This book is a brief handbook or enchiridion on the proper mode of serving God, through Faith, Hope, and Love.
1. I cannot say, my dearest son Laurence, how much your learning pleases me, and how
much I desire that you should be wise—though not one of those of whom it is
said: "Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputant of this
world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?"
2. Human wisdom consists in piety. This you have in the book of the saintly
Job, for there he writes that Wisdom herself said to man, "Behold, piety is
wisdom."
When you ask me to be brief, you do not expect me to speak of great issues in a few sentences, do you? Is not this rather what you desire: a brief summary or a short treatise on the proper mode of worshipping [serving] God?
3. If I should answer, "God should be worshipped in faith, hope, love," you would doubtless reply that this was shorter than you wished, and might then beg for a brief explication of what each of these three means: What should be believed, what should be hoped for, and what should be loved? If I should answer these questions, you would then have everything you asked for in your letter. If you have kept a copy of it, you can easily refer to it. If not, recall your questions as I discuss them.
4. It is your desire, as you wrote, to have from me a book, a sort of
enchiridion,
5. But, as this faith, which works by love,
6. You have asked for an enchiridion, something you could carry around, not just baggage for your bookshelf. Therefore we may return to these three ways in which, as we said, God should be served: faith, hope, love. It is easy to say what one ought to believe, what to hope for, and what to love. But to defend our doctrines against the calumnies of those who think differently is a more difficult and detailed task. If one is to have this wisdom, it is not enough just to put an enchiridion in the hand. It is also necessary that a great zeal be kindled in the heart.
7. Let us
begin, for example, with the Symbol
8. Now, is it possible to hope for what we do not believe in? We can, of course, believe in something that we do not hope for. Who among the faithful does not believe in the punishment of the impious? Yet he does not hope for it, and whoever believes that such a punishment is threatening him and draws back in horror from it is more rightly said to fear than to hope. A poet, distinguishing between these two feelings, said,
but another poet, and a better one, did not put it rightly:
Indeed, some grammarians use this as an example of inaccurate language and comment, "He said 'to hope' when he should have said 'to fear.'"
Therefore faith may refer to evil things as well as to good, since we believe in both the good and evil. Yet faith is good, not evil. Moreover, faith refers to things past and present and future. For we believe that Christ died; this is a past event. We believe that he sitteth at the Father's right hand; this is present. We believe that he will come as our judge; this is future. Again, faith has to do with our own affairs and with those of others. For everyone believes, both about himself and other persons—and about things as well—that at some time he began to exist and that he has not existed forever. Thus, not only about men, but even about angels, we believe many things that have a bearing on religion.
But hope deals only with good things, and only with those which lie in the
future, and which pertain to the man who cherishes the hope. Since this is so,
faith must be distinguished from hope: they are different terms and likewise
different concepts. Yet faith and hope have this in common: they refer to what
is not seen, whether this unseen is believed in or hoped for. Thus in the
Epistle to the Hebrews, which is used by the enlightened defenders of the
catholic rule of faith, faith is said to be "the conviction of things not
seen."
What, then, shall I say of love, without which faith can do nothing? There
can be no true hope without love. Indeed, as the apostle James says, "Even the
demons believe and tremble."
Yet they neither hope nor love. Instead, believing as we do that what we hope for and love is coming to pass, they tremble. Therefore, the apostle Paul approves and commends the faith that works by love and that cannot exist without hope. Thus it is that love is not without hope, hope is not without love, and neither hope nor love are without faith.
9. Wherefore, when it is asked what we ought to believe in matters of
religion, the answer is not to be sought in the exploration of the nature of
things [rerum natura], after the manner of those whom the Greeks called
"physicists."
For the Christian, it is enough to believe that the cause of all created
things, whether in heaven or on earth, whether visible or invisible, is nothing
other than the goodness of the Creator, who is the one and the true God.
10. By this Trinity, supremely and equally and immutably good, were all things created. But they were not created supremely, equally, nor immutably good. Still, each single created thing is good, and taken as a whole they are very good, because together they constitute a universe of admirable beauty.
11. In this universe, even what is called evil, when it is rightly ordered
and kept in its place, commends the good more eminently, since good things yield
greater pleasure and praise when compared to the bad things. For the Omnipotent
God, whom even the heathen acknowledge as the Supreme Power over all, would not
allow any evil in his works, unless in his omnipotence and goodness, as the
Supreme Good, he is able to bring forth good out of evil. What, after all, is
anything we call evil except the privation of good? In animal bodies, for
instance, sickness and wounds are nothing but the privation of health. When a
cure is effected, the evils which were present (i.e., the sickness and the
wounds) do not retreat and go elsewhere. Rather, they simply do not exist any
more. For such evil is not a substance; the wound or the disease is a defect of
the bodily substance which, as a substance, is good. Evil, then, is an accident,
i.e., a privation of that good which is called health. Thus, whatever defects
there are in a soul are privations of a natural good. When a cure takes place,
they are not transferred elsewhere but, since they are no longer present in the
state of health, they no longer exist at all.
12. All of nature, therefore, is good, since the Creator of all nature is supremely good. But nature is not supremely and immutably good as is the Creator of it. Thus the good in created things can be diminished and augmented. For good to be diminished is evil; still, however much it is diminished, something must remain of its original nature as long as it exists at all. For no matter what kind or however insignificant a thing may be, the good which is its "nature" cannot be destroyed without the thing itself being destroyed. There is good reason, therefore, to praise an uncorrupted thing, and if it were indeed an incorruptible thing which could not be destroyed, it would doubtless be all the more worthy of praise. When, however, a thing is corrupted, its corruption is an evil because it is, by just so much, a privation of the good. Where there is no privation of the good, there is no evil. Where there is evil, there is a corresponding diminution of the good. As long, then, as a thing is being corrupted, there is good in it of which it is being deprived; and in this process, if something of its being remains that cannot be further corrupted, this will then be an incorruptible entity [natura incorruptibilis], and to this great good it will have come through the process of corruption. But even if the corruption is not arrested, it still does not cease having some good of which it cannot be further deprived. If, however, the corruption comes to be total and entire, there is no good left either, because it is no longer an entity at all. Wherefore corruption cannot consume the good without also consuming the thing itself. Every actual entity [natura] is therefore good; a greater good if it cannot be corrupted, a lesser good if it can be. Yet only the foolish and unknowing can deny that it is still good even when corrupted. Whenever a thing is consumed by corruption, not even the corruption remains, for it is nothing in itself, having no subsistent being in which to exist.
13. From this it follows that there is nothing to be called evil if there is
nothing good. A good that wholly lacks an evil aspect is entirely good. Where
there is some evil in a thing, its good is defective or defectible. Thus there
can be no evil where there is no good. This leads us to a surprising conclusion:
that, since every being, in so far as it is a being, is good, if we then say
that a defective thing is bad, it would seem to mean that we are saying that
what is evil is good, that only what is good is ever evil and that there is no
evil apart from something good. This is because every actual entity is good
[omnis natura bonum est.] Nothing evil exists in itself, but only
as an evil aspect of some actual entity. Therefore, there can be nothing evil
except something good. Absurd as this sounds, nevertheless the logical
connections of the argument compel us to it as inevitable. At the same time, we
must take warning lest we incur the prophetic judgment which reads: "Woe to
those who call evil good and good evil: who call darkness light and light
darkness; who call the bitter sweet and the sweet bitter."
14. Actually, then, in these two contraries we call evil and good, the rule
of the logicians fails to apply.
15. But when we say that evil has its source in the good, do not suppose that
this denies our Lord's judgment: "A good tree cannot bear evil fruit."
16. This being the case, when that verse of Maro's gives us pleasure,
it still does not follow that our felicity depends upon our knowing the causes of the great physical processes in the world, which are hidden in the secret maze of nature,
and other such things as this.
But we ought to know the causes of good and evil in things, at least as far as men may do so in this life, filled as it is with errors and distress, in order to avoid these errors and distresses. We must always aim at that true felicity wherein misery does not distract, nor error mislead. If it is a good thing to understand the causes of physical motion, there is nothing of greater concern in these matters which we ought to understand than our own health. But when we are in ignorance of such things, we seek out a physician, who has seen how the secrets of heaven and earth still remain hidden from us, and what patience there must be in unknowing.
17. Although we should beware of error wherever possible, not only in great
matters but in small ones as well, it is impossible not to be ignorant of many
things. Yet it does not follow that one falls into error out of ignorance alone.
If someone thinks he knows what he does not know, if he approves as true what is
actually false, this then is error, in the proper sense of the term. Obviously,
much depends on the question involved in the error, for in one and the same
question one naturally prefers the instructed to the ignorant, the expert to the
blunderer, and this with good reason. In a complex issue, however, as when one
man knows one thing and another man knows something else, if the former
knowledge is more useful and the latter is less useful or even harmful, who in
this latter case would not prefer ignorance? There are some things, after all,
that it is better not to know than to know. Likewise, there is sometimes profit
in error—but on a journey, not in morals.
for there is such a thing as a fortunate mistake which not only does no harm but actually does some good.
But now for a more careful consideration of the truth in this business. To
err means nothing more than to judge as true what is in fact false, and as false
what is true. It means to be certain about the uncertain, uncertain about the
certain, whether it be certainly true or certainly false. This sort of error in
the mind is deforming and improper, since the fitting and proper thing would be
to be able to say, in speech or judgment: "Yes, yes. No, no."
18. Here a most difficult and complex issue arises which I once dealt with in
a large book, in response to the urgent question whether it is ever the duty of
a righteous man to lie.
