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| + | Moved to [http://www.logicmuseum.com/authors/augustine/civitate-16.htm here]. |
| − | ON THE CITY OF GOD, BOOK XVI
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| − | [[Directory:Logic Museum/Augustine City of God|Index]]
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| − | Translated by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Dods_%28theologian%29 Marcus Dods]
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| − | *[[#c0|Introduction]]
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| − | *[[#c1|Chapter 1]] Whether, After the Deluge, from Noah to Abraham, Any Families Can Be Found Who Lived According to God
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| − | *[[#c2|Chapter 2]] What Was Prophetically Prefigured in the Sons of Noah
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| − | *[[#c3|Chapter 3]] Of the Generations of the Three Sons of Noah
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| − | *[[#c4|Chapter 4]] Of the Diversity of Languages, and of the Founding of Babylon
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| − | *[[#c5|Chapter 5]] Of God's Coming Down to Confound the Languages of the Builders of the City
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| − | *[[#c6|Chapter 6]] What We are to Understand by God's Speaking to the Angels
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| − | *[[#c7|Chapter 7]] Whether Even the Remotest Islands Received Their Fauna from the Animals Which Were Preserved, Through the Deluge, in the Ark
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| − | *[[#c8|Chapter 8]] Whether Certain Monstrous Races of Men are Derived from the Stock of Adam or Noah's Sons
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| − | *[[#c9|Chapter 9]] Whether We are to Believe in the Antipodes
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| − | *[[#c10|Chapter 10]] Of the Genealogy of Shem, in Whose Line the City of God is Preserved Till the Time of Abraham
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| − | *[[#c11|Chapter 11]] That the Original Language in Use Among Men Was that Which Was Afterwards Called Hebrew, from Heber, in Whose Family It Was Preserved When the Confusion of Tongues Occurred
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| − | *[[#c12|Chapter 12]] Of the Era in Abraham's Life from Which a New Period in the Holy Succession Begins
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| − | *[[#c13|Chapter 13]] Why, in the Account of Terah's Emigration, on His Forsaking the Chaldeans and Passing Over into Mesopotamia, No Mention is Made of His Son Nahor
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| − | *[[#c14|Chapter 14]] Of the Years of Terah, Who Completed His Lifetime in Haran
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| − | *[[#c15|Chapter 15]] Of the Time of the Migration of Abraham, When, According to the Commandment of God, He Went Out from Haran
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| − | *[[#c16|Chapter 16]] Of the Order and Nature of the Promises of God Which Were Made to Abraham
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| − | *[[#c17|Chapter 17]] Of the Three Most Famous Kingdoms of the Nations, of Which One, that is the Assyrian, Was Already Very Eminent When Abraham Was Born
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| − | *[[#c18|Chapter 18]] Of the Repeated Address of God to Abraham, in Which He Promised the Land of Canaan to Him and to His Seed
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| − | *[[#c19|Chapter 19]] Of the Divine Preservation of Sarah's Chastity in Egypt, When Abraham Had Called Her Not His Wife But His Sister
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| − | *[[#c20|Chapter 20]] Of the Parting of Lot and Abraham, Which They Agreed to Without Breach of Charity
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| − | *[[#c21|Chapter 21]] Of the Third Promise of God, by Which He Assured the Land of Canaan to Abraham and His Seed in Perpetuity
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| − | *[[#c22|Chapter 22]] Of Abraham's Overcoming the Enemies of Sodom, When He Delivered Lot from Captivity and Was Blessed by Melchizedek the Priest
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| − | *[[#c23|Chapter 23]] Of the Word of the Lord to Abraham, by Which It Was Promised to Him that His Posterity Should Be Multiplied According to the Multitude of the Stars; On Believing Which He Was Declared Justified While Yet in Uncircumcision
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| − | *[[#c24|Chapter 24]] Of the Meaning of the Sacrifice Abraham Was Commanded to Offer When He Supplicated to Be Taught About Those Things He Had Believed
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| − | *[[#c25|Chapter 25]] Of Sarah's Handmaid, Hagar, Whom She Herself Wished to Be Abraham's Concubine
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| − | *[[#c26|Chapter 26]] Of God's Attestation to Abraham, by Which He Assures Him, When Now Old, of a Son by the Barren Sarah, and Appoints Him the Father of the Nations, and Seals His Faith in the Promise by the Sacrament of Circumcision
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| − | *[[#c27|Chapter 27]] Of the Male, Who Was to Lose His Soul If He Was Not Circumcised on the Eighth Day, Because He Had Broken God's Covenant
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| − | *[[#c28|Chapter 28]] Of the Change of Name in Abraham and Sarah, Who Received the Gift of Fecundity When They Were Incapable of Regeneration Owing to the Barrenness of One, and the Old Age of Both
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| − | *[[#c29|Chapter 29]] Of the Three Men or Angels, in Whom the Lord is Related to Have Appeared to Abraham at the Oak of Mamre
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| − | *[[#c30|Chapter 30]] Of Lot's Deliverance from Sodom, and Its Consumption by Fire from Heaven; And of Abimelech, Whose Lust Could Not Harm Sarah's Chastity
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| − | *[[#c31|Chapter 31]] Of Isaac, Who Was Born According to the Promise, Whose Name Was Given on Account of the Laughter of Both Parents
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| − | *[[#c31|Chapter 32]] Of Abraham's Obedience and Faith, Which Were Proved by the Offering Up, of His Son in Sacrifice, and of Sarah's Death
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| − | *[[#c31|Chapter 33]] Of Rebecca, the Grand-Daughter of Nahor, Whom Isaac Took to Wife
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| − | *[[#c31|Chapter 34]] What is Meant by Abraham's Marrying Keturah After Sarah's Death
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| − | *[[#c35|Chapter 35]] What Was Indicated by the Divine Answer About the Twins Still Shut Up in the Womb of Rebecca Their Mother
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| − | *[[#c36|Chapter 36]] Of the Oracle and Blessing Which Isaac Received, Just as His Father Did, Being Beloved for His Sake
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| − | *[[#c37|Chapter 37]] Of the Things Mystically Prefigured in Esau and Jacob
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| − | *[[#c38|Chapter 38]] Of Jacob's Mission to Mesopotamia to Get a Wife, and of the Vision Which He Saw in a Dream by the Way, and of His Getting Four Women When He Sought One Wife
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| − | *[[#c39|Chapter 39]] The Reason Why Jacob Was Also Called Israel
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| − | *[[#c40|Chapter 40]] How It is Said that Jacob Went into Egypt with Seventy-Five Souls, When Most of Those Who are Mentioned Were Born at a Later Period
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| − | *[[#c41|Chapter 41]] Of the Blessing Which Jacob Promised in Judah His Son
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| − | *[[#c42|Chapter 42]] Of the Sons of Joseph, Whom Jacob Blessed, Prophetically Changing His Hands
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| − | *[[#c43|Chapter 43]] Of the Times of Moses and Joshua the Son of Nun, of the Judges, and Thereafter of the Kings, of Whom Saul Was the First, But David is to Be Regarded as the Chief, Both by the Oath and by Merit
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| − | ||<div id="c0"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [] ||The City of God (Book XVI) Argument-In the former part of this book, from the first to the twelfth chapter, the progress of the two cities, the earthly and the heavenly, from Noah to Abraham, is exhibited from Holy Scripture: In the latter part, the progress of the heavenly alone, from Abraham to the kings of Israel, is the subject.
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| − | ||<div id="c1"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [I] Post diluuium procurrentis sanctae uestigia civitatis utrum continuata sint an intercurrentibus impietatis interrupta temporibus, ita ut nullus hominum veri unius Dei cultor existeret, ad liquidum scripturis loquentibus invenire difficile est, propterea quia in canonicis libris post Noe, qui cum coniuge ac tribus filiis totidemque nuribus suis meruit per arcam uastatione diluuii liberari, non invenimus usque Abraham cuiusquam pietatem evidenti divino eloquio praedicatam, nisi quod Noe duos filios suos Sem et Iapheth prophetica benedictione commendat, intuens et praevidens quod longe fuerat post futurum. Vnde factum est etiam illud, et filium suum medium, hoc est primogenito iuniorem ultimoque maiorem, qui peccaverat in patrem, non in ipso, sed in filio eius suo nepote malediceret his verbis: Maledictus Chanaan puer, famulus erit fratribus suis. Chanaan porro natus fuerat ex Cham, qui patris dormientis nec texerat, sed potius prodiderat nuditatem. Vnde etiam quod secutus adiunxit benedictionem duorum maximi et minimi filiorum dicens: Benedictus Dominus Deus Sem, et erit Chanaan puer illius; latificet Deus Iapheth, et habitet in domibus Sem, sicut ipsa eiusdem Noe et vineae plantatio et ex eius fructu inebriatio et dormientis enudatio, et quae ibi cetera facta atque conscripta sunt, propheticis sunt gravidata sensibus et velata tegminibus. ||It is difficult to discover from Scripture, whether, after the deluge, traces of the holy city are continuous, or are so interrupted by intervening seasons of godlessness, that not a single worshipper of the one true God was found among men; because from Noah, who, with his wife, three sons, and as many daughters-in-law, achieved deliverance in the ark from the destruction of the deluge, down to Abraham, we do not find in the canonical books that the piety of any one is celebrated by express divine testimony, unless it be in the case of Noah, who commends with a prophetic benediction his two sons Shem and Japheth, while he beheld and foresaw what was long afterwards to happen. It was also by this prophetic spirit that, when his middle son-that is, the son who was younger than the first and older than the last born-had sinned against him, he cursed him not in his own person, but in his son's (his own grandson's), in the words, "Cursed be the lad Canaan; a servant shall he be unto his brethren." Genesis 9:25 Now Canaan was born of Ham, who, so far from covering his sleeping father's nakedness, had divulged it. For the same reason also he subjoins the blessing on his two other sons, the oldest and youngest, saying, "Blessed be the Lord God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant. God shall gladden Japheth, and he shall dwell in the houses of Shem." Genesis 9:26-27 And so, too, the planting of the vine by Noah, and his intoxication by its fruit, and his nakedness while he slept, and the other things done at that time, and recorded, are all of them pregnant with prophetic meanings, and veiled in mysteries.
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| − | ||<div id="c2"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [II] Sed nunc rerum effectu iam in posteris consecuto, quae operta fuerant, satis aperta sunt. Quis enim haec diligenter et intellegenter advertens non agnoscat in Christo? Sem quippe, de cuius semine in carne natus est Christus, interpretatur nominatus. Quid autem nominatius Christo, cuius nomen ubique iam fragrat, ita ut in cantico canticorum etiam ipsa praecedente prophetia unguento conparetur effuso; in cuius domibus, id est ecclesiis, habitat gentium latitudo? Nam Iapheth latitudo interpretatur. Cham porro, quod interpretatur calidus, medius Noe filius, tamquam se ab utroque discernens et inter utrumque remanens, nec in primitiis Israelitarum nec in plenitudine gentium, quid significat nisi haereticorum genus calidum, non spiritu sapientiae, sed inpatientiae, quo solent haereticorum feruere praecordia et pacem perturbare sanctorum? Sed haec in usum cedunt proficientium, iuxta illud apostoli: Oportet et haereses esse, ut probati manifesti fiant in vobis. Vnde etiam scriptum est: Filius eruditus sapiens erit, inprudente autem ministro utetur. Multa quippe ad fidem catholicam pertinentia, dum haereticorum calida inquietudine exagitantur, ut adversus eos defendi possint, et considerantur diligentius et intelleguntur clarius et instantius praedicantur, et ab adversario mota quaestio discendi existit occasio. Quamuis non solum qui sunt apertissime separati, verum omnes, qui Christiano vocabulo gloriantur et perdite vivunt, non absurde possunt videri medio Noe filio figurati; passionem quippe Christi, quae illius hominis nuditate significata est, et adnuntiant profitendo, et male agendo exhonorant. De talibus ergo dictum est: Ex fructibus eorum cognoscetis eos. Ideo Cham in filio suo maledictus est, tamquam in fructu suo, id est in opere suo. Vnde convenienter et ipse filius eius Chanaan interpretatur motus eorum; quod aliud quid est quam opus eorum? Sem vero et Iapheth tamquam circumcisio et praeputium, vel sicut alio modo eos appellat apostolus, Iudaei et Graeci, sed vocati et iustificati, cognita quoquo modo nuditate patris, qua significabatur passio Saluatoris, sumentes uestimentum posuerunt supra dorsa sua et intraverunt aversi et operuerunt nuditatem patris sui, nec viderunt quod reuerendo texerunt. Quodam enim modo in passione Christi et quod pro nobis factum est honoramus et Iudaeorum facinus aversamur. Vestimentum significat sacramentum, dorsa memoriam praeteritorum, quia passionem Christi eo scilicet iam tempore, quo habitat Iapheth in domibus Sem et malus frater in medio eorum, transactam celebrat ecclesia, non adhuc prospectat futuram. Sed malus frater in filio suo, hoc est, in opere suo, puer, id est seruus est fratrum bonorum, cum ad exercitationem patientiae vel ad provectum sapientiae scienter utantur malis boni. Sunt enim teste apostolo, qui Christum adnuntiant non caste; sed sive occasione, inquit, sive veritate Christus adnuntietur. Ipse quippe plantavit vineam, de qua dicit propheta: Vinea Domini Sabaoth domus Israel est, et bibit de vino eius (sive ille calix hic intellegatur, de quo dicit: Potestis bibere calicem, quem ego bibiturus sum? et: Pater, si fieri potest, transeat calix iste, quo suam sine dubio significat passionem; sive, quia vinum fructus est vineae, hoc potius illo significatum est, quod ex ipsa vinea, hoc est ex genere Israelitarum, carnem pro nobis et sanguinem, ut pati posset, adsumpsit), et inebriatus est, id est passus est, et nudatus est: ibi namque nudata est, id est apparuit, eius infirmitas, de qua dicit apostolus: Etsi crucifixus est ex infirmitate. Vnde idem dicit: Infirmum Dei fortius est hominibus, et stultum Dei sapientius est hominibus. Quod vero cum dictum esset: Et nudatus est, addidit scriptura: In domo sua, eleganter ostendit, quod a suae carnis gente et domesticis sanguinis sui, utique Iudaeis, fuerat crucem mortemque passurus. Hanc passionem Christi foris in sono tantum vocis reprobi adnuntiant; non enim quod adnuntiant intellegunt. Probi autem in interiore homine habent tam grande mysterium atque honorant intus in corde infirmum et stultum Dei, quia fortius et sapientius est hominibus. Huius rei figura est, quod Cham exiens hoc nuntiavit foris; Sem vero et Iapheth, ut hoc velarent, id est honorarent, ingressi sunt, hoc est interius id egerunt. Haec scripturae secreta divinae indagamus, ut possumus, alius alio magis minusue congruenter, verum tamen fideliter certum tenentes non ea sine aliqua praefiguratione futurorum gesta atque conscripta neque nisi ad Christum et eius ecclesiam, quae civitas Dei est, esse referenda; cuius ab initio generis humani non defuit praedicatio, quam per omnia videmus impleri. Benedictis igitur duobus filiis Noe atque uno in medio eorum maledicto deinceps usque ad Abraham de iustorum aliquorum, qui pie Deum colerent, commemoratione silentium est per annos amplius quam mille. Nec eos defuisse crediderim, sed si omnes commemorarentur, nimis longum fieret, et esset haec historica magis diligentia quam prophetica providentia. Illa itaque exequitur litterarum sacrarum scriptor istarum vel potius per eum Dei Spiritus, quibus non solum narrentur praeterita, verum etiam praenuntientur futura, quae tamen pertinent ad civitatem Dei; quia et de hominibus, qui non sunt cives eius, quidquid hic dicitur, ad hoc dicitur, ut illa ex comparatione contraria vel proficiat vel emineat. Non sane omnia, quae gesta narrantur, aliquid etiam significare putanda sunt; sed propter illa, quae aliquid significant, etiam ea, quae nihil significant, adtexuntur. Solo enim vomere terra proscinditur; sed ut hoc fieri possit, etiam cetera aratri membra sunt necessaria; et soli nerui in citharis atque huius modi uasis musicis aptantur ad cantum; sed ut aptari possint, insunt et cetera in compagibus organorum, quae non percutiuntur a canentibus, sed ea, quae percussa resonant, his conectuntur. Ita in prophetica historia dicuntur et aliqua, quae nihil significant, sed quibus adhaereant quae significant et quodam modo religentur. ||The things which then were hidden are now sufficiently revealed by the actual events which have followed. For who can carefully and intelligently consider these things without recognizing them accomplished in Christ? Shem, of whom Christ was born in the flesh, means "named." And what is of greater name than Christ, the fragrance of whose name is now everywhere perceived, so that even prophecy sings of it beforehand, comparing it in the Song of Songs, Song of Songs 1:3 to ointment poured forth? Is it not also in the houses of Christ, that is, in the churches, that the "enlargement" of the nations dwells? For Japheth means "enlargement." And Ham (i.e., hot), who was the middle son of Noah, and, as it were, separated himself from both, and remained between them, neither belonging to the first-fruits of Israel nor to the fullness of the Gentiles, what does he signify but the tribe of heretics, hot with the spirit, not of patience, but of impatience, with which the breasts of heretics are wont to blaze, and with which they disturb the peace of the saints? But even the heretics yield an advantage to those that make proficiency, according to the apostle's saying, "There must also be heresies, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you." 1 Corinthians 11:19 Whence, too, it is elsewhere said, "The son that receives instruction will be wise, and he uses the foolish as his servant." For while the hot restlessness of heretics stirs questions about many articles of the catholic faith, the necessity of defending them forces us both to investigate them more accurately, to understand them more clearly, and to proclaim them more earnestly; and the question mooted by an adversary becomes the occasion of instruction. However, not only those who are openly separated from the church, but also all who glory in the Christian name, and at the same time lead abandoned lives, may without absurdity seem to be figured by Noah's middle son: for the passion of Christ, which was signified by that man's nakedness, is at once proclaimed by their profession, and dishonored by their wicked conduct. Of such, therefore, it has been said, "By their fruits you shall know them." Matthew 7:20 And therefore was Ham cursed in his son, he being, as it were, his fruit. So, too, this son of his, Canaan, is fitly interpreted "their movement," which is nothing else than their work. But Shem and Japheth, that is to say, the circumcision and uncircumcision, or, as the apostle otherwise calls them, the Jews and Greeks, but called and justified, having somehow discovered the nakedness of their father (which signifies the Saviour's passion), took a garment and laid it upon their backs, and entered backwards and covered their father's nakedness, without their seeing what their reverence hid. For we both honor the passion of Christ as accomplished for us, and we hate the crime of the Jews who crucified Him. The garment signifies the sacrament, their backs the memory of things past: for the church celebrates the passion of Christ as already accomplished, and no longer to be looked forward to, now that Japheth already dwells in the habitations of Shem, and their wicked brother between them.But the wicked brother is, in the person of his son (i.e., his work), the boy, or slave, of his good brothers, when good men make a skillful use of bad men, either for the exercise of their patience or for their advancement in wisdom. For the apostle testifies that there are some who preach Christ from no pure motives; "but," says he, "whether in pretence or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice." Philippians 1:18 For it is Christ Himself who planted the vine of which the prophet says, "The vine of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel;" Isaiah 5:7 and He drinks of its wine, whether we thus understand that cup of which He says, "Can ye drink of the cup that I shall drink of?" Matthew 20:22 and, "Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me," Matthew 26:39 by which He obviously means His passion. Or, as wine is the fruit of the vine, we may prefer to understand that from this vine, that is to say, from the race of Israel, He has assumed flesh and blood that He might suffer; "and he was drunken," that is, He suffered; "and was naked," that is, His weakness appeared in His suffering, as the apostle says, "though He was crucified through weakness." 2 Corinthians 13:4 Wherefore the same apostle says, "The weakness of God is stronger than men; and the foolishness of God is wiser than men." 1 Corinthians 1:25 And when to the expression "he was naked" Scripture adds "in his house," it elegantly intimates that Jesus was to suffer the cross and death at the hands of His own household, His own kith and kin, the Jews. This passion of Christ is only externally and verbally professed by the reprobate, for what they profess, they do not understand. But the elect hold in the inner man this so great mystery, and honor inwardly in the heart this weakness and foolishness of God. And of this there is a figure in Ham going out to proclaim his father's nakedness; while Shem and Japheth, to cover or honor it, went in, that is to say, did it inwardly.These secrets of divine Scripture we investigate as well as we can. All will not accept our interpretation with equal confidence, but all hold it certain that these things were neither done nor recorded without some foreshadowing of future events, and that they are to be referred only to Christ and His church, which is the city of God, proclaimed from the very beginning of human history by figures which we now see everywhere accomplished. From the blessing of the two sons of Noah, and the cursing of the middle son, down to Abraham, or for more than a thousand years, there is, as I have said, no mention of any righteous persons who worshipped God. I do not therefore conclude that there were none; but it had been tedious to mention every one, and would have displayed historical accuracy rather than prophetic foresight. The object of the writer of these sacred books, or rather of the Spirit of God in him, is not only to record the past, but to depict the future, so far as it regards the city of God; for whatever is said of those who are not its citizens, is given either for her instruction, or as a foil to enhance her glory. Yet we are not to suppose that all that is recorded has some signification; but those things which have no signification of their own are interwoven for the sake of the things which are significant. It is only the ploughshare that cleaves the soil; but to effect this, other parts of the plough are requisite. It is only the strings in harps and other musical instruments which produce melodious sounds; but that they may do so, there are other parts of the instrument which are not indeed struck by those who sing, but are connected with the strings which are struck, and produce musical notes. So in this prophetic history some things are narrated which have no significance, but are, as it were, the framework to which the significant things are attached.
