things are ready. For the king, in royal abundance worthy of his kingdom and his wealth, makes such a breakfast. It seems to me indeed that the leading calling to the wedding was addressed to certain noble Israelite souls,

for it is preeminently through those who call, by the word of teaching, that God wishes those more naturally suited for understanding to come to this blessed hearth. And one can see that such people do not wish to come to the calling, and for this reason other slaves are sent, inviting those who do not wish to come, and promising, if

...that those who had been invited might come and partake of the breakfast prepared by the king, and of bulls that, as among clean things, are greater than the clean, and of fattened animals, by the varied and abundant demonstration of the thoughts pertaining to each problem. For he who brings forward a full and abundant demonstration concerning the problem before us sets out, as it were, a fattened discourse — one that is divided and spoken of in tropology, and slaughtered.

As if, for the sake of argument, one were to bring forward certain slight and weak points for the demonstration of the problems, constructing them according to mere appearances, the things slaughtered would be certain thin and lean ones, and (likewise) dry and fleshless. But such are not the things prepared at the king's breakfast, in which he says: "My bulls and fatted beasts are slaughtered" — and thus also

all things are ready, so that in the standing of the servants and the ministry of the spiritual wine-pourers, each of the deacons appointed to the breakfast might bring forward especially those things in which he learned to minister. And indeed, exhorting those who (as I said) are second according to the parable, he said, "Behold, I have prepared the breakfast; my bulls and fatted beasts are slaughtered." And all things

are ready; come to the marriage feast. But those who were first invited, as being poor and needy, neglected this in their minds and went away, tending to their own affairs and rejoicing in them rather than in what the king promised through the servants he had sent. And observe that the one of them who had a field of his own did not come to the marriage feast, while the one who had acquired a business wished in some way to imitate

what is said in the parable of the merchant of pearls, who sought "goodly pearls" and, having found "one of great price," sold off the many in order to buy the one. Yet this business was not a fortunate one, since the one invited, having gone off to it, did not partake of the breakfast prepared by the king, nor of the slaughtered bulls and fatted beasts, nor of all that was ready.

As many, then, of the discerning as, having been invited, do not come to the calling, yet do not also insult and kill the servants sent to call them, are more moderate than those who have dared to do these things; and they rest, one in his own field, the other in his business. But there are those — it seems to me — who have fallen away into the preparation of contentious and

sophistic arguments, in which, prevailing over the servants sent, who are not prepared to refute sophisms, or seeming to prevail, they insult those ministering the call. And indeed one may see those who are devoted to the practice of the divine words, and who wish, together with divine wisdom, to advocate for them, being insulted by the discerning who are unwilling to believe the truth; and some

of them are even killed by those against whom the king is said to have been angered, since "the anger" that is called "came upon them." Now let us see who are next after these, and who were sent as "the army of the king" — either the multitude of the heavenly host, or the angels appointed over punishments; and they indeed kill the murderers of the servants of the

...word, and the king burns down their entire city. For each of the doctrines compounded together “in the wisdom of the rulers of this age” is, as it were, a city of the impious, which the king burns and utterly destroys, as being built up out of wicked structures. And whenever you observe a demolition, whether of “knowledge falsely so called” or of any words at all that profess truth, and their noble overthrow,

do not hesitate to say that such a thing has come about through the soldiers of God burning down the cities of the enemies of the truth of God. Indeed, the city of Jewish teaching was also burned after the coming of Christ; and when it had been burned, the king said to his servants — the apostles of Christ, or the angels of God appointed over the calling of the nations —

“The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy; go therefore to the crossroads, and call to the wedding as many as you find.” And one can see, from every road of private and non-private doctrines belonging to the customs of the nations and cities and villages and places, those who are called to the wedding by those

appointed to do this. And the servants went out — whether the apostles of Christ from Judea and Jerusalem, or the blessed angels from the inner regions in which they were — and coming to the roads they gathered, and will gather, all whom they find, wicked *** , so that, having put off wickedness, the garment foreign to the wedding, and having put on

along with what are called good works the garment of the wedding, they might fill the hearth of the wedding as they recline. When, then, the wedding has been filled with those reclining and resting upon faith and reverence toward God, then the king will enter to inspect and judge those reclining, so that, having exposed the one who does not have a wedding garment, he may punish him, but set before the rest the prepared breakfast, and

the fattened animals that were sacrificed, along with the bulls, and all the rest that he had prepared. But he saw one man clothed — clothed not in a wedding garment — referring to a single class or kind all those who kept the wickedness they had before faith and did not strip it off. And indeed he finds fault with such a man, as having done wrong in daring to enter into such a wedding without having put on

the wedding garment, the woven fabric of virtue, the bright robe, concerning which Solomon in Ecclesiastes commanded, saying: “At every season let your garments be white.” And the one who dared to enter this bright wedding without a wedding garment is muzzled, and is unable to speak — condemned as deserving punishment and judgment by the one who said to the servants,

to others (that is, the armies), “Bind his feet and hands” — the members he did not put to proper use, for he neither walked the journey he ought to have walked, nor performed the deeds he ought to have performed — “cast him out,” not only from the hearth of the wedding but also throw him into the outer darkness, utterly unmixed with light, so that, thirsting for light after having been in darkness,

in the outer darkness weep toward the God who is able to do him good and to rescue him from there, and gnash the teeth of one who, through wickedness, has eaten the sour grape and for that reason has had his teeth set on edge. For "the teeth of the one who eats the sour grape" "will be set on edge"; and there too the sour grape must be understood to mean the wickedness of the one who does not forget "the things behind" nor [reach forward] "to the things ahead," but remains in it, when he ought instead to journey on

toward what is ripe, and to make the cluster of virtue's vine sweet. He adds, to the whole parable, on account of the many who were called and did not prove worthy, the words "for many are called"; and on account of those who entered into the wedding feast and reclined there, being few, the words "but few are chosen." And if one were to observe the crowded gatherings of