19. In some things, then, we are deceived in great matters; in others, small. In some of them no harm is done; in others, even good results. It is a great evil for a man to be deceived so as not to believe what would lead him to life eternal, or what would lead to eternal death. But it is a small evil to be deceived by crediting a falsehood as the truth in a matter where one brings on himself some temporal setback which can then be turned to good use by being borne in faithful patience—as for example, when someone judges a man to be good who is actually bad, and consequently has to suffer evil on his account. Or, take the man who believes a bad man to be good, yet suffers no harm at his hand. He is not badly deceived nor would the prophetic condemnation fall on him: "Woe to those who call evil good." For we should understand that this saying refers to the things in which men are evil and not to the men themselves. Hence, he who calls adultery a good thing may be rightly accused by the prophetic word. But if he calls a man good supposing him to be chaste and not knowing that he is an adulterer, such a man is not deceived in his doctrine of good and evil, but only as to the secrets of human conduct. He calls the man good on the basis of what he supposed him to be, and this is undoubtedly a good thing. Moreover, he calls adultery bad and chastity good. But he calls this particular man good in ignorance of the fact that he is an adulterer and not chaste. In similar fashion, if one escapes an injury through an error, as I mentioned before happened to me on that journey, there is even something good that accrues to a man through his mistakes. But when I say that in such a case a man may be deceived without suffering harm therefrom, or even may gain some benefit thereby, I am not saying that error is not a bad thing, nor that it is a positively good thing. I speak only of the evil which did not happen or the good which did happen, through the error, which was not caused by the error itself but which came out of it. Error, in itself and by itself, whether a great error in great matters or a small error in small affairs, is always a bad thing. For who, except in error, denies that it is bad to approve the false as though it were the truth, or to disapprove the truth as though it were falsehood, or to hold what is certain as if it were uncertain, or what is uncertain as if it were certain? It is one thing to judge a man good who is actually bad—this is an error. It is quite another thing not to suffer harm from something evil if the wicked man whom we supposed to be good actually does nothing harmful to us. It is one thing to suppose that this particular road is the right one when it is not. It is quite another thing that, from this error—which is a bad thing—something good actually turns out, such as being saved from the onslaught of wicked men.
20. I do not rightly know whether errors of this sort should be called
sins—when one thinks well of a wicked man, not knowing what his character
really is, or when, instead of our physical perception, similar perceptions
occur which we experience in the spirit (such as the illusion of the apostle
Peter when he thought he was seeing a vision but was actually being liberated
from fetters and chains by the angel
Nor am I at the moment trying to deal with that knottiest of questions which
baffled the most acute men of the Academy, whether a wise man ought ever to
affirm anything positively lest he be involved in the error of affirming as true
what may be false, since all questions, as they assert, are either mysterious
[occulta] or uncertain. On these points I wrote three books in the early
stages of my conversion because my further progress was being blocked by
objections like this which stood at the very threshold of my understanding.
Among us, on the other hand, "the righteous man lives by faith."
21. In those things which do not concern our attainment of the Kingdom of
God, it does not matter whether they are believed in or not, or whether they are
true or are supposed to be true or false. To err in such questions, to mistake
one thing for another, is not to be judged as a sin or, if it is, as a small and
light one. In sum, whatever kind or how much of an error these miscues may be,
it does not involve the way that leads to God, which is the faith of Christ
which works through love. This way of life was not abandoned in that error so
dear to parents concerning the twins.
22. Every lie, then, must be called a sin, because every man ought to speak what is in his heart—not only when he himself knows the truth, but even when he errs and is deceived, as a man may be. This is so whether it be true or is only supposed to be true when it is not. But a man who lies says the opposite of what is in his heart, with the deliberate intent to deceive. Now clearly, language, in its proper function, was developed not as a means whereby men could deceive one another, but as a medium through which a man could communicate his thought to others. Wherefore to use language in order to deceive, and not as it was designed to be used, is a sin.
Nor should we suppose that there is any such thing as a lie that is not a
sin, just because we suppose that we can sometimes help somebody by lying. For
we could also do this by stealing, as when a secret theft from a rich man who
does not feel the loss is openly given to a pauper who greatly appreciates the
gain. Yet no one would say that such a theft was not a sin. Or again, we could
also "help" by committing adultery, if someone appeared to be dying for love if
we would not consent to her desire and who, if she lived, might be purified by
repentance. But it cannot be denied that such an adultery would be a sin. If,
then, we hold chastity in such high regard, wherein has truth offended us so
that although chastity must not be violated by adultery, even for the sake of
some other good, yet truth may be violated by lying? That men have made progress
toward the good, when they will not lie save for the sake of human values, is
not to be denied. But what is rightly praised in such a forward step, and
perhaps even rewarded, is their good will and not their deceit. The deceit may
be pardoned, but certainly ought not to be praised, especially among the heirs
of the New Covenant to whom it has been said, "Let your speech be yes, yes; no,
no: for what is more than this comes from evil."
23. With this much said, within the necessary brevity of this kind of treatise, as to what we need to know about the causes of good and evil—enough to lead us in the way toward the Kingdom, where there will be life without death, truth without error, happiness without anxiety—we ought not to doubt in any way that the cause of everything pertaining to our good is nothing other than the bountiful goodness of God himself. The cause of evil is the defection of the will of a being who is mutably good from the Good which is immutable. This happened first in the case of the angels and, afterward, that of man.
24. This was the primal lapse of the rational creature, that is, his first privation of the good. In train of this there crept in, even without his willing it, ignorance of the right things to do and also an appetite for noxious things. And these brought along with them, as their companions, error and misery. When these two evils are felt to be imminent, the soul's motion in flight from them is called fear. Moreover, as the soul's appetites are satisfied by things harmful or at least inane—and as it fails to recognize the error of its ways—it falls victim to unwholesome pleasures or may even be exhilarated by vain joys. From these tainted springs of action—moved by the lash of appetite rather than a feeling of plenty—there flows out every kind of misery which is now the lot of rational natures.
25. Yet such a nature, even in its evil state, could not lose its appetite for blessedness. There are the evils that both men and angels have in common, for whose wickedness God hath condemned them in simple justice. But man has a unique penalty as well: he is also punished by the death of the body. God had indeed threatened man with death as penalty if he should sin. He endowed him with freedom of the will in order that he might rule him by rational command and deter him by the threat of death. He even placed him in the happiness of paradise in a sheltered nook of life [in umbra vitae] where, by being a good steward of righteousness, he would rise to better things.
26. From this state, after he had sinned, man was banished, and through his
sin he subjected his descendants to the punishment of sin and damnation, for he
had radically corrupted them, in himself, by his sinning. As a consequence of
this, all those descended from him and his wife (who had prompted him to sin and
who was condemned along with him at the same time)—all those born through
carnal lust, on whom the same penalty is visited as for disobedience—all these
entered into the inheritance of original sin. Through this involvement they were
led, through divers errors and sufferings (along with the rebel angels, their
corruptors and possessors and companions), to that final stage of punishment
without end. "Thus by one man, sin entered into the world and death through sin;
and thus death came upon all men, since all men have sinned."
27. This, then, was the situation: the whole mass of the human race stood condemned, lying ruined and wallowing in evil, being plunged from evil into evil and, having joined causes with the angels who had sinned, it was paying the fully deserved penalty for impious desertion. Certainly the anger of God rests, in full justice, on the deeds that the wicked do freely in blind and unbridled lust; and it is manifest in whatever penalties they are called on to suffer, both openly and secretly. Yet the Creator's goodness does not cease to sustain life and vitality even in the evil angels, for were this sustenance withdrawn, they would simply cease to exist. As for mankind, although born of a corrupted and condemned stock, he still retains the power to form and animate his seed, to direct his members in their temporal order, to enliven his senses in their spatial relations, and to provide bodily nourishment. For God judged it better to bring good out of evil than not to permit any evil to exist. And if he had willed that there should be no reformation in the case of men, as there is none for the wicked angels, would it not have been just if the nature that deserted God and, through the evil use of his powers, trampled and transgressed the precepts of his Creator, which could have been easily kept—the same creature who stubbornly turned away from His Light and violated the image of the Creator in himself, who had in the evil use of his free will broken away from the wholesome discipline of God's law—would it not have been just if such a being had been abandoned by God wholly and forever and laid under the everlasting punishment which he deserved? Clearly God would have done this if he were only just and not also merciful and if he had not willed to show far more striking evidence of his mercy by pardoning some who were unworthy of it.
28. While some of the angels deserted God in impious pride and were cast into the lowest darkness from the brightness of their heavenly home, the remaining number of the angels persevered in eternal bliss and holiness with God. For these faithful angels were not descended from a single angel, lapsed and damned. Hence, the original evil did not bind them in the fetters of inherited guilt, nor did it hand the whole company over to a deserved punishment, as is the human lot. Instead, when he who became the devil first rose in rebellion with his impious company and was then with them prostrated, the rest of the angels stood fast in pious obedience to the Lord and so received what the others had not had—a sure knowledge of their everlasting security in his unfailing steadfastness.
29. Thus it pleased God, Creator and Governor of the universe, that since the
whole multitude of the angels had not perished in this desertion of him, those
who had perished would remain forever in perdition, but those who had remained
loyal through the revolt should go on rejoicing in the certain knowledge of the
bliss forever theirs. From the other part of the rational creation—that is,
mankind—although it had perished as a whole through sins and punishments, both
original and personal, God had determined that a portion of it would be restored
and would fill up the loss which that diabolical disaster had caused in the
angelic society. For this is the promise to the saints at the resurrection, that
they shall be equal to the angels of God.
Thus the heavenly Jerusalem, our mother and the commonwealth of God, shall
not be defrauded of her full quota of citizens, but perhaps will rule over an
even larger number. We know neither the number of holy men nor of the filthy
demons, whose places are to be filled by the sons of the holy mother, who seemed
barren in the earth, but whose sons will abide time without end in the peace the
demons lost. But the number of those citizens, whether those who now belong or
those who will in the future, is known to the mind of the Maker, "who calleth
into existence things which are not, as though they were,"
30. But now, can that part of the human race to whom God hath promised
deliverance and a place in the eternal Kingdom be restored through the merits of
their own works? Of course not! For what good works could a lost soul do except
as he had been rescued from his lostness? Could he do this by the determination
of his free will? Of course not! For it was in the evil use of his free will
that man destroyed himself and his will at the same time. For as a man who kills
himself is still alive when he kills himself, but having killed himself is then
no longer alive and cannot resuscitate himself after he has destroyed his own
life—so also sin which arises from the action of the free will turns out to be
victor over the will and the free will is destroyed. "By whom a man is overcome,
to this one he then is bound as slave."