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| − | ||<div id="c3"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [III] Generationes ergo filiorum Noe deinceps intuendae, et quod de his dicendum videtur, adtexendum est huic operi, quo civitatis utriusque, terrenae scilicet et caelestis, per tempora procursus ostenditur. Coeptae sunt enim commemorari a minimo filio, qui vocatus est Iapheth, cuius filii octo nominati sunt, nepotes autem septem de duobus filiis eius, tres ex uno, quattuor ex altero; fiunt itaque omnes quindecim. Filii autem Cham, hoc est medii filii Noe, quattuor et nepotes quinque ex uno eius filio, pronepotes duo ex nepote uno; fit eorum summa undecim. Quibus enumeratis reditur tamquam ad caput et dicitur: Chus autem genuit Nebroth; hic coepit esse gigans super terram. Hic erat gigans venator contra Dominum Deum. Propter hoc dicunt: Sicut Nebroth gignas venator contra Dominum. Et factum est initium regni eius Babylon, Orech, Archad et Chalanne in terra Sennaar. De terra illa exivit Assur et aedificavit Nineuen et Roboth civitatem et Chalach et Dasem inter medium Niveuae et Chalach: haec civitas magna. Iste porro Chus, pater gigantis Nebroth, primus nominatus est in filiis Cham, cuius quinque filii iam fuerant computati et nepotes duo. Sed istum gigantem aut post nepotes suos natos genuit, aut, quod est credibilius, seorsum de illo propter eius eminentiam scriptura locuta est; quando quidem et regnum eius commemoratum est, cuius initium erat illa nobilissima Babylon civitas, et quae iuxta commemoratae sunt sive civitates sive regiones. Quod vero dictum est de terra illa, id est de terra Sennaar, quae pertinebat ad regnum Nebroth, exisse Assur et aedificasse Nineuen et alias quas contexuit civitates, longe postea factum est, quod ex hac occasione perstrinxit propter nobilitatem regni Assyriorum, quod mirabiliter dilatavit Ninus, Beli filius, conditor Nineuae civitatis magnae; cuius civitatis nomen ex illius nomine derivatum est, ut a Nino Nineue vocaretur. Assur autem, unde Assyrii, non fuit in filiis Cham, medii filii Noe, sed in filiis Sem reperitur, qui fuit Noe maximus filius. Vnde apparet de progenie Sem exortos fuisse, qui postea regnum gigantis illius obtinerent et inde procederent atque alias conderent civitates, quarum prima est a Nino appellata Nineue. Hinc reditur ad alium filium Cham, qui vocabatur Mesraim, et commemorantur quos genuit, non tamquam singuli homines, sed nationes septem. Et de sexta, velut de sexto filio, gens commemoratur exisse, quae appellatur Philistiim; unde fiunt octo. Inde iterum ad Chanaan reditur, in quo filio maledictus est Cham, et quos genuit undecim nominantur. Deinde usque ad quos fines peruenerint commemoratis quibusdam civitatibus dicitur. Ac per hoc filiis nepotibusque computatis de progenie Cham triginta unus geniti referuntur. Restat commemorare filios Sem, maximi filii Noe; ad eum quippe gradatim generationum istarum pe rvenit a minirfio exorta narratio. Sed unde incipiunt commemorari filii Sem, habet quiddam obscuritatis, quod expositione inlustrandum est, quia et multum ad rem pertinet, quam requirimus. Sic enim legitur: Et Sem natus est, et ipsi patri omnium filiorum, Heber, fratri Iapheth maiori. Ordo verborum est: Et Sem natus est Heber, etiam ipsi, id est ipsi Sem, natus est Heber, qui Sem pater est omnium filiorum. Sem ergo patriarcham intellegi voluit omnium, qui de stirpe eius exorti sunt, quos commemoraturus est, sive sint filii, sive nepotes et pronepotes et deinceps indidem exorti. Non sane istum Heber genuit Sem, sed ab illo quintus in progenitorum serie reperitur. Sem quippe inter alios filios genuit Arphaxat, Arphaxat genuit Cainan, Cainan genuit Sala, Sala genuit Heber. Non itaque frustra ipse primus est nominatus in progenie veniente de Sem et praelatus etiam filiis, cum sit quintus nepos, nisi quia verum est, quod traditur, ex illo Hebraeos esse cognominatos, tamquam Heberaeos; cum et alia possit esse opinio, ut ex Abraham tamquam Abrahaei dicti esse videantur; sed nimirum hoc verum est, quod ex Heber Heberaei appellati sunt, ac deinde una detrita littera Hebraei, quam linguam solus Israel populus potuit obtinere, in quo Dei civitas et in sanctis peregrinata est et in omnibus sacramento adumbrata. Igitur filii Sem prius sex nominantur, deinde ex uno eorum nati sunt quattuor nepotes eius, itemque alter filiorum Sem genuit eius nepotem, atque ex illo itidem pronepos natus est atque inde abnepos, qui est Heber. Genuit autem Heber duos filios, quorum unum appellavit Phalech, quod interpretatur dividens. Deinde scriptura subiungens rationemque huius nominis reddens: Quia in diebus, inquit, eius divisa est terra. Hoc autem quid sit, post apparebit. Alius vero, qui natus est ex Heber, genuit duodecim filios; ac per hoc fiunt omnes progeniti de Sem viginti septem. In summa igitur omnes progeniti de tribus filiis Noe, id est quindecim de Iapheth, triginta unus de Cham, viginti septem de Sem fiunt septuaginta tres. Deinde sequitur scriptura dicens: Hi filii Sem in tribubus suis secundum linguas suas in regionibus suis et in gentibus suis; itemque de omnibus: Haec, inquit, tribus filiorum Noe secundum generationes eorum, secundum gentes eorum. Ab his dispersae sunt insulae gentium super terram post diluuium. Vnde colligitur septuaginta tres vel potius (quod postea demonstrabitur) septuaginta duas gentes tunc fuisse, non homines. Nam et prius, cum fuissent commemorati filii Iapheth, ita conclusum est: Ex his segregatae sunt insulae gentium in terra sua, unus quosque secundum linguam in tribubus suis et in gentibus suis. Iam vero in filiis Cham quodam loco apertius gentes commemoratae sunt, sicut superius ostendi. Mesraim genuit eos, qui dicuntur Ludiim; et eodem modo ceterae usque ad septem gentes. Et enumeratis omnibus postea concludens: Hi filii Cham, inquit, in tribubus suis secundum linguas suas in regionibus suis et in gentibus suis. Propterea ergo multorum filii non sunt commemorati, quia gentibus aliis nascendo accesserunt, ipsi autem gentes facere neqmuerunt. Nam qua alia causa, cum filii Iapheth octo enumerentur, ex duobus eorum tantum filii nati commemorantur, et cum filii Cham quattuor nominentur, ex tribus tantum qui nati sunt adiciuntur, et cum filii Sem nominentur sex, duorum tantum posteritas adtexitur? Numquid ceteri sine filiis remanserunt? Absit hoc credere; sed gentes, propter quas commemorari digni essent, non utique fecerunt, quia, sicut nascebantur, aliis gentibus addebantur. ||We must therefore introduce into this work an explanation of the generations of the three sons of Noah, in so far as that may illustrate the progress in time of the two cities. Scripture first mentions that of the youngest son, who is called Japheth: he had eight sons, and by two of these sons seven grandchildren, three by one son, four by the other; in all, fifteen descendants. Ham, Noah's middle son, had four sons, and by one of them five grandsons, and by one of these two great-grandsons; in all, eleven. After enumerating these, Scripture returns to the first of the sons, and says, "Cush begat Nimrod; he began to be a giant on the earth. He was a giant hunter against the Lord God: wherefore they say, As Nimrod the giant hunter against the Lord. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babylon, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. Out of that land went forth Assur, and built Nineveh, and the city Rehoboth, and Calah, and Resen between Nineveh and Calah: this was a great city." Now this Cush, father of the giant Nimrod, is the first-named among the sons of Ham, to whom five sons and two grandsons are ascribed. But he either begat this giant after his grandsons were born, or, which is more credible, Scripture speaks of him separately on account of his eminence; for mention is also made of his kingdom, which began with that magnificent city Babylon, and the other places, whether cities or districts, mentioned along with it. But what is recorded of the land of Shinar which belonged to Nimrod's kingdom, to wit, that Assur went forth from it and built Nineveh and the other cities mentioned with it, happened long after; but he takes occasion to speak of it here on account of the grandeur of the Assyrian kingdom, which was wonderfully extended by Ninus son of Belus, and founder of the great city Nineveh, which was named after him, Nineveh, from Ninus. But Assur, father of the Assyrian, was not one of the sons of Ham, Noah's son, but is found among the sons of Shem, his eldest son. Whence it appears that among Shem's offspring there arose men who afterwards took possession of that giant's kingdom, and advancing from it, founded other cities, the first of which was called Nineveh, from Ninus. From him Scripture returns to Ham's other son, Mizraim; and his sons are enumerated, not as seven individuals, but as seven nations. And from the sixth, as if from the sixth son, the race called the Philistines are said to have sprung; so that there are in all eight. Then it returns again to Canaan, in whose person Ham was cursed; and his eleven sons are named. Then the territories they occupied, and some of the cities, are named. And thus, if we count sons and grandsons, there are thirty-one of Ham's descendants registered.It remains to mention the sons of Shem, Noah's eldest son; for to him this genealogical narrative gradually ascends from the youngest. But in the commencement of the record of Shem's sons there is an obscurity which calls for explanation, since it is closely connected with the object of our investigation. For we read, "Unto Shem also, the father of all the children of Heber, the brother of Japheth the elder, were children born." Genesis 10:21 This is the order of the words: And to Shem was born Heber, even to himself, that is, to Shem himself was born Heber, and Shem is the father of all his children. We are intended to understand that Shem is the patriarch of all his posterity who were to be mentioned, whether sons, grandsons, great-grandsons, or descendants at any remove. For Shem did not beget Heber, who was indeed in the fifth generation from him. For Shem begat, among other sons, Arphaxad; Arphaxad begat Cainan, Cainan begat Salah, Salah begat Heber. And it was with good reason that he was named first among Shem's offspring, taking precedence even of his sons, though only a grandchild of the fifth generation; for from him, as tradition says, the Hebrews derived their name, though the other etymology which derives the name from Abraham (as if Abrahews) may possibly be correct. But there can be little doubt that the former is the right etymology, and that they were called after Heber, Heberews, and then, dropping a letter, Hebrews; and so was their language called Hebrew, which was spoken by none but the people of Israel among whom was the city of God, mysteriously prefigured in all the people, and truly present in the saints. Six of Shem's sons then are first named, then four grandsons born to one of these sons; then it mentions another son of Shem, who begat a grandson; and his son, again, or Shem's great-grandson, was Heber. And Heber begat two sons, and called the one Peleg, which means "dividing;" and Scripture subjoins the reason of this name, saying, "for in his days was the earth divided." What this means will afterwards appear. Heber's other son begat twelve sons; consequently all Shem's descendants are twenty-seven. The total number of the progeny of the three sons of Noah is seventy-three, fifteen by Japheth, thirty-one by Ham, twenty-seven by Shem. Then Scripture adds, "These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, after their nations." And so of the whole number "These are the families of the sons of Noah after their generations, in their nations; and by these were the isles of the nations dispersed through the earth after the flood." From which we gather that the seventy-three (or rather, as I shall presently show, seventy-two) were not individuals, but nations. For in a former passage, when the sons of Japheth were enumerated, it is said in conclusion, "By these were the isles of the nations divided in their lands, every one after his language, in their tribes, and in their nations."But nations are expressly mentioned among the sons of Ham, as I showed above. "Mizraim begat those who are called Ludim;" and so also of the other seven nations. And after enumerating all of them, it concludes, "These are the sons of Ham, in their families, according to their languages, in their territories, and in their nations." The reason, then, why the children of several of them are not mentioned, is that they belonged by birth to other nations, and did not themselves become nations. Why else is it, that though eight sons are reckoned to Japheth, the sons of only two of these are mentioned; and though four are reckoned to Ham, only three are spoken of as having sons; and though six are reckoned to Shem, the descendants of only two of these are traced? Did the rest remain childless? We cannot suppose so; but they did not produce nations so great as to warrant their being mentioned, but were absorbed in the nations to which they belonged by birth.
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| − | ||<div id="c4"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [IV] Cum ergo in suis linguis istae gentes fuisse referantur, redit tamen narrator ad illud tempus, quando una lingua omnium fuit, et inde iam exponit, quid acciderit, ut linguarum diversitas nasceretur. Et erat, inquit, omnis terra labium unum et vox una omnibus. Et factum est, cum moverent ipsi ab Oriente, invenerunt campum in terra Sennaar, et habitaverunt ibi. Et dixit homo proximo: Venite, faciamus lateres et coquamus illos igni. Et facti sunt illis lateres in lapidem, et bitumen erat illis lutum, et dixerunt: Venite, aedificemus nobismetipsis civitatem et turrem, cuius caput erit usque ad caelum, et faciamus nostrum nomen antequam dispergamur in faciem omnis terrae. Et descendit Dominus videre civitatem et turrem, quam aedificaverunt filii hominum. Et dixit Dominus Deus: Ecce genus unum et labium unum omnium; et hoc inchoaverunt facere, et nunc non deficient ex illis omnia quae conati fuerint facere; venite, et descendentes confundamus ibi linguam eorum, ut non audiant unusquisque vocem proximi. Et dispersit eos Dominus inde super faciem omnis terrae, et cessaverunt aedificantes civitatem et turrem. Propter hoc appellatum est nomen illius confusio, quia ibi confudit Dominus labia omnis terrae; et inde dispersit illos Dominus Deus super faciem omnis terrae. Ista civitas, quae appellata est confusio, ipsa est Babylon, cuius mirabilem constructionem etiam gentium commendat historia. Babylon quippe interpretatur confusio. Vnde colligitur, gigantem illum Nebroth fuisse illius conditorem, quod superius breviter fuerat intimatum, ubi, cum de illo scriptura loqueretur, ait initium regni eius fuisse Babylonem, id est quae civitatum ceterarum gereret principatum, ubi esset tamquam in metropoli habitaculum regni; quamuis perfecta non fuerit usque in tantum modum, quantum superba cogitabat impietas. Nam nimia disponebatur altitudo, quae dicta est usque in caelum, sive unius turris eius, quam praecipuam moliebantur inter alias, sive omnium turrium; quae per numerum singularem ita significatae sunt, ut dicitur miles et intelleguntur milla militum; ut rana et lucusta; sic enim appellata est multitudo ranarum ac lucustarum in plagis, quibus Aegyptii percussi sunt per Moysen. Quid autem factura fuerat humana et uana praesumptio, cuiuslibet et quantumlibet in caelum adversus Deum altitudinem molis extolleret, quando montes transcenderet universos, quando spatium nebulosi aeris huius euaderet? Quid denique noceret Deo quantacumque vel spiritalis vel corporalis elatio? Tutam veramque in caelum viam molitur humilitas, sursum leuans cor ad Dominum, non contra Dominum, sicut dictus est gigans iste venator contra Dominum. Quod non intellegentes nonnulli ambiguo Graeco falsi sunt, ut non interpretarentur contra Dominum, sed ante Dominum; *e)nanti/on quippe et contra et ante significat. Hoc enim verbum est in psalmo: Et ploremus ante Dominum quo nos fecit; et hoc verbum est etiam in libro Iob, ubi scriptum est: In furorem erupisti contra Dominum. Sic ergo intellegendus est gigans iste venator contra Dominum. Quid autem hic significatur hoc nomine, quod est venator, nisi animalium terrigenarum deceptor oppressor extinctor? Erigebat ergo cum suis populis turrem contra Deum, qua est impia significata superbia. Merito autem malus punitur affectus, etiam cui non succedit effectus. Genus vero ipsum poenae quale fuit? Quoniam dominatio imperantis in lingua est, ibi est damnata superbia, ut non intellegeretur iubens homini, qui noluit intellegere ut oboediret Deo iubenti. Sic illa conspiratio dissoluta est, cum quisque ab eo, quem non intellegebat, abscederet nec se nisi ei, cum quo loqui poterat, adgregaret; et per linguas divisae sunt gentes dispersaeque per terras, sicut Deo placuit, qui hoc modis occultis nobisque inconprehensibilibus fecit. ||But though these nations are said to have been dispersed according to their languages, yet the narrator recurs to that time when all had but one language, and explains how it came to pass that a diversity of languages was introduced. "The whole earth," he says, "was of one lip, and all had one speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and dwelt there. And they said one to another, Come, and let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly. And they had bricks for stone, and slime for mortar. And they said, Come, and let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top shall reach the sky; and let us make us a name, before we be scattered abroad on the face of all the earth. And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men built. And the Lord God said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Come, and let us go down, and confound there their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. And God scattered them thence on the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city and the tower. Therefore the name of it is called Confusion; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and the Lord God scattered them thence on the face of all the earth." Genesis 11:1-9 This city, which was called Confusion, is the same as Babylon, whose wonderful construction Gentile history also notices. For Babylon means Confusion. Whence we conclude that the giant Nimrod was its founder, as had been hinted a little before, where Scripture, in speaking of him, says that the beginning of his kingdom was Babylon, that is, Babylon had a supremacy over the other cities as the metropolis and royal residence; although it did not rise to the grand dimensions designed by its proud and impious founder. The plan was to make it so high that it should reach the sky, whether this was meant of one tower which they intended to build higher than the others, or of all the towers, which might be signified by the singular number, as we speak of "the soldier," meaning the army, and of the frog or the locust, when we refer to the whole multitude of frogs and locusts in the plagues with which Moses smote the Egyptians. Exodus x But what did these vain and presumptuous men intend? How did they expect to raise this lofty mass against God, when they had built it above all the mountains and the clouds of the earth's atmosphere? What injury could any spiritual or material elevation do to God? The safe and true way to heaven is made by humility, which lifts up the heart to the Lord, not against Him; as this giant is said to have been a "hunter against the Lord." This has been misunderstood by some through the ambiguity of the Greek word, and they have translated it, not "against the Lord," but "before the Lord;" for ??a?t??? means both "before" and "against." In the Psalm this word is rendered, "Let us weep before the Lord our Maker." The same word occurs in the book of Job, where it is written, "You have broken into fury against the Lord." Job 15:13 And so this giant is to be recognized as a "hunter against the Lord." And what is meant by the term "hunter" but deceiver, oppressor, and destroyer of the animals of the earth? He and his people therefore, erected this tower against the Lord, and so gave expression to their impious pride; and justly was their wicked intention punished by God, even though it was unsuccessful. But what was the nature of the punishment? As the tongue is the instrument of domination, in it pride was punished; so that man, who would not understand God when He issued His commands, should be misunderstood when he himself gave orders. Thus was that conspiracy disbanded, for each man retired from those he could not understand, and associated with those whose speech was intelligible; and the nations were divided according to their languages, and scattered over the earth as seemed good to God, who accomplished this in ways hidden from and incomprehensible to us.
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| − | ||<div id="c5"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [V] Quod enim scriptum est: Et descendit Dominus videre civitatem et turrem, quam aedificaverunt filii hominum, hoc est non filii Dei, sed illa societas secundum hominem vivens, quam terrenam dicimus civitatem: non loco movetur Deus, qui semper est ubique totus, sed descendere dicitur, cum aliquid facit in terra, quod praeter usitatum naturae cursum mirabiliter factum praesentiam quodam modo eius ostendat; nec videndo discit ad tempus, qui numquam potest aliquid ignorare, sed ad tempus videre et cognoscere dicitur, quod videri et cognosci facit. Non sic ergo videbatur illa civitas, quo modo eam Deus videri fecit, quando sibi quantum displiceret ostendit. Quamuis possit intellegi Deus ad illam civitatem descendisse, quia descenderunt angeli eius in quibus habitat; ut, quod adiunctum est: Et dixit Dominus Deus: Ecce genus unum et labium unum omnium, et cetera, ac deinde additum: Venite et descendentes confundamus ibi linguam eorum, recapitulatio sit, demonstrans quem ad modum factum sit, quod dictum fuerat: Descendit Dominus. Si enim iam descenderat, quid sibi uult: Venite et descendentes confundamus <quod intellegitur angelis dictum>, nisi quia per angelos descendebat, qui in angelis descendentibus erat? Et bene non ait: "Venite et descendentes confundite", sed: Confundamus ibi linguam eorum; ostendens ita se operari per ministros suos, ut sint etiam ipsi cooperatores Dei, sicut apostolus dicit: Dei enim sumus cooperarii. ||We read, "The Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men built:" it was not the sons of God, but that society which lived in a merely human way, and which we call the earthly city. God, who is always wholly everywhere, does not move locally; but He is said to descend when He does anything in the earth out of the usual course, which, as it were, makes His presence felt. And in the same way, He does not by "seeing" learn some new thing, for He cannot ever be ignorant of anything; but He is said to see and recognize, in time, that which He causes others to see and recognize. And therefore that city was not previously being seen as God made it be seen when He showed how offensive it was to Him. We might, indeed, interpret God's descending to the city of the descent of His angels in whom He dwells; so that the following words, "And the Lord God said, Behold, they are all one race and of one language," and also what follows, "Come, and let us go down and confound their speech," are a recapitulation, explaining how the previously intimated "descent of the Lord" was accomplished. For if He had already gone down, why does He say, "Come, and let us go down and confound?"-words which seem to be addressed to the angels, and to intimate that He who was in the angels descended in their descent. And the words most appropriately are, not, "Go ye down and confound," but, "Let us confound their speech;" showing that He so works by His servants, that they are themselves also fellow-laborers with God, as the apostle says, "For we are fellow-laborers with God." 1 Corinthians 3:9
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| − | ||<div id="c6"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [VI] Poterat et illud, quando factus est homo, de angelis intellegi quod dictum est: Faciamus hominem, quia non dixit: "Faciam"; sed quia sequitur ad imaginem nostram, nec fas est credere ad imaginem angelorum hominem factum, aut eandem esse imaginem angelorum et Dei: recte illic intellegitur pluralitas trinitatis. Quae tamen trinitas quia unus Deus est, etiam cum dixisset: "Faciamus": "Et fecit, inquit, Deus hominem ad imaginem Dei", non dixit "fecerunt dii" aut "ad imaginem deorum". Poterat et hic eadem intellegi trinitas, tamquam Pater dixerit ad Filium et Spiritum sanctum: Venite, et descendentes confundamus ibi linguam eorum, si aliquid esset, quod angelos prohiberet intellegi, quibus potius convenit venire ad Deum motibus sanctis, hoc est cogitationibus piis, quibus ab eis consulitur incommutabilis Veritas, tamquam lex aeterna in illa eorum curia superna. Neque enim sibi ipsi sunt veritas, sed creatricis participes Veritatis ad illam moventur, tamquam ad fontem vitae, ut, quod non habent ex se ipsis, capiant ex ipsa. Et eorum stabilis est iste motus, quo veniunt, qui non recedunt. Nec sic loquitur angelis Deus, quo modo nos in vicem nobis vel Deo vel angelis vel ipsi angeli nobis sive per illos Deus nobis, sed ineffabili suo modo; nobis autem hic indicatur nostro modo. Dei quippe sublimior ante suum factum locutio ipsius sui facti est inmutabilis ratio, quae non habet sonum strepentem atque transeuntem, sed vim sempiterne manentem et temporaliter operantem. Hac loquitur angelis sanctis, nobis autem aliter longe positis. Quando autem etiam nos aliquid talis locutionis interioribus auribus capimus, angelis propinquamus. Non itaque mihi adsidue reddenda ratio est in hoc opere de locutionibus Dei. Aut enim Veritas incommutabilis per se ipsam ineffabiliter loquitur rationalis creaturae mentibus, aut per mutabilem creaturam loquitur, sive spiritalibus imaginibus nostro spiritui sive corporalibus vocibus corporis sensui. Illud sane quod dictum est: Et nunc non deficient ex illis omnia, quae conati fuerint facere, non dictum est confirmando, sed tamquam interrogando, sicut solet a comminantibus dici, quem ad modum ait quidam: Non arma expedient totaque ex urbe sequentur? Sic ergo accipiendum est, tamquam dixerit: "Nonne omnia deficient ex illis, quae conati fuerint facere?" Sed si ita dicatur, non exprimit comminantem. Verum propter tardiusculos addidimus particulam, id est "ne", ut diceremus "nonne", quoniam vocem pronuntiantis non possumus scribere. Ex illis igitur tribus hominibus, Noe filiis, septuaginta tres, vel potius, ut ratio declaratura est, septuaginta duae gentes totidemque linguae per terras esse coeperunt, quae crescendo et insulas impleuerunt. Auctus est autem numerus gentium multo amplius quam linguarum. Nam et in Africa barbaras gentes in una lingua plurimas novimus. ||We might have supposed that the words uttered at the creation of man, "Let us," and not Let me, "make man," were addressed to the angels, had He not added "in our image;" but as we cannot believe that man was made in the image of angels, or that the image of God is the same as that of angels, it is proper to refer this expression to the plurality of the Trinity. And yet this Trinity, being one God, even after saying "Let us make," goes on to say, "And God made man in His image," Genesis 1:26 and not "Gods made," or "in their image." And were there any difficulty in applying to the angels the words, "Come, and let us go down and confound their speech," we might refer the plural to the Trinity, as if the Father were addressing the Son and the Holy Spirit; but it rather belongs to the angels to approach God by holy movements, that is, by pious thoughts, and thereby to avail themselves of the unchangeable truth which rules in the court of heaven as their eternal law. For they are not themselves the truth; but partaking in the creative truth, they are moved towards it as the fountain of life, that what they have not in themselves they may obtain in it. And this movement of theirs is steady, for they never go back from what they have reached. And to these angels God does not speak, as we speak to one another, or to God, or to angels, or as the angels speak to us, or as God speaks to us through them: He speaks to them in an ineffable manner of His own, and that which He says is conveyed to us in a manner suited to our capacity. For the speaking of God antecedent and superior to all His works, is the immutable reason of His work: it has no noisy and passing sound, but an energy eternally abiding and producing results in time. Thus He speaks to the holy angels; but to us, who are far off, He speaks otherwise. When, however, we hear with the inner ear some part of the speech of God, we approximate to the angels. But in this work I need not labor to give an account of the ways in which God speaks. For either the unchangeable Truth speaks directly to the mind of the rational creature in some indescribable way, or speaks through the changeable creature, either presenting spiritual images to our spirit, or bodily voices to our bodily sense.The words, "Nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do," Genesis 11:6 are assuredly not meant as an affirmation, but as an interrogation, such as is used by persons threatening, as e.g., when Dido exclaims,They will not take arms and pursue?We are to understand the words as if it had been said, Shall nothing be restrained from them which they have imagined to do? From these three men, therefore, the three sons of Noah we mean, 73, or rather, as the catalogue will show, 72 nations and as many languages were dispersed over the earth, and as they increased filled even the islands. But the nations multiplied much more than the languages. For even in Africa we know several barbarous nations which have but one language; and who can doubt that, as the human race increased, men contrived to pass to the islands in ships?