(to name them more simply) the churches, and examine how many live more decently and are transformed "by the renewal of the mind," and how many conduct themselves more carelessly and are conformed "to this age," he would see that the Savior's saying is apt: "for many are called, but few are chosen." And elsewhere it is said: "many will seek to enter and will not be able," and

"strive to enter through the narrow gate, because few find it." "Then the Pharisees went and took counsel against him, how they might entrap him in speech," and so on, down to "and leaving him they went away." The intent of the passage set before us seems to me, on the literal level, to be as follows. The Jews, since they had their own teaching according to the law of Moses, and

a way of life estranged from the conduct of the nations, and held the doctrine which says, "Strive even unto death for the truth, and the Lord will fight on your behalf," resisted the nations that ruled over them, so as not to transgress the law of God. And indeed they often risked utter destruction under the Romans, when these wished to bring a statue of Caesar into the temple of God, resisting and preventing

those who had grown stronger than they, because of the sins of the Jews. We have found, in the histories concerning the time of Tiberius Caesar, accounts of how, under Pontius Pilate, the people were placed in danger, Pilate forcing the setting up of a statue of Caesar in the temple, while they, beyond their strength, prevented it; and a similar thing is recorded to have happened also in the times of Gaius

Caesar. And we conjecture that, so long as the people were watched over and "the vineyard of the Lord of hosts, the house of Israel, and his beloved new planting, the man of Judah," was walled about with the hedge spoken of according to the prophets, nothing of such magnitude occurred. But the most paradoxical thing is this: it was Pilate himself, to whom they handed Jesus over, who was the first to dare defile the temple of God. And so, in the time

of the Savior, when the Jews were commanded to pay tribute to the Romans, there was deliberation and counsel among the Jews as to whether it was fitting for those set apart to God, being his portion, to pay tribute to the rulers, or to fight for freedom, if they were not permitted to live as they wished, and not pay tribute. And it is recorded that Judas the Galilean, whom Luke also mentions

in the Acts of the Apostles, having drawn away a large crowd of Jews, he taught that they must not pay tribute to Caesar nor proclaim Caesar as lord; but the tetrarch of his time wanted to persuade the people to yield to the present state of subjection and not choose war of their own accord against stronger powers, but to pay the tribute. And the passage of the gospel before us does not clearly

show these things, yet to one able to look with careful scrutiny, the text set out shows that this is how matters stood. For the Pharisees, wishing to catch Jesus in speech, would have had no occasion for sending their own disciples together with the Herodians to ask Jesus whether it is lawful to give the census-tax to Caesar or not, if it were agreed that one ought not to give it. And if

it had been agreed to give it. And observe whether the facts of the story before us are not made clear by this: that the Pharisees, wishing to trap Jesus in speech, did not send only their own disciples to inquire about the census, but sent them together with the Herodians. For it is likely that at that time, among the people, those who taught that the tribute should be paid to Caesar were called Herodians by

those who did not want this to happen; while those who, under the pretense of freedom, forbade paying the tribute to Caesar, were thought to be the ones who kept the teachings of the Jews strictly, the Pharisees. But if someone does not wish this to be so, let him explain how it is that the Pharisees, wishing to trap him in speech, send their own disciples, and send the Herodians as well, to inquire about the tribute. For what

trap would there be in Jesus answering, whether he wanted the census to be given to Caesar or not, unless (as we have explained) if he forbade giving the census to Caesar, the Herodians were going to hand him over to the Romans as one teaching rebellion, while if he permitted it, the Pharisees were going to accuse Jesus of looking to the face of a man rather than teaching the way of God in truth? Examine

for yourself that the disciples of the Pharisees, saying: Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God in truth, and you care about no one, for you do not look at the face of a man — see how by this praise they provoke him not to show favor to the Herodians and to those who thought as Caesar did, so that

having declared himself, according to the wish of the Pharisees, that one ought not to give tribute to Caesar, he might be handed over by them to the Herodians. Observe also that Jesus, knowing their cunning, said: Why do you test me, hypocrites? He therefore knew he was being tested by the Pharisees, who approached him with cunning, so that whatever he might answer, they would plot against him from his answer. Let this much,

then, be said from the gospel before us on this passage, as regards the wording, with which the words of Mark and Luke concerning similar matters agree, as you can see for yourself by setting the gospels side by side and examining them together; for the sense expressed here by Matthew concerning these matters is no different, and likewise

...Matthew has that Mark also has. At the same time we are also taught by our Savior not to pay attention to what is said by the many and therefore appears reputable, under the pretext of piety toward God, but rather to what is established by an examination of the coherence of the argument. For observe that when the question was raised whether it is right to give Caesar the census-tax or not, he did not simply declare his own opinion,

but having said, "Show me the coin of the census," he asked whose image and inscription it bore, and when they said, "Caesar's," he answered that one must render to Caesar what belongs to him when he asks for it, and not deprive him of what is his own on the pretense of piety toward God. For surely it is not the case that one must render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's but not also render the things of God

to God, and no one is prevented, in rendering to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, from also rendering to God the things that are God's. Now one might allegorize the passage in this way. We are composed of soul and body (let us pass over for now saying also of spirit), and we owe a certain payment, as it were a tribute of bodies, to the one called the ruler of bodies, Caesar — namely, the things necessary for the body, which bear the bodily

image of the ruler of bodies. These are food and shelter and the necessary rest and periods of sleep. And we owe other things as well, since the soul is by nature according to the image of God, to its king, God — namely, whatever is beneficial and fitting to the nature and being of the soul. These are the roads that lead to virtue and the