He serves freely who freely does the will of his master. Accordingly he who is slave to sin is free to sin. But thereafter he will not be free to do right unless he is delivered from the bondage of sin and begins to be the servant of righteousness. This, then, is true liberty: the joy that comes in doing what is right. At the same time, it is also devoted service in obedience to righteous precept.
But how would a man, bound and sold, get back his liberty to do good, unless
he could regain it from Him whose voice saith, "If the Son shall make you free,
then you will be free indeed"
31. And lest men should arrogate to themselves saving faith as their own work
and not understand it as a divine gift, the same apostle who says somewhere else
that he had "obtained mercy of the Lord to be trustworthy"
We are then truly free when God ordereth our lives, that is, formeth and
createth us not as men—this he hath already done—but also as good men, which
he is now doing by his grace, that we may indeed be new creatures in Christ
Jesus.
32. Once again, lest anyone glory, if not in his own works, at least in the
determination of his free will, as if some merit had originated from him and as
if the freedom to do good works had been bestowed on him as a kind of reward,
let him hear the same herald of grace, announcing: "For it is God who is at work
in you both to will and to do according to his good will." From the days at Cassiciacum till the very end,
Augustine toiled with the mystery of the primacy of God's grace and the reality
of human freedom. Of two things he was unwaveringly sure, even though they
involved him in a paradox and the appearance of confusion. The first is that
God's grace is not only primary but also sufficient as the ground and source of
human willing. And against the Pelagians and other detractors from grace, he did
not hesitate to insist that grace is irresistible and inviolable. Cf. On
Grace and Free Will, 99, 41–43; On the Predestination of the Saints,
19:10; On the Gift of Perseverance, 41; On the Soul and Its
Origin, 16; and even the Enchiridion, XXIV, 97. But he never drew from this deterministic emphasis the conclusion that man is
unfree and everywhere roundly rejects the not illogical corollary of his
theonomism, that man's will counts for little or nothing except as passive agent
of God's will. He insists on responsibility on man's part in responding to the
initiatives of grace. For this emphasis, which is characteristically directed to
the faithful themselves, see On the Psalms, LXVIII, 7–8; On the Gospel
of John, Tractate, 53:6–8; and even his severest anti-Pelagian tracts: On
Grace and Free Will, 6–8, 10, 31 and On Admonition and Grace, 2–8.
For a man's good will comes before many other gifts from God, but not all of
them. One of the gifts it does not antedate is—just itself! Thus in the Sacred
Eloquence we read both, "His mercy goes before me,"
33. Thus it was that the human race was bound in a just doom and all men were
children of wrath. Of this wrath it is written: "For all our days are wasted; we
are ruined in thy wrath; our years seem like a spider's web."
34. It would take too long to say all that would be truly worthy of this
Mediator. Indeed, men cannot speak properly of such matters. For who can unfold
in cogent enough fashion this statement, that "the Word became flesh and dwelt
among us,"
But it was a nature entirely free from the bonds of all sin. It was not a
nature born of both sexes with fleshly desires, with the burden of sin, the
guilt of which is washed away in regeneration. Instead, it was the kind of
nature that would be fittingly born of a virgin, conceived by His mother's faith
and not her fleshly desires. Now if in his being born, her virginity had been
destroyed, he would not then have been born of a virgin. It would then be false
(which is unthinkable) for the whole Church to confess him "born of the Virgin
Mary." This is the Church which, imitating his mother, daily gives birth to his
members yet remains virgin. Read, if you please, my letter on the virginity of
Saint Mary written to that illustrious man, Volusianus, whom I name with honor
and affection.
35. Christ Jesus, Son of God, is thus both God and man. He was God before all
ages; he is man in this age of ours. He is God because he is the Word of God,
for "the Word was God."
Accordingly, in so far as he is God, he and the Father are one. Yet in so far
as he is man, the Father is greater than he. Since he was God's only Son—not by
grace but by nature—to the end that he might indeed be the fullness of all
grace, he was also made Son of Man—and yet he was in the one nature as well as
in the other, one Christ. "For being in the form of God, he judged it not a
violation to be what he was by nature, the equal of God. Yet he emptied himself,
taking on the form of a servant,"
36. In this the grace of God is supremely manifest, commended in grand and visible fashion; for what had the human nature in the man Christ merited, that it, and no other, should be assumed into the unity of the Person of the only Son of God? What good will, what zealous strivings, what good works preceded this assumption by which that particular man deserved to become one Person with God? Was he a man before the union, and was this singular grace given him as to one particularly deserving before God? Of course not! For, from the moment he began to be a man, that man began to be nothing other than God's Son, the only Son, and this because the Word of God assuming him became flesh, yet still assuredly remained God. Just as every man is a personal unity—that is, a unity of rational soul and flesh—so also is Christ a personal unity: Word and man.
Why should there be such great glory to a human nature—and this undoubtedly
an act of grace, no merit preceding unless it be that those who consider such a
question faithfully and soberly might have here a clear manifestation of God's
great and sole grace, and this in order that they might understand how they
themselves are justified from their sins by the selfsame grace which made it so
that the man Christ had no power to sin? Thus indeed the angel hailed his mother
when announcing to her the future birth: "Hail," he said, "full of grace." And
shortly thereafter, "You have found favor with God."
37. This same Jesus Christ, God's one and only Son our Lord, was born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary. Now obviously the Holy Spirit is God's gift, a gift that is itself equal to the Giver; wherefore the Holy Spirit is God also, not inferior to the Father and the Son. Now what does this mean, that Christ's birth in respect to his human nature was of the Holy Spirit, save that this was itself also a work of grace?
For when the Virgin asked of the angel the manner by which what he announced
would come to pass (since she had known no man), the angel answered: "The Holy
Spirit shall come upon you and the power of the Most High shall overshadow you;
therefore the Holy One which shall be born of you shall be called the Son of
God."
38. Are we, then, to say that the Holy Spirit is the Father of Christ's human nature, so that as God the Father generated the Word, so the Holy Spirit generated the human nature, and that from both natures Christ came to be one, Son of God the Father as the Word, Son of the Holy Spirit as man? Do we suppose that the Holy Spirit is his Father through begetting him of the Virgin Mary? Who would dare to say such a thing? There is no need to show by argument how many absurd consequences such a notion has, when it is so absurd in itself that no believer's ear can bear to hear it. Actually, then, as we confess our Lord Jesus Christ, who is God from God yet born as man of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, there is in each nature (in both the divine and the human) the only Son of God the Father Almighty, from whom proceeds the Holy Spirit.
How, then, do we say that Christ is born of the Holy Spirit, if the Holy
Spirit did not beget him? Is it because he made him? This might be, since
through our Lord Jesus Christ—in the form of God—all things were made. Yet in
so far as he is man, he himself was made, even as the apostle says: "He was made
of the seed of David according to the flesh."
For what still concerns us is how it can be said, "Born of the Holy Spirit," when he is in no wise the Son of the Holy Spirit? Now, just because God made [fecit] this world, one could not say that the world is the son of God, or that it is "born" of God. Rather, one says it was "made" or "created" or "founded" or "established" by him, or however else one might like to speak of it. So, then, when we confess, "Born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary," the sense in which he is not the Son of the Holy Spirit and yet is the son of the Virgin Mary, when he was born both of him and of her, is difficult to explain. But there is no doubt as to the fact that he was not born from him as Father as he was born of her as mother.
39. Consequently we should not grant that whatever is born of something should therefore be called the son of that thing. Let us pass over the fact that a son is "born" of a man in a different sense than a hair is, or a louse, or a maw worm—none of these is a son. Let us pass over these things, since they are an unfitting analogy in so great a matter. Yet it is certain that those who are born of water and of the Holy Spirit would not properly be called sons of the water by anyone. But it does make sense to call them sons of God the Father and of Mother Church. Thus, therefore, the one born of the Holy Spirit is the son of God the Father, not of the Holy Spirit.
What we said about the hair and the other things has this much relevance, that it reminds us that not everything which is "born" of something is said to be "son" to him from which it is "born." Likewise, it does not follow that those who are called sons of someone are always said to have been born of him, since there are some who are adopted. Even those who are called "sons of Gehenna" are not born of it, but have been destined for it, just as the sons of the Kingdom are destined for that.
40. Wherefore, since a thing may be "born" of something else, yet not in the fashion of a "son," and conversely, since not everyone who is called son is born of him whose son he is called—this is the very mode in which Christ was "born" of the Holy Spirit (yet not as a son), and of the Virgin Mary as a son—this suggests to us the grace of God by which a certain human person, no merit whatever preceding, at the very outset of his existence, was joined to the Word of God in such a unity of person that the selfsame one who is Son of Man should be Son of God, and the one who is Son of God should be Son of Man. Thus, in his assumption of human nature, grace came to be natural to that nature, allowing no power to sin. This is why grace is signified by the Holy Spirit, because he himself is so perfectly God that he is also called God's Gift. Still, to speak adequately of this—even if one could—would call for a very long discussion.
41. Since he was begotten and conceived in no pleasure of carnal
appetite—and therefore bore no trace of original sin—he was, by the grace of
God (operating in a marvelous and an ineffable manner), joined and united in a
personal unity with the only-begotten Word of the Father, a Son not by grace but
by nature. And although he himself committed no sin, yet because of "the
likeness of sinful flesh"
Indeed, under the old law, sacrifices for sins were often called sins.
He himself is therefore sin as we ourselves are righteousness—not our own but God's, not in ourselves but in him. Just as he was sin—not his own but ours, rooted not in himself but in us—so he showed forth through the likeness of sinful flesh, in which he was crucified, that since sin was not in him he could then, so to say, die to sin by dying in the flesh, which was "the likeness of sin." And since he had never lived in the old manner of sinning, he might, in his resurrection, signify the new life which is ours, which is springing to life anew from the old death in which we had been dead to sin.
42. This is the meaning of the great sacrament of baptism, which is celebrated among us. All who attain to this grace die thereby to sin—as he himself is said to have died to sin because he died in the flesh, that is, "in the likeness of sin"—and they are thereby alive by being reborn in the baptismal font, just as he rose again from the sepulcher. This is the case no matter what the age of the body.