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| − | ||<div id="c7"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [VII] Et homines quidem multiplicatio genere humano ad insulas inhabitandas navigio transire potuisse, quis ambigat? Sed quaestio est de omni genere bestiarum, quae sub cura hominum non sunt neque sicuti ranae nascuntur ex terra, sed sola commixtione maris et feminae propagantur, sicut lupi atque huius modi cetera, quo modo post diluuium, quo ea, quae in arca non erant, cuncta deleta sunt, etiam in insulis esse potuerint, si reparata non sunt nisi ex his, quorum genera in utroque sexu arca servavit. Possunt quidem credi ad insulas natando transisse, sed proximas. Sunt autem quaedam tam longe positae a continentibus terris, ut ad eas nulla videatur natare potuisse bestiarum. Quod si homines eas captas secum advexerunt et eo modo ubi habitabant earum genera instituerunt venandi studio, fieri potuisse incredibile non est; quamuis iussu Dei sive permissu etiam opere angelorum negandum non sit potuisse transferri. Si vero terra exortae sunt secundum originem primam, quando dixit Deus: Producat terra animam vivam, multo clarius apparet non tam reparandorum animalium causa quam figurandarum variarum gentium propter ecclesiae sacramentum in arca fuisse omnia genera, si in insulis, quo transire non possent, multa animalia terra produxit. ||There is a question raised about all those kinds of beasts which are not domesticated, nor are produced like frogs from the earth, but are propagated by male and female parents, such as wolves and animals of that kind; and it is asked how they could be found in the islands after the deluge, in which all the animals not in the ark perished, unless the breed was restored from those which were preserved in pairs in the ark. It might, indeed, be said that they crossed to the islands by swimming, but this could only be true of those very near the mainland; whereas there are some so distant, that we fancy no animal could swim to them. But if men caught them and took them across with themselves, and thus propagated these breeds in their new abodes, this would not imply an incredible fondness for the chase. At the same time, it cannot be denied that by the intervention of angels they might be transferred by God's order or permission. If, however, they were produced out of the earth as at their first creation, when God said, "Let the earth bring forth the living creature," Genesis 1:24 this makes it more evident that all kinds of animals were preserved in the ark, not so much for the sake of renewing the stock, as of prefiguring the various nations which were to be saved in the church; this, I say, is more evident, if the earth brought forth many animals in islands to which they could not cross over.
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| − | ||<div id="c8"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [VIII] Quaeritur etiam, utrum ex filiis Noe vel potius ex illo uno homine, unde etiam ipsi extiterunt, propagata esse credendum sit quaedam monstrosa hominum genera, quae gentium narrat historia, sicut perhibentur quidam unum habere oculum in fronte media, quibusdam plantas versas esse post crura, quibusdam utriusque sexus esse naturam et dextram mammam virilem, sinistram muliebrem, vicibusque inter se coeundo et gignere et parere; aliis ora non esse eosque per nares tantummodo halitu vivere, alios statura esse cubitales, quos Pygmaeos a cubito Graeci vocant, alibi quinquennes concipere feminas et octauum vitae annum non excedere. Item ferunt esse gentem, ubi singula crura in pedibus habent nec poplitem flectunt, et sunt mirabilis celeritatis; qu os Sciopodas vocant, quod per aestum in terra iacentes resupini umbra se pedum protegant; quosdam sine ceruice oculos habentes in umeris, et cetera hominum vel quasi hominum genera, quae in maritima platea Carthaginis musivo picta sunt, ex libris deprompta velut curiosioris historiae. Quid dicam de Cynocephalis, quorum canina capita atque ipse latratus magis bestias quam homines confitetur? Sed omnia genera hominum, quae dicuntur esse, credere non est necesse. Verum quisquis uspiam nascitur homo, id est animal rationale mortale, quamlibet nostris inusitatam sensibus gerat corporis formam seu colorem sive motum sive sonum sive qualibet vi, qualibet parte, qualibet qualitate naturam: ex illo uno protoplasto originem ducere nullus fidelium dubitaverit. Apparet tamen quid in pluribus natura obtinverit et quid sit ipsa raritate mirabile. Qualis autem ratio redditur de monstrosis apud nos hominum partubus, talis de monstrosis quibusdam gentibus reddi potest. Deus enim creator est omnium, qui ubi et quando creari quid oporteat vel oportuerit, ipse novit, sciens universitatis pulchritudinem quarum partium vel similitudine vel diversitate contexat. Sed qui totum inspicere non potest, tamquam deformitate partis offenditur, quoniam cui congruat et quo referatur ignorat. Pluribus quam quinis digitis in manibus et pedibus nasci homines novimus; et haec levior est quam ulla distantia; sed tamen absit, ut quis ita desipiat, ut existimet in numero humanorum digitorum errasse Creatorem, quamuis nesciens cur hoc fecerit. Ita etsi maior diversitas oriatur, scit ille quid egerit, cuius opera iuste nemo reprehendit. Apud Hipponem Zaritum est homo quasi lunatas habens plantas et in eis binos tantummodo digitos, similes et manus. Si aliqua gens talis esset, illi curiosae atque mirabili adderetur historiae. Num igitur istum propter hoc negabimus ex illo uno, qui primus creatus est, esse propagatum? Androgyni, quos etiam Hermaphroditos nuncupant, quamuis ad modum rari sint, difficile est tamen ut temporibus desint, in quibus sic uterque sexus apparet, ut, ex quo potius debeant accipere nomen, incertum sit; a meliore tamen, hoc est a masculino, ut appellarentur, loquendi consuetudo praeualuit. Nam nemo umquam Androgynaecas aut Hermaphroditas nuncupavit. Ante annos aliquot, nostra certe memoria, in Oriente duplex homo natus est superioribus membris, inferioribus simplex. Nam duo erant capita, duo pectora, quattuor manus, venter autem unus, et pedes duo, sicut uni homini; et tamdiu vixit, ut multos ad eum videndum fama contraheret. Quis autem omnes commemorare possit humanos fetus longe dissimiles his, ex quibus eos natos esse certissimum est? Sicut ergo haec ex illo uno negari non possunt originem ducere, ita quaecumque gentes in diversitatibus corporum ab usitato naturae cursu, quem plures et prope omnes tenent, velut exorbitasse traduntur, si definitione illa includuntur, ut rationalia animalia sint atque mortalia, ab eodem ipso uno primo patre omnium stirpem trahere confitendum est, si tamen vera sunt quae de illarum nationum varietate et tanta inter se atque nobiscum diversitate traduntur. Nam et simias et cercopithecos et sphingas si nesciremus non homines esse, sed bestias, possent illi historici de sua curiositate gloriantes velut gentes aliquas hominum nobis inpunita uanitate mentiri. Sed si homines sunt, de quibus illa mira conscripta sunt: quid, si propterea Deus voluit etiam nonnullas gentes ita creare, ne in his monstris, quae apud nos oportet ex hominibus nasci, eius sapientiam, qua naturam fingit humanam, velut artem cuiuspiam minus perfecti opificis, putaremus errasse? Non itaque nobis videri debet absurdum, ut, quem ad modum in singulis qu ibus que gentibus quaedam monstra sunt hominum, ita in universo genere humano quaedam monstra sint gentium. Quapropter ut istam quaestionem pedetemtim cauteque concludam: aut illa, quae talia de quibusdam gentibus scripta sunt, omnino nulla sunt; aut si sunt, homines non sunt; aut ex Adam sunt, si homines sunt. ||It is also asked whether we are to believe that certain monstrous races of men, spoken of in secular history, have sprung from Noah's sons, or rather, I should say, from that one man from whom they themselves were descended. For it is reported that some have one eye in the middle of the forehead; some, feet turned backwards from the heel; some, a double sex, the right breast like a man, the left like a woman, and that they alternately beget and bring forth: others are said to have no mouth, and to breathe only through the nostrils; others are but a cubit high, and are therefore called by the Greeks "Pigmies:" they say that in some places the women conceive in their fifth year, and do not live beyond their eighth. So, too, they tell of a race who have two feet but only one leg, and are of marvellous swiftness, though they do not bend the knee: they are called Skiopodes, because in the hot weather they lie down on their backs and shade themselves with their feet. Others are said to have no head, and their eyes in their shoulders; and other human or quasi-human races are depicted in mosaic in the harbor esplanade of Carthage, on the faith of histories of rarities. What shall I say of the Cynocephali, whose dog-like head and barking proclaim them beasts rather than men? But we are not bound to believe all we hear of these monstrosities. But whoever is anywhere born a man, that is, a rational, mortal animal, no matter what unusual appearance he presents in color, movement, sound, nor how peculiar he is in some power, part, or quality of his nature, no Christian can doubt that he springs from that one protoplast. We can distinguish the common human nature from that which is peculiar, and therefore wonderful.The same account which is given of monstrous births in individual cases can be given of monstrous races. For God, the Creator of all, knows where and when each thing ought to be, or to have been created, because He sees the similarities and diversities which can contribute to the beauty of the whole. But He who cannot see the whole is offended by the deformity of the part, because he is blind to that which balances it, and to which it belongs. We know that men are born with more than four fingers on their hands or toes on their feet: this is a smaller matter; but far from us be the folly of supposing that the Creator mistook the number of a man's fingers, though we cannot account for the difference. And so in cases where the divergence from the rule is greater. He whose works no man justly finds fault with, knows what He has done. At Hippo-Diarrhytus there is a man whose hands are crescent-shaped, and have only two fingers each, and his feet similarly formed. If there were a race like him, it would be added to the history of the curious and wonderful. Shall we therefore deny that this man is descended from that one man who was first created? As for the Androgyni, or Hermaphrodites, as they are called, though they are rare, yet from time to time there appears persons of sex so doubtful, that it remains uncertain from which sex they take their name; though it is customary to give them a masculine name, as the more worthy. For no one ever called them Hermaphroditesses. Some years ago, quite within my own memory, a man was born in the East, double in his upper, but single in his lower half-having two heads, two chests, four hands, but one body and two feet like an ordinary man; and he lived so long that many had an opportunity of seeing him. But who could enumerate all the human births that have differed widely from their ascertained parents? As, therefore, no one will deny that these are all descended from that one man, so all the races which are reported to have diverged in bodily appearance from the usual course which nature generally or almost universally preserves, if they are embraced in that definition of man as rational and mortal animals, unquestionably trace their pedigree to that one first father of all. We are supposing these stories about various races who differ from one another and from us to be true; but possibly they are not: for if we were not aware that apes, and monkeys, and sphinxes are not men, but beasts, those historians would possibly describe them as races of men, and flaunt with impunity their false and vainglorious discoveries. But supposing they are men of whom these marvels are recorded, what if God has seen fit to create some races in this way, that we might not suppose that the monstrous births which appear among ourselves are the failures of that wisdom whereby He fashions the human nature, as we speak of the failure of a less perfect workman? Accordingly, it ought not to seem absurd to us, that as in individual races there are monstrous births, so in the whole race there are monstrous races. Wherefore, to conclude this question cautiously and guardedly, either these things which have been told of some races have no existence at all; or if they do exist, they are not human races; or if they are human, they are descended from Adam.
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| − | ||<div id="c9"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [IX] Quod vero et antipodas esse fabulantur, id est homines a contraria parte terrae, ubi sol oritur, quando occidit nobis, adversa pedibus nostris calcare uestigia: nulla ratione credendum est. Neque hoc ulla historica cognitione didicisse se adfirmant, sed quasi ratiocinando coniectant, eo quod intra convexa caeli terra suspensa sit, eundemque locum mundus habeat et infimum et medium; et ex hoc opinantur alteram terrae partem, quae infra est, habitatione hominum care re non posse. Nec adtendunt, etiamsi figura conglobata et rutunda mundus esse credatur sive aliqua ratione monstretur, non tamen esse consequens, ut etiam ex illa parte ab aquarum congerie nuda sit terra; deinde etiamsi nuda sit, neque hoc statim necesse esse, ut homines habeat. Quoniam nullo modo scriptura ista mentitur, quae narratis praeteritis facit fidem eo, quod eius praedicta conplentur, nimisque absurdum est, ut dicatur aliquos homines ex hac in illam partem, Oceani inmensitate traiecta, navigare ac pervenire potuisse, ut etiam illic ex uno illo primo homine genus institueretur humanum. Quapropter inter illos tunc hominum populos, qui per septuaginta duas gentes et totidem linguas colliguntur fuisse divisi, quaeramus, si possumus invenire, illam in terris peregrinantem civitatem Dei, quae usque ad diluuium arcamque perducta est atque in filiis Noe per eorum benedictiones perseuerasse monstratur, maxime in maximo, qui est appellatus Sem, quando quidem Iapheth ita benedictus est, ut in eius, fratris sui, domibus habitaret. ||But as to the fable that there are Antipodes, that is to say, men on the opposite side of the earth, where the sun rises when it sets to us, men who walk with their feet opposite ours, that is on no ground credible. And, indeed, it is not affirmed that this has been learned by historical knowledge, but by scientific conjecture, on the ground that the earth is suspended within the concavity of the sky, and that it has as much room on the one side of it as on the other: hence they say that the part which is beneath must also be inhabited. But they do not remark that, although it be supposed or scientifically demonstrated that the world is of a round and spherical form, yet it does not follow that the other side of the earth is bare of water; nor even, though it be bare, does it immediately follow that it is peopled. For Scripture, which proves the truth of its historical statements by the accomplishment of its prophecies, gives no false information; and it is too absurd to say, that some men might have taken ship and traversed the whole wide ocean, and crossed from this side of the world to the other, and that thus even the inhabitants of that distant region are descended from that one first man. Wherefore let us seek if we can find the city of God that sojourns on earth among those human races who are catalogued as having been divided into seventy-two nations and as many languages. For it continued down to the deluge and the ark, and is proved to have existed still among the sons of Noah by their blessings, and chiefly in the eldest son Shem; for Japheth received this blessing, that he should dwell in the tents of Shem.
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| − | ||<div id="c10"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [X] Tenenda est igitur series generationum ab ipso Sem, ut ipsa ostendat post diluuium civitatem Dei, sicut eam series generationum ab illo, qui est appellatus Seth, ostendebat ante diluuium. Propter hoc ergo scriptura divina cum terrenam civitatem in Babylone, hoc est in confusione, monstrasset, ad patriarcham Sem recapitulando reuertitur et orditur inde generationes usque ad Abraham, commemorato etiam numero annorum, quanto quisque ad hanc seriem pertinentem filium genuisset quantoque vixisset. Vbi certe agnoscendum est, quod ante promiseram, ut appareat quare sit dictum de filiis Heber: Nomen unius Phalech, quia in diebus eius divisa est terra. Quid enim aliud intellegendum est terram esse divisam nisi divergitate linguarum? Omissis igitur ceteris filiis Sem ad hanc rem non pertinentibus illi conectuntur in ordine generationum, per quos possit ad Abraham perveniri; sicut illi conectebantur ante diluuium, per quos perveniretur ad Noe generationibus, quae propagatae sunt ex illo Adam filio, qui est appellatus Seth. Sic ergo incipit generationum ista contextio: Et hae generationes Sem. Sem filius centum annorum, cum genuit Arphaxat, secundo anno post diluuium. Et vixit Sem, postquam genuit Arphaxat, quingentos annos et genuit filios et filias et mortuus est. Sic exsequitur ceteros dicens, quoto quisque anno vitae suae filium genuerit ad istum generationum ordinem pertinentem, qui pertendit ad Abrabam, et quot annos postmodum vixerit, intimans eum filios filiasque genuisse; ut intellegamus unde potuerint populi adcrescere, ne in paucis qui commemorantur hominibus occupati pueriliter haesitemus, unde tanta spatia terrarum atque regnorum repleri potuerint de genere Sem, maxime propter Assyriorum regnum, unde Ninus ille Orientalium domitor usquequaque populorum ingenti prosperitate regnavit et latissimum ac fundatissimum regnum, quod diuturno tempore duceretur, suis posteris propagavit. Sed nos, ne diutius quam opus est inmoremur, non quot annos quisque in ista generationum serie vixerit, sed quoto anno vitae suae genuerit filium, hoc ordine memorandum tantummodo ponimus, ut et numerum annorum a transacto diluuio usque ad Abrabam colligamus et praeter illa, in quibus nos cogit necessitas inmorari, breviter alia cursimque tangamus. Secundo igitur anno post diluuium Sem genuit Arphaxat; Arphaxat autem, cum esset centum triginta quinque <annorum>, genuit Cainan; qui cum esset centum triginta, genuit Sala; porro etiam ipse Sala totidem annorum erat, quando genuit Heber; centum vero et triginta et quattuor agebat annos Heber, cum genuit Phalech, in cuius diebus divisa est terra; ipse autem Phalech vixit centum triginta, et genuit Ragau; et Ragau centum triginta duo, et genuit Seruch; et Seruch centum triginta, et genuit Nachor; et Nachor septuaginta novem, et genuit Thara; Thara autem septuaginta, et genuit Abram; quem postea Deus mutato vocabulo nominavit Abraham. Fiunt itaque anni a diluuio usque ad Abraham mille septuaginta et duo secundum uulgatam editionem, hoc est interpretum septuaginta. In Hebraeis autem codicibus longe pauciores annos perhibent inveniri, de quibus rationem aut nullam aut difficillimam reddunt. Cum ergo quaerimus in illis septuaginta duabus gentibus civitatem Dei, non possumus adfirmare illo tempore, quo erat eis labium unum, id est loquella una, tunc iam genus humanum alienatum fuisse a cultu veri Dei, ita ut in solis istis generationibus pietas vera remaneret, quae descendunt de semine Sem per Arphaxat et tendunt ad Abraham; sed ab illa superbia aedificandae turris usque in caelum, qua impia significatur elatio, apparuit civitas, hoc est societas, impiorum. Vtrum itaque ante non fuerit an latuerit, an potius utraque permanserit, pia scilicet in duobus filiis Noe, qui benedicti sunt, eorumque posteris; impia vero in eo, qui maledictus est, atque eius progenie, ubi etiam exortus est gigans venator contra Dominum, non est diiudicatio facilis. Fortassis enim, quod profecto est credibilius, et in filiis duorum illorum iam tunc, antequam Babylonia coepisset institui, fuerunt contemptores Dei, et in filiis Cham cultores Dei; utrumque tamen hominum genus terris numquam defuisse credendum est. Si quidem et quando dictum est: Omnes declinaverunt, simul inutiles facti sunt; non est qui faciat bonum, non est usque ad unum, in utroque psalmo, ubi haec verba sunt, et hoc legitur: Nonne cognoscent omnes, qui operantur iniquitatem, qui deuorant populum meum in cibo panis? Erat ergo etiam tunc populus Dei. Vnde illud, quod dictum est: Non est qui faciat bonum, non est usque ad unum, de filiis hominum dictum est, non de filiis Dei. Nam praemissum est: Deus de caelo prospexit super filios hominum, ut videret si est intellegens aut requirens Deum, ac deinde illa subiuncta, quae omnes filios hominum, id est, ad civitatem pertinentes, quae vivit secundum hominem, non secundum Deum, reprobos esse demonstrant. ||It is necessary, therefore, to preserve the series of generations descending from Shem, for the sake of exhibiting the city of God after the flood; as before the flood it was exhibited in the series of generations descending from Seth. And therefore does divine Scripture, after exhibiting the earthly city as Babylon or "Confusion," revert to the patriarch Shem, and recapitulate the generations from him to Abraham, specifying besides, the year in which each father begat the son that belonged to this line, and how long he lived. And unquestionably it is this which fulfills the promise I made, that it should appear why it is said of the sons of Heber, "The name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided." Genesis 10:25 For what can we understand by the division of the earth, if not the diversity of languages? And, therefore, omitting the other sons of Shem, who are not concerned in this matter, Scripture gives the genealogy of those by whom the line runs on to Abraham, as before the flood those are given who carried on the line to Noah from Seth. Accordingly this series of generations begins thus: "These are the generations of Shem: Shem was an hundred years old, and begat Arphaxad two years after the flood. And Shem lived after he begat Arphaxad five hundred years, and begat sons and daughters." In like manner it registers the rest, naming the year of his life in which each begat the son who belonged to that line which extends to Abraham. It specifies, too, how many years he lived thereafter, begetting sons and daughters, that we may not childishly suppose that the men named were the only men, but may understand how the population increased, and how regions and kingdoms so vast could be populated by the descendants of Shem; especially the kingdom of Assyria, from which Ninus subdued the surrounding nations, reigning with brilliant prosperity, and bequeathing to his descendants a vast but thoroughly consolidated empire, which held together for many centuries.But to avoid needless prolixity, we shall mention not the number of years each member of this series lived, but only the year of his life in which he begat his heir, that we may thus reckon the number of years from the flood to Abraham, and may at the same time leave room to touch briefly and cursorily upon some other matters necessary to our argument. In the second year, then, after the flood, Shem when he was a hundred years old begat Arphaxad; Arphaxad when he was 135 years old begat Cainan; Cainan when he was 130 years begat Salah. Salah himself, too, was the same age when he begat Eber. Eber lived 134 years, and begat Peleg, in whose days the earth was divided. Peleg himself lived 130 years, and begat Reu; and Reu lived 132 years, and begat Serug; Serug 130, and begat Nahor; and Nahor 79, and begat Terah; and Terah 70, and begat Abram, whose name God afterwards changed into Abraham. There are thus from the flood to Abraham 1072 years, according to the Vulgate or Septuagint versions. In the Hebrew copies far fewer years are given; and for this either no reason or a not very credible one is given.When, therefore, we look for the city of God in these seventy-two nations, we cannot affirm that while they had but one lip, that is, one language, the human race had departed from the worship of the true God, and that genuine godliness had survived only in those generations which descend from Shem through Arphaxad and reach to Abraham; but from the time when they proudly built a tower to heaven, a symbol of godless exaltation, the city or society of the wicked becomes apparent. Whether it was only disguised before, or non-existent; whether both cities remained after the flood,-the godly in the two sons of Noah who were blessed, and in their posterity, and the ungodly in the cursed son and his descendants, from whom sprang that mighty hunter against the Lord,-is not easily determined. For possibly-and certainly this is more credible-there were despisers of God among the descendants of the two sons, even before Babylon was founded, and worshippers of God among the descendants of Ham. Certainly neither race was ever obliterated from earth. For in both the Psalms in which it is said, "They are all gone aside, they are altogether become filthy; there is none that does good, no, not one," we read further, "Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge? who eat up my people as they eat bread, and call not upon the Lord." There was then a people of God even at that time. And therefore the words, "There is none that does good, no, not one," were said of the sons of men, not of the sons of God. For it had been previously said, "God looked down from heaven upon the sons of men, to see if any understood and sought after God;" and then follow the words which demonstrate that all the sons of men, that is, all who belong to the city which lives according to man, not according to God, are reprobate.