deeds that accord with virtue. Now those who are taught the law of God concerning the affairs of the body and what is owed to it do not all hold the same opinion. For some do the equivalent of those who advise not giving the census-tax to Caesar, afflicting the body as much as they can with fasts and sleeplessness and abstinence of every kind from what pertains to the body and its necessary functions. Others, distinct

from these, hold confused views about the passage but imagine that one must render dues to the body as well. But our Savior, the Word of God, clearly separating the reasonable debts owed to the body from the spiritual debts, says: "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." For the

tribute that belongs to Caesar and to bodily affairs bears his image, and this alone — and nothing more than this — do we owe to the body. I know also another account of this passage that is in circulation. The ruler of this age is called, in the allegorical sense, Caesar; but the God of all the ages, who appears on no symbol, is named everywhere. Since, then, we bear a certain

image of the ruler of this age — that is, the things that pertain to vice — and we cannot render to God the things that are God's until we first render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, having laid aside everything that pertains to vice, for this reason the Savior, once the coin and the image on it had been displayed, says: "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." And this

Let us consider, on this point, that if ever, being tested by those seeking occasions against us, who put forward certain problems not in order to learn but so that they might accuse our power, we hear words that test us, we ought neither to keep entirely silent nor to answer at random, but circumspectly and with due consideration, so as, as far as possible, to deny occasions to "those wanting" occasions, and to teach without reproach the things that save those who wish

to be saved by hearing. Now the Pharisees can be taken as the teachers of the various Jewish traditions, and the Herodians as belonging to what most people reckoned the royal party of the Jews, spoken of in this simpler sense. From both sides, then, they inquire of the Savior about the census. And he answers them as we have already recorded; except that, since they do not wish to learn from

questioning him, but to entrap him in speech and to test him, for this reason, having heard what seemed good to him in answer to their question, and having marveled that he gave them no occasion to plot against him, they did not remain with him as the disciples did, nor did they simply depart, as is written concerning others, but they left him and went away. And such indeed are those who abandon

the word, and disbelieve him, and go away from him after hearing him. And one would not err in saying, of those who fell away after hearing and after that hearing, that such people abandoned Jesus and went away; but we shall say the word of the bride: "I held him, and I did not let him go." On that day the Sadducees came to him, saying that there is

no resurrection, and so on, down to where they were astonished at his teaching. The things equivalent to these, or the same as these, are also said in Mark and in Luke, in slightly different words in each. "On that day" — which day? Or was it when the Pharisees, having gone off, took counsel against him how they might entrap him in speech, and inquired about

the census? For it is likely that, when our Savior had answered concerning the census and had said, "Render therefore the things of Caesar to Caesar, and the things of God to God," and they had marveled at his answer, the Sadducees, knowing his shrewd answers, thought that either they themselves, through raising this difficulty, would show themselves to have the better argument, saying there is no resurrection

for those who hope for it, or perhaps also that they would learn how there can be a resurrection according to the writing of Moses, and what kind of life those who rise again will have. Observe that almost the whole of our Savior's teaching at this time arose in response to questions. And first, when he had come into the temple, as he was teaching, the elders and chief priests of the people approached him, saying

"By what authority do you do these things? And who gave you this authority?" To them, having asked in turn about John, he seems reasonably to have declined giving an answer to their intent. Then after this he tells the parable of the two children, the one who promised to work in the vineyard and did not work, and the one who professed

...not having worked. Then after this he tells the parable about the vineyard and the tenant farmers who killed the servants and the son, and after these things another parable about those called to the wedding feast. And after this Matthew recorded a second question, the one about the census tax, and a third, the doubt of the Sadducees concerning the resurrection. But also

a fourth question was raised after this one, from a certain Pharisee testing him about "which is the great commandment in the law?" And after so many questions had been brought to him, he himself, "when the Pharisees were gathered together, asked them" about the Christ. The Sadducees, however, saying that there is no resurrection, did not <only> set aside the resurrection of the flesh, so called in common usage,

but they also did away entirely with not only the immortality of the soul but also its continued existence, supposing that nowhere in the writings of Moses is the life of the soul after these things indicated. And to this day the Samaritans, along with those among them accounted skilled in the law, hold the same opinion as the Sadducees concerning the soul of human beings, and they contend even to the death for the law of Moses and for circumcision.

And this meaning concerning the resurrection — I mean the one held by the Sadducees and the Samaritans, who reject this life of the soul — some of the Corinthians in the apostle's time also had in mind when they held the doctrine that there is no resurrection, about whom he writes these things: "But if Christ is preached, that he has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that

there is no resurrection of the dead?" And that those in Corinth who said there is no resurrection of the dead were, according to the meaning intended by the Sadducees, setting aside the resurrection — that is, the continued existence of the soul — he makes clear from: "If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied." Which, if you examine it carefully, you will see that the one who sets aside the

resurrection of the dead that is believed in the church, even if he sets it aside falsely, is by no means "hoping in Christ" "in this life" "only." For supposing, hypothetically, that the resurrection believed by the majority were not true, the one who sets it aside has not hoped "in Christ" "in this life" "only," since the soul lives on, not indeed receiving back that body but being clothed instead

with something ethereal and better. But neither would we be "of all people most to be pitied," if we were to say that the soul lives and exists, even without attaching this body to it or saying that it receives it back. Further, in support of establishing that the apostle is chiefly concerned with this very meaning, we shall also make use, in the first letter to the Corinthians, of the passage: "if the dead are not raised at all, why then are people even

baptized on behalf of them? Why do we too face danger every hour?" And also: "if, humanly speaking, I fought with wild beasts at Ephesus, what benefit is it to me? If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die." For let it be supposed that what is thought true by the majority is not true concerning the resurrection of the dead — how