43. For whether it be a newborn infant or a decrepit old man—since no one should be barred from baptism—just so, there is no one who does not die to sin in baptism. Infants die to original sin only; adults, to all those sins which they have added, through their evil living, to the burden they brought with them at birth.
44. But even these are frequently said to die to sin, when without doubt they die not to one but to many sins, and to all the sins which they have themselves already committed by thought, word, and deed. Actually, by the use of the singular number the plural number is often signified, as the poet said,
although they did this with many warriors. And in our
own Scriptures we read: "Pray therefore to the Lord that he may
take from us the serpent."
Yet, when the original sin is signified by the use of the plural number, as
we say when infants are baptized "unto the remission of sins," instead of saying
"unto the remission of sin," then we have the converse expression in which the
singular is expressed by the plural number. Thus in the Gospel, it is said of
Herod's death, "For they are dead who sought the child's life"
45. Still, even in that one sin—which "entered into the world by one man and
so spread to all men,"
46. It is also said—and not without support—that infants are involved in
the sins of their parents, not only of the first pair, but even of their own, of
whom they were born. Indeed, that divine judgment, "I shall visit the sins of
the fathers on their children,"
This is why each one of them must be born again, so that he may thereby be
absolved of whatever sin was in him at the time of birth. For the sins committed
by evil-doing after birth can be healed by repentance—as, indeed, we see it
happen even after baptism. For the new birth [regeneratio] would not have
been instituted except for the fact that the first birth [generatio] was
tainted—and to such a degree that one born of even a lawful wedlock said, "I
was conceived in iniquities; and in sins did my mother nourish me in her
womb."
47. But, in the matter of the sins of one's other parents, those who stand as one's forebears from Adam down to one's own parents, a question might well be raised: whether a man at birth is involved in the evil deeds of all his forebears, and their multiplied original sins, so that the later in time he is born, the worse estate he is born in; or whether, on this very account, God threatens to visit the sins of the parents as far as—but no farther than—the third and fourth generations, because in his mercy he will not continue his wrath beyond that. It is not his purpose that those not given the grace of regeneration be crushed under too heavy a burden in their eternal damnation, as they would be if they were bound to bear, as original guilt, all the sins of their ancestors from the beginning of the human race, and to pay the due penalty for them. Whether yet another solution to so difficult a problem might or might not be found by a more diligent search and interpretation of Holy Scripture, I dare not rashly affirm.
48. That one sin, however, committed in a setting of such great happiness,
was itself so great that by it, in one man, the whole human race was originally
and, so to say, radically condemned. It cannot be pardoned and washed away
except through "the one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,"
49. They were not reborn, those who were baptized by John's baptism, by which
Christ himself was baptized.
For his baptism is not with water alone, as John's was, but with the Holy
Spirit as well. Thus, whoever believes in Christ is reborn by that same Spirit,
of whom Christ also was born, needing not to be reborn. This is the reason for
the Voice of the Father spoken over him at his baptism, "Today have I begotten
thee,"
Therefore, he chose to be baptized in water by John, not thereby to wash away any sin of his own, but to manifest his great humility. Indeed, baptism found nothing in him to wash away, just as death found nothing to punish. Hence, it was in authentic justice, and not by violent power, that the devil was overcome and conquered: for, as he had most unjustly slain Him who was in no way deserving of death, he also did most justly lose those whom he had justly held in bondage as punishment for their sins. Wherefore, He took upon himself both baptism and death, not out of a piteous necessity but through his own free act of showing mercy—as part of a definite plan whereby One might take away the sin of the world, just as one man had brought sin into the world, that is, the whole human race.
50. There is a difference, however. The first man brought sin into the world,
whereas this One took away not only that one sin but also all the others which
he found added to it. Hence, the apostle says, "And the gift [of grace] is not
like the effect of the one that sinned: for the judgment on that one trespass
was condemnation; but the gift of grace is for many offenses, and brings
justification."
51. However, when he [the apostle] says, shortly after, "Therefore, as the
offense of one man led all men to condemnation, so also the righteousness of one
man leads all men to the life of justification,"
52. And after this discussion of punishment through one man and grace through the Other, as he deemed sufficient for that part of the epistle, the apostle passes on to speak of the great mystery of holy baptism in the cross of Christ, and to do this so that we may understand nothing other in the baptism of Christ than the likeness of the death of Christ. The death of Christ crucified is nothing other than the likeness of the forgiveness of sins—so that in the very same sense in which the death is real, so also is the forgiveness of our sins real, and in the same sense in which his resurrection is real, so also in us is there authentic justification.
He asks: "What, then, shall we say? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may
abound?"
If, therefore, the fact that we are baptized into the death of Christ shows that we are dead to sin, then certainly infants who are baptized in Christ die to sin, since they are baptized into his own death. For there is no exception in the saying, "All we who are baptized into Christ Jesus are baptized into his death." And the effect of this is to show that we are dead to sin.
Yet what sin do infants die to in being reborn except that which they inherit
in being born? What follows in the epistle also pertains to this: "Therefore we
were buried with him by baptism into death; that, as Christ was raised up from
the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in the newness
of life. For if we have been united with him in the likeness of his death, we
shall be also united with him in the likeness of his resurrection, knowing this,
that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed,
that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin.
Now if we are dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:
knowing that Christ, being raised from the dead, dies no more; death has no more
dominion over him. For the death he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the
life he lives, he lives unto God. So also, reckon yourselves also to be dead to
sin, but alive unto God through Christ Jesus."
Now, he had set out to prove that we should not go on sinning, in order that thereby grace might abound, and had said, "If we have died to sin, how, then, shall we go on living in it?" And then to show that we were dead to sin, he had added, "Know you not, that as many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?" Thus he concludes the passage as he began it. Indeed, he introduced the death of Christ in order to say that even he died to sin. To what sin, save that of the flesh in which he existed, not as sinner, but in "the likeness of sin" and which was, therefore, called by the name of sin? Thus, to those baptized into the death of Christ—into which not only adults but infants as well are baptized—he says, "So also you should reckon yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus."
53. Whatever was done, therefore, in the crucifixion of Christ, his burial,
his resurrection on the third day, his ascension into heaven, his being seated
at the Father's right hand—all these things were done thus, that they might not
only signify their mystical meanings but also serve as a model for the Christian
life which we lead here on the earth. Thus, of his crucifixion it was said, "And
they that are Jesus Christ's have crucified their own flesh, with the passions
and lusts thereof"
54. Now what we believe concerning Christ's future actions, since we confess
that he will come again from heaven to judge the living and the dead, does not
pertain to this life of ours as we live it here on earth, because it belongs not
to his deeds already done, but to what he will do at the close of the age. To
this the apostle refers and goes on to add, "When Christ, who is your life,
shall appear, you shall then also appear with him in glory."
55. There are two ways to interpret the affirmation that he "shall judge the
living and the dead." On the one hand, we may understand by "the living" those
who are not yet dead but who will be found living in the flesh when he comes;
and we may understand by "the dead" those who have left the body, or who shall
have left it before his coming. Or, on the other hand, "the living" may signify
"the righteous," and "the dead" may signify "the unrighteous"—since the
righteous are to be judged as well as the unrighteous. For sometimes the
judgment of God is passed upon the evil, as in the word, "But they who have done
evil [shall come forth] to the resurrection of judgment."
56. Now, when we have spoken of Jesus Christ, the only Son of God our Lord, in the brevity befitting our confession of faith, we go on to affirm that we believe also in the Holy Spirit, as completing the Trinity which is God; and after that we call to mind our faith "in holy Church." By this we are given to understand that the rational creation belonging to the free Jerusalem ought to be mentioned in a subordinate order to the Creator, that is, the supreme Trinity. For, of course, all that has been said about the man Christ Jesus refers to the unity of the Person of the Only Begotten.
Thus, the right order of the Creed demanded
God therefore dwelleth in his temple, not the Holy Spirit only, but also
Father and Son, who saith of his body—in which he standeth as Head of the
Church on earth "that in all things he may be pre-eminent"
57. But what can we affirm about that part of the Church in heaven, save that
in it no evil is to be found, nor any apostates, nor will there be again, since
that time when "God did not spare the sinning angels"—as the apostle Peter
writes—"but casting them out, he delivered them into the prisons of darkness in
hell, to be reserved for the sentence in the Day of Judgment"
58. Still, how is life ordered in that most blessed and supernal society?
What differences are there in rank among the angels, so that while all are
called by the general title "angels"—as we read in the Epistle to the Hebrews,
"But to which of the angels said he at any time, 'Sit at my right hand'?"
59. Furthermore, who can explain the kind of bodies in which the angels
appeared to men, so that they were not only visible, but tangible as well? And,
again, how do they, not by impact of physical stimulus but by spiritual force,
bring certain visions, not to the physical eyes but to the spiritual eyes of the
mind, or speak something, not to the ears, as from outside us, but actually from
within the human soul, since they are present within it too? For, as it is
written in the book of the Prophets: "And the angel that spoke in me, said to
me . . ."
To ask such questions as these, and to guess at the answers as one can, is not a useless exercise in speculation, so long as the discussion is moderate and one avoids the mistake of those who think they know what they do not know.
60. It is more important to be able to discern and tell when Satan transforms himself as an angel of light, lest by this deception he should seduce us into harmful acts. For, when he deceives the corporeal senses, and does not thereby turn the mind from that true and right judgment by which one leads the life of faith, there is no danger to religion. Or if, feigning himself to be good, he does or says things that would fit the character of the good angels, even if then we believe him good, the error is neither dangerous nor fatal to the Christian faith. But when, by these alien wiles, he begins to lead us into his own ways, then great vigilance is required to recognize him and not follow after. But how few men are there who are able to avoid his deadly stratagems, unless God guides and preserves them! Yet the very difficulty of this business is useful in this respect: it shows that no man should rest his hopes in himself, nor one man in another, but all who are God's should cast their hopes on him. And that this latter is obviously the best course for us no pious man would deny.
61. This part of the Church, therefore, which is composed of the holy angels
and powers of God will become known to us as it really is only when, at the end
of the age, we are joined to it, to possess, together with it, eternal bliss.