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| − | ||<div id="c11"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XI] Quam ob rem sicut lingua una cum esset omnium, non ideo filii pestilentiae defuerunt (nam et ante diluuium una erat lingua, et tamen omnes praeter unam Noe iusti domum deleri diluuio meruerunt): ita, quando merito elatioris impietatis gentes linguarum diversitate punitae atque divisae sunt et civitas impiorum confusionis nomen accepit, hoc est, appellata est Babylon, non defuit domus Heber, ubi ea quae antea fuit omnium lingua remaneret. Vnde, sicut supra memoravi, cum coepissent enumerari filii Sem, qui singuli gentes singulas procrearunt, primus est commendatus Heber, cum sit abnepos ipsius, hoc est ab illo quintus inveniatur exortus. Quia ergo in eius familia remansit haec lingua, divisis per alias linguas ceteris gentibus, quae lingua prius humano generi non inmerito creditur fuisse communis, ideo deinceps Hebraea est nuncupata. Tunc enim opus erat eam distingui ab aliis linguis nomine proprio, sicut aliae quoque vocatae sunt nominibus propriis. Quando autem erat una, nihil aliud quam humana lingua vel humana locutio vocabatur, qua sola universum genus humanum loquebatur. Dixerit aliquis: Si in diebus Phalech filii Heber divisa est terra per linguas, id est homines, qui tunc erant in terra, ex eius nomine potius debuit appellari lingua illa, quae fuit omnibus ante communis. Sed intellegendum est ipsum Heber propterea tale nomen inposuisse filio suo, ut vocaretur Phalech, quod interpretatur divisio, quia tunc ei natus est, quando per linguas terra divisa est, id est ipso tempore, ut hoc sit quod dictum est: In diebus eius divisa est terra. Nam nisi adhuc Heber viveret quando linguarum facta est multitudo, non ex eius nomine nomen acciperet lingua, quae apud illum potuit permanere. Et ideo credenda est ipsa fuisse prima illa communis, quoniam de poena venit illa multiplicatio mutatioque linguarum et utique praeter hanc poenam esse debuit populus Dei. Nec frustra lingua haec est, quam tenuit Abraham, nec in omnes suos filios transmittere potuit, sed in eos tantum, qui propagati per Iacob et insignius atque eminentius in Dei populum coalescentes Dei testamenta et stirpem Christi habere potuerunt. Nec Heber ipse eandem linguam in universam progeniem suam refudit, sed in eam tantum, cuius generationes perducantur ad Abrabam. Quapropter etiamsi non evidenter expressum est fuisse aliquod pium genus hominum, quando ab impiis Babylonia condebatur, non ad hoc valuit haec obscuritas, ut quaerentis fraudaretur, sed potius ut exerceretur intentio. Cum enim legitur unam fuisse linguam primitus omnium et ante omnes filios Sem commendatur Heber, quamuis ex illo quintus oriatur, et Hebraea vocatur lingua, quam patriarcharum et prophetarum non solum in sermonibus suis, verum etiam in litteris sacris custodivit auctoritas: profecto, cum quaeritur in divisione linguarum, ubi lingua illa remanere potuerit, quae fuit ante communis (quae sine ulla dubitatione ubi remansit, non ibi fuit illa poena, quae facta est mutatione linguarum), quid aliud occurrit, nisi quod in huius gente remanserit, a cuius nomine nomen accepit, et hoc iustitiae gentis huius non paruum apparuisse uestigium, quod, cum aliae gentes plecterentur mutatione linguarum, ad istam non pervenit tale supplicium? Sed adhuc illud movet, quo modo potuerunt singulas gentes facere Heber et filius eius Phalech, si una lingua permansit ambobus. Et certe una est Hebraea gens ex Heber propagata usque ad Abraham, et per eum deinceps, donec magnus fieret populus Israel. Quo modo igitur omnes filii, qui commemorati sunt trium filiorum Noe, fecerunt singulas gentes, si Heber et Phalech singulas non fecerunt? Nimirum illud est probabilius, quod gigans ille Nebroth fecerit etiam ipse gentem suam, sed propter excellentiam dominationis et corporis seorsum eminentius nominatus est, ut maneat numerus septuaginta duarum gentium atque linguarum. Phalech autem propterea commemoratus est, non quod gentem fecerit (nam eadem ipsa est eius gens Hebraea eademque lingua), sed propter tempus insigne, quod in diebus eius terra divisa sit. Nec movere nos debet, quo modo potuerit gigans Nebroth ad illud aetatis occurrere, quo Babylon condita est et confusio facta linguarum atque ex hoc divisio gentium. Non enim quia Heber sextus est a Noe, ille autem quartus, ideo non potuerunt ad idem tempus convenire vivendo. Hoc enim contigit, cum plus viverent ubi pauciores sunt generationes, minus ubi plures; aut serius nati essent ubi pauciores, maturius ubi plures. Sane intellegendum est, quando terra divisa est, non solum iam natos ceteros filios filiorum Noe, qui commemorantur patres gentium, sed etiam eius aetatis fuisse, ut numerosas familias haberent, quae dignae fuissent nominibus gentium. Vnde nequaquam putandum, quod eo fuerint ordine geniti, quo commemorati leguntur. Alioquin duodecim filii Iectan, qui erat alius filius Heber, frater Phalech, quo modo potuerunt iam gentes facere, si post Phalech fratrem suum Iectan natus est, sicut post eum commemoratus est; quando quidem tempore, quo natus est Phalech, divisa est terra. Proinde intellegendum est priorem quidem nominatum, sed longe post fratrem suum Iectan fuisse natum, cuius Iectan duodecim filii tam grandes iam familias haberent, ut in linguas proprias dividi possent. Sic enim potuit prior commemorari, qui erat aetate posterior, quem ad modum prius commemorati sunt ex tribus filiis Noe procreati filii Iapheth, qui erat minimus eorum; deinde filii Cham, qui erat medius; postremo filii Sem, qui erat primus et maximus. Illarum autem gentium vocabula partim manserunt, ita ut hodieque appareat unde fuerint derivata, sicut ex Assur Assyrii <et> ex Heber Hebraei; partim temporis uetustate mutata sunt, ita ut vix homines doctissimi antiquissimas historias perscrutantes, nec omnium, sed aliquarum ex istis origines gentium potuerint reperire. Nam quod ex filio Cham, qui vocabatur Mesraim, Aegyptii perhibentur exorti, nulla hic resonat origo vocabuli; sicut nec Aethiopum, qui dicuntur ad eum filium Cham pertinere, qui Chus appellatus est. Et si omnia considerentur, plura mutata quam manentia nomina apparent. ||Wherefore, as the fact of all using one language did not secure the absence of sin-infected men from the race,-for even before the deluge there was one language, and yet all but the single family of just Noah were found worthy of destruction by the flood,-so when the nations, by a prouder godlessness, earned the punishment of the dispersion and the confusion of tongues, and the city of the godless was called Confusion or Babylon, there was still the house of Heber in which the primitive language of the race survived. And therefore, as I have already mentioned, when an enumeration is made of the sons of Shem, who each founded a nation, Heber is first mentioned, although he was of the fifth generation from Shem. And because, when the other races were divided by their own peculiar languages, his family preserved that language which is not unreasonably believed to have been the common language of the race, it was on this account thenceforth named Hebrew. For it then became necessary to distinguish this language from the rest by a proper name; though, while there was only one, it had no other name than the language of man, or human speech, it alone being spoken by the whole human race. Some one will say: If the earth was divided by languages in the days of Peleg, Heber's son, that language, which was formerly common to all, should rather have been called after Peleg. But we are to understand that Heber himself gave to his son this name Peleg, which means Division; because he was born when the earth was divided, that is, at the very time of the division, and that this is the meaning of the words, "In his days the earth was divided." Genesis 10:25 For unless Heber had been still alive when the languages were multiplied, the language which was preserved in his house would not have been called after him. We are induced to believe that this was the primitive and common language, because the multiplication and change of languages was introduced as a punishment, and it is fit to ascribe to the people of God an immunity from this punishment. Nor is it without significance that this is the language which Abraham retained, and that he could not transmit it to all his descendants, but only to those of Jacob's line, who distinctively and eminently constituted God's people, and received His covenants, and were Christ's progenitors according to the flesh. In the same way, Heber himself did not transmit that language to all his posterity, but only to the line from which Abraham sprang. And thus, although it is not expressly stated, that when the wicked were building Babylon there was a godly seed remaining, this indistinctness is intended to stimulate research rather than to elude it. For when we see that originally there was one common language, and that Heber is mentioned before all Shem's sons, though he belonged to the fifth generation from him, and that the language which the patriarchs and prophets used, not only in their conversation, but in the authoritative language of Scripture, is called Hebrew, when we are asked where that primitive and common language was preserved after the confusion of tongues, certainly, as there can be no doubt that those among whom it was preserved were exempt from the punishment it embodied, what other suggestion can we make, than that it survived in the family of him whose name it took, and that this is no small proof of the righteousness of this family, that the punishment with which the other families were visited did not fall upon it?But yet another question is mooted: How did Heber and his son Peleg each found a nation, if they had but one language? For no doubt the Hebrew nation propagated from Heber through Abraham, and becoming through him a great people, is one nation. How, then, are all the sons of the three branches of Noah's family enumerated as founding a nation each, if Heber and Peleg did not so? It is very probable that the giant Nimrod founded also his nation, and that Scripture has named him separately on account of the extraordinary dimensions of his empire and of his body, so that the number of seventy-two nations remains. But Peleg was mentioned, not because he founded a nation (for his race and language are Hebrew), but on account of the critical time at which he was born, all the earth being then divided. Nor ought we to be surprised that the giant Nimrod lived to the time in which Babylon was founded and the confusion of tongues occurred, and the consequent division of the earth. For though Heber was in the sixth generation from Noah, and Nimrod in the fourth, it does not follow that they could not be alive at the same time. For when the generations are few, they live longer and are born later; but when they are many, they live a shorter time, and come into the world earlier. We are to understand that, when the earth was divided, the descendants of Noah who are registered as founders of nations were not only already born, but were of an age to have immense families, worthy to be called tribes or nations. And therefore we must by no means suppose that they were born in the order in which they were set down; otherwise, how could the twelve sons of Joktan, another son of Heber's, and brother of Peleg, have already founded nations, if Joktan was born, as he is registered, after his brother Peleg, since the earth was divided at Peleg's birth? We are therefore to understand that, though Peleg is named first, he was born long after Joktan, whose twelve sons had already families so large as to admit of their being divided by different languages. There is nothing extraordinary in the last born being first named: of the sons of Noah, the descendants of Japheth are first named; then the sons of Ham, who was the second son; and last the sons of Shem, who was the first and oldest. Of these nations the names have partly survived, so that at this day we can see from whom they have sprung, as the Assyrians from Assur, the Hebrews from Heber, but partly have been altered in the lapse of time, so that the most learned men, by profound research in ancient records, have scarcely been able to discover the origin, I do not say of all, but of some of these nations. There is, for example, nothing in the name Egyptians to show that they are descended from Misraim, Ham's son, nor in the name Ethiopians to show a connection with Cush, though such is said to be the origin of these nations. And if we take a general survey of the names, we shall find that more have been changed than have remained the same.
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| − | ||<div id="c12"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XII] Nunc iam videamus procursum civitatis Dei etiam ab illo articulo temporis, qui factus est in patre Abraham, unde incipit esse notitia eius evidentior, et ubi clariora leguntur promissa divina, quae nunc in Christo videmus impleri. Sicut ergo scriptura sancta indicante didicimus, in regione Chaldaeorum natus est Abraham, quae terra ad regnum Assyrium pertinebat. Apud Chaldaeos autem iam etiam tunc superstitiones impiae praeualebant, quem ad modum per ceteras gentes. Vna igitur Tharae domus erat, de quo natus est Abraham, in qua unius veri Dei cultus et, quantum credibile est, in qua iam sola etiam Hebraea lingua remanserat (quamuis et ipse, sicut iam manifestior Dei populus in Aegypto, ita in Mesopotamia seruisse diis alienis Iesu Nave narrante referatur) ceteris ex progenie illius Heber in linguas paulatim alias et in nationes alias defluentibus. Proinde sicut per aquarum diluuium una domus Noe remanserat ad reparandum genus humanum, sic in diluuio multarum superstitionum per universum mundum una remanserat domus Tharae, in qua custodita est plantatio civitatis Dei. Denique sicut illic enumeratis supra generationibus usque ad Noe simul cum annorum numeris et exposita diluuii causa, priusquam Deus inciperet de arca fabricanda loqui ad Noe, dicitur: Hae autem generationes Noe: ita et hic enumeratis generationibus ab illo, qui est appellatus Sem, filio Noe, usque ad Abraham, deinde insignis articulus similiter ponitur ut dicatur: Hae sunt generationes Tharae. Thara genuit Abram et Nachor et Arran, et Arran genuit Loth. Et mortuus est Arran coram Thara patre suo in terra in qua natus est, in regione Chaldaeorum. Et sumpsit Abram et Nachor sibi uxores; nomen mulieris Abram Sara et nomen mulieris Nachor Melcha, filia Arran. Iste Arran pater Melchae fuit et pater Iescae, quae Iesca creditur ipsa esse etiam Sarra uxor Abrahae. ||Let us now survey the progress of the city of God from the era of the patriarch Abraham, from whose time it begins to be more conspicuous, and the divine promises which are now fulfilled in Christ are more fully revealed. We learn, then, from the intimations of holy Scripture, that Abraham was born in the country of the Chaldeans, a land belonging to the Assyrian empire. Now, even at that time impious superstitions were rife with the Chaldeans, as with other nations. The family of Terah, to which Abraham belonged, was the only one in which the worship of the true God survived, and the only one, we may suppose, in which the Hebrew language was preserved; although Joshua the son of Nun tells us that even this family served other gods in Mesopotamia. Joshua 24:2 The other descendants of Heber gradually became absorbed in other races and other languages. And thus, as the single family of Noah was preserved through the deluge of water to renew the human race, so, in the deluge of superstition that flooded the whole world, there remained but the one family of Terah in which the seed of God's city was preserved. And as, when Scripture has enumerated the generations prior to Noah, with their ages, and explained the cause of the flood before God began to speak to Noah about the building of the ark, it is said, "These are the generations of Noah;" so also now, after enumerating the generations from Shem, Noah's son, down to Abraham, it then signalizes an era by saying, "These are the generations of Terah: Terah begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran begat Lot. And Haran died before his father Terah in the land of his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees. And Abram and Nahor took them wives: the name of Abram's wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor's wife Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah." Genesis 11:27-29 This Iscah is supposed to be the same as Sarah, Abraham's wife.
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| − | ||<div id="c13"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XIII] Deinde narratur quem ad modum Thara cum suis regionem reliquerit Chaldaeorum et venerit in Mesopotamiam et habitaverit in Charra. Tacetur autem de uno eius filio, qui vocabatur Nachor, tamquam eum non duxerit secum. Nam ita narratur: Et sumpsit Thara Abram filium suum et Loth filium Arran, filium filii sui, et Saram nurum suam, uxorem Abram filii sui, et eduxit illos de regione Chaldaeorum ire in terram Chanaan: et venit in Charran et habitavit ibi. Nusquam hic nominatus est Nachor et uxor eius Melcha. Sed invenimus postea, cum seruum suum mitteret Abraham ad accipiendam uxorem filio suo Isaac, ita scriptum: Et accepit puer decem camelos de camelis domini sui et de omnibus bonis domini sui secum, et exsurgens profectus est in Mesopotamiam in civitatem Nachor. Isto et aliis sacrae huius historiae testimoniis ostenditur etiam Nachor frater Abrahae exisse de regione Chaldaeorum sedesque constituisse in Mesopotamia, ubi cum patre suo habitaverat Abraham. Cur ergo eum scriptura non commemoravit, quando ex gente Chaldaea cum suis profectus est Thara et habitavit in Mesopotamia; ubi non solum Abraham filius eius, verum etiam Sarra nurus et Loth nepos eius commemorantur, quod eos duxerit secum? Cur, putamus, nisi forte quod a paterna et fraterna pietate desciverat et superstitioni adhaeserat Chaldaeorum et postea inde sive paenitendo sive persecutionem passus, quod suspectus haberetur, et ipse emigravit? In libro enim qui inscribitur Iudith, cum quaereret Holofernes, hostis Israelitarum, quaenam illa gens esset, utrum adversus eam bellandum fuisset, sic ei respondit Achior dux Ammanitarum: Audiat dominus noster verbum de ore pueri sui, et referam tibi veritatem de populo, qui habitat iuxta te montanam hanc, et non exibit mendacium de ore serui tui. Haec enim progenies populi est Chaldaeorum, et antea habitaverunt Mesopotamiam, quia noluerunt sequi deos patrum suorum, qui fuerunt in terra Chaldaeorum gloriosi, sed declinaverunt de via parentum suorum et adoraverunt Deum caeli, quem cognoverunt, et proiecerunt eos a facie deorum suorum et fugerunt Mesopotamiam et habitaverunt ibi dies multos. Dixitque illis Deus eorum, ut exirent de habitatione sua et irent in terram Chanaan, et illic habitaverunt, et cetera, quae narrat Achior Ammanites. Vnde manifestum est domum Tharae persecutionem passam fuisse a Chaldaeis pro vera pietate, qua unus et verus ab eis colebatur Deus. ||Next it is related how Terah with his family left the region of the Chaldeans and came into Mesopotamia, and dwelt in Haran. But nothing is said about one of his sons called Nahor, as if he had not taken him along with him. For the narrative runs thus: "And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his son's son, and Sarah his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife, and led them forth out of the region of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan; and he came into Haran, and dwelt there." Genesis 11:31 Nahor and Milcah his wife are nowhere named here. But afterwards, when Abraham sent his servant to take a wife for his son Isaac, we find it thus written: "And the servant took ten camels of the camels of his lord, and of all the goods of his lord, with him; and arose, and went into Mesopotamia, into the city of Nahor." Genesis 24:10 This and other testimonies of this sacred history show that Nahor, Abraham's brother, had also left the region of the Chaldeans, and fixed his abode in Mesopotamia, where Abraham dwelt with his father. Why, then, did the Scripture not mention him, when Terah with his family went forth out of the Chaldean nation and dwelt in Haran, since it mentions that he took with him not only Abraham his son, but also Sarah his daughter-in-law, and Lot his grandson? The only reason we can think of is, that perhaps he had lapsed from the piety of his father and brother, and adhered to the superstition of the Chaldeans, and had afterwards emigrated thence, either through penitence, or because he was persecuted as a suspected person. For in the book called Judith, when Holofernes, the enemy of the Israelites, inquired what kind of nation that might be, and whether war should be made against them, Achior, the leader of the Ammonites, answered him thus: "Let our lord now hear a word from the mouth of your servant, and I will declare unto you the truth concerning the people which dwells near you in this hill country, and there shall no lie come out of the mouth of your servant. For this people is descended from the Chaldeans, and they dwelt heretofore in Mesopotamia, because they would not follow the gods of their fathers, which were glorious in the land of the Chaldeans, but went out of the way of their ancestors, and adored the God of heaven, whom they knew; and they cast them out from the face of their gods, and they fled into Mesopotamia, and dwelt there many days. And their God said to them, that they should depart from their habitation, and go into the land of Canaan; and they dwelt," etc., as Achior the Ammonite narrates. Whence it is manifest that the house of Terah had suffered persecution from the Chaldeans for the true piety with which they worshipped the one and true God.
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| − | ||<div id="c14"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XIV] Defuncto autem Thara in Mesopotamia, ubi vixisse perhibetur ducentos et quinque annos, iam incipiunt indicari ad Abraham factae promissiones Dei, quod ita scriptum est: Et fuerunt dies Tharae in Charra quinque et ducenti anni, et mortuus est Thara in Charra. Non sic autem accipiendum est, quasi omnes hos dies ibi egerit, sed quia omnes dies vitae suae, qui fuerunt anni ducenti quinque, ibi conpleuerit; alioquin nescietur quot annos vixerit Thara, quoniam non legitur quoto anno vitae suae in Charran venerit; et absurdum est existimare in ista serie generationum, ubi diligenter commemoratur quot annos quisque vixerit, huius solius numerum annorum vitae non commendatum esse memoriae. Quod enim quorundam, quos eadem scriptura commemorat, tacentur anni, non sunt in hoc ordine, in quo temporum dinumeratio decessione gignentium et genitorum successione contexitur. Iste autem ordo, qui dirigitur ab Adam usque ad Noe et inde usque ad Abrabam, sine numero annorum vitae suae neminem continet. ||On Terah's death in Mesopotamia, where he is said to have lived 205 years, the promises of God made to Abraham now begin to be pointed out; for thus it is written: "And the days of Terah in Haran were two hundred and five years, and he died in Haran." Genesis 11:32 This is not to be taken as if he had spent all his days there, but that he there completed the days of his life, which were two hundred and five years: otherwise it would not be known how many years Terah lived, since it is not said in what year of his life he came into Haran; and it is absurd to suppose that, in this series of generations, where it is carefully recorded how many years each one lived, his age was the only one not put on record. For although some whom the same Scripture mentions have not their age recorded, they are not in this series, in which the reckoning of time is continuously indicated by the death of the parents and the succession of the children. For this series, which is given in order from Adam to Noah, and from him down to Abraham, contains no one without the number of the years of his life.