From this it follows that we are risking ourselves in vain when we strive for the salvation of our souls. And how is it of no benefit to the one who has fought with beasts for Christ's sake *** being administered according to merit, if he does not receive back his former body? And how does it follow, from there being no resurrection of the flesh, that “let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die”? But we do not say these things because we disbelieve what is written in Isaiah

in this manner: “all flesh shall behold the deliverance wrought by God,” or what is said by Job: “that he who is to release me is eternal upon the earth, and will raise up again this skin of mine that endures these things.” Nor do we disbelieve the apostolic voice which says: “he will give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit dwelling”

“in you.” But, as far as we are able, let us purify the meaning signified in the passage of the gospel set before us, from the language of resurrection; and for this reason we have also set alongside it the sayings from the first letter to the Corinthians. The Sadducees, then, came to Jesus, who say that there is no resurrection — but resurrection (as we have explained) in the proper sense — and they questioned our Lord, saying: Moses said, if

someone dies without having children, his brother shall marry his wife and produce offspring on his brother's behalf. It seems worthwhile to me, then, to set out at this point the text of Moses, to which the Sadducees referred what was said by them to have been written in the gospel. It runs thus in Deuteronomy: “if brothers dwell

together, and one of them dies,” and so on, down to “the house of him whose sandal was loosed.” Now the Sadducees, since they had no hope of the resurrection, having heard this text carelessly and having conceived nothing worthy of God concerning the law here set forth, supposed that it followed, if there is a resurrection, that the man would rise as a man having male

parts, and the woman would rise clothed with a woman's body. And, understanding in a lowly way what is said about the resurrection, from what they thought followed from this, having fashioned a certain myth about seven brothers who married one woman, they raised the difficulty of whose wife such a woman, once risen, would be, since she had already been the wife of seven men in succession. But they could have raised the same difficulty, even without such a fiction, from

women who had many husbands, and perhaps also from men who had many wives. And our Savior, in answering them, did not explain the intention of the law of Moses, since they were not worthy of the knowledge of so great a mystery; but he simply declared, saying that the divine scriptures also proclaim concerning the resurrection from the dead, that there there are no marriages, but those who rise

from the dead become like the angels in heaven, and just as the angels in heaven neither marry nor are given in marriage, so too (he says) are those raised from the dead. But I think it is shown through these words that it is not only in respect of not marrying and not being given in marriage that those who are counted worthy of the resurrection from the dead

of the resurrection, but also that their bodies, being transformed with respect to “their lowliness,” become such as the bodies of the angels are, ethereal and gleaming with light. One might inquire into a doctrine that startles many of the faithful — perhaps arising from many places, but clearly also from this one — raising the difficulty whether, just as there are those who rise from the dead and become like the angels in

heaven, and a certain order of angels who change over from being human beings, so too there are other angels in heaven who were once human beings and, having contended well in a human body, have become angels in heaven, just as certain others before them did. Let the person seeking out this startling doctrine from the passage before us — and perhaps from elsewhere as well — look closely and survey the whole

scripture and the sequence of the matters, and consider what follows for one who posits these things, and let him examine whether one ought to accept such a reasoning as entails what is shown by “we shall judge angels” and by “things into which angels long to look.” And if one should also accept the letter of Jude, let him see what follows for the argument on account of “the angels who did not

keep their own domain but abandoned their proper dwelling, he has kept in everlasting chains under gloom for the judgment of the great day.” And let the one who dares to inquire into such things see how one must understand what is written in Genesis, that “the sons of God, seeing that the daughters of men were beautiful, took for themselves wives from all whom they chose.”

But to raise difficulties over the matters in this passage and to examine their sequence, and to entrust to paper the clarification of such weighty things, might perhaps not be safe; for it is enough that we have ventured so far even in what has been said. Having set out once for all the wording of the law from Deuteronomy, I judge it not unfitting to see what its intention is. One must therefore inquire in

it who the one wife is, and who the two brothers are who are brothers of one another, of whom the one, marrying first, does not bear fruit from her, while the brother of the deceased, marrying second, begets a child in the name of the one who has died. And after this you will inquire who is the one who is unwilling “to take his brother’s wife,” and

who on that account, “before the elders,” has “the one sandal” loosed and is “spat upon in the face” by the woman, who has gone up “to the gate” and says, “my husband’s brother is unwilling to raise up his brother’s name in Israel.” One might also inquire in this passage who the elders are, and what the gate is, up to which

“the woman” goes to say what is written. Now that every law professing to be of God must be believed to be something dignified and worthy of reverence, or else, if it is not dignified, is not a law of God, anyone not utterly without understanding would agree; but whether we find the dignity and reverence of this law to be so or not, first of all God

his Christ too would know, and after this the one called in Scripture the "approved money-changer," who knows to "test all things," to hold fast the "good," and to "abstain from every form of evil." Come then, since we wish to expound the problem set before us, let us call upon the one who said, "I will utter problems from the beginning," and let us say that it is "good" if we hold to the things given by him,

but if not, then to the things that fall to us with respect to the topic. The one who reads what is said will judge. Now it seems to me that, according to one way of explaining it, the woman is the soul of the man, married first to the letter of the law and bearing no children from it, and second to the spiritual law, and from this one bearing fruit and begetting, and not departing

from the honor owed to the letter of the law that died for her in the person begotten to her. And perhaps every soul that is to be blessed, and is figuratively called a "woman," is necessarily first, in the introductory stages, married to the letter of the law, which dies as the soul-as-woman advances, so that she may attain the more venerable and child-bearing marriage, at which time "she will be saved through childbearing," provided the children remain in

"faith and love and holiness, with sound-mindedness"; for she will not be saved before childbearing, or apart from it. And the children of this woman-soul, from the second husband, the spiritual law, are the works that accord with it. Now the two brothers, born of one mind, are the laws * * *, which always dwell "together"; for

their house is not divided from one another, but they are "brothers," and both interpretations are as it were in one house, that which contains them, namely the letter. And see whether this cannot be shown from the words "if brothers dwell together." Then next comes: "and one of them dies, and he has no seed," which I have expounded to the best of my ability.