But the other part which, separated from this heavenly company, wanders through
the earth is better known to us because we are in it, and because it is composed
of men like ourselves. This is the part that has been redeemed from all sin by
the blood of the sinless Mediator, and its cry is: "If God be for us, who is
against us? He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us
all. . . ."
62. Of course, the holy angels, taught by God—in the eternal contemplation
of whose truth they are blessed—know how many of the human race are required to
fill up the full census of that commonwealth. This is why the apostle says "that
all things are restored to unity in Christ, both those in heaven and those on
the earth in him."
Thus by the single sacrifice, of which the many victims of the law were only
shadows, the heavenly part is set at peace with the earthly part and the earthly
reconciled to the heavenly. Wherefore, as the same apostle says: "For it pleased
God that all plenitude of being should dwell in him and by him to reconcile all
things to himself, making peace with them by the blood of his cross, whether
those things on earth or those in heaven."
63. This peace, as it is written, "passes all understanding." It cannot be
known by us until we have entered into it. For how is the heavenly realm set at
peace, save together with us; that is, by concord with us? For in that realm
there is always peace, both among the whole company of rational creatures and
between them and their Creator. This is the peace that, as it is said, "passes
all understanding." But obviously this means our understanding, not that
of those who always see the Father's face. For no matter how great our
understanding may be, "we know in part, and we see in a glass darkly."
In this way their peace will become known to us, since ours will be like theirs in kind and measure—nor will it then surpass our understanding. But the peace of God, which is there, will still doubtless surpass our understanding and theirs as well. For, of course, in so far as a rational creature is blessed, this blessedness comes, not from himself, but from God. Hence, it follows that it is better to interpret the passage, "The peace of God which passes all understanding," so that from the word "all" not even the understanding of the holy angels should be excepted. Only God's understanding is excepted; for, of course, his peace does not surpass his own understanding.
64. The angels are in concord with us even now, when our sins are forgiven.
Therefore, in the order of the Creed, after the reference to "holy Church" is
placed the reference to "forgiveness of sins." For it is by this that the part
of the Church on earth stands; it is by this that "what was lost and is found
again"
65. Nevertheless, no matter how great our crimes, their forgiveness should
never be despaired of in holy Church for those who truly repent, each according
to the measure of his sin. And, in the act of repentance,
Still, since the sorrow of one heart is mostly hid from another, and does not
come to notice through words and other such signs—even when it is plain to Him
of whom it is said, "My groaning is not hid from thee"
66. Now the remission of sins has chiefly to do with the future judgment. In
this life the Scripture saying holds true: "A heavy yoke is on the sons of Adam,
from the day they come forth from their mother's womb till the day of their
burial in the mother of us all."
Indeed, many sins seem to be ignored and go unpunished; but their punishment
is reserved for the future. It is not in vain that the day when the Judge of the
living and the dead shall come is rightly called the Day of Judgment. Just so,
on the other hand, some sins are punished here, and, if they are forgiven, will
certainly bring no harm upon us in the future age. Hence, referring to certain
temporal punishments, which are visited upon sinners in this life, the apostle,
speaking to those whose sins are blotted out and not reserved to the end, says:
"For if we judge ourselves truly we should not be judged by the Lord. But when
we are judged, we are chastised by the Lord, that we may not be condemned along
with this world."
67. There are some, indeed, who believe that those who do not abandon the name of Christ, and who are baptized in his laver in the Church, who are not cut off from it by schism or heresy, who may then live in sins however great, not washing them away by repentance, nor redeeming them by alms—and who obstinately persevere in them to life's last day—even these will still be saved, "though as by fire." They believe that such people will be punished by fire, prolonged in proportion to their sins, but still not eternal.
But those who believe thus, and still are Catholics, are deceived, as it
seems to me, by a kind of merely human benevolence. For the divine Scripture,
when consulted, answers differently. Moreover, I have written a book about this
question, entitled Faith and Works,
Now, if the wicked man were to be saved by fire on account of his faith only,
and if this is the way the statement of the blessed Paul should be
understood—"But he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire"
68. But, since these fully plain and most pertinent apostolic testimonies
cannot be false, that one obscure saying about those who build on "the
foundation, which is Christ, not gold, silver, and precious stones, but wood,
hay, and stubble"
In fact, wood and hay and stubble may be understood, without absurdity, to signify such an attachment to those worldly things—albeit legitimate in themselves—that one cannot suffer their loss without anguish in the soul. Now, when such anguish "burns," and Christ still holds his place as foundation in the heart—that is, if nothing is preferred to him and if the man whose anguish "burns" would still prefer to suffer loss of the things he greatly loves than to lose Christ—then one is saved, "by fire." But if, in time of testing, he should prefer to hold onto these temporal and worldly goods rather than to Christ, he does not have him as foundation—because he has put "things" in the first place—whereas in a building nothing comes before the foundations.
Now, this fire, of which the apostle speaks, should be understood as one
through which both kinds of men must pass: that is, the man who builds with
gold, silver, and precious stones on this foundation and also the man who builds
with wood, hay, and stubble. For, when he had spoken of this, he added: "The
fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is. If any man's work abides
which he has built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work burns
up, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire."
The fire is a sort of trial of affliction, concerning which it is clearly
written elsewhere: "The furnace tries the potter's vessels and the trial of
affliction tests righteous men."
69. It is not incredible that something like this should occur after this
life, whether or not it is a matter for fruitful inquiry. It may be discovered
or remain hidden whether some of the faithful are sooner or later to be saved by
a sort of purgatorial fire, in proportion as they have loved the goods that
perish, and in proportion to their attachment to them. However, this does not
apply to those of whom it was said, "They shall not possess the Kingdom of
God,"
70. We must beware,
however, lest anyone suppose that unspeakable crimes such as they commit who
"will not possess the Kingdom of God" can be perpetrated daily and then daily
redeemed by almsgiving. Of course, life must be changed for the better, and alms
should be offered as propitiation to God for our past sins. But he is not
somehow to be bought off, as if we always had a license to commit crimes with
impunity. For, "he has given no man a license to sin"
71. For the passing and trivial sins of every day, from which no life is
free, the everyday prayer of the faithful makes satisfaction. For they can say,
"Our Father who art in heaven," who have already been reborn to such a Father
"by water and the Spirit."
72. Accordingly, what our Lord says—"Give alms and, behold, all things are
clean to you"
Now, many benefits are bestowed on the unwilling, when their interests and not their preferences are consulted. And men frequently are found to be their own enemies, while those they suppose to be their enemies are their true friends. And then, by mistake, they return evil for good, when a Christian ought not to return evil even for evil. Thus, there are many kinds of alms, by which, when we do them, we are helped in obtaining forgiveness of our own sins.
73. But none of these alms is greater than the forgiveness from the heart of
a sin committed against us by someone else. It is a smaller thing to wish well
or even to do well to one who has done you no evil. It is far greater—a sort of
magnificent goodness—to love your enemy, and always to wish him well and, as
you can, do well to him who wishes you ill and who does you harm when he
can. Thus one heeds God's command: "Love your enemies, do good to them that hate
you, and pray for them that persecute you."
Such counsels are for the perfect sons of God. And although all the faithful should strive toward them and through prayer to God and earnest endeavor bring their souls up to this level, still so high a degree of goodness is not possible for so great a multitude as we believe are heard when, in prayer, they say, "Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors." Accordingly, it cannot be doubted that the terms of this pledge are fulfilled if a man, not yet so perfect that he already loves his enemies, still forgives from the heart one who has sinned against him and who now asks his forgiveness. For he surely seeks forgiveness when he asks for it when he prays, saying, "As we forgive our debtors." For this means, "Forgive us our debts when we ask for forgiveness, as we also forgive our debtors when they ask for forgiveness."
74. Again, if one seeks forgiveness from a man against whom he sinned—moved by his sin to seek it—he should no longer be regarded as an enemy, and it should not now be as difficult to love him as it was when he was actively hostile.
Now, a man who does not forgive from the heart one who asks forgiveness and
is repentant of his sins can in no way suppose that his own sins are forgiven by
the Lord, since the Truth cannot lie, and what hearer and reader of the gospel
has not noted who it was who said, "I am the Truth"
75. Now, surely, those who live in gross wickedness and take no care to
correct their lives and habits, who yet, amid their crimes and misdeeds,
continue to multiply their alms, flatter themselves in vain with the Lord's
words, "Give alms; and, behold, all things are clean to you." They do not
understand how far this saying reaches. In order for them to understand, let
them notice to whom it was that he said it. For this is the context of it in the
Gospel: "As he was speaking, a certain Pharisee asked him to dine with him. And
he went in and reclined at the table. And the Pharisee began to wonder and ask
himself why He had not washed himself before dinner. But the Lord said to him:
'Now you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but within you are
still full of extortion and wickedness. Foolish ones! Did not He who made the
outside make the inside too? Nevertheless, give for alms what remains within;
and, behold, all things are clean to you.'"
76. He who would give alms as a set plan of his life should begin with
himself and give them to himself. For almsgiving is a work of mercy, and the
saying is most true: "Have mercy upon your own soul, pleasing God."
But the Pharisees, while they gave as alms a tithing of even the least of
their fruits, disregarded this "judgment and love of God." Therefore, they did
not begin their almsgiving with themselves, nor did they, first of all, show
mercy toward themselves. In reference to this right order of self-love, it was
said, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."
Therefore, when the Lord had reproved the Pharisees for washing themselves on
the outside while inwardly they were still full of extortion and wickedness, he
then admonished them also to give those alms which a man owes first to
himself—to make clean the inner man: "However," he said, "give what remains as
alms, and, behold, all things are clean to you." Then, to make plain the import
of his admonition, which they had ignored, and to show them that he was not
ignorant of their kind of almsgiving, he adds, "But woe to you, Pharisees"
But, lest it appear that he was rejecting the kind of alms we give of the earth's bounty, he adds, "These things you should do"—that is, pay heed to the judgment and love of God—and "not omit the others"—that is, alms done with the earth's bounty.
77. Therefore, let them not deceive themselves who suppose that by giving
alms—however profusely, and whether of their fruits or money or anything
else—they purchase impunity to continue in the enormity of their crimes and the
grossness of their wickedness. For not only do they do such things, but they
also love them so much that they would always choose to continue in them—if
they could do so with impunity. "But he who loves iniquity hates his own
soul."