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| − | ||<div id="c15"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XV] Quod vero commemorata morte Tharae, patris Abraham, deinde legitur: Et dixit Dominus ad Abram: Exi de terra tua et de cognatione tua et de domo patris tui et cetera, non, quia hoc sequitur in sermone libri, hoc etiam in rerum gestarum tempore sequi existimandum est. Erit quippe, si ita est, insolubilis quaestio. Post haec enim verba Dei, quae ad Abraham facta sunt, scriptura sic loquitur: Et exiit Abram, quem ad modum locutus est ei Dominus, et abiit cum eo Luth. Abram autem erat quinque et septuaginta annorum, cum exiit ex Charra. Quo modo potest hoc esse verum, si post mortem patris sui exiit de Charra? Cum enim esset Thara septuaginta annorum, sicut supra intimatum est, genuit Abraham; cui numero additis septuaginta quinque annis, quos agebat Abraham, quando egressus est de Charra, fiunt anni centum quadraginta quinque. Tot igitur annorum erat Thara, quando exiit Abraham de illa Mesopotamiae civitate; agebat enim annum aetatis suae septuagensimum quintum, ac per hoc pater eius, qui eum septuagensimo anno suo genuerat, agebat, ut dictum est, centensimum quadragensimum et quintum. Non ergo inde post mortem patris, id est post ducentos quinque annos, quibus pater eius vixit, egressus est; sed annus de illo loco profectionis eius, quoniam ipsius septuagensimus quintus erat, procul dubio patris eius, qui eum septuagensimo suo anno genuerat, centensimus quadragensimus quintus fuisse colligitur. Ac per hoc intellegendum est more suo scripturam redisse ad tempus, quod iam narratio illa transierat; sicut superius, cum filios filiorum Noe commemorasset, dixit illos fuisse in linguis et gentibus suis, et tamen postea, quasi hoc etiam in ordine temporum sequeretur: Et erat, inquit, omnis terra labium unum et vox una omnibus. Quo modo ergo secundum suas gentes et secundum suas linguas erant, si una erat omnibus, nisi quia ad illud quod iam transierat recapitulando est reuersa narratio? Sic ergo et hic cum dictum esset: Et fuerunt dies Tharae in Charra quinque et ducenti anni, et mortuus est Thara in Charra, deinde scriptura redeundo ad id, quod ideo praetermiserat, ut prius de Thara id quod incohatum fuerat compleretur: Et dixit, inquit, Dominus ad Abram: Exi de terra tua et cetera. Post quae Dei verba subiungitur: Et exiit Abram, quem ad modum locutus est illi Dominus, et abiit cum eo Loth. Abram autem erat quinque et septuaginta annorum, cum exiit ex Charra. Tunc itaque factum est, quando pater eius centensimum quadragensimum et quintum annum agebat aetatis; tunc enim fuit huius septuagensimus quintus. Soluta est autem ista quaestio et aliter, ut septuaginta quinque anni Abrahae, quando egressus est de Charra, ex illo computarentur, ex quo de igne Chaldaeorum liberatus, non ex quo natus est, tamquam tunc potius natus habendus sit. Sed beatus Stephanus in actibus apostolorum cum ista narraret: Deus, inquit, gloriae apparuit Abrahae patri nostro, cum esset in Mesopotamia, priusquam habitaret in Charra, et ait ad illum: Exi de terra tua et de cognatione tua et de domo patris tui, et veni in terram, quam tibi demonstrabo. Secundum haec verba Stephani non post mortem patris eius locutus est Deus Abrahae, qui utique in Charra mortuus est, ubi cum illo et ipse filius habitavit, sed priusquam habitaret in eadem civitate, iam tamen cum esset in Mesopotamia. Iam ergo exierat a Chaldaeis. Quod itaque adiungit Stephanus: Tunc Abraham egressus est de terra Chaldaeorum et habitavit in Charra, non quid sit factum, postea quam locutus est illi Deus meque enim post illa Dei verba egressus est de terra Chaldaeorum, cum dicat ei locutum Deum cum esset in Mesopotamia>, sed ad totum illud tempus pertinet quod ait: "Tunc, id est ex quo, egressus est a Chaldaeis et habitavit in Charra." Item quod sequitur: Et inde postquam mortuus est pater eius, conlocavit illum in terra hac, in qua vos nunc habitatis et patres uestri, non ait: "Postquam mortuus est pater eius, exiit de Charra"; sed: "Inde hic eum conlocavit, postquam mortuus est pater eius." Intellegendum est igitur locutum Deum fuisse ad Abraham, cum esset in Mesopotamia, priusquam habitaret in Charra; sed eum in Charram pervenisse cum patre, retento apud se praecepto Dei, et inde exisse septuagensimo et quinto suo, patris autem sui centensimo quadragensimo et quinto anno. Conlocationem vero eius in terra Chanaan, non profectionem de Charra post mortem patris eius factam esse dicit, quia iam mortuus erat pater eius, quando emit terram, cuius ibi iam suae rei coepit esse possessor. Quod autem iam in Mesopotamia constituto, hoc est iam egresso de terra Chaldaeorum, dicit Deus: Exi de terra tua et de cognatione tua et de domo patris tui, non ut corpus inde eiceret, quod iam fecerat, sed ut animum avelleret, dicitur. Non enim exierat inde animo, si spe redeundi et desiderio tenebatur, quae spes et desiderium Deo iubente ac ivuante et illo oboediente fuerat amputandum. Non sane incredibiliter existimatur, cum postea secutus esset Nachor patrum suum, tunc Abraham praeceptum Domini implesse, ut cum Sarra coniuge sua et Loth filio fratris sui exiret de Charra. ||When, after the record of the death of Terah, the father of Abraham, we next read, "And the Lord said to Abram, Get you out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father's house," Genesis 12:1 etc., it is not to be supposed, because this follows in the order of the narrative, that it also followed in the chronological order of events. For if it were so, there would be an insoluble difficulty. For after these words of God which were spoken to Abraham, the Scripture says: "And Abram departed, as the Lord had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him. Now Abraham was seventy-five years old when he departed out of Haran." Genesis 12:4 How can this be true if he departed from Haran after his father's death? For when Terah was seventy years old, as is intimated above, he begat Abraham; and if to this number we add the seventy-five years which Abraham reckoned when he went out of Haran, we get 145 years. Therefore that was the number of the years of Terah, when Abraham departed out of that city of Mesopotamia; for he had reached the seventy-fifth year of his life, and thus his father, who begat him in the seventieth year of his life, had reached, as was said, his 145th. Therefore he did not depart thence after his father's death, that is, after the 205 years his father lived; but the year of his departure from that place, seeing it was his seventy-fifth, is inferred beyond a doubt to have been the 145th of his father, who begat him in his seventieth year. And thus it is to be understood that the Scripture, according to its custom, has gone back to the time which had already been passed by the narrative; just as above, when it had mentioned the grandsons of Noah, it said that they were in their nations and tongues; and yet afterwards, as if this also had followed in order of time, it says, "And the whole earth was of one lip, and one speech for all." Genesis 11:1 How, then, could they be said to be in their own nations and according to their own tongues, if there was one for all; except because the narrative goes back to gather up what it had passed over? Here, too, in the same way, after saying, "And the days of Terah in Haran were 205 years, and Terah died in Haran," the Scripture, going back to what had been passed over in order to complete what had been begun about Terah, says, "And the Lord said to Abram, Get you out of your country," Genesis 12:1 etc. After which words of God it is added, "And Abram departed, as the Lord spoke unto him; and Lot went with him. But Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed out of Haran." Therefore it was done when his father was in the 145th year of his age; for it was then the seventy-fifth of his own. But this question is also solved in another way, that the seventy-five years of Abraham when he departed out of Haran are reckoned from the year in which he was delivered from the fire of the Chaldeans, not from that of his birth, as if he was rather to be held as having been born then.Now the blessed Stephen, in narrating these things in the Acts of the Apostles, says: "The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran, and said unto him, Get you out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father's house, and come into the land which I will show you." Acts 7:2-3 According to these words of Stephen, God spoke to Abraham, not after the death of his father, who certainly died in Haran, where his son also dwelt with him, but before he dwelt in that city, although he was already in Mesopotamia. Therefore he had already departed from the Chaldeans. So that when Stephen adds, "Then Abraham went out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt in Charran," Acts 7:4 this does not point out what took place after God spoke to him (for it was not after these words of God that he went out of the land of the Chaldeans, since he says that God spoke to him in Mesopotamia), but the word "then" which he uses refers to that whole period from his going out of the land of the Chaldeans and dwelling in Haran. Likewise in what follows, "And thenceforth, when his father was dead, he settled him in this land, wherein ye now dwell, and your fathers," he does not say, after his father was dead he went out from Haran; but thenceforth he settled him here, after his father was dead. It is to be understood, therefore, that God had spoken to Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran; but that he came to Haran with his father, keeping in mind the precept of God, and that he went out thence in his own seventy-fifth year, which was his father's 145th. But he says that his settlement in the land of Canaan, not his going forth from Haran, took place after his father's death; because his father was already dead when he purchased the land, and personally entered on possession of it. But when, on his having already settled in Mesopotamia, that is, already gone out of the land of the Chaldeans, God says, "Get you out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father's house," Genesis 12:1 this means, not that he should cast out his body from thence, for he had already done that, but that he should tear away his soul. For he had not gone out from thence in mind, if he was held by the hope and desire of returning,-a hope and desire which was to be cut off by God's command and help, and by his own obedience. It would indeed be no incredible supposition that afterwards, when Nahor followed his father, Abraham then fulfilled the precept of the Lord, that he should depart out of Haran with Sarah his wife and Lot his brother's son.
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| − | ||<div id="c16"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XVI] Iam considerandae sunt promissiones Dei factae ad Abraham. In his enim apertiora Dei nostri, hoc est Dei veri, oracula apparere coeperunt de populo piorum, quem prophetica praenuntiavit auctoritas. Harum prima ita legitur: Et dixit Dominus ad Abram: Exi de terra tua et de cognatione tua et de domo patris tui <et uade> in terram, quam tibi demonstravero; et faciam te in gentem magnam et benedicam te et magnificabo nomen tuum, et eris benedictus, et benedicam benedicentes te et maledicentes te maledicam, et benedicentur in te omnes tribus terrae. Advertendum est igitur duas res promissas Abrahae; unam scilicet, quod terram Chanaan possessurum fuerat semen eius, quod significatur, ubi dictum est: Vade in terram, quam tibi demonstravero, et faciam te in gentem magnam; aliam vero longe praestantiorem non de carnali, sed de spiritali semine, per quod pater est non unius gentis Israeliticae, sed omnium gentium, quae fidei eius uestigia consequuntur, quod promitti coepit his verbis: Et benedicentur in te omnes tribus terrae. Hanc promissionem factam arbitratur Eusebius septuagensimo quinto anno aetatis Abrahae, tamquam mox ut facta est de Charra exierit Abraham; quoniam scripturae contradici non potest, ubi legitur: Abram erat quinque et septuaginta annorum, cum exiit ex Charra. Sed si eo anno facta est ista promissio, iam utique in Charra cum patre suo demorabatur Abraham. Neque enim exire inde posset, nisi prius ibi habitasset. Numquidnam ergo contradicitur Stephano dicenti: Deus gloriae apparuit Abrahae patri nostro, cum esset in Mesopotamia, priusquam habitaret in Charra? Sed intellegendum est, quod eodem anno facta sint omnia, et Dei promissio, antequam in Charra habitaret Abraham, et in Charra habitatio eius et inde profectio; non solum quia Eusebius in chronicis ab anno huius promissionis computat et ostendit post quadringentos et triginta annos exitum esse de Aegypto, quando lex data est, verum etiam quia id commemorat apostolus Paulus. ||God's promises made to Abraham are now to be considered; for in these the oracles of our God, that is, of the true God, began to appear more openly concerning the godly people, whom prophetic authority foretold. The first of these reads thus: "And the Lord said unto Abram, Get you out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father's house, and go into a land that I will show you: and I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and magnify your name; and you shall be blessed: and I will bless them that bless you, and curse them that curse you: and in you shall all tribes of the earth be blessed." Genesis 12:1-3 Now it is to be observed that two things are promised to Abraham, the one, that his seed should possess the land of Canaan, which is intimated when it is said, "Go into a land that I will show you, and I will make of you a great nation;" but the other far more excellent, not about the carnal but the spiritual seed, through which he is the father, not of the one Israelite nation, but of all nations who follow the footprints of his faith, which was first promised in these words, "And in you shall all tribes of the earth be blessed." Eusebius thought this promise was made in Abraham's seventy-fifth year, as if soon after it was made Abraham had departed out of Haran because the Scripture cannot be contradicted in which we read, "Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran." But if this promise was made in that year, then of course Abraham was staying in Haran with his father; for he could not depart thence unless he had first dwelt there. Does this, then, contradict what Stephen says, "The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran?" Acts 7:2 But it is to be understood that the whole took place in the same year,-both the promise of God before Abraham dwelt in Haran, and his dwelling in Haran, and his departure thence,-not only because Eusebius in the Chronicles reckons from the year of this promise, and shows that after 430 years the exodus from Egypt took place, when the law was given, but because the Apostle Paul also mentions it.
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| − | ||<div id="c17"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XVII] Per idem tempus eminentia regna erant gentium, in quibus terrigenarum civitas, hoc est societas hominum secundum hominem viventium, sub dominatu angelorum desertorum insignius excellebat, regna videlicet tria, Sicyoniorum, Aegyptiorum, Assyriorum. Sed Assyriorum multo erat potentius atque sublimius. Nam rex ille Ninus Beli filius excepta India universae Asiae populos subiugaverat. Asiam nunc dico non illam partem quae huius maioris Asiae una provincia est, sed eam quae universa Asia nuncupatur, quam quidam in altera duarum, plerique autem in tertia totius orbis parte posuerunt, ut sint omnes Asia, Europa et Africa; quod non aequali divisione fecerunt. Namque ista, quae Asia nuncupatur, a meridie per orientem usque ad septentrionem pervenit; Europa vero a septentrione usque ad occidentem, atque inde Africa ab occidente usque ad meridiem. Vnde videntur orbem dimidium duae tenere, Europa et Africa, alium vero dimidium sola Asia. Sed ideo illae duae partes factae sunt, quia inter utramque ab Oceano ingreditur, quidquid aquarum terras interluit; et hoc mare magnum nobis facit. Quapropter si in duas partes orbem dividas, Orientis et Occidentis, Asia erit in una, in altera vero Europa et Africa. Quam ob rem trium regnorum, quae tunc praecellebant, Sicyoniorum non erat sub Assyriis, quia in Europa sunt; Aegyptiorum autem quo modo eis non subiacebat, a quibus tota Asia tenebatur, solis Indis, ut perbibetur, exceptis? In Assyria igitur praeualuerat dominatus impiae civitatis; huius caput erat illa Babylon, cuius terrigenae civitatis nomen aptissimum est, id est confusio. Ibi iam Ninus regnabat post mortem patris sui Beli, qui primus illic regnaverat sexaginta quinque annos. Filius vero eius Ninus, qui defuncto patri successit in regnum, quinquaginta duo regnavit annos, et habebat in regno quadraginta tres, quando natus est Abraham, qui erat annus circiter millensimus ducentensimus ante conditam mam, veluti alteram in occidente Babyloniam. ||During the same period there were three famous kingdoms of the nations, in which the city of the earth-born, that is, the society of men living according to man under the domination of the fallen angels, chiefly flourished, namely, the three kingdoms of Sicyon, Egypt, and Assyria. Of these, Assyria was much the most powerful and sublime; for that king Ninus, son of Belus, had subdued the people of all Asia except India. By Asia I now mean not that part which is one province of this greater Asia, but what is called Universal Asia, which some set down as the half, but most as the third part of the whole world,-the three being Asia, Europe, and Africa, thereby making an unequal division. For the part called Asia stretches from the south through the east even to the north; Europe from the north even to the west; and Africa from the west even to the south. Thus we see that two, Europe and Africa, contain one half of the world, and Asia alone the other half. And these two parts are made by the circumstance, that there enters between them from the ocean all the Mediterranean water, which makes this great sea of ours. So that, if you divide the world into two parts, the east and the west, Asia will be in the one, and Europe and Africa in the other. So that of the three kingdoms then famous, one, namely Sicyon, was not under the Assyrians, because it was in Europe; but as for Egypt, how could it fail to be subject to the empire which ruled all Asia with the single exception of India? In Assyria, therefore, the dominion of the impious city had the pre-eminence. Its head was Babylon,-an earth-born city, most fitly named, for it means confusion. There Ninus reigned after the death of his father Belus, who first had reigned there sixty-five years. His son Ninus, who, on his father's death, succeeded to the kingdom, reigned fifty-two years, and had been king forty-three years when Abraham was born, which was about the 1200th year before Rome was founded, as it were another Babylon in the west.
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| − | ||<div id="c18"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XVIII] Egressus ergo Abrabam de Charra septuagensimo quinto anno aetatis suae, centensimo autem quadragensimo et quinto patris sui, cum Loth filio fratris et Sarra coniuge perrexit in terram Chanaan et pervenit usque ad Sichem, ubi rursus divinum accepit oraculum, de quo ita scriptum est: Et apparuit Dominus Abrae, et dixit illi: Semini tuo dabo terram hanc. Nihil hic de illo semine dictum est, in quo pater factus est omnium gentium, sed de illo solo, de quo pater est unius Israeliticae gentis; ab hoc enim semine terra illa possessa est. ||Abraham, then, having departed out of Haran in the seventy-fifth year of his own age, and in the hundred and forty-fifth of his father's, went with Lot, his brother's son, and Sarah his wife, into the land of Canaan, and came even to Sichem, where again he received the divine oracle, of which it is thus written: "And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said unto him, Unto your seed will I give this land." Genesis 12:7 Nothing is promised here about that seed in which he is made the father of all nations, but only about that by which he is the father of the one Israelite nation; for by this seed that land was possessed.
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| − | ||<div id="c19"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XIX] Deinde aedificato ibi altari et inuocato Deo Abraham profectus est inde et habitavit in heremo atque inde ire in Aegyptum famis necessitate conpulsus est. Vbi uxorem suam dixit sororem, nihil mentitus; erat enim et hoc, quia propinqua erat sanguine; sicut etiam Loth eadem propinquitate, cum fratris eius esset filius, frater eius est dictus. Itaque uxorem tacuit, non negavit, coniugis tuendam pudicitiam committens Deo et humanas insidias cavens ut homo; quoniam, si periculum quantum caveri poterat non caveret, magis temptaret Deum, quam speraret in Deum. De qua re contra calumniantem Faustum Manichaeum satis diximus. Denique factum est, quod de Domino praesumpsit Abraham. Nam Pharao rex Aegypti, qui eam sibi uxorem acceperat, graviter adflictus marito reddidit. Vbi absit ut credamus alieno concubitu fuisse pollutam, quia multo est credibilius, hoc Pharaonem facere adflictionibus magnis non fuisse permissum. ||Having built an altar there, and called upon God, Abraham proceeded thence and dwelt in the desert, and was compelled by pressure of famine to go on into Egypt. There he called his wife his sister, and told no lie. For she was this also, because she was near of blood; just as Lot, on account of the same nearness, being his brother's son, is called his brother. Now he did not deny that she was his wife, but held his peace about it, committing to God the defence of his wife's chastity, and providing as a man against human wiles; because if he had not provided against the danger as much as he could, he would have been tempting God rather than trusting in Him. We have said enough about this matter against the calumnies of Faustus the Manichжan. At last what Abraham had expected the Lord to do took place. For Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who had taken her to him as his wife, restored her to her husband on being severely plagued. And far be it from us to believe that she was defiled by lying with another; because it is much more credible that, by these great afflictions, Pharaoh was not permitted to do this.
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| − | ||<div id="c20"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XX] Reuerso igitur Abraham ex Aegypto in locum unde venerat, tunc Loth fratris filius ab illo in terram Sodomorum salua caritate discessit. Divites quippe facti erant pastoresque multos pecorum habere coeperant, quibus inter se rixantibus eo modo familiarum suarum pugnacem discordiam vitaverunt. Poterat quippe hinc, ut sunt humana, etiam inter ipsos aliqua rixa consurgere. Proinde hoc malum praecaventis Abrabae verba ista sunt ad Loth: Non sit rixa inter me et te, et inter pastores meos et inter pastores tuos, quia homines fratres nos sumus. Nonne ecce tota terra ante te est? Discede a me; si tu in sinistram, ego in dextram: vel si tu in dextram, ego in sinistram. Hinc fortassis effecta est inter homines pacifica consuetudo, ut, quando terrenorum aliquid partiendum est, maior dividat, minor eligat. ||On Abraham's return out of Egypt to the place he had left, Lot, his brother's son, departed from him into the land of Sodom, without breach of charity. For they had grown rich, and began to have many herdmen of cattle, and when these strove together, they avoided in this way the pugnacious discord of their families. Indeed, as human affairs go, this cause might even have given rise to some strife between themselves. Consequently these are the words of Abraham to Lot, when taking precaution against this evil, "Let there be no strife between me and you, and between my herdmen and your herdmen; for we be brethren. Behold, is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me: if you will go to the left hand, I will go to the right; or if you will go to the right hand, I will go to the left." Genesis 13:8-9 From this, perhaps, has arisen a pacific custom among men, that when there is any partition of earthly things, the greater should make the division, the less the choice.
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| − | ||<div id="c21"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXI] Cum ergo digressi essent separatimque habitarent Abraham et Loth necessitate sustentandae familiae, non foeditate discordiae, et Abraham in terra Chanaan, Loth autem esset in Sodomis, oraculo tertio dixit Dominus ad Abraham: Respiciens oculis tuis vide a loco, in quo nunc tu es, ad aquilonem et Africum et orientem et mare, quia omnem terram, quam tu vides, tibi dabo eam et semini tuo usque in saeculum, et faciam semen tuum tamquam harenam terrae. Si potest aliquis dinumerare harenam terrae, et semen tuum dinumerabitur. Surgens perambula terram in longitudinem eius et in latitudinem, quia tibi dabo eam. In hac promissione utrum sit etiam illa, qua pater factus est omnium gentium, non evidenter apparet. Potest enim videri ad hoc pertinere: Et faciam semen tuum tamquam harenam terrae, quod ea locutione dictum est, quam Graeci vocant hyperbolen; quae utique tropica est, non propria. Quo tamen modo, ut ceteris tropis, uti solere scripturam, nullus qui eam didicit ambigit. Iste autem tropus, id est modus locutionis, fit, quando id quod dicitur longe est amplius, quam quod eo dicto significatur. Quis enim non videat, quam sit incomparabiliter amplior harenae numerus, quam potest esse hominum omnium ab ipso Adam usque ad terminum saeculi? Quanto ergo magis quam semen Abrahae, non solum quod pertinet ad Israeliticam gentem, verum etiam quod est et futurum est secundum imitationem fidei toto orbe terrarum in omnibus gentibus! Quod semen in comparatione multitudinis impiorum profecto in paucis est; quamuis et ipsi pauci faciant innumerabilem multitudinem suam, quae significata est secundum hyperbolen per harenam terrae. Sane ista multitudo, quae promittitur Abrabae, non Deo est innumerabilis, sed hominibus; Deo autem nec harena terrae. Proinde quia non tantum gens Israelitica, sed universum semen Abrahae, ubi est et promissio non secundum carnem, sed secundum spiritum plurium fiorum, congruentius harenae multitudini comparatur: potest hic intellegi utriusque rei facta promissio. Sed ideo diximus, quod non evidenter appareat, quia et illius gentis unius multitudo, quae secundum carnem nata est ex Abraham per eius nepotem Iacob, in tantum crevit, ut paene omnes partes orbis impleuerit. Et ideo potuit et ipsa secundum hyperbolen harenae multitudini comparari, quia et haec sola innumera est homini. Terram certe illam solam significatam, quae appellata est Chanaan, ambigit nemo. Sed quod dictum est: Tibi dabo eam et semini tuo usque in saeculum, potest movere nonnullos, si usque in saeculum intellegant "in aeternum". Si autem saeculum hoc loco sic accipiant, quem ad modum fideliter tenemus initium futuri saeculi a fine praesentis ordiri, nihil eos movebit; quia, etsi expulsi sunt Israelitae de Hierosolymis, manent tamen in aliis civitatibus terrae Chanaan, et usque in finem manebunt; et universa terra illa cum a Christianis inhabitatur, etiam ipsum semen est Abrahae. ||Now, when Abraham and Lot had separated, and dwelt apart, owing to the necessity of supporting their families, and not to vile discord, and Abraham was in the land of Canaan, but Lot in Sodom, the Lord said to Abraham in a third oracle, "Lift up your eyes, and look from the place where you now are, to the north, and to Africa, and to the east, and to the sea; for all the land which you see, to you will I give it, and to your seed for ever. And I will make your seed as the dust of the earth: if any one can number the dust of the earth, your seed shall also be numbered. Arise, and walk through the land, in the length of it, and in the breadth of it; for unto you will I give it." Genesis 13:14-17 It does not clearly appear whether in this promise that also is contained by which he is made the father of all nations. For the clause, "And I will make your seed as the dust of the earth," may seem to refer to this, being spoken by that figure the Greeks call hyperbole, which indeed is figurative, not literal. But no person of understanding can doubt in what manner the Scripture uses this and other figures. For that figure (that is, way of speaking) is used when what is said is far larger than what is meant by it; for who does not see how incomparably larger the number of the dust must be than that of all men can be from Adam himself down to the end of the world? How much greater, then, must it be than the seed of Abraham,-not only that pertaining to the nation of Israel, but also that which is and shall be according to the imitation of faith in all nations of the whole wide world! For that seed is indeed very small in comparison with the multitude of the wicked, although even those few of themselves make an innumerable multitude, which by a hyperbole is compared to the dust of the earth. Truly that multitude which was promised to Abraham is not innumerable to God, although to man; but to God not even the dust of the earth is so. Further, the promise here made may be understood not only of the nation of Israel, but of the whole seed of Abraham, which may be fitly compared to the dust for multitude, because regarding it also there is the promise of many children, not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. But we have therefore said that this does not clearly appear, because the multitude even of that one nation, which was born according to the flesh of Abraham through his grandson Jacob, has increased so much as to fill almost all parts of the world. Consequently, even it might by hyperbole be compared to the dust for multitude, because even it alone is innumerable by man. Certainly no one questions that only that land is meant which is called Canaan. But that saying, "To you will I give it, and to your seed for ever," may move some, if by "for ever" they understand "to eternity." But if in this passage they take "for ever" thus, as we firmly hold it means that the beginning of the world to come is to be ordered from the end of the present, there is still no difficulty, because, although the Israelites are expelled from Jerusalem, they still remain in other cities in the land of Canaan, and shall remain even to the end; and when that whole land is inhabited by Christians, they also are the very seed of Abraham.
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| − | ||<div id="c22"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXII] Hoc responso promissionis accepto migravit Abraham et mansit in alio eiusdem terrae loco, iuxta quercum Mambre, quae erat Chebron. Deinde ab hostibus, qui Sodomis inruerant, cum quinque reges adversus quattuor bellum gererent et victis Sodomitis etiam Loth captus esset, liberavit eum Abraham adductis secum in proelium trecentis decem et octo vernaculis suis et victoriam fecit regibus Sodomorum nihilque spoliorum auferre voluit, cum rex cui vicerat obtulisset. Sed plane tunc benedictus est a Melchisedech, qui erat sacerdos Dei excelsi; de quo in epistula, quae inscribitur ad Hebraeos, quam plures Pauli apostoli esse dicunt, quidam vero negant, multa et magna conscripta sunt. Ibi quippe primum apparuit sacrificium, quod nunc a Christianis offertur Deo toto orbe terrarum, impleturque illud, quod longe post hoc factum per prophetiam dicitur ad Christum, qui fuerat adhuc venturus in carne: Tu es sacerdos in aeternum secundum ordinem Melchisedech; non scilicet secundum ordinem Aaron, qui ordo fuerat auferendus inlucescentibus rebus, quae illis umbris praenotabantur. ||Having received this oracle of promise, Abraham migrated, and remained in another place of the same land, that is, beside the oak of Mamre, which was Hebron. Then on the invasion of Sodom, when five kings carried on war against four, and Lot was taken captive with the conquered Sodomites, Abraham delivered him from the enemy, leading with him to battle three hundred and eighteen of his home-born servants, and won the victory for the kings of Sodom, but would take nothing of the spoils when offered by the king for whom he had won them. He was then openly blessed by Melchizedek, who was priest of God Most High, about whom many and great things are written in the epistle which is inscribed to the Hebrews, which most say is by the Apostle Paul, though some deny this. For then first appeared the sacrifice which is now offered to God by Christians in the whole wide world, and that is fulfilled which long after the event was said by the prophet to Christ, who was yet to come in the flesh, "You are a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek,"-that is to say, not after the order of Aaron, for that order was to be taken away when the things shone forth which were intimated beforehand by these shadows.