Let us also look at "the wife of the dead man shall not be outside, married to a man not near of kin," and consider which woman-soul transgresses this law and which keeps it. It is in such passages, I take it, that after the death of the letter-interpretation of the law and its overturning, one soul acts contrary to the divine commandment,

having previously been the wife of the dead man and having trusted in him, becoming altogether a "woman to a man not near of kin" to the law, when she accepts a word that does not belong to the interpretation of the letter, but is altogether foreign (such are the souls of the heterodox, for whom the interpretation of the letter according to the law came to an end, and who were unwilling to be married to that one who forever dwells "together" with them,

namely the spiritual law, but instead to some word "outside" both of these, and in no way to have communion with one who is "near of kin." Another soul, however, [is the woman who], living according to God after the death and overturning of the former husband, is unwilling to become "outside" and belong to "a man not near of kin," but is married to the brother of the deceased, who dwells "together" with him, at the time when "the brother of her husband comes in to

‹her,› and he comes to be within her soul and takes ‹her to himself as wife,› and dwells together with that soul, to her blessing, since she is being married according to God's will to the second, spiritual law. ‹And the child that she bears›—that is, the child that the soul, having become wife and dwelling together with the second and spiritual brother, brings forth—is established ‹from the name›

of his brother ‹who has died,› and comes to be, not indeed from the former, yet bearing the same name as the former; for the name given to the offspring by the spiritual law is the name of the one who died, since that one too was called the law of God, and it is not right that ‹the name› of the dead man be blotted out from the one who is discerning and truly Israel, even if he himself is blotted out.

Let this, then, be said in part concerning the law. But we have need of God again, or rather still more, to enlighten our mind in Christ for the contemplation of what follows. ‹For if,› he says, ‹the man is not willing to take his brother's wife, his brother's wife shall go up to the gate, to the elders, and shall say›

what follows. And first observe that, for as long as the woman also was doing what was commanded by the law, and the man, going in to her, dwelt with her and had children by her, he was not called a man but ‹brother› of the woman's husband; but when he is not willing ‹to take his brother's wife› and ‹does not wish to raise up his brother's›

name in Israel,› and, being called by the elders ‹of the city,› says, ‹I do not wish to take her,› he is dishonored, having ‹his sandal› loosed, and is spat upon ‹in the face› by the woman, and is renamed, so that ‹his name› may be ‹the house of him whose sandal was loosed›—then he is called, no longer brother but [...]; for it is as though, by the keeping of the

law it was said to him: ‹I said, You are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High›; but for doing the opposite of the law he is, as it were, convicted by the word that says to him: ‹But you die like men.› And observe, if you are able to understand, that after death there is, apart from the interpretation of the letter, some other understanding of the law that is mistaken and neither spiritual nor blameless, except

that it has its origin ‹from the law,› though a mistaken origin, beginning from an occasion afforded by what is written in the law, and not willing ‹to raise up the name of his brother› and to honor the name of the law. Now such an interpretation, taken as a soul, does not wish to take the wife of its brother; for it does not wish to bear fruit for the glorifying of the name of the dead

brother. Therefore the woman does not stand below, ready to honor her former husband, but goes up ‹to the gate,› which holds for itself the entrance of the city, and ‹the elders.› And let this be understood as happening with reference to the church and the introduction and entrance into it. The woman, then, convicts the man who is unwilling to bear fruit with this kind of speech: And

she says: "My husband's brother is not willing to raise up the name of his brother in Israel." Then "the elders of that city," examining such a man, inquire whether he truly does not wish it. And when he answers that he does not wish it, she comes forward to the man who was not willing to raise up seed for his brother, and refutes him before the elders,

and dishonors him by loosing "his one sandal." And observe, in connection with this, what is said to Moses and to Joshua about "loosing the sandal from your feet," and the saying "of whom I am not worthy to loose the strap of his sandal," written in the Gospel according to Luke and according to Mark and according to John,

lest perhaps "to loose the sandal" is not the same as "to unloose" it; for Moses or Joshua is not bidden to unloose it for himself, nor did John, speaking of the Savior, use the word "unloose" but "loose." This lawgiver, then, is neither wholly unloosed nor wholly adorned with the fastening of the sandal, but has each condition by half. For this reason the woman who has refuted him before the elders "spits in his face";

for every soul spits upon the word that does not beget children nor bear fruit, and by this overthrow unlooses him in the very points where he stumbles, and "answering" says, "Thus shall it be done to the man who does not build up the house of his brother." And observe here carefully that the word "man" is used a second time of the one who sins, but now

already also of one who does not build up "the house of his brother." Everyone, then, who sees this man being unloosed by the woman and spat upon, and hears her saying, "Thus shall they do to the man who does not build up the house of his brother," let him do everything toward the building up of his brother; for if he should fail to build up "the house of his brother" (that is, of the law), there will be unloosed