78. What sins are trivial and what are grave, however, is not for human but
for divine judgment to determine. For we see that, in respect of some sins, even
the apostle, by pardoning them, has conceded this point. Such a case is seen in
what the venerable Paul says to married folks: "Do not deprive one another,
except by consent for a time to give yourselves to prayer, and then return
together lest Satan tempt you at the point of self-control."
Another such case is seen where he says, "Dare any of you, having a case
against another, bring it to be judged before the unrighteous and not the
saints?"
Because of these and similar sins—and of others even less than these, such
as offenses in words and thoughts—and because, as the apostle James confesses,
"we all offend in many things,"
79. There are, however, some sins that could be deemed quite trifling if the
Scriptures did not show that they are more serious than we think. For who would
suppose that one saying to his brother, "You fool," is "in danger of hell-fire,"
if the Truth had not said it? Still, for the hurt he immediately supplied a
medicine, adding the precept of brotherly reconciliation: "If, therefore, you
are offering a gift at the altar, and remember there that your brother has
something against you,"
Or who would think how great a sin it is to observe days and months and years
and seasons—as those people do who will or will not begin projects on certain
days or in certain months or years, because they follow vain human doctrines and
suppose that various seasons are lucky or unlucky—if we did not infer the
magnitude of this evil from the apostle's fear, in saying to such men, "I fear
for you, lest perhaps I have labored among you in vain"
80. To this one might add those sins, however grave and terrible, which, when
they come to be habitual, are then believed to be trivial or no sins at all. And
so far does this go that such sins are not only not kept secret, but are even
proclaimed and published abroad—cases of which it is written, "The sinner is
praised in the desires of his soul; and he that works iniquity is blessed."
In the divine books such iniquity is called a "cry" (clamor). You have
such a usage in the prophet Isaiah's reference to the evil vineyard: "I looked
that he should perform justice, yet he did iniquity; not justice but a cry."
So also in our times so many evils, even if not like those [of old], have come to be public customs that we not only do not dare excommunicate a layman; we do not dare degrade a clergyman for them. Thus, several years ago, when I was expounding the Epistle to the Galatians, where the apostle says, "I fear for you, lest perchance I have labored in vain among you," I was moved to exclaim: "Woe to the sins of men! We shrink from them only when we are not accustomed to them. As for those sins to which we are accustomed—although the blood of the Son of God was shed to wash them away—although they are so great that the Kingdom of God is wholly closed to them, yet, living with them often we come to tolerate them, and, tolerating them, we even practice some of them! But grant, O Lord, that we do not practice any of them which we could prohibit!" I shall someday know whether immoderate indignation moved me here to speak rashly.
81. I shall now mention what I have often discussed before in other places in
my short treatises.
We must surely fight against both; but we shall as surely be defeated unless we are divinely helped, not only to see what we ought to do, but also, as sound judgment increases, to make our love of righteousness victor over our love of those things because of which—either by desiring to possess them or by fearing to lose them—we fall, open-eyed, into known sin. In this latter case, we are not only sinners—which we are even when we sin through ignorance—but also lawbreakers: for we do not do what we should, and we do what we know already we should not.
Accordingly, we should pray for pardon if we have sinned, as we do when we
say, "Forgive us our debts as we also forgive our debtors." But we should also
pray that God should guide us away from sin, and this we do when we say, "Lead
us not into temptation"—and we should make our petitions to Him of whom it is
said in the psalm, "The Lord is my light and my salvation"
82. Now, penance itself is often omitted because of weakness, even when in
Church custom there is an adequate reason why it should be performed. For shame
is the fear of displeasing men, when a man loves their good opinion more than he
regards judgment, which would make him humble himself in penitence. Wherefore,
not only for one to repent, but also in order that he may be enabled to do so,
the mercy of God is prerequisite. Otherwise, the apostle would not say of some
men, "In case God giveth them repentance."
83. But the man who does not believe that sins are forgiven in the Church,
who despises so great a bounty of the divine gifts and ends, and persists to his
last day in such an obstinacy of mind—that man is guilty of the unpardonable
sin against the Holy Spirit, in whom Christ forgiveth sins.
84. Now, with respect to the resurrection of the body—and by this I do not mean the cases of resuscitation after which people died again, but a resurrection to eternal life after the fashion of Christ's own body—I have not found a way to discuss it briefly and still give satisfactory answers to all the questions usually raised about it. Yet no Christian should have the slightest doubt as to the fact that the bodies of all men, whether already or yet to be born, whether dead or still to die, will be resurrected.
85. Once this fact is established, then, first of all, comes the question
about abortive fetuses, which are indeed "born" in the mother's womb, but are
never so that they could be "reborn." For, if we say that there is a
resurrection for them, then we can agree that at least as much is true of
fetuses that are fully formed. But, with regard to undeveloped fetuses, who
would not more readily think that they perish, like seeds that did not
germinate?
But who, then, would dare to deny—though he would not dare to affirm it either—that in the resurrection day what is lacking in the forms of things will be filled out? Thus, the perfection which time would have accomplished will not be lacking, any more than the blemishes wrought by time will still be present. Nature, then, will be cheated of nothing apt and fitting which time's passage would have brought, nor will anything remain disfigured by anything adverse and contrary which time has wrought. But what is not yet a whole will become whole, just as what has been disfigured will be restored to its full figure.
86. On this score, a corollary question may be most carefully discussed by the most learned men, and still I do not know that any man can answer it, namely: When does a human being begin to live in the womb? Is there some form of hidden life, not yet apparent in the motions of a living thing? To deny, for example, that those fetuses ever lived at all which are cut away limb by limb and cast out of the wombs of pregnant women, lest the mothers die also if the fetuses were left there dead, would seem much too rash. But, in any case, once a man begins to live, it is thereafter possible for him to die. And, once dead, wheresoever death overtook him, I cannot find the basis on which he would not have a share in the resurrection of the dead.
87. By the same token, the resurrection is not to be denied in the cases of
monsters which are born and live, even if they quickly die, nor should we
believe that they will be raised as they were, but rather in an amended nature
and free from faults. Far be it from us to say of that double-limbed man
recently born in the Orient—about whom most reliable brethren have given
eyewitness reports and the presbyter Jerome, of holy memory, has left a written
account
88. Moreover, with God, the earthly substance from which the flesh of mortal man is produced does not perish. Instead, whether it be dissolved into dust or ashes, or dispersed into vapors and the winds, or converted into the substance of other bodies (or even back into the basic elements themselves), or has served as food for beasts or even men and been turned into their flesh—in an instant of time this matter returns to the soul that first animated it, and that caused it to become a man, to live and to grow.
89. This earthly matter which becomes a corpse upon the soul's departure will not, at the resurrection, be so restored that the parts into which it was separated and which have become parts of other things must necessarily return to the same parts of the body in which they were situated—though they do return to the body from which they were separated. Otherwise, to suppose that the hair recovers what frequent clippings have taken off, or the nails get back what trimming has pared off, makes for a wild and wholly unbecoming image in the minds of those who speculate this way and leads them thus to disbelieve in the resurrection. But take the example of a statue made of fusible metal: if it were melted by heat or pounded into dust, or reduced to a shapeless mass, and an artist wished to restore it again from the mass of the same material, it would make no difference to the wholeness of the restored statue which part of it was remade of what part of the metal, so long as the statue, as restored, had been given all the material of which it was originally composed. Just so, God—an artist who works in marvelous and mysterious ways—will restore our bodies, with marvelous and mysterious celerity, out of the whole of the matter of which it was originally composed. And it will make no difference, in the restoration, whether hair returns to hair and nails to nails, or whether the part of this original matter that had perished is turned back into flesh and restored to other parts of the body. The main thing is that the providence of the [divine] Artist takes care that nothing unbecoming will result.
90. Nor does it follow that the stature of each person will be different when brought to life anew because there were differences in stature when first alive, nor that the lean will be raised lean or the fat come back to life in their former obesity. But if this is in the Creator's plan, that each shall retain his special features and the proper and recognizable likeness of his former self—while an equality of physical endowment will be preserved—then the matter of which each resurrection body is composed will be so disposed that none shall be lost, and any defect will be supplied by Him who can create out of nothing as he wills.
But if in the bodies of those rising again there is to be an intelligible inequality, such as between voices that fill out a chorus, this will be managed by disposing the matter of each body so to bring men into their place in the angelic band and impose nothing on their senses that is inharmonious. For surely nothing unseemly will be there, and whatever is there will be fitting, and this because the unfitting will simply not be.
91. The bodies of the saints, then, shall rise again free from blemish and deformity, just as they will be also free from corruption, encumbrance, or handicap. Their facility [facilitas] will be as complete as their felicity [felicitas]. This is why their bodies are called "spiritual," though undoubtedly they will be bodies and not spirits. For just as now the body is called "animate" [animale], though it is a body and not a "spirit" [anima], so then it will be a "spiritual body," but still a body and not a spirit.
Accordingly, then, as far as the corruption which weighs down the soul and
the vices through which "the flesh lusts against the spirit"
But, as far as the substance of the resurrection body is concerned, it will
even then still be "flesh." This is why the body of Christ is called "flesh"
even after the resurrection. Wherefore the apostle also says, "What is sown a
natural body [corpus animale] rises as a spiritual body [corpus
spirituale]."
92. But whoever are not liberated from that mass of perdition (brought to
pass through the first man) by the one Mediator between God and man, they will
also rise again, each in his own flesh, but only that they may be punished
together with the devil and his angels. Whether these men will rise again with
all their faults and deformities, with their diseased and deformed members—is
there any reason for us to labor such a question? For obviously the uncertainty
about their bodily form and beauty need not weary us, since their damnation is
certain and eternal. And let us not be moved to inquire how their body can be
incorruptible if it can suffer—or corruptible if it cannot die. For there is no
true life unless it be lived in happiness; no true incorruptibility save where
health is unscathed by pain. But where an unhappy being is not allowed to die,
then death itself, so to say, dies not; and where pain perpetually afflicts but
never destroys, corruption goes on endlessly. This state is called, in the
Scripture, "the second death."