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| − | ||<div id="c23"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXIII] Etiam tunc factum est verbum Domini ad Abraham in visu. Qui cum ei protectionem mercedemque promitteret valde multam, ille de posteritate sollicitus quandam Eliezer vernaculum suum futurum sibi dixit heredem, continuoque illi promissus est heres, non ille vernaculus, sed qui de ipso Abraham fuerat exiturus, rursusque semen innumerabile, non sicut harena terrae, sed stellae caeli; ubi mihi magis videtur promissa posteritas caelesti felicitate sublimis. Nam quantum ad multitudinem pertinet, quid sunt stellae caeli ad harenam terrae? nisi quis et istam comparationem in tantum esse similem dicat, in quantum etiam stellae dinumerari non valent, quia nec omnes eas videri posse credendum est. Nam quanto quisque acutius intuetur, tanto plures videt. Vnde et acerrime cernentibus aliquas occultas esse merito existimatur, exceptis eis sideribus, quae in alia parte orbis a nobis remotissima oriri et occidere perhibentur. Postremo quicumque universum stellarum numerum conprehendisse et conscripsisse iactantur, sicut Aratus vel Eudoxus vel si qui alii sunt, eos libri huius contemnit auctoritas. Hic sane illa sententia ponitur, cuius apostolus meminit propter Dei gratiam commendandam: Credidit Abraham Deo, et deputatum est illi ad iustitiam; ne circumcisio gloriaretur gentesque incircumcisas ad fidem Christi nollet admitti. Hoc enim quando factum est, ut credenti Abrabae deputaretur fides ad iustitiam, nondum fuerat circumcisus. ||The word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision also. For when God promised him protection and exceeding great reward, he, being solicitous about posterity, said that a certain Eliezer of Damascus, born in his house, would be his heir. Immediately he was promised an heir, not that house-born servant, but one who was to come forth of Abraham himself; and again a seed innumerable, not as the dust of the earth, but as the stars of heaven,-which rather seems to me a promise of a posterity exalted in celestial felicity. For, so far as multitude is concerned, what are the stars of heaven to the dust of the earth, unless one should say the comparison is like inasmuch as the stars also cannot be numbered? For it is not to be believed that all of them can be seen. For the more keenly one observes them, the more does he see. So that it is to be supposed some remain concealed from the keenest observers, to say nothing of those stars which are said to rise and set in another part of the world most remote from us. Finally, the authority of this book condemns those like Aratus or Eudoxus, or any others who boast that they have found out and written down the complete number of the stars. Here, indeed, is set down that sentence which the apostle quotes in order to commend the grace of God, "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness;" lest the circumcision should glory, and be unwilling to receive the uncircumcised nations to the faith of Christ. For at the time when he believed, and his faith was counted to him for righteousness, Abraham had not yet been circumcised.
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| − | ||<div id="c24"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXIV] In eodem visu cum loqueretur ei Deus, etiam hoc ait ad illum: Ego Deus, qui eduxi te de regione Chaldaeorum, ut dem tibi terram hanc, ut heres sis eius. Vbi cum interrogasset Abraham secundum quid sciret, quod heres eius erit, dixit illi Deus: Accipe mihi ivuencam trimam et capram trimam et arietem trimum et turturem et columbam. Accepit autem illi haec omnia et divisit illa media et posuit ea contra faciem alterum alteri; aves autem non divisit. Et descenderunt, sicut scriptum est, aves supra corpora quae divisa erant, et consedit illis Abram. Circa solis autem occasum pauor inruit super Abram, et ecce timor tenebrosus magnus incidit ei; et dictum est ad Abram: Sciendo scies, quia peregrinum erit semen tuum in terra non propria, et in seruitutem redigent eos et adfligent eos quadringentis annis; gentem autem, cui seruierint, iudicabo ego. Post haec vero exibunt hoc cum supellectili multa. Tu autem ibis ad patres tuos cum pace nutritus in senecta bona. Quarta vero generatione convertent se hoc. Nondum enim impleta sunt peccata Amorrhaeorum usque adhuc. Cum autem iam sol erat ad occasum, flamma facta est, et ecce fornax fumabunda et lampades ignis, quae pertransierunt per media divisa illa. In die illa disposuit Dominus Deus testamentum ad Abram, dicens: Semini tuo dabo terram hanc, a flumine Aegypti usque ad flumen magnum flumen Euphraten, Cenaeos et Cenezaeos et Celmonaeos et Chettaeos et Pherezaeos et Raphaim et Amorrhaeos et Chananaeos et Euaeos et Gergesaeos et Iebusaeos. Haec omnia in visu facta divinitus atque dicta sunt, de quibus singulis enucleate disserere longum est et intentionem operis huius excedit. Quod ergo satis est nosse debemus. Postea quam dictum est credidisse Abraham Deo et deputatum illi ad iustitiam, non eum in fide defecisse, ut diceret: Dominator Domine, secundum quid sciam, quia heres eius ero? (terrae quippe illius promissa erat hereditas) _ - non enim ait: "Vnde sciam?" quasi adhuc non crederet; sed ait: Secundum quid sciam? ut ei rei, quam crediderat, aliqua similitudo adhiberetur, qua eius modus agnosceretur; sicut non est virginis Mariae diffidentia quod ait: Quo modo fiet istud, quoniam virum non cognosco? quod enim futurum esset, certa erat; modum quo fieret inquirebat, et hoc cum quaesisset, audivit -: denique et hic similitudo data est de animalibus, ivuenca et capra et ariete et duabus volucribus, turture et columba, ut secundum haec futurum sciret, quod futurum esse iam non ambigeret. Sive ergo per ivuencam significata sit plebs posita sub iugo legis, per capram eadem plebs peccatrix futura, per arietem eadem plebs etiam regnatura (quae animalia propterea trima dicuntur, quia, cum sint insignes afficuli temporum ab Adam usque ad Noe et inde usque ad Abraham et inde usque ad David, qui reprobato Saule primus in regno gentis Israeliticae Domini est voluntate fundatus, in hoc ordine tertio, qui tenditur ex Abraham usque ad David, tamquam tertiam aetatem gerens ille populus adolevit), sive aliquid aliud convenientius ista significent: nullo modo tamen dubitaverim spiritales in ea praefiguratos additamento turturis et columbae. Et ideo dictum est: Aves autem non divisit, quoniam carnales inter se dividuntur, spiritales autem nullo modo, sive a negotiosis conversationibus hominum se removeant, sicut turtur, sive inter illas degant, sicut columba; utraque tamen avis est simplex et innoxia, significans et in ipso Israelitico populo, cui terra illa danda erat, futuros individuos filios promssionis et heredes regni in aeterna felicitate mansuri. Aves autem descendentes supra corpora, quae divisa erant, non boni aliquid, sed spiritus indicant aeris huius, pastum quendam suum de carnalium divisione quaerentes. Quod autem illis consedit Abraham, significat etiam inter illas carnalium divisiones veros usque in finem perseueraturos fideles. Et circa solis occasum quod pauor inruit in Abraham et timor tenebrosus magnus significat circa huius saeculi finem magnam perturbationem ac tribulationem futuram fidelium, de qua Dominus dicit in euangelio: Erit enim tunc tribulatio magna, qualis non fuit ab initio. Quod vero dictum est ad Abraham: Sciendo scies, quia peregrinum erit semen tuum in terra non propria, et in seruitutem redigent eos et adfligent eos quadringentis annis, de populo Israel, qui fuerat in Aegypto seruiturus, apertissime prophetatum est; non quod in eadem seruitute sub Aegyptiis adfligentibus quadringentos annos ille populus fuerat peracturus, sed in ipsis quadringentis annis praenuntiatum est hoc futurum. Quem ad modum enim scriptum est de Thara patre Abrahae: Et fuerunt dies Tharae in Charra quinque et ducenti anno, non quia ibi omnes acti sunt, sed quia ibi completi sunt: ita et hic propterea interpositum est: Et in seruitutem redigent eos et adfligent eos quadringentis annis, quoniam iste numerus in eadem adflictione completus est, non quia ibi universus peractus est. Quadringenti sane dicuntur anni propter numeri plenitudinem, quamuis aliquanto amplius sint, sive ex hoc tempore computentur, quo ista promittebantur Abrahae, sive ex quo natus est Isaac, propter semen Abrahae, de quo ista praedicuntur. Computantur enim, sicut superius iam diximus, ab anno septuagensimo et quinto Abrahae, quando ad eum facta est prima promissio, usque ad exitum Israel ex Aegypto quadringenti et triginta anni; quorum apostolus ita meminit: Hoc autem dico, inquit: testamentum confirmatum a Deo post quadringentos triginta annos facta lex non infirmat ad euacuandam promissionem. Iam ergo isti quadringenti et triginta <anni> quadringenti poterant nuncupari, quia non sunt multo amplius: quanto magis cum aliquot iam ex isto numero praeterissent, quando illa in visu demonstrata et dicta sunt Abrahae, vel qu ando Isaac natus est centenario patri suo, a prima promissione post viginti quinque annos, cum iam ex istis quadringentis triginta quadringenti et quinque remanerent, quos Deus quadringentos voluit nominare. Et cetera, quae sequuntur in verbis praenuntiantis Dei, nullus dubitaverit ad Israeliticum populum pertinere. Quod vero adiungitur: Cum autem iam sol erat ad occasum, flamma facta est, et ecce fornax fumabunda et lampades ignis, quae pertransierunt per media divisa illa, significat iam in fine saeculi per ignem iudicandos esse carnales. Sicut enim adflictio civitatis Dei, qualis antea numquam fuit, quae sub Antichristo futura speratur, significatur tenebroso timore Abrahae circa solis occasum, id est propinquante iam fine saeculi: sic ad solis occasum, id est ad ipsum iam finem, significatur isto igne dies iudicii dirimens carnales per ignem saluandos et in igne damnandos. Deinde testamentum factum ad Abraham terram Chanaan proprie manifestat et nominat in ea undecim gentes a flumine Aegypti usque ad flumen magnum Euphraten. Non ergo a flumine magno Aegypti, hoc est Nilo, sed a paruo, quod dividit inter Aegyptum et Palae stinam, ubi est civitas Rhinocorura. ||In the same vision, God in speaking to him also says, "I am God that brought you out of the region of the Chaldees, to give you this land to inherit it." Genesis 15:7 And when Abram asked whereby he might know that he should inherit it, God said to him, "Take me an heifer of three years old, and a she-goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtle-dove, and a pigeon. And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another; but the birds divided he not. And the fowls came down," as it is written, "on the carcasses, and Abram sat down by them. But about the going down of the sun, great fear fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him. And He said unto Abram, Know of a surety that your seed shall be a stranger in a land not theirs, and they shall reduce them to servitude and shall afflict them four hundred years: but the nation whom they shall serve will I judge; and afterward shall they come out hither with great substance. And you shall go to your fathers in peace; kept in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full. And when the sun was setting, there was a flame, and a smoking furnace, and lamps of fire, that passed through between those pieces. In that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto your seed will I give this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river Euphrates: the Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Hivites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites." Genesis 15:9-21 All these things were said and done in a vision from God; but it would take long, and would exceed the scope of this work, to treat of them exactly in detail. It is enough that we should know that, after it was said Abram believed in God, and it was counted to him for righteousness, he did not fail in faith in saying, "Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" for the inheritance of that land was promised to him. Now he does not say, How shall I know, as if he did not yet believe; but he says, "Whereby shall I know," meaning that some sign might be given by which he might know the manner of those things which he had believed, just as it is not for lack of faith the Virgin Mary says, "How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?" Luke 1:34 for she inquired as to the way in which that should take place which she was certain would come to pass. And when she asked this, she was told, "The Holy Ghost shall come upon you, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow you." Luke 1:35 Here also, in fine, a symbol was given, consisting of three animals, a heifer, a she-goat, and a ram, and two birds, a turtle-dove and pigeon, that he might know that the things which he had not doubted should come to pass were to happen in accordance with this symbol. Whether, therefore, the heifer was a sign that the people should be put under the law, the she-goat that the same people was to become sinful, the ram that they should reign (and these animals are said to be of three years old for this reason, that there are three remarkable divisions of time, from Adam to Noah, and from him to Abraham, and from him to David, who, on the rejection of Saul, was first established by the will of the Lord in the kingdom of the Israelite nation: in this third division, which extends from Abraham to David, that people grew up as if passing through the third age of life), or whether they had some other more suitable meaning, still I have no doubt whatever that spiritual things were prefigured by them as well as by the turtle-dove and pigeon. And it is said, "But the birds divided he not," because carnal men are divided among themselves, but the spiritual not at all, whether they seclude themselves from the busy conversation of men, like the turtle-dove, or dwell among them, like the pigeon; for both birds are simple and harmless, signifying that even in the Israelite people, to which that land was to be given, there would be individuals who were children of the promise, and heirs of the kingdom that is to remain in eternal felicity. But the fowls coming down on the divided carcasses represent nothing good, but the spirits of this air, seeking some food for themselves in the division of carnal men. But that Abraham sat down with them, signifies that even amid these divisions of the carnal, true believers shall persevere to the end. And that about the going down of the sun great fear fell upon Abraham and a horror of great darkness, signifies that about the end of this world believers shall be in great perturbation and tribulation, of which the Lord said in the gospel, "For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not from the beginning." Matthew 24:21 But what is said to Abraham, "Know of a surety that your seed shall be a stranger in a land not theirs, and they shall reduce them to servitude, and shall afflict them 400 years," is most clearly a prophecy about the people of Israel which was to be in servitude in Egypt. Not that this people was to be in that servitude under the oppressive Egyptians for 400 years, but it is foretold that this should take place in the course of those 400 years. For as it is written of Terah the father of Abraham, "And the days of Terah in Haran were 205 years," Genesis 11:32 not because they were all spent there, but because they were completed there, so it is said here also, "And they shall reduce them to servitude, and shall afflict them 400 years," for this reason, because that number was completed, not because it was all spent in that affliction. The years are said to be 400 in round numbers, although they were a little more,-whether you reckon from this time, when these things were promised to Abraham, or from the birth of Isaac, as the seed of Abraham, of which these things are predicted. For, as we have already said above, from the seventy-fifth year of Abraham, when the first promise was made to him, down to the exodus of Israel from Egypt, there are reckoned 430 years, which the apostle thus mentions: "And this I say, that the covenant confirmed by God, the law, which was made 430 years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect." Galatians 3:17 So then these 430 years might be called 400, because they are not much more, especially since part even of that number had already gone by when these things were shown and said to Abraham in vision, or when Isaac was born in his father's 100th year, twenty-five years after the first promise, when of these 430 years there now remained 405, which God was pleased to call 400. No one will doubt that the other things which follow in the prophetic words of God pertain to the people of Israel.When it is added, "And when the sun was now setting there was a flame, and lo, a smoking furnace, and lamps of fire, which passed through between those pieces," this signifies that at the end of the world the carnal shall be judged by fire. For just as the affliction of the city of God, such as never was before, which is expected to take place under Antichrist, was signified by Abraham's horror of great darkness about the going down of the sun, that is, when the end of the world draws nigh,-so at the going down of the sun, that is, at the very end of the world, there is signified by that fire the day of judgment, which separates the carnal who are to be saved by fire from those who are to be condemned in the fire. And then the covenant made with Abraham particularly sets forth the land of Canaan, and names eleven tribes in it from the river of Egypt even to the great river Euphrates. It is not then from the great river of Egypt, that is, the Nile, but from a small one which separates Egypt from Palestine, where the city of Rhinocorura is.
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| − | ||<div id="c25"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXV] Iam hinc tempora consequuntur filiorum Abrahae, unius de Agar ancilla, alterius de Sarra libera, de quibus in libro superiore iam diximus. Quod autem adtinet ad rem gestam, nullo modo est inurendum de hac concubina crimen Abrabae. Vsus est ea quippe ad generandam prolem, non ad explendam libidinem, nec insultans, sed potius obediens coniugi, quae suae sterilitatis credidit esse solacium, si fecundum ancillae uterum, quoniam natura non poterat, voluntate faceret sum, et eo iure, quo dicit apostolus: Similiter et vir non habet potestatem corporis sui, sed mulier, uteretur mulier ad pariendum ex altera, quod non poterat ex se ipsa. Nulla est hic cupido lasciviae, nulla nequitiae turpitudo. Ab uxore causa prolis ancilla marito traditur, a marito causa prolis accipitur; ab utroque non culpae luxus, sed naturae fructus exquiritur. Denique cum ancilla gravida dominae sterili superbiret et hoc Sarra suspicione muliebri viro potius inputaret, etiam ibi demonstravit Abraham non se amatorem seruum, sed liberum fuisse genitorem et in Agar Sarrae coniugi pudicitiam custodisse nec voluptatem suam, sed voluntatem illius implevisse; accepisse nec petisse, accessisse nec haesisse, seminasse nec amasse. Ait enim: Ecce ancilla tua in manibus tuis, utere ea quo modo tibi placuerit. O virum viriliter utentem feminis, coniuge temperanter, ancilla obtemperanter, nulla intemperanter! ||And here follow the times of Abraham's sons, the one by Hagar the bond maid, the other by Sarah the free woman, about whom we have already spoken in the previous book. As regards this transaction, Abraham is in no way to be branded as guilty concerning this concubine, for he used her for the begetting of progeny, not for the gratification of lust; and not to insult, but rather to obey his wife, who supposed it would be solace of her barrenness if she could make use of the fruitful womb of her handmaid to supply the defect of her own nature, and by that law of which the apostle says, "Likewise also the husband has not power of his own body, but the wife," 1 Corinthians 7:4 could, as a wife, make use of him for childbearing by another, when she could not do so in her own person. Here there is no wanton lust, no filthy lewdness. The handmaid is delivered to the husband by the wife for the sake of progeny, and is received by the husband for the sake of progeny, each seeking, not guilty excess, but natural fruit. And when the pregnant bond woman despised her barren mistress, and Sarah, with womanly jealousy, rather laid the blame of this on her husband, even then Abraham showed that he was not a slavish lover, but a free begetter of children, and that in using Hagar he had guarded the chastity of Sarah his wife, and had gratified her will and not his own,-had received her without seeking, had gone in to her without being attached, had impregnated without loving her,-for he says, "Behold your maid is in your hands: do to her as it pleases you;" Genesis 16:6 a man able to use women as a man should,-his wife temperately, his handmaid compliantly, neither intemperately!
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| − | ||<div id="c26"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXVI] Post haec natus est Ismael ex Agar, in quo putare posset impletum, quod ei promissum fuerat, cum sibi vernaculum suum adoptare voluisset, Deo dicente: Non erit heres tuus hic; sed qui exiet de te, ille erit heres tuus. Hoc ergo promissum ne in ancillae filio putaret impletum, iam cum esset annorum nonaginta et novem, apparuit ei Dominus et dixit illi; Ego sum Deus, place in conspectu meo et esto sine querella, et ponam testamentum meum inter me et inter te et implebo te valde. Et procidit Abram in faciem suam. Et locutus est illi Deus dicens: Et ego, ecce testamentum meum tecum, et eris pater multitudinis gentium; et non appellabitur adhuc nomen tuum Abram, sed erit nomen tuum Abraham, quia patrem multarum gentium posui te; et augeam te valde valde et ponam te in gentes, et reges ex te exibunt; et statuam testamentum meum inter me et <inter> te et inter semen tuum post te in generationes eorum in testamentum aeternum, ut sim tibi Deus et semini tuo post te. Et dabo tibi et semini tuo post te terram, in qua incola es, omnem terram Chanaan in pussessionem aeternam, et ero illis Deus. Et dixit Deus ad Abraham: Tu autem testamentum meum conservabis, tu et semen tuum post te in progenies suas. Et hoc est testamentum, quod conservabis inter me et vos et inter semen tuum post te in generationes suas: Circumcidetur uestrum omne masculinum,, et circumcidemini carnem praeputii uestri, et erit in signo testamenti inter me et vos. Et puer octo dierum circumcidetur, uestrum omne masculinum in progenies uestras. Vernaculus et empticius ab omni filio alieno, qui non est de semine tuo, circumcisione circumcidetur vernaculus domus tuae et empticius. Et erit testamentum meum in carne uestra in testamento aeterno. Et qui non fuerit circumcisus masculus, qui non circumcidetur carnem praeputii sui octaua die, interibit anima illa de genere eius, quia testamentum meum dissipavit. Et dixit Deus ad Abraham: Sara uxor tua, non appellabitur nomen eius Sara, sed Sarra erit nomen eius. Benedicam autem illam et dabo tibi ex ea filium, et benedicam illum, et erit in nationes, et reges gentium ex eo erunt. Et procidit Abraham super faciem suam et risit et dixit in animo suo dicens: Si mihi centum annos habenti nascetur <filius>, et si Sarra annorum nonaginta pariet? Dixit autem Abraham ad Deum: Ismael hic vivat in conspectu tuo. Dixit autem Deus ad Abraham: Ita, ecce Sarra uxor tua pariet tibi filium, et vocabis nomen eius Isaac; et statuam testamentum meum ad illum in testamentum aeternum, esse illi Deus et semini eius post illum. De Ismael autem ecce exaudivi te; ecce benedixi eum et ampliabo illum et multiplicabo eum valde. Duodecim gentes generabit, et dabo illum in magnam gentem. Testamentum autem meum statuam ad Isaac, quem pariet tibi Sarra in tempore hoc ad annum sequentem. Hic apertiora promissa sunt de vocatione gentium in Isaac, id est in filio promissionis, quo significatur gratia, non natura, quia de sene et anu sterili promittitur filius. Quamuis enim et naturalem procreationis excursum Deus operetur: ubi tamen evidens opus Dei est vitiata et cessante natura, ibi evidentius intellegitur gratia. Et quia hoc non per generationem, sed per regenerationem futurum erat, ideo nunc imperata est circumcisio, quando de Sarra promissus est filius. Et quod omnes non solum filios, verum etiam seruos vernaculos et empticios circumcidi iubet, ad omnes istam gratiam pertinere testatur. Quid enim aliud circumcisio significat quam naturam exuta uetustate renouatam? Et quid aliud quam Christum octauus dies, qui hebdomade completa, hoc est post sabbatum, resurrexit? Parentum mutantur et nomina: omnia resonant novitatem, et in testamento uetere obumbratur nouum. Quid est enim quod dicitur testamentum uetus nisi novi occultatio? Et quid est aliud quod dicitur nouum nisi ueteris reuelatio? Risus Abrahae exultatio est gratulantis, non inrisio diffidentis. Verba quoque eius illa in animo suo: Si mihi centum annos habenti nascetur <filius> et si Sarra annorum nonaginta pariet, non,sunt dubitantis, sed admirantis. Si quem vero movet quod dictum est: Et dabo tibi et semini tuo post te terram, in qua tu incola es, omnem terram Chanaan in possessionem aeternam, quo modo accipiatur impletum sive adhuc expectetur implendum, cum possessio quaecumque terrena aeterna cuilibet genti esse non possit: sciat aeternum a nostris interpretari, quod Graeci appellant *ai)w/nion, quod a saeculo derivatum est; *ai)w\n quippe Graece saeculum nuncupatur. Sed non sunt ausi Latini hoc dicere saeculare, ne longe in aliud mitterent sensum. Saecularia quippe dicuntur multa, quae in hoc saeculo sic aguntur, ut brevi etiam tempore transeant; *ai)w/nion autem quod dicitur, aut non habet finem aut usque in huius saeculi tenditur finem. ||After these things Ishmael was born of Hagar; and Abraham might think that in him was fulfilled what God had promised him, saying, when he wished to adopt his home-born servant, "This shall not be your heir; but he that shall come forth of you, he shall be your heir." Genesis 15:4 Therefore, lest he should think that what was promised was fulfilled in the handmaid's son, "when Abram was ninety years old and nine, God appeared to him, and said unto him, I am God; be well-pleasing in my sight, and be without complaint, and I will make my covenant between me and you, and will fill you exceedingly."Here there are more distinct promises about the calling of the nations in Isaac, that is, in the son of the promise, by which grace is signified, and not nature; for the son is promised from an old man and a barren old woman. For although God effects even the natural course of procreation, yet where the agency of God is manifest, through the decay or failure of nature, grace is more plainly discerned. And because this was to be brought about, not by generation, but by regeneration, circumcision was enjoined now, when a son was promised of Sarah. And by ordering all, not only sons, but also home-born and purchased servants to be circumcised, he testifies that this grace pertains to all. For what else does circumcision signify than a nature renewed on the putting off of the old? And what else does the eighth day mean than Christ, who rose again when the week was completed, that is, after the Sabbath? The very names of the parents are changed: all things proclaim newness, and the new covenant is shadowed forth in the old. For what does the term old covenant imply but the concealing of the new? And what does the term new covenant imply but the revealing of the old? The laughter of Abraham is the exultation of one who rejoices, not the scornful laughter of one who mistrusts. And those words of his in his heart, "Shall a son be born to me that am an hundred years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear?" are not the words of doubt, but of wonder. And when it is said, "And I will give to you, and to your seed after you, the land in which you are a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession," if it troubles any one whether this is to be held as fulfilled, or whether its fulfilment may still be looked for, since no kind of earthly possession can be everlasting for any nation whatever, let him know that the word translated everlasting, by our writers is what the Greeks term a???????, which is derived from a????, the Greek for sжculum, an age. But the Latins have not ventured to translate this by secular, lest they should change the meaning into something widely different. For many things are called secular which so happen in this world as to pass away even in a short time; but what is termed a??????? either has no end, or lasts to the very end of this world.