"the one sandal," and he will be spat upon, and "the name" of every such man "in Israel," in the sight of all who see it, "shall be called the house of him whose sandal was unloosed." Let us also look at a second interpretation of the passage before us, and let there be two brother laws, according to which the one who kept the former was not "lawless before God," while the one who keeps the second is "under law

to Christ." And understand me: at the coming of Christ the former law died, being, as it were, a man of the soul of men, since "that which was glorified in this part" was not glorified formerly, "on account of the surpassing glory" belonging to the second; and understand the second law of Christ, brother to the former and, through Moses, likewise a son of the same Word, who also

begot the former. While, then, these two brothers were "dwelling together," especially at the coming, the one of them died and had no seed. But the wife of the dead man, after the death of the former husband — that is, the soul that is under the law — does not become "the wife of a stranger who is not near of kin"; for a kinsman draws near, the law of the gospel, as a brother

with the husband dead under the former law, and he goes in to the wife of his brother. Take, for example, the soul of Paul: see it "under the law," and then, ransomed by Christ from the law, coming to be under the gospel. And consider whether the husband of Paul's soul has not died, and whether, nonetheless, though that one has died, the wife of the deceased

has not become "outside," as those of the heresies suppose, nor "belonging to no man who comes near her." For "the brother of her husband" went in to her and "took her to himself as wife" and lived with her, and there came to be "the fruit and the offspring and the child" and "that which was born in the name of the deceased." For according to the spiritual law

the gospel calls everything by name, and the name of the deceased has not been blotted out, now that the law of the gospel has come; for among the true Israel the name of the former one is kept as well. Who, then, after this, is the man unwilling "to take the wife of his own brother," if not the reasoning found among the heresies, unwilling that the soul who honored the former

husband should also accept remembrance of the former husband? Against such a man the wife of his brother "goes up to the gate," concerning which it is said, "the Lord's gate is this one; through it the righteous shall enter," and she goes up "to the elders" and testifies against the one unwilling "to raise up seed for his brother in Israel," nor to honor the law of

God given through Moses. When, then, "the elders" inquire of such a man whether the woman speaks the truth about him, and he is unwilling to raise up seed for his brother, then "the wife" of the deceased comes forward "before the elders" and "looses the one sandal from off his foot," so that, even if he is shod with the name of Christ, he may be

stripped of the name of God, and for this reason bears the name of Christ neither gloriously nor truly. And the woman also "spits in the face" of such a man and reproaches him as a mere man, one unwilling to be made divine by bearing fruit; and she declares that this shall happen to everyone who has not built up "the house of his brother," that is, of the evangelical word,

which is both lawful and prophetic. And he who does not build up his name among the Israelites shall have no other name than this, that his "house" is "the house of him whose sandal was loosed." Every man, then, who wallows among the heresies — especially those that sever the deity and separate the law from the gospel — is "the house of him whose sandal was loosed," spat upon "in the face"

and having "the one sandal" loosed from him. And we have also received a third such interpretation of this passage, which we shall state briefly. The wife is said to be Wisdom, because of the saying "her I sought to take as a bride for myself," whom one must also love, according to Solomon who said, "love her, and she will keep you," and her husband is the wise man. If, then, the wise man, having begotten no children,

...departs from life by means of wisdom, the brother who dwelt with him and rested in the same words should be an ambassador for the same words, so that from wisdom might be born the glory that will secure for the one who departed from that companionship someone to present it. But if the surviving brother should be unwilling to be an ambassador for the words, he will be dishonored by wisdom, which will half loose his sandal from him; for neither

will such a one's sandal fail to be loosed, nor will it be completely loosed. Now to establish that, according to scripture, the law is called the husband of the soul as wife, we shall set forth what stands thus in the letter to the Romans: "Or are you ignorant, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law has dominion over a person for as long as he lives?" and so on, down to "having become another man's." More has been said

by us on this passage of the letter to the Romans when we expounded it in our commentaries on it. Let these things, then, even though they may seem to have been said by way of digression, be said for the clarification of the law given through Moses, which the Sadducees recalled when they questioned the Savior, saying, "Moses said, If anyone dies having no children," and so on. Come,

then, let us next examine the other parts of the gospel, from "Now there were with us seven brothers, and the first, having married, died," and so on. Isaiah, in his prophecy, says: "Seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: We will eat our own bread and wear our own garments; only let your name be called upon us;

take away our reproach." But the Sadducees, approaching the Savior, speak of the opposite of the prophecy, concerning seven men who married one woman. Now their problem seems to me to be a fabrication, since by means of the fabrication they intended to overturn the doctrine of the resurrection, supposing it follows from the resurrection that each of those raised has the same relation to those whom he had in

this life, so that the husband would receive back his wife as well after attaining the resurrection, and the father would remain in his relation to the son, and the brother to the brother. But they were, it seems, unaware that the Creator, doing everything for what is useful, has of necessity made such relations wherever there is generation and decay, so that

one man might be served by a woman for the begetting of children, and those begotten might have something in common through being begotten by the same parents, being brothers; and it was a function of generation that there be both father and son, mother and daughter. If, then, in that blessedness those deemed worthy of honor on account of the present age in which they lived well are to be in that

life, and none of those who did not strive here is deemed worthy of the resurrection from the dead, it is clear that whatever here was needed on account of generation will not exist there. For God does nothing superfluous, nor does anything happen in vain with him. But those who draw this consequence from their supposition—that each will receive back his own wife—ought to have seen that a city

there would be the begetting of children, births and deaths of children; and if these, then also illnesses; and if births, then also infancies, and advances from infancy to the completion of speech, and afterward, in the completion of reason, wickedness as well — and only rarely, and among the few who seek it, is virtue ever found in a city. What could be more futile than these things? And it would be better

for there to be no resurrection at all than for it to be of the sort the Sadducees supposed, assuming that it follows from the resurrection of the dead that each man gets his wife back — which entailed that each of the things mentioned would also occur. If, then, the age to come is hoped for as new, and as Isaiah named it, "a new heaven and a new earth," and as it is written in the gospel, "the cup" of a new