93. Yet neither the first death, in which the soul is compelled to leave its body, nor the second death, in which it is not allowed to leave the body undergoing punishment, would have befallen man if no one had sinned. Surely, the lightest of all punishments will be laid on those who have added no further sin to that originally contracted. Among the rest, who have added further Sins to that one, they will suffer a damnation somewhat more tolerable in proportion to the lesser degree of their iniquity.
94. And thus it will be that while the reprobated angels and men go on in
their eternal punishment, the saints will go on learning more fully the
blessings which grace has bestowed upon them. Then, through the actual realities
of their experience, they will see more clearly the meaning of what is written
in The Psalms: "I will sing to thee of mercy and judgment, O Lord"
95. Then what is now hidden will not be hidden: when one of two infants is
taken up by God's mercy and the other abandoned through God's judgment—and when
the chosen one knows what would have been his just deserts in judgment—why was
the one chosen rather than the other, when the condition of the two was the
same? Or again, why were miracles not wrought in the presence of certain people
who would have repented in the face of miraculous works, while miracles were
wrought in the presence of those who were not about to believe. For our Lord
saith most plainly: "Woe to you, Chorazin; woe to you, Bethsaida. For if in Tyre
and Sidon had been wrought the miracles done in your midst, they would have
repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes."
Then, in the clearest light of wisdom, will be seen what now the pious hold
by faith, not yet grasping it in clear understanding—how certain, immutable,
and effectual is the will of God, how there are things he can do but doth not
will to do, yet willeth nothing he cannot do, and how true is what is sung in
the psalm: "But our God is above in heaven; in heaven and on earth he hath done
all things whatsoever that he would."
96. Nor should we doubt that God doth well, even when he alloweth whatever happens ill to happen. For he alloweth it only through a just judgment—and surely all that is just is good. Therefore, although evil, in so far as it is evil, is not good, still it is a good thing that not only good things exist but evil as well. For if it were not good that evil things exist, they would certainly not be allowed to exist by the Omnipotent Good, for whom it is undoubtedly as easy not to allow to exist what he does not will, as it is for him to do what he does will.
Unless we believe this, the very beginning of our Confession of Faith is imperiled—the sentence in which we profess to believe in God the Father Almighty. For he is called Almighty for no other reason than that he can do whatsoever he willeth and because the efficacy of his omnipotent will is not impeded by the will of any creature.
97. Accordingly, we must now inquire about the meaning of what was said most
truly by the apostle concerning God, "Who willeth that all men should be
saved."
Now, when we ask for the reason why not all are saved, the customary answer
is: "Because they themselves have not willed it." But this cannot be said of
infants, who have not yet come to the power of willing or not willing. For, if
we could attribute to their wills the infant squirmings they make at baptism,
when they resist as hard as they can, we would then have to say that they were
saved against their will. But the Lord's language is clearer when, in the
Gospel, he reproveth the unrighteous city: "How often," he saith, "would I have
gathered your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks, and you would
not."
98. Furthermore, who would be so impiously foolish as to say that God cannot
turn the evil wills of men—as he willeth, when he willeth, and where he
willeth—toward the good? But, when he acteth, he acteth through mercy; when he
doth not act, it is through justice. For, "he hath mercy on whom he willeth; and
whom he willeth, he hardeneth."
Now when the apostle said this, he was commending grace, of which he had just
spoken in connection with the twin children in Rebecca's womb: "Before they had
yet been born, or had done anything good or bad, in order that the electing
purpose of God might continue—not through works but through the divine
calling—it was said of them, 'The elder shall serve the younger.' "
Thus, both the twins were "by nature children of wrath,"
99. Now, after the apostle had commended God's mercy in saying, "So then,
there is no question of him who wills nor of him who runs, but of God's showing
mercy," next in order he intends to speak also of his judgment—for where his
mercy is not shown, it is not unfairness but justice. For with God there is no
injustice. Thus, he immediately added, "For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, 'For
this very purpose I raised you up, that I may show through you my power, and
that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth."
There are some stupid men who think that in this part of the argument the apostle had no answer to give; and, for lack of a reasonable rejoinder, simply rebuked the audacity of his gainsayer. But what he said—"O man, who are you?"—has actually great weight and in an argument like this recalls man, in a single word, to consider the limits of his capacity and, at the same time, supplies an important explanation.
For if one does not understand these matters, who is he to talk back to God?
And if one does understand, he finds no better ground even then for talking
back. For if he understands, he sees that the whole human race was condemned in
its apostate head by a divine judgment so just that not even if a single member
of the race were ever saved from it, no one could rail against God's justice.
And he also sees that those who are saved had to be saved on such terms that it
would show—by contrast with the greater number of those not saved but simply
abandoned to their wholly just damnation—what the whole mass deserved and to
what end God's merited judgment would have brought them, had not his undeserved
mercy interposed. Thus every mouth of those disposed to glory in their own
merits should be stopped, so that "he that glories may glory in the Lord."
100. These are "the great works of the Lord, well-considered in all his acts
of will"
For, as far as they were concerned, they did what God did not will that they do, but as far as God's omnipotence is concerned, they were quite unable to achieve their purpose. In their very act of going against his will, his will was thereby accomplished. This is the meaning of the statement, "The works of the Lord are great, well-considered in all his acts of will"—that in a strange and ineffable fashion even that which is done against his will is not done without his will. For it would not be done without his allowing it—and surely his permission is not unwilling but willing—nor would he who is good allow the evil to be done, unless in his omnipotence he could bring good even out of evil.
101. Sometimes, however, a man of good will wills something that God doth not
will, even though God's will is much more, and much more certainly, good—for
under no circumstances can it ever be evil. For example, it is a good son's will
that his father live, whereas it is God's good will that he should die. Or,
again, it can happen that a man of evil will can will something that God also
willeth with a good will—as, for example, a bad son wills that his father die
and this is also God's will. Of course, the former wills what God doth not will,
whereas the latter does will what God willeth. Yet the piety of the one, though
he wills not what God willeth, is more consonant with God's will than is the
impiety of the other, who wills the same thing that God willeth. There is a very
great difference between what is fitting for man to will and what is fitting for
God—and also between the ends to which a man directs his will—and this
difference determines whether an act of will is to be approved or disapproved.
Actually, God achieveth some of his purposes—which are, of course, all
good—through the evil wills of bad men. For example, it was through the ill
will of the Jews that, by the good will of the Father, Christ was slain for
us—a deed so good that when the apostle Peter would have nullified it he was
called "Satan" by him who had come in order to be slain.
102. But, however strong the wills either of angels or of men, whether good or evil, whether they will what God willeth or will something else, the will of the Omnipotent is always undefeated. And this will can never be evil, because even when it inflicts evils, it is still just; and obviously what is just is not evil. Therefore, whether through pity "he hath mercy on whom he willeth," or in justice "whom he willeth, he hardeneth," the omnipotent God never doth anything except what he doth will, and doth everything that he willeth.
103. Accordingly, when we hear and read in sacred Scripture that God "willeth
that all men should be saved,"
In any case, the word concerning God, "who will have all men to be saved," does not mean that there is no one whose salvation he doth not will—he who was unwilling to work miracles among those who, he said, would have repented if he had wrought them—but by "all men" we are to understand the whole of mankind, in every single group into which it can be divided: kings and subjects; nobility and plebeians; the high and the low; the learned and unlearned; the healthy and the sick; the bright, the dull, and the stupid; the rich, the poor, and the middle class; males, females, infants, children, the adolescent, young adults and middle-aged and very old; of every tongue and fashion, of all the arts, of all professions, with the countless variety of wills and minds and all the other things that differentiate people. For from which of these groups doth not God will that some men from every nation should be saved through his only begotten Son our Lord? Therefore, he doth save them since the Omnipotent cannot will in vain, whatsoever he willeth.
Now, the apostle had enjoined that prayers should be offered "for all men"
104. Consequently, God would have willed to preserve even the first man in that state of salvation in which he was created and would have brought him in due season, after the begetting of children, to a better state without the intervention of death—where he not only would have been unable to sin, but would not have had even the will to sin—if he had foreknown that man would have had a steadfast will to continue without sin, as he had been created to do. But since he did foreknow that man would make bad use of his free will—that is, that he would sin—God prearranged his own purpose so that he could do good to man, even in man's doing evil, and so that the good will of the Omnipotent should be nullified by the bad will of men, but should nonetheless be fulfilled.
105. Thus it was fitting that man should be created, in the first place, so that he could will both good and evil—not without reward, if he willed the good; not without punishment, if he willed the evil. But in the future life he will not have the power to will evil; and yet this will not thereby restrict his free will. Indeed, his will will be much freer, because he will then have no power whatever to serve sin. For we surely ought not to find fault with such a will, nor say it is no will, or that it is not rightly called free, when we so desire happiness that we not only are unwilling to be miserable, but have no power whatsoever to will it.
And, just as in our present state, our soul is unable to will unhappiness for
ourselves, so then it will be forever unable to will iniquity. But the ordered
course of God's plan was not to be passed by, wherein he willed to show how good
the rational creature is that is able not to sin, although one unable to sin is
better.
106. Human nature lost the former kind of immortality through the misuse of free will. It is to receive the latter through grace—though it was to have obtained it through merit, if it had not sinned. Not even then, however, could there have been any merit without grace. For although sin had its origin in free will alone, still free will would not have been sufficient to maintain justice, save as divine aid had been afforded man, in the gift of participation in the immutable good. Thus, for example, the power to die when he wills it is in a man's own hands—since there is no one who could not kill himself by not eating (not to mention other means). But the bare will is not sufficient for maintaining life, if the aids of food and other means of preservation are lacking.
Similarly, man in paradise was capable of self-destruction by abandoning
justice by an act of will; yet if the life of justice was to be maintained, his
will alone would not have sufficed, unless He who made him had given him aid.
But, after the Fall, God's mercy was even more abundant, for then the will
itself had to be freed from the bondage in which sin and death are the masters.
There is no way at all by which it can be freed by itself, but only through
God's grace, which is made effectual in the faith of Christ. Thus, as it is
written, even the will by which "the will itself is prepared by the Lord"
107. Accordingly, even the life eternal, which is surely the wages of good
works, is called a gift of God by the apostle. "For the wages of sin," he
says, "is death; but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our
Lord."