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| − | ||<div id="c27"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXVII] Item potest movere, quo modo intellegi oporteat quod hic dictum est: Masculus, qui non circumcidetur carnem praeputii sui octaua die, interibit anima illa de genere eius, quia testamentum meum dissipavit, cum haec nulla culpa sit paruuli, cuius dixit animam perituram, nec ipse dissipaverit testamentum Dei, sed maiores, qui eum circumcidere non curarunt; nisi quia etiam paruuli, non secundum suae vitae proprietatem, sed secundum communem generis humani originem omnes in illo uno testamentum Dei dissipaverunt, in quo omnes peccaverunt. Multa quippe appellantur testamenta Dei exceptis illis duobus magnis, uetere et nouo, quod licet cuique legendo cognoscere. Testamentum autem primum, quod factum est ad hominem primum, profecto illud est: Qua die ederitis, morte moriemini. Vnde scriptum est in libro, qui ecclesiasticus appellatur: Omnis caro sicut uestis ueterescit. Testamentum enim a saeculo: Morte morieris. Cum enim lex evidentior postea data sit, et dicat apostolus: Vbi autem non est lex, nec praeuaricatio, quo pacto in psalmo quod legitur verum est: Praeuaricatores aestimavi omnes peccatores terrae, nisi quia omnes legis alicuius praeuaricatae sunt rei, qui aliquo peccato tenentur obstricti? Quam ob rem si etiam paruuli, quod vera fides habet, nascuntur non proprie, sed originaliter peccatores, unde illis gratiam remissionis peccatorum necessariam confitemur: profecto eo modo, quo sunt peccatores, etiam praeuaricatores legis illius, quae in paradiso data est, agnoscuntur; ut verum sit utrumque, quod scriptum est, et: Praeuaricatores aestimavi omnes peccatores terrae, et: Vbi lex non est, nec praeuaricatio. Ac per hoc, quia circumcisio signum regenerationis fuit et non inmerito paruulum propter originale peccatum, quo primum Dei dissipatum est testamentum, generatio disperdet, nisi regeneratio liberet: sic intellegenda sunt haec verba divina, tamquam dictum sit: "Qui non fuerit regeneratus, interibit anima illa de genere eius", quia testamentum Dei dissipavit, quando in Adam cum omnibus etiam ipse peccavit. Si enim dixisset: "Quia hoc testamentum meum dissipavit", non nisi de ista circumcisione intellegi cogeret; nunc vero, quoniam non expressit cuius modi testamentum paruulus dissipaverit, liberum est intellegere de illo testamento dictum, cuius dissipatio pertinere posset ad paruulum. Si autem hoc quisquam non nisi de ista circumcisione dictum esse contendit, quod in ea testamentum Dei, quoniam non est circumcisus, dissipaverit paruulus: quaerat locutionis aliquem modum, quo non absurde possit intellegi, ideo dissipasse testamentum, quia licet non ab illo, tamen in illo est dissipatum. Verum sic quoque animadvertendum est nulla in se neglegentia sua iniuste interire incircumcisi animam paruuli nisi originalis obligatione peccati. ||When it is said, "The male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that soul shall be cut off from his people, because he has broken my covenant," Genesis 17:14 some may be troubled how that ought to be understood, since it can be no fault of the infant whose life it is said must perish; nor has the covenant of God been broken by him, but by his parents, who have not taken care to circumcise him. But even the infants, not personally in their own life, but according to the common origin of the human race, have all broken God's covenant in that one in whom all have sinned. Now there are many things called God's covenants besides those two great ones, the old and the new, which any one who pleases may read and know. For the first covenant, which was made with the first man, is just this: "In the day ye eat thereof, you shall surely die." Genesis 2:17 Whence it is written in the book called Ecclesiasticus, "All flesh waxes old as does a garment. For the covenant from the beginning is, You shall die the death." Sirach 15:17 Now, as the law was more plainly given afterward, and the apostle says, "Where no law is, there is no prevarication," Romans 4:15 on what supposition is what is said in the psalm true, "I accounted all the sinners of the earth prevaricators," except that all who are held liable for any sin are accused of dealing deceitfully (prevaricating) with some law? If on this account, then, even the infants are, according to the true belief, born in sin, not actual but original, so that we confess they have need of grace for the remission of sins, certainly it must be acknowledged that in the same sense in which they are sinners they are also prevaricators of that law which was given in Paradise, according to the truth of both scriptures, "I accounted all the sinners of the earth prevaricators," and "Where no law is, there is no prevarication." And thus, be cause circumcision was the sign of regeneration, and the infant, on account of the original sin by which God's covenant was first broken, was not undeservedly to lose his generation unless delivered by regeneration, these divine words are to be understood as if it had been said, Whoever is not born again, that soul shall perish from his people, because he has broken my covenant, since he also has sinned in Adam with all others. For had He said, Because he has broken this my covenant, He would have compelled us to understand by it only this of circumcision; but since He has not expressly said what covenant the infant has broken, we are free to understand Him as speaking of that covenant of which the breach can be ascribed to an infant. Yet if any one contends that it is said of nothing else than circumcision, that in it the infant has broken the covenant of God because, he is not circumcised, he must seek some method of explanation by which it may be understood without absurdity (such as this) that he has broken the covenant, because it has been broken in him although not by him. Yet in this case also it is to be observed that the soul of the infant, being guilty of no sin of neglect against itself, would perish unjustly, unless original sin rendered it obnoxious to punishment.
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| − | ||<div id="c28"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXVIII] Facta igitur promissione tam magna tamque dilucida ad Abraham, cui evidentissime dictum est: Patrem multarum gentium posui te; et augeam te valde valde et ponam te in gentes, et reges ex te exibunt. Et dabo tibi ex Sarra filium, et benedicam illum, et erit in nationes, et reges gentium ex eo erunt (quam promissionem nunc in Christo cernimus reddi), ex illo deinceps illi coniuges non vocantur in scripturis, sicut antea vocabuntur, Abram et Sara, sed sicut eos nos ab initio vocavimus, quoniam sic iam vocantur ab omnibus, Abrabam et Sarra. Cur autem mutatum sit nomen Abrahae, reddita est ratio: Quia patrem, inquit, multarum gentium posui te. Hoc ergo significare intellegendum est Abraham; Abram vero, quod ante vocabatur, interpretatur pater excelsus. De nomine autem mutato Sarrae non est reddita ratio; sed, sicut aiunt, qui scripserunt interpretationes nominum Hebraeorum, quae his sacris litteris continentur, Sara interpretatur princeps mea, Sarra autem virtus. Vnde scriptum est in epistula ad Hebraeos: Fide et ipsa Sarra virtutem accepit ad emissionem seminis. Ambo enim seniores erant, sicut scriptura testatur; sed illa etiam sterilis et cruore menstruo iam destituta, propter quod iam parere non posset, etiam si sterilis non fuisset. Porro si femina ita sit provectioris aetatis, ut ei solita mulierum adhuc fluant, de ivuene parere potest, de seniore non potest; quamuis adhuc possit ille senior, sed de adulescentula gignere, sicut Abraham post mortem Sarrae de Cettura potuit, quia vividam eius invenit aetatem. Hoc ergo est, quod mirum commendat apostolus, et ad hoc dicit Abrahae iam fuisse corpus emortuum, quoniam non ex omni femina, cui adhuc esset aliquod pariendi tempus extremum, generare ipse in illa aetate adhuc posset. Ad aliquid enim emortuum corpus intellegere debemus, non ad omnia. Nam si ad omnia non iam senectus vivi, sed cadaver est mortui. Quamuis etiam sic solvi soleat ista quaestio, quod de Cettura postea genuit Abraham, quia donum gignendi, quod a Domino accepit, etiam post obitum mansit uxoris. Sed propterea mihi videtur illa, quam secuti sumus, huius quaestionis solutio praeferenda, quia centenarius quidem senex, sed temporis nostri, de nulla potest femina gignere; non tunc, quando adhuc tamdiu vivebant, ut centum anni nondum facerent hominem decrepitae senectutis. ||Now when a promise so great and clear was made to Abraham, in which it was so plainly said to him, "I have made you a father of many nations, and I will increase you exceedingly, and I will make nations of you, and kings shall go forth of you. And I will give you a son of Sarah; and I will bless him, and he shall become nations, and kings of nations shall be of him,"-a promise which we now see fulfilled in Christ,-from that time forward this couple are not called in Scripture, as formerly, Abram and Sarai, but Abraham and Sarah, as we have called them from the first, for every one does so now. The reason why the name of Abraham was changed is given: "For," He says, "I have made you a father of many nations." This, then, is to be understood to be the meaning of Abraham; but Abram, as he was formerly called, means "exalted father." The reason of the change of Sarah's name is not given; but as those say who have written interpretations of the Hebrew names contained in these books, Sarah means "my princess," and Sarai "strength." Whence it is written in the Epistle to the Hebrews, "Through faith also Sarah herself received strength to conceive seed." Hebrews 11:11 For both were old, as the Scripture testifies; but she was also barren, and had ceased to menstruate, so that she could no longer bear children even if she had not been barren. Further, if a woman is advanced in years, yet still retains the custom of women, she can bear children to a young man, but not to an old man, although that same old man can beget, but only of a young woman; as after Sarah's death Abraham could of Keturah, because he met with her in her lively age. This, then, is what the apostle mentions as wonderful, saying, besides, that Abraham's body was now dead; Hebrews 11:12 because at that age he was no longer able to beget children of any woman who retained now only a small part of her natural vigor. Of course we must understand that his body was dead only to some purposes, not to all; for if it was so to all, it would no longer be the aged body of a living man, but the corpse of a dead one. Although that question, how Abraham begot children of Keturah, is usually solved in this way, that the gift of begetting which he received from the Lord, remained even after the death of his wife, yet I think that solution of the question which I have followed is preferable, because, although in our days an old man of a hundred years can beget children of no woman, it was not so then, when men still lived so long that a hundred years did not yet bring on them the decrepitude of old age.
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| − | ||<div id="c29"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXIX] Item Deus apparuit Abrahae ad quercum Mambre in tribus viris, quos dubitandum non est angelos fuisse; quamuis quidam existiment unum in eis fuisse Dominum Christum, adserentes eum etiam ante indumentum carnis fuisse visibilem. Est quidem divinae potestatis et inuisibilis, incorporalis inmutabilisque naturae, sine ulla sui mutatione etiam mortalibus aspectibus apparere, non per id quod est, sed per aliquid quod sibi subditum est; quid autem illi subditum non est? Verum tamen si propterea confirmant horum trium aliquem fuisse Christum, quia, cum tres vidisset, ad Dominum singulariter est locutus (sic enim scriptum est: Et ecce tres viri stabant super eum, et videns procucurrit in obuiam illis ab ostio tabernaculi sui, et adoravit super terram et dixit: Domine, si inveni gratiam ante te, et cetera): cur non et illud advertunt, duos ex eis venisse, ut Sodomitae delerentur, cum adhuc Abrabam ad unum loqueretur, Dominum appellans et intercedens, ne simul iustum cum impio in Sodomis perderet? Illos autem duos sic suscepit Loth, ut etiam ipse in conloquio cum illis suo singulariter Dominum appellet. Nam cum eis pluraliter dixisset: Ecce, domini, declinate in domum pueri uestri, et cetera quae ibi dicuntur, postea tamen ita legitur: Et tenuerunt angeli manum eius et manum uxoris eius et manus duarum filiarum eius, in eo quod parceret Dominus ipsi. Et factum est, mox ut eduxerunt illum foras, et dixerunt: Saluam fac animam tuam, ne respexeris retro, nec steteris in tota regione; in monte saluum te fac, ne quando conprehendaris. Dixit autem Loth ad illos: Oro, Domine, quia invenit puer tuus misericordiam ante te, et quae sequuntur. Deinde post haec verba singulariter illi respondet et Dominus, cum in duobus angelis esset, dicens: Ecce miratus sum faciem tuam, et cetera. Vnde multo est credibilius, quod et Abraham in tribus et Loth in duobus viris Dominum agnoscebant, cui per singularem numerum loquebantur, etiam cum eos homines esse arbitrarentur; neque enim aliam ob causam sic eos susceperunt, ut tamquam mortalibus et humana refectione indigentibus ministrarent; sed erat profecto aliquid, quo ita excellebant, licet tamquam homines, ut in eis esse Dominum, sicut adsolet in prophetis, hi, qui hospitalitatem illis exhibebant, dubitare non possent; atque ideo et ipsos aliquando pluraliter et in eis Dominum aliquando singulariter appellabant. Angelos autem fuisse scriptura testatur, non solum in hoc genesis libro, ubi haec gesta narrantur, verum etiam in epistula ad Hebraeos, ubi, cum hospitalitas laudaretur: Per hanc, inquit, etiam quidam nescientes hospitio receperunt angelos. Per illos igitur tres viros, cum rursus filius Isaac de Sarra promitteretur Abrahae, divinum datum est etiam tale responsum, ut diceretur: Abraham erit in magnam gentem et multam, et benedicentur in eo omnes gentes terrae. Et hic duo illa brevissime plenissimeque promissa sunt, gens Israel secundum carnem et omnes gentes secundum fidem. ||God appeared again to Abraham at the oak of Mamre in three men, who it is not to be doubted were angels, although some think that one of them was Christ, and assert that He was visible before He put on flesh. Now it belongs to the divine power, and invisible, incorporeal, and incommutable nature, without changing itself at all, to appear even to mortal men, not by what it is, but by what is subject to it. And what is not subject to it? Yet if they try to establish that one of these three was Christ by the fact that, although he saw three, he addressed the Lord in the singular, as it is written, "And, lo, three men stood by him: and, when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent-door, and worshipped toward the ground, and said, Lord, if I have found favor before you," Genesis 18:2-3 etc.; why do they not advert to this also, that when two of them came to destroy the Sodomites, while Abraham still spoke to one, calling him Lord, and interceding that he would not destroy the righteous along with the wicked in Sodom, Lot received these two in such a way that he too in his conversation with them addressed the Lord in the singular? For after saying to them in the plural, "Behold, my lords, turn aside into your servant's house," Genesis 19:2 etc., yet it is afterwards said, "And the angels laid hold upon his hand, and the hand of his wife, and the hands of his two daughters, because the Lord was merciful unto him. And it came to pass, whenever they had led him forth abroad, that they said, Save your life; look not behind you, neither stay in all this region: save yourself in the mountain, lest you be caught. And Lot said unto them, I pray you, Lord, since your servant has found grace in your sight," Genesis 19:16-19 etc. And then after these words the Lord also answered him in the singular, although He was in two angels, saying, "See, I have accepted your face," Genesis 19:21 etc. This makes it much more credible that both Abraham in the three men and Lot in the two recognized the Lord, addressing Him in the singular number, even when they were addressing men; for they received them as they did for no other reason than that they might minister human refection to them as men who needed it. Yet there was about them something so excellent, that those who showed them hospitality as men could not doubt that God was in them as He was wont to be in the prophets, and therefore sometimes addressed them in the plural, and sometimes God in them in the singular. But that they were angels the Scripture testifies, not only in this book of Genesis, in which these transactions are related, but also in the Epistle to the Hebrews, where in praising hospitality it is said, "For thereby some have entertained angels unawares." Hebrews 13:2 By these three men, then, when a son Isaac was again promised to Abraham by Sarah, such a divine oracle was also given that it was said, "Abraham shall become a great and numerous nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him." Genesis 18:18 And here these two things, are promised with the utmost brevity and fullness,-the nation of Israel according to the flesh, and all nations according to faith.
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| − | ||<div id="c30"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXX] Post hanc promissionem liberato de Sodomis Loth et veniente igneo imbre de caelo tota illa regio impiae civitatis in cinerem versa est, ubi stupra in masculos in tantam consuetudinem conualuerant, quantam leges solent aliorum factorum praebere licentiam. Verum et hoc eorum supplicium specimen futuri iudicii divini fuit. Nam quo pertinet quod prohibiti sunt qui liberabantur ab angelis retro respicere, nisi quia non est animo redeundum ad ueterem vitam, qua per gratiam regeneratus exuitur, si ultimum euadere iudicium cogitamus? Denique uxor Loth, ubi respexit, remansit et in salem conversa hominibus fidelibus quoddam praestitit condimentum, quo sapiant aliquid, unde illud caveatur exemplum. Inde rursus Abraham fecit in Geraris apud regem civitatis illius Abimelech, quod in Aegypto de coniuge fecerat, eique intacta similiter reddita est. Vbi sane Abraham obiurganti regi, cur tacuisset uxorem sororemque dixisset, aperiens quid timuerit etiam hoc addidit: Etenim vere soror mea est de patre, sed non de matre, quia de patre suo soror erat Abrahae, de quo propinqua eius erat. Tantae autem pulchritudinis fuit, ut etiam in illa aetate posset adamari. ||After this promise Lot was delivered out of Sodom, and a fiery rain from heaven turned into ashes that whole region of the impious city, where custom had made sodomy as prevalent as laws have elsewhere made other kinds of wickedness. But this punishment of theirs was a specimen of the divine judgment to come. For what is meant by the angels forbidding those who were delivered to look back, but that we are not to look back in heart to the old life which, being regenerated through grace, we have put off, if we think to escape the last judgment? Lot's wife, indeed, when she looked back, remained, and, being turned into salt, furnished to believing men a condiment by which to savor somewhat the warning to be drawn from that example. Then Abraham did again at Gerar, with Abimelech the king of that city, what he had done in Egypt about his wife, and received her back untouched in the same way. On this occasion, when the king rebuked Abraham for not saying she was his wife, and calling her his sister, he explained what he had been afraid of, and added this further, "And yet indeed she is my sister by the father's side, but not by the mother's; Genesis 20:12 for she was Abraham's sister by his own father, and so near of kin. But her beauty was so great, that even at that advanced age she could be fallen in love with.
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| − | ||<div id="c31"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXI] Post haec natus est Abrahae secundum promissionem Dei de Sarra filius, eumque nominavit Isaac, quod interpretatur risus. Riserat enim et pater, quando ei promissus est, admirans in gaudio; riserat et mater, quando per illos tres viros iterum promissus est, dubitans in gaudio; quamuis exprobrante angelo, quod risus ille, etiamsi gaudii fuit, tamen plenae fidei non fuit, post ab eodem angelo in fide etiam confirmata est. Ex hoc ergo puer nomen accepit. Nam quod risus ille non ad inridendum opprobrium,sed ad celebrandum gaudium pertinebat, nato Isaac et eo nomine vocato Sarra monstravit; ait quippe: Risum mihi fecit Dominus; quicumque enim audierit, congaudebit mihi. Sed post aliquantulum tempus ancilla de domo eicitur cum filio suo, et duo illa secundum apostolum testamenta significantur, uetus et nouum, ubi Sarra illa supernae Hierusalem, hoc est civitatis Dei, figuram gerit. ||After these things a son was born to Abraham, according to God's promise, of Sarah, and was called Isaac, which means laughter. For his father had laughed when he was promised to him, in wondering delight, and his mother, when he was again promised by those three men, had laughed, doubting for joy; yet she was blamed by the angel because that laughter, although it was for joy, yet was not full of faith. Afterwards she was confirmed in faith by the same angel. From this, then, the boy got his name. For when Isaac was born and called by that name, Sarah showed that her laughter was not that of scornful reproach, but that of joyful praise; for she said, "God has made me to laugh, so that every one who hears will laugh with me." Genesis 21:6 Then in a little while the bond maid was cast out of the house with her son; and, according to the apostle, these two women signify the old and new covenants,-Sarah representing that of the Jerusalem which is above, that is, the city of God. Galatians 4:24-26
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| − | ||<div id="c32"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXII] Inter haec, quae omnia commemorare nimis longum est, temptatur Abraham de immolando dilectissimo filio ipso Isaac, ut pia eius oboedientia probaretur, saeclis in notitiam proferenda, non Deo. Neque enim omnis est culpanda temptatio, quia et gratulanda est, qua fit probatio. Et plerumque aliter animus humanus sibi ipsi innotescere non potest, nisi vires suas sibi non verbo, sedexperimento temptatione quodam modo interrogante respondeat; ubi si Dei munus agnoverit, tunc pius est, tunc solidatur firmitate gratiae, non inflatur inanitate iactantiae. Numquam sane crederet Abraham, quod victimis Deus delectaretur humanis; quamuis divino intonante praecepto oboediendum sit, non disputandum. Verum tamen Abrabam confestim filium, cum fuisset immolatus, resurrecturum credidisse laudandus est. Dixerat namque illi Deus, cum de ancilla et filio eius foras eiciendis voluntatem coniugis nollet implere: In Isaac vocabitur tibi semen. Et certe ibi sequitur ac dicitur: Et filium autem ancillae huius in magnam gentem faciam illum, quia semen tuum est. Quo modo ergo dictum est: In Isaac vocabitur tibi semen, cum et Ismaelem Deus semen eius vocaverit? Exponens autem apostolus quid sit: In Isaac vocabitur tibi semen: Id est, inquit, non qui filii carnis, hi filii Dei, sed filii promissionis deputantur in semen. Ac per hoc filii promissionis, ut sint semen Abrahae, in Isaac vocantur, hoc est in Christo vocante gratia congregantur. Hanc ergo promissionem pater pius fideliter tenens, quia per hunc oportebat impleri, quem Deus iubebat occidi non haesitavit quod sibi reddi poterat immolatus, qui dari potuit non speratus. Sic intellectum est et in epistula ad Hebraeos, et sic expositum. Fide, inquit, praecessit. Abraham Isaac temptatus et unicum obtulit, qui promissiones suscepit, ad quem dictum est: In Isaac vocabitur tibi semen, cogitans quia et ex mortuis suscitare potest Deus. Proinde addidit: Pro hoc etiam eum et in similitudinem adduxit; cuius similitudinem, nisi illius unde dicit apostolus: Qui proprio filio non pepercit, sed pro nobis omnibus tradidit eum? Propterea et Isaac, sicut Dominus crucem suam, ita sibi ligna ad victimae locum, quibus fuerat et inponendus, ipse portavit. Postremo quia Isaac occidi non oportebat, postea quam est pater ferire prohibitus, quis erat ille aries, quo immolato impletum est significativo sanguine sacrificium? Nempe quando eum vidit Abrabam, cornibus in frutice tenebatur. Quis ergo illo figurabatur, nisi Iesus, antequam immolaretur, spinis Iudaicis coronatus? Sed divina per angelum verba potius audiamus. Ait quippe scriptura: Et extendit Abraham manum suam sumere machaeram, ut occideret filium suum. Et vocavit illum angelus Domini de caelo et dixit: Abraham! Ille autem dixit: Ecce ego. Et dixit: Non inicias manum tuam super puerum, neque facias illi quicquam; nunc enim scivi quia times Deum tuum, et non pepercisti filio tuo dilecto propter me. Nunc scivi dictum est "nunc sciri feci"; neque enim hoc nondum sciebat Deus. Deinde ariete illo immolato pro Isaac filio suo vocavit, ut legitur, Abraham nomen loci illius: Dominus vidit; ut dicant hodie: In monte Dominus apparuit. Sicut dictum est: Nunc scivi, pro eo quod est nunc sciri feci: ita hic Dominus vidit, pro eo quod est Dominus apparuit, hoc est videri se fecit. Et vocavit angelus Domini Abraham secundo de caelo dicens: Per me ipsum iuravi, dicit Dominus, propter quod fecisti verbum hoc et non pepercisti filio tuo dilecto propter me, nisi benedicens benedicam te, et multiplicans multiplicabo semen tuum tamquam stellas caeli et tamquam harenam, quae iuxta labium maris. Et hereditate possidebit semen tuum civitates adversariorum, et benedicentur in semine tuo omnes gentes terrae, quia obaudisti vocem meam. Hoc modo est illa de vocatione gentium in semine Abrahae post holocaustum, quo significatus est Christus, etiam iuratione Dei firmata promissio. Saepe enim promiserat, sed numquam iuraverat. Quid est autem Dei veri veracisque iuratio nisi promissi confirmatio et infidelium quaedam increpatio? Post haec Sarra mortua est, centensimo vicensimo septimo anno vitae suae, centensimo autem et tricensimo septimo viri sui. Decem quippe annis eam praecedebat aetate; sicut ipse, quando sibi ex illa promissus est filius, ait: Si mihi annorum centum nascetur <filius>, et si Sarra annorum nonaginta pariet. Tunc emit agrum Abraham, in quo sepelivit uxorem. Tunc ergo secundum narrationem Stephani in terra illa est conlocatus, quoniam coepit ibi esse possessor; post mortem scilicet patris sui, qui colligitur ante biennium fuisse defunctus. ||Among other things, of which it would take too long time to mention the whole, Abraham was tempted about the offering up of his well-beloved son Isaac, to prove his pious obedience, and so make it known to the world, not to God. Now every temptation is not blame-worthy; it may even be praise-worthy, because it furnishes probation. And, for the most part, the human mind cannot attain to self-knowledge otherwise than by making trial of its powers through temptation, by some kind of experimental and not merely verbal self-interrogation; when, if it has acknowledged the gift of God, it is pious, and is consolidated by steadfast grace and not puffed up by vain boasting. Of course Abraham could never believe that God delighted in human sacrifices; yet when the divine commandment thundered, it was to be obeyed, not disputed. Yet Abraham is worthy of praise, because he all along believed that his son, on being offered up, would rise again; for God had said to him, when he was unwilling to fulfill his wife's pleasure by casting out the bond maid and her son, "In Isaac shall your seed be called." No doubt He then goes on to say, "And as for the son of this bond woman, I will make him a great nation, because he is your seed." Genesis 21:12-13 How then is it said "In Isaac shall your seed be called," when God calls Ishmael also his seed? The apostle, in explaining this, says, "In Isaac shall your seed be called, that is, they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed." Romans 9:7-8 In order, then, that the children of the promise may be the seed of Abraham, they are called in Isaac, that is, are gathered together in Christ by the call of grace. Therefore the father, holding fast from the first the promise which behoved to be fulfilled through this son whom God had ordered him to slay, did not doubt that he whom he once thought it hopeless he should ever receive would be restored to him when he had offered him up. It is in this way the passage in the Epistle to the Hebrews is also to be understood and explained. "By faith," he says, "Abraham overcame, when tempted about Isaac: and he who had received the promise offered up his only son, to whom it was said, In Isaac shall your seed be called: thinking that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead;" therefore he has added, "from whence also he received him in a similitude." Hebrews 11:17-19 In whose similitude but His of whom the apostle says, "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all?" Romans 8:32 And on this account Isaac also himself carried to the place of sacrifice the wood on which he was to be offered up, just as the Lord Himself carried His own cross. Finally, since Isaac was not to be slain, after his father was forbidden to smite him, who was that ram by the offering of which that sacrifice was completed with typical blood? For when Abraham saw him, he was caught by the horns in a thicket. What, then, did he represent but Jesus, who, before He was offered up, was crowned with thorns by the Jews?But let us rather hear the divine words spoken through the angel. For the Scripture says, "And Abraham stretched forth his hand to take the knife, that he might slay his son. And the Angel of the Lord called unto him from heaven, and said, Abraham. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Lay not your hand upon the lad, neither do anything unto him: for now I know that you fear God, and hast not spared your beloved son for my sake." Genesis 22:10-12 It is said, "Now I know," that is, Now I have made to be known; for God was not previously ignorant of this. Then, having offered up that ram instead of Isaac his son, "Abraham," as we read, "called the name of that place The Lord sees: as they say this day, In the mount the Lord has appeared." Genesis 22:14 As it is said, "Now I know," for Now I have made to be known, so here, "The Lord sees," for The Lord has appeared, that is, made Himself to be seen. "And the Angel of the Lord called unto Abraham from heaven the second time, saying, By myself have I sworn, says the Lord; because you have done this thing, and hast not spared your beloved son for my sake; that in blessing I will bless you, and in multiplying I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and as the sand which is upon the seashore; and your seed shall possess by inheritance the cities of the adversaries: and in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because you have obeyed my voice." Genesis 22:15-18 In this manner is that promise concerning the calling of the nations in the seed of Abraham confirmed even by the oath of God, after that burnt-offering which typified Christ. For He had often promised, but never sworn. And what is the oath of God, the true and faithful, but a confirmation of the promise, and a certain reproof to the unbelieving?After these things Sarah died, in the 127th year of her life, and the 137th of her husband for he was ten years older than she, as he himself says, when a son is promised to him by her: "Shall a son be born to me that am an hundred years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear?" Genesis 17:17 Then Abraham bought a field, in which he buried his wife. And then, according to Stephen's account, he was settled in that land, entering then on actual possession of it,-that is, after the death of his father, who is inferred to have died two years before.
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| − | ||<div id="c33"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXIII] Deinde Rebeccam neptem Nachor patrui sui, cum annorum quadraginta esset Isaac, duxit uxorem, centensimo scilicet et quadragensimo anno vitae patris sui, triennio post mortem matris suae. Vt autem illam duceret, quando ab eius patre in Mesopotamiam seruus missus est, quid aliud demonstratum est, cum eidem seruo dixit Abraham: Pone manum tuam sub femore meo, et adiurabo te Dominum Deum caeli et Dominum terrae, ut non sumas uxorem filio meo Isaac a filiabus Chananaeorum, nisi Dominum Deum caeli et Dominum terrae in carne, quae ex illo femore trahebatur, fuisse venturum? Numquid haec parua sunt praenuntiatae indicia veritatis, quam conpleri videmus in Christo? ||Isaac married Rebecca, the grand-daughter of Nahor, his father's brother, when he was forty years old, that is, in the 140th year of his father's life, three years after his mother's death. Now when a servant was sent to Mesopotamia by his father to fetch her, and when Abraham said to that servant, "Put your hand under my thigh, and I will make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven, and the Lord of the earth, that you shall not take a wife unto my son Isaac of the daughters of the Canaanites," Genesis 24:2-3 what else was pointed out by this, but that the Lord, the God of heaven, and the Lord of the earth, was to come in the flesh which was to be derived from that thigh? Are these small tokens of the foretold truth which we see fulfilled in Christ?
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| − | ||<div id="c34"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXIV] Quid autem sibi uult, quod Abraham post mortem Sarrae Cetturam duxit uxorem? Vbi absit ut incontinentiam suspicemur, praesertim in illa iam aetate et in illa fidei sanctitate. An adhuc procreandi filii quaerebantur, cum iam Deo promittente tanta multiplicatio filiorum ex Isaac per stellas caeli et harenam terrae fide probatissima teneretur? Sed profecto si Agar et Ismael, doctore apostolo, significaverunt carnales ueteris testamenti, cur non etiam Cettura et filii eius significent carnales, qui se ad testamentum nouum existimant pertinere? Ambae quippe et uxores Abrahae et concubinae sunt appellatae; Sarra vero numquam dicta est concubina. Nam et quando data est Agar Abrahae, ita scriptum est: Et adprehendit Sara uxor Abram Agar Aegyptiam ancillam suam post decem annos, quam habitaverat Abram in terra Chanaan, et dedit eam Abram viro suo ipsi uxorem. De Cettura autem, quam post obitum Sarrae accepit, sic legitur: Adiciens autem Abraham sumpsit uxorem, cui nomen Cettura. Ecce ambae dicuntur uxores; ambae porro concubinae fuisse reperiuntur, postea dicente scriptura: Dedit autem Abraham omnem censum suum Isaac filio suo, et filiis concubinarum suarum dedit Abraham dationes et dimisit eos ab Isaac filio suo adhuc se vivo ad orientem, in terram orientis. Habent ergo nonnulla munera filii concubinarum, sed non perveniunt ad regnum promissum, nec haeretici, nec Iudaei carnales, quia praeter Isaac nullus est heres, et non qui filii carnis, hi filii Dei, sed filii promissionis deputantur in semine, de quo dictum est: In Isaac vocabitur tibi semen. Neque enim video, cur etiam Cettura post uxoris mortem ducta, nisi propter hoc mysterium, dicta sit concubina. Sed quisquis haec non uult in istis significationibus accipere, non calumnietur Abrahae. Quid si enim et hoc provisum est contra haereticos futuros secundarum adversarios nuptiarum, ut in ipso patre multarum gentium post obitum coniugis iterum coniugari demonstraretur non esse peccatum? Et mortuus est Abraham, cum esset annorum centum septuaginta <quinque>. Annorum ergo septuaginta <quinque> Isaac filium dereliquit, quem centenarius genuit. ||What did Abraham mean by marrying Keturah after Sarah's death? Far be it from us to suspect him of incontinence, especially when he had reached such an age and such sanctity of faith. Or was he still seeking to beget children, though he held fast, with most approved faith, the promise of God that his children should be multiplied out of Isaac as the stars of heaven and the dust of the earth? And yet, if Hagar and Ishmael, as the apostle teaches us, signified the carnal people of the old covenant, why may not Keturah and her sons also signify the carnal people who think they belong to the new covenant? For both are called both the wives and the concubines of Abraham; but Sarah is never called a concubine (but only a wife). For when Hagar is given to Abraham, it is written. "And Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her handmaid, after Abraham had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife." Genesis 16:3 And of Keturah, whom he took after Sarah's departure, we read, "Then again Abraham took a wife, whose name was Keturah." Genesis 25:1 Lo! both are called wives, yet both are found to have been concubines; for the Scripture afterward says, "And Abraham gave his whole estate unto Isaac his son. But unto the sons of his concubines Abraham gave gifts, and sent them away from his son Isaac, (while he yet lived,) eastward, unto the east country." Genesis 25:5-6 Therefore the sons of the concubines, that is, the heretics and the carnal Jews, have some gifts, but do not attain the promised kingdom; "For they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed, of whom it was said, In Isaac shall your seed be called." Romans 9:7-8 For I do not see why Keturah, who was married after the wife's death, should be called a concubine, except on account of this mystery. But if any one is unwilling to put such meanings on these things, he need not calumniate Abraham. For what if even this was provided against the heretics who were to be the opponents of second marriages, so that it might be shown that it was no sin in the case of the father of many nations himself, when, after his wife's death, he married again? And Abraham died when he was 175 years old, so that he left his son Isaac seventy-five years old, having begotten him when 100 years old.
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| − | ||<div id="c35"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXV] Iam ex hoc, quem ad modum per posteros Abrahae civitatis Dei procurrant tempora, videamus. A primo igitur anno vitae Isaac usque ad sexagensimum, quo ei nati sunt filii, illud memorabile est, quod, cum illi Deum roganti ut pareret uxor eius, quae sterilis erat, concessisset Dominus quod petebat, atque haberet illa conceptum, gestiebant gemini adhuc in utero eius inclusi. Qua molestia cum angeretur, Dominum interrogavit accepitque responsum: Duae gentes in utero tuo sunt et duo populi de ventre tuo separabuntur et populus populum superabit et maior seruiet minori. Quod Paulus apostolus magnum uult intellegi gratiae documentum, quia nondum illis natis nec aliquid agentibus boni seu mali sine ullis bonis meritis eligitur minor maiore reprobato; quando procul dubio, quantum adtinet ad originale peccatum, ambo pares erant; quantum autem ad proprium, ullius eorum nullum erat. Sed nunc de hac re dicere aliquid latius instituti operis ratio non sinit, unde in aliis multa iam diximus. Quod autem dictum est: Maior seruiet minori, nemo fere nostrorum aliter intellexit, quam maiorem populum Iudaeorum minori Christiano populo seruiturum. Et re vera quamuis in gente Idumaeorum, quae nata est de maiore, cui duo nomina erant (nam et Esau vocabatur et Edom, unde Idumaei), hoc videri possit impletum, quia postea superanda fuerat a populo, qui ortus est ex minore, id est Israelitico, eique fuerat futura subiecta: tamen in aliquid maius intentam fuisse istam prophetiam, qua dictum est: Populus populum superabit et maior seruiet minori, convenientius creditur. Et quid est hoc, nisi quod in Iudaeis et Christianis evidenter impletur? ||Let us now see how the times of the city of God run on from this point among Abraham's descendants. In the time from the first year of Isaac's life to the seventieth, when his sons were born, the only memorable thing is, that when he prayed God that his wife, who was barren, might bear, and the Lord granted what he sought, and she conceived, the twins leapt while still enclosed in her womb. And when she was troubled by this struggle, and inquired of the Lord, she received this answer: "Two nations are in your womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from your bowels; and the one people shall overcome the other people, and the elder shall serve the younger." Genesis 25:23 The Apostle Paul would have us understand this as a great instance of grace; Romans 9:10-13 for the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, the younger is chosen without any good desert and the elder is rejected, when beyond doubt, as regards original sin, both were alike, and as regards actual sin, neither had any. But the plan of the work on hand does not permit me to speak more fully of this matter now, and I have said much about it in other works. Only that saying, "The elder shall serve the younger," is understood by our writers, almost without exception, to mean that the elder people, the Jews, shall serve the younger people, the Christians. And truly, although this might seem to be fulfilled in the Idumean nation, which was born of the elder (who had two names, being called both Esau and Edom, whence the name Idumeans), because it was afterwards to be overcome by the people which sprang from the younger, that is, by the Israelites, and was to become subject to them; yet it is more suitable to believe that, when it was said, "The one people shall overcome the other people, and the elder shall serve the younger," that prophecy meant some greater thing; and what is that except what is evidently fulfilled in the Jews and Christians?
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| − | ||<div id="c36"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXVI] Accepit etiam Isaac tale oraculum, quale aliquotiens pater eius acceperat. De quo oraculo sic scriptum est: Facta est autem fames super terram praeter famem, quae prius facta est in tempore Abrahae. Abiit autem Isaac ad Abimelech regem Philistinorum in Gerara. Apparuit autem illi Dominus et dixit: Noli descendere in Aegyptum; habita autem in terra, quam tibi dixero, et incole in terra hac; et ero tecum et benedicam te. Tibi enim et semini tuo dabo omnem terram hanc, et statuam iuramentum meum, quod iuravi Abrahae patri tuo; et multiplicabo semen tuum tamquam stellas caeli, et dabo semini tuo omnem terram hanc, et benedicentur in semine toto omnes gentes terrae, pro eo quod obaudivit Abraham pater tuus vocem meam et custodivit praecepta mea et mandata mea et iustificationes meas et legitima mea. Iste patriarcha nec uxorem habuit aliam nec aliquam concubinam, sed posteritate duorum geminorum ex uno concubitu procreatorum contentus fuit. (Timuit sane etiam ipse periculum de pulchritudine coniugis, cum habitaret inter alienos, fecitque quod pater, ut eam sororem diceret, taceret uxorem; erat enim ei propinqua et paterno et materno sanguine; sed etiam ipsa ab alienis, cognito quod uxor esset, mansit intacta.) Nec ideo tamen istum patri eius praeferre debemus, quia iste nullam feminam praeter unam coniugem noverat. Erant enim procul dubio paternae fidei et oboedientiae merita potiora, in tantum, ut propter illum dicat Deus huic se facere bona quae facit. Benedicentur, inquit, in semine tuo omnes gentes terrae, pro eo quod obaudivit Abraham pater tuus vocem meam et custodivit praecepta mea et mandata mea et iustificationes meas et legitima mea; et alio rursus oraculo: Ego sum, inquit, Deus Abraham patris tui, noli timere; tecum enim sum et benedixi te et multiplicabo semen tuum propter Abraham patrem tuum; ut intellegamus quam caste Abrabam fecerit, quod hominibus inpudicis et nequitiae suae de scripturis sanctis patrocinia requirentibus videtur fecisse libidine; deinde ut etiam hoc noverimus, non ex bonis singulis inter se homines conparare, sed in uno quoque consideremus universa. Fieri enim potest, ut habeat aliquid in vita et moribus quispiam, quo superat alium, idque sit longe praestabilius, quam est illud, unde ab alio superatur. Ac per hoc sano veroque iudicio, cum continentia coniugio praeferatur, melior est tamen homo fidelis coniugatus quam continens infidelis. Sed infidelis homo non solum minus laudandus, verum etiam maxime detestandus est. Constituamus ambos bonos; etiam sic profecto melior est coniugatus fidelissimus et oboedientissimus Deo quam continens minoris fidei minorisque oboedientiae. Si vero paria sint cetera, continentem coniugato praeferre quis ambigat? ||Isaac also received such an oracle as his father had often received. Of this oracle it is thus written: "And there was a famine over the land, beside the first famine that was in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went unto Abimelech king of the Philistines unto Gerar. And the Lord appeared unto him, and said, Go not down into Egypt; but dwell in the land which I shall tell you of. And abide in this land, and I will be with you, and will bless you: unto you and unto your seed I will give all this land; and I will establish mine oath, which I sware unto Abraham your father: and I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and will give unto your seed all this land: and in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because that Abraham your father obeyed my voice, and kept my precepts, my commandments, my righteousness, and my laws." Genesis 26:1-5 This patriarch neither had another wife, nor any concubine, but was content with the twin-children begotten by one act of generation. He also was afraid, when he lived among strangers, of being brought into danger owing to the beauty of his wife, and did like his father in calling her his sister, and not telling that she was his wife; for she was his near blood-relation by the father's and mother's side. She also remained untouched by the strangers, when it was known she was his wife. Yet we ought not to prefer him to his father because he knew no woman besides his one wife. For beyond doubt the merits of his father's faith and obedience were greater, inasmuch as God says it is for his sake He does Isaac good: "In your seed," He says, "shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because that Abraham your father obeyed my voice, and kept my precepts, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws." And again in another oracle He says, "I am the God of Abraham your father: fear not, for I am with you, and will bless you, and multiply your seed for my servant Abraham's sake." Genesis 26:24 So that we must understand how chastely Abraham acted, because imprudent men, who seek some support for their own wickedness in the Holy Scriptures, think he acted through lust. We may also learn this, not to compare men by single good things, but to consider everything in each; for it may happen that one man has something in his life and character in which he excels another, and it may be far more excellent than that in which the other excels him. And thus, according to sound and true judgment, while continence is preferable to marriage, yet a believing married man is better than a continent unbeliever; for the unbeliever is not only less praiseworthy, but is even highly detestable. We must conclude, then, that both are good; yet so as to hold that the married man who is most faithful and most obedient is certainly better than the continent man whose faith and obedience are less. But if equal in other things, who would hesitate to prefer the continent man to the married?
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| − | ||<div id="c37"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXVII] Duo igitur Isaac filii Esau et Iacob pariter crescunt. Primatus maioris transfunditur in minorem ex pacto et placito inter illos, eo quod lenticulam, quem cibum minor paraverat, maior inmoderatius concupivit, eoque pretio primogenita sua fratri iuratione interposita vendidit. Vbi discimus in uescendo non cibi genere, sed aviditate inmodesta quemque culpandum. Senescit Isaac eiusque oculis per senectam visus aufertur. Vult benedicere filium maiorem et pro illo nesciens benedicit minorem, pro fratre maiore, qui erat pilosus, se paternis manibus supponentem, haedinis sibi pelliculis coaptatis velut aliena peccata portantem. Iste dolus Iacob ne putaretur fraudulentus dolus et non in eo magnae rei mysterium quaereretur, superius praedixit scriptura: Et erat Esau homo sciens venari, agrestis. Iacob autem homo simplex, habitans domum. Hoc nostri quidam interpretati sunt "sine dolo". Sive autem "sine dolo" sive "simplex" sive potius "sine fictione" dicatur, quod est Graece *a)/plastos: quis est in ista percipienda benedictione dolus hominis sine dolo? Quis est dolus simplicis, quae fictio non mentientis, nisi profundum mysterium veritatis? Ipsa autem benedictio qualis est? Ecce, inquit, odor filii mei tamquam odor agri pleni, quem benedixit Dominus. Et det tibi Deus de rore caeli et de ubertate terrae et multitudinem frumenti et vini, et seruiant tibi gentes et adorent te principes et fiere dominus fratris tui et adorabunt te filii patris tui. Qui maledixerit te, maledictus; et qui benedixerit te, benedictus. Benedictio igitur Iacob praedicatio est Christi in omnibus gentibus. Hoc fit, hoc agitur. Lex et prophetia est Isaac; etiam per os Iudaeorum Christus ab illa benedicitur velut a nesciente, quia ipsa nescitur. Odore nominis Christi, sicut ager, mundus impletur; eius est benedictio de rore caeli, hoc est de verborum pluuia divinorum, et de ubertate terrae, hoc est congregatione populorum; eius est multitudo frumenti et vini, hoc est multitudo quam colligit frumentum et vinum in sacramento corporis eius et sanguinis. Ei seruiunt gentes, ipsum adorant principes. Ipse est dominus fratris sui, quia populus eius dominatur Iudaeis. Ipsum adorant filii patris eius, hoc est filii Abrabae secundum fidem; quia et ipse filius est Abrahae secundum carnem. Ipsum qui maledixerit, maledictus, et qui benedixerit, benedictus est. Christus, inquam, noster etiam ex ore Iudaeorum quamuis errantium, sed tamen legem prophetasque cantantium benedicitur, id est veraciter dicitur; et alius benedici putatur, qui ab eis errantibus expectatur. Ecce benedictionem promissam repetente maiore expavescit Isaac et alium se pro alio benedixisse cognoscit; miratur et quisnam ille sit percontatur; nec tamen se deceptum esse conqueritur; immo confestim reuelato sibi intus in corde magno sacramento devitat indignationem, confirmat benedictionem. Quis ergo, inquit, venatus est mihi venationem et intulit mihi, et manducavi ab omnibus, antequam tu venires? et benedixi eum, et benedictus sit. Quis non hic maledictionem potius expectaret irati, si haec non superna inspiratione, sed terreno more gererentur? O res gestas, sed prophetice gestas; in terra, sed caelitus; per homines, sed divinitus! Si excutiantur singula tantis fecunda mysteriis, multa sunt implenda volumina; sed huic operi modus moderate inponendus nos in alia festinare conpellit. ||Isaac's two sons, Esau and Jacob, grew up together. The primacy of the elder was transferred to the younger by a bargain and agreement between them, when the elder immoderately lusted after the lentiles the younger had prepared for food, and for that price sold his birthright to him, confirming it with an oath. We learn from this that a person is to be blamed, not for the kind of food he eats, but for immoderate greed. Isaac grew old, and old age deprived him of his eyesight. He wished to bless the elder son, and instead of the elder, who was hairy, unwittingly blessed the younger, who put himself under his father's hands, having covered himself with kid-skins, as if bearing the sins of others. Lest we should think this guile of Jacob's was fraudulent guile, instead of seeking in it the mystery of a great thing, the Scripture has predicted in the words just before, "Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field; and Jacob was a simple man, dwelling at home." Genesis 25:27 Some of our writers have interpreted this, "without guile." But whether the Greek ??ast?? means "without guile," or "simple," or rather "without reigning," in the receiving of that blessing what is the guile of the man without guile? What is the guile of the simple, what the fiction of the man who does not lie, but a profound mystery of the truth? But what is the blessing itself? "See," he says, "the smell of my son is as the smell of a full field which the Lord has blessed: therefore God give you of the dew of heaven, and of the fruitfulness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine: let nations serve you, and princes adore you: and be lord of your brethren, and let your father's sons adore you: cursed be he that curses you, and blessed be he that blesses you." Genesis 27:27-29 The blessing of Jacob is therefore a proclamation of Christ to all nations. It is