covenant — from a new vine, I suppose — then all the things belonging to the life there must be different, and truly blessed. But just as, as the argument has shown, it followed from there being a wife and a husband that there would also be children of fathers, and brothers of brothers, and a mother of those born, so perhaps it likewise follows, from there being neither wife nor husband, that there will no longer be a father and mother

or any of them brothers to one another — perhaps not only with respect to those to come but also to those already past. For there, among those who reasonably hear "Do not remember the former things, and do not dwell on the ancient things; behold, I am making all things new," there will no longer be any remembrance of kinship according to the flesh. And accordingly, in the age to come, Terah will not be called the father of Abraham, nor

will Abraham be called the father of Ishmael and of those from Keturah — perhaps not even of Isaac; for "the ancient things have passed away," and then it will be said, "behold, all things have become new." And if there is some other kind of brother besides the one "according to the flesh," and some other kind of father and son besides those that occur in the affairs of begetting — no longer through a woman nor through the unseemly parts of the body,

but by analogy with the way the Savior too is Son of God — this the one who is capable of inquiring rightly into such great matters will grasp, having made room for the Spirit that "searches all things, even the depths of God." And I take this otherness, this virtual homonymy, to apply not only in these cases — I mean those of brother and father and son — but also in the case of wife and husband. For in the resurrection

of the dead it is also true that they neither marry nor take spouses, but exist as the angels do in heaven; and it is also true, as stated in the parable, concerning a marriage different from those on earth, in "The kingdom of heaven has been compared to a king who held a marriage feast for his son," and what follows; and in "Then the kingdom of heaven will be compared"

"to ten virgins, who took their lamps," and what follows. The son of the king, then, in the resurrection of the dead, enters into a marriage beyond every marriage — one that eye has seen and ear has heard and that has "arisen upon the heart of man"; and that solemn and divine and spiritual marriage will take place in unspeakable words, which it is not

it is permitted for a man to say. But someone will inquire whether, corresponding to the bridegroom's marriage in the resurrection of the dead, there are also other marriages, or whether in the resurrection of the dead the bridegroom alone, having abolished every marriage, contracts a marriage — not where “the two shall become one flesh,” but where it is more proper to say that the bridegroom and

the bride are one spirit. But watch that you do not slip, on hearing such words, into accepting the myth-making about the aeons — males and females — in the manner of those who have fabricated their unions, which nowhere exist and are nowhere indicated by the sacred writings. Since the Sadducees' question about the seven brothers who had one wife requires no allegorical interpretation, come, let us examine the savior's

words about these matters, in which he says: ‘You are mistaken, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God. For in the resurrection people do not marry, nor are they given as spouses, but exist as the angels do in heaven.’ But in response to this someone will raise questions of the following kind: the savior, in saying to the Sadducees, ‘You are mistaken, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God,’ indicates

that it is established, in accordance with the scriptures, that in the resurrection of the dead there are no marriages, inasmuch as human beings will be made like the angels, among whom there is no marriage. Which scripture, then, shows that once raised, people do not marry, nor are they given as spouses? And where in the law or the prophets do we learn concerning those who will rise again that they will be like the

angels in heaven? For plainly we find nothing of this sort in the old scripture. Now according to Luke this would not be raised as a question, since he records the savior as having said: ‘The sons of this age beget and are begotten, marry and are given in marriage,’ and so on, and did not say anything at this point to the Sadducees, even about these things

being indicated in the scriptures. But according to Matthew this would be raised as a question, and likewise also according to Mark; for according to him, Jesus answered and said to the Sadducees: ‘Is it not for this reason that you are mistaken, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God? For once they have risen from the dead, they do not marry, nor are they given as spouses, but exist as the angels do who are in the heavens.’ Each one, then,

of those who attend to our difficulty, let him seek out from the scriptures what is established as having been said by the savior concerning those after the resurrection. But we for our part will say this: that the scriptures contain these things not literally, nor in a way to be understood by ordinary people, but in an allegorical sense. For since ‘the law possesses a mere shadow of the good things that are coming,’ having legislated certain matters concerning women and men,

and having narrated lawful marriages, does not speak primarily about the things one might take from the plain wording, but about the matters we ourselves have already set forth above when we cited what concerns the marriage of the savior and the church that is to be in the age to come. As, for instance, [if] ‘Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and one by the free woman. And the one from the

was born of the slave-girl according to the flesh, but the one from the free woman was born through the promise," it is not at all necessary for me to stand upon the sense-perceptible marriage of the free woman and her association with the slave-girl; for these things are said allegorically. But even, "for this reason a man will leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will be

one flesh," this saying is not to be heard as though it reveals no mystery; for "this mystery is great," and, as Paul says, it is referred "to Christ and to the church." And a little before this, having set out the matter concerning the woman married to the brother of her deceased husband, we examined, as best we could, the intention of the law. There are also

countless other laws concerning woman and man - as, for instance, about the bill of divorce, and about the two wives belonging to one man, one loved and the other hated, and about the woman taken captive who is married by the man who desired her, married after she has shaved her head and mourned her father and her mother in mourning - each of which has

something solemn and divine in the true tropological sense that is found in it. If, then, someone reading the law and going through the matters concerning the marriages of women and men supposes that nothing more is signified than what is indicated by the letter, he is in error, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God. One might inquire whether the statement "you are in error, not knowing the scriptures"

was addressed to the Sadducees, who accept no scripture other than that of the law, and whether it also refers to scriptures other than the law of Moses. One person will say that the Sadducees are accused on precisely this ground, that by not accepting the scriptures that follow the law they err through not knowing it. Another will say: it is enough, for the error of the Sadducees to be exposed, that they do not

know the scriptures of Moses themselves, in that they fail to grasp the divine sense within them. Yet he says that the Sadducees do not know two things: one, the scriptures, and the other, the power of God, from which power the events of the resurrection come about, and the common life within it. But one might say that "not knowing the power of God" is

also said of the Sadducees as referring to the Savior himself; since Christ is God's power and God's wisdom, and the Sadducees were ignorant of him, as ones not knowing the scriptures concerning him, nor the things he would accomplish in service of the resurrection from the dead of those who are to be saved. But whoever is not satisfied that the difficulty about "you are in error, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God" is resolved by tropology

will have to do one of two things: either disbelieve the passages as they stand written, on the ground that they have not been well recorded - since the Savior would not have spoken as written things that were not written - or he will dare to disbelieve on the ground that Jesus did not speak truly. And a third person, taking refuge in the apocryphal writings, where the matters concerning