Man was, therefore, made upright, and in such a fashion that he could either
continue in that uprightness—though not without divine aid—or become perverted
by his own choice. Whichever of these two man had chosen, God's will would be
done, either by man or at least concerning him. Wherefore, since man
chose to do his own will instead of God's, God's will concerning him was
done; for, from the same mass of perdition that flowed out of that common
source, God maketh "one vessel for honorable, another for ignoble use"
108. Now, we could not be redeemed, even through "the one Mediator between
God and man, Man himself, Christ Jesus,"
109. Now, for the time that intervenes between man's death and the final resurrection, there is a secret shelter for his soul, as each is worthy of rest or affliction according to what it has merited while it lived in the body.
110. There is no denying that the souls of the dead are benefited by the piety of their living friends, when the sacrifice of the Mediator is offered for the dead, or alms are given in the church. But these means benefit only those who, when they were living, have merited that such services could be of help to them. For there is a mode of life that is neither so good as not to need such helps after death nor so bad as not to gain benefit from them after death. There is, however, a good mode of life that does not need such helps, and, again, one so thoroughly bad that, when such a man departs this life, such helps avail him nothing. It is here, then, in this life, that all merit or demerit is acquired whereby a man's condition in the life hereafter is improved or worsened. Therefore, let no one hope to obtain any merit with God after he is dead that he has neglected to obtain here in this life.
So, then, those means which the Church constantly uses in interceding for the
dead are not opposed to that statement of the apostle when he said, "For all of
us shall stand before the tribunal of Christ, so that each may receive according
to what he has done in the body, whether good or evil."
111. After the resurrection, however, when the general judgment has been held and finished, the boundary lines will be set for the two cities: the one of Christ, the other of the devil; one for the good, the other for the bad—both including angels and men. In the one group, there will be no will to sin, in the other, no power to sin, nor any further possibility of dying. The citizens of the first commonwealth will go on living truly and happily in life eternal. The second will go on, miserable in death eternal, with no power to die to it. The condition of both societies will then be fixed and endless. But in the first city, some will outrank others in bliss, and in the second, some will have a more tolerable burden of misery than others.
112. It is quite in vain, then, that some—indeed very many—yield to merely
human feelings and deplore the notion of the eternal punishment of the damned
and their interminable and perpetual misery. They do not believe that such
things will be. Not that they would go counter to divine Scripture—but,
yielding to their own human feelings, they soften what seems harsh and give a
milder emphasis to statements they believe are meant more to terrify than to
express the literal truth. "God will not forget," they say, "to show mercy, nor
in his anger will he shut up his mercy." This is, in fact, the text of a holy
psalm.
But let them suppose, if it pleases them, that, for certain intervals of
time, the punishments of the damned are somewhat mitigated. Even so, the wrath
of God must be understood as still resting on them. And this is damnation—for
this anger, which is not a violent passion in the divine mind, is called "wrath"
in God. Yet even in his wrath—his wrath resting on them—he does not "shut up
his mercy." This is not to put an end to their eternal afflictions, but rather
to apply or interpose some little respite in their torments. For the psalm does
not say, "To put an end to his wrath," or, "After his wrath," but,
"In his wrath." Now, if this wrath were all there is [in man's
damnation], and even if it were present only in the slightest degree
conceivable—still, to be lost out of the Kingdom of God, to be an exile from
the City of God, to be estranged from the life of God, to suffer loss of the
great abundance of God's blessings which he has hidden for those who fear him
and prepared for those who hope in him
113. The eternal death of the damned—that is, their estrangement from the life of God—will therefore abide without end, and it will be common to them all, no matter what some people, moved by their human feelings, may wish to think about gradations of punishment, or the relief or intermission of their misery. In the same way, the eternal life of the saints will abide forever, and also be common to all of them no matter how different the grades of rank and honor in which they shine forth in their effulgent harmony.
114. Thus, from our confession of faith, briefly summarized in the
Creed (which is milk for babes when pondered at the carnal level but food for
strong men when it is considered and studied spiritually), there is born the
good hope of the faithful, accompanied by a holy
love.
115. Accordingly, in the Evangelist Matthew, the Lord's Prayer may be seen to contain seven petitions: three of them ask for eternal goods, the other four for temporal goods, which are, however, necessary for obtaining the eternal goods.
For when we say: "Hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done on
earth, as it is in heaven"
116. However, the Evangelist Luke, in his version of the Lord's Prayer, has
brought together, not seven, but five petitions. Yet, obviously, there is no
discrepancy here, but rather, in his brief way, the Evangelist has shown us how
the seven petitions should be understood. Actually, God's name is even now
hallowed in the spirit, but the Kingdom of God is yet to come in the
resurrection of the body. Therefore, Luke was seeking to show that the third
petition ["Thy will be done"] is a repetition of the first two, and makes this
better understood by omitting it. He then adds three other petitions, concerning
daily bread, forgiveness of sins, and avoidance of temptation.
117. And now regarding love, which the apostle says is greater than the other two—that is, faith and hope—for the more richly it dwells in a man, the better the man in whom it dwells. For when we ask whether someone is a good man, we are not asking what he believes, or hopes, but what he loves. Now, beyond all doubt, he who loves aright believes and hopes rightly. Likewise, he who does not love believes in vain, even if what he believes is true; he hopes in vain, even if what he hopes for is generally agreed to pertain to true happiness, unless he believes and hopes for this: that he may through prayer obtain the gift of love. For, although it is true that he cannot hope without love, it may be that there is something without which, if he does not love it, he cannot realize the object of his hopes. An example of this would be if a man hopes for life eternal—and who is there who does not love that?—and yet does not love righteousness, without which no one comes to it.
Now this is the true faith of Christ which the apostle commends: faith that
works through love. And what it yet lacks in love it asks that it may receive,
it seeks that it may find, and knocks that it may be opened unto it.
118. When, in the deepest shadows of ignorance, he lives according to the
flesh with no restraint of reason—this is the primal state of man.
But if God regards a man with solicitude so that he then believes in God's
help in fulfilling His commands, and if a man begins to be led by the Spirit of
God, then the mightier power of love struggles against the power of the flesh.
A final peace is in store for him who continues to go forward in this course toward perfection through steadfast piety. This will be perfected beyond this life in the repose of the spirit, and, at the last, in the resurrection of the body.
Of these four different stages of man, the first is before the law, the
second is under the law, the third is under grace, and the fourth is in full and
perfect peace. Thus, also, the history of God's people has been ordered by
successive temporal epochs, as it pleased God, who "ordered all things in
measure and number and weight."
119. Now, in whichever of these four "ages"—if one can call them that—the
grace of regeneration finds a man, then and there all his past sins are forgiven
him and the guilt he contracted in being born is removed by his being reborn.
And so true is it that "the Spirit breatheth where he willeth"
120. Yet, before a man can receive the commandment, he must, of course, live
according to the flesh. But, once he has been imbued with the sacrament of
rebirth, no harm will come to him even if he then immediately depart this
life—"Wherefore on this account Christ died and rose again, that he might be
the Lord of both the living and the dead."
121. All the divine precepts are, therefore, referred back to love, of
which the apostle says, "Now the end of the commandment is love, out of a pure
heart, and a good conscience and a faith unfeigned."
Therefore, whatsoever things God commands (and one of these is, "Thou shalt
not commit adultery"
122. But somewhere this book must have an end. You can see for yourself whether you should call it an Enchiridion, or use it as one. But since I have judged that your zeal in Christ ought not to be spurned and since I believe and hope for good things for you through the help of our Redeemer, and since I love you greatly as one of the members of his body, I have written this book for you—may its usefulness match its prolixity!—on Faith, Hope, and Love.
Genesis
Exodus
Numbers
Deuteronomy
Job
Psalms
2:7 10:3 10:6 23:6 27:1 31:19 38:9 43:1 51:5 51:10 51:17 54:1 58:11 58:11 59:10 77:9 82:6 88:5 90:9 100:1 101:1 110:2 113:3 113:11 115:3 135:6 135:6 148:2
Proverbs
Isaiah
Jeremiah
Ezekiel
Hosea
Joel
Habakkuk
Zechariah
Malachi
Matthew
1:20 1:20 2:20 3:13 5:22 5:23 5:27 5:37 5:37 5:40 5:44 5:44 6:9 6:9-12 6:10 6:11-13 6:12 6:14 6:15 7:7 7:18 11:21 12:33 12:35 16:23 22:40 23:26 23:37 25:32 25:33 25:34 25:41 25:46
Mark
Luke
1:28-30 1:35 3:4 6:30 10:27 11:2-4 11:37-41 11:41 11:42 11:42 15:24 20:36 20:36 22:61
John
1:1 1:9 1:14 1:14 1:16 1:17 2:19 3:5 3:8 3:36 5:29 8:36 10:34 14:6 15:23 20:22 20:23
Acts
Romans
1:3 1:17 3:20 3:20 4:17 5:8 5:9 5:10 5:12 5:12 5:16 5:16 5:18 5:20 5:20 6:1 6:2 6:3 6:4-11 6:23 8:3 8:14 8:14 8:24 8:25 8:31 8:32 9:11 9:12 9:13 9:14 9:15 9:15 9:16 9:16 9:17 9:18 9:19 9:20 9:21 9:21 9:23 10:14 14:9 14:10 16:19
1 Corinthians
1:20 1:31 1:31 3:11 3:11 3:11-15 3:12 3:15 4:5 6:1 6:4-6 6:9 6:10 6:15 6:19 7:1 7:5 7:25 7:32 7:33 11:31 11:31 13:9 13:10 13:11 13:12 13:12 15:40 15:44 15:50
2 Corinthians
Galatians
4:11 5:6 5:6 5:17 5:17 5:24 6:15
Ephesians
Philippians
Colossians
1 Timothy
1:5 1:5 2:1 2:2 2:3 2:4 2:4 2:4 2:5 2:5
2 Timothy
Titus
Hebrews
James
2 Peter
1 John
Revelation
Wisdom of Solomon
Sirach