...to have been written concerning the blessed life, he will say that the reference of what is written here is to them, in the phrase ‘you are led astray, not knowing the scriptures.’ And see whether he will not fall into absurdities on every side by avoiding the preliminary argument. For if he disbelieves the scripture, he will act contrary to the ecclesiastical position; and if he disbelieves Jesus, he will do so as one who is a Jew according to the flesh; or if...

...he turns to the apocryphal <sayings>, he will not arrive at a matter agreed upon among believers. For this reason it does not seem to me that ‘you are led astray, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God’ can be resolved in any other way except through the phrase ‘since at the resurrection people neither take wives nor are given as wives,’ or through the allegory laid down analogously by the apostle in the letter to the Galatians concerning the slave woman and...

...the free woman, which is to be applied also to the rest of the scriptures wherever something is said about a man and a woman. And just as those are led astray who, because they do not interpret the prophetic writings figuratively, suppose that after the resurrection we shall eat and drink bodily food <and drink>, since <also> the wording of the <prophetic> scriptures is of such a kind, and likewise concerning the things written about marriages and about men and women, holding fast...

...to the letter, and supposing that we shall then also make use of intercourse — on account of which it is not even possible to have leisure ‘for prayer,’ since those who make use of sexual intercourse are in some sort of defilement and a certain impurity. After this I ask whether ‘you are led astray, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God’ refers only to the clause ‘since at the resurrection people neither take wives nor...’

...are given in marriage,’ or also to ‘but they are like the angels in heaven.’ For I do not find where in scripture those who are to be saved are said to be like angels in heaven — unless perhaps someone will say that this too is shown in ‘but you shall go to your fathers in peace, having been nurtured to a good old age,’ and in ‘he was added to...

...his own people,’ and in ‘he was added to his people.’ Or by what is said in Deuteronomy concerning a man as one appointed by God in heaven and on earth — keeping the wording for yourself, you will find it. Next after this it is possible to see the passage concerning the resurrection of the dead: ‘Have you not read what was said to you by God, who says: I am the God of Abraham...

...and the God of Isaac and of Jacob? He is no God of the dead, but rather of the living. And to this too we shall say that, although the Savior was able to set out countless proofs from the prophets that the coming life exists for human beings, he did not do this, because the Sadducees accepted only the writing of Moses, from which he wished to put them to shame by a syllogism...

...indicating something of the following sort: to Moses God declared, 'I am Abraham's God, Isaac's God, and Jacob's God,' when he spoke to him from the bush. Therefore God is either the God of things that exist, or the God of things that do not exist. But it is absurd to say that the God who said, 'I am the one who is; this is my name,' is the God of things that in no way exist.

But if this is absurd, he is God of beings that exist and live and subsist and perceive the grace which God has bestowed on them, proclaiming himself their God and saying, "This is my memorial forever." Abraham, then, and Isaac and Jacob live, perceiving God and his grace, and with respect to each of them he is called God.

For it is not written, "I am God of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob," but rather, "I myself am Abraham's God, and Isaac's God, and Jacob's God." And that is exactly how Matthew, Mark, and Luke recorded it, in order, I think, to demonstrate to attentive readers that with respect to each patriarch individually God is God, granting them this as a special favor. For they were not like the Hebrews,

so that God should be spoken of collectively of these as he is of those. For of those it is written, "The God of the Hebrews has sent me," but of these, one by one, so that the statement might show that Abraham alone is of equal honor to the whole nation of the Hebrews; for God is not equally God of Abraham and God of the Hebrews. And you will say the same

about his being God of Isaac and God of Jacob as he is God of the Hebrews. And I think Elijah too was deemed worthy of such an honor, which is why it is written in the fourth book of Kingdoms, "the God of Elijah." Of Abraham, then, God was only God, and likewise of Isaac and of Jacob. But of our greater Savior

God is not only God but also Father. Hence it is well said by the apostle: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." This same Jesus Christ, of whom "blessed be the God and Father," granted to his own genuine disciples that the same one should be not only their God but also their Father. For he says,

having risen from the dead, to Mary: "Do not cling to me, since I have not yet gone up to my Father; instead go to my brothers and tell them: I am going up to my Father, who is also your Father, and to my God, who is also your God." And I think that then he granted this also to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob,

so that God should no longer be only their God but now also their Father. And Luke appended to the statement “God is not the God of dead men — he is God of the living,” a statement also found in Matthew and Mark, the phrase “for to him all are alive.” This was no ordinary praise of the patriarchs, since so great a Savior as ours testifies of them not only that

they live, but also that they live to the God to whom they live, and to no one else. And this phrase, "for to him all are alive," it is good for us to practice in every way and to take to heart, so that all of us may live to none other than God, in Christ. But the concise proof from the writings of Moses, for those who accept only those writings as divine, concerning the living...

...the patriarchs, the crowds, on hearing this, were astonished, welcoming the Savior's teaching as most wise and able to turn back to him those who were inclined to disbelief.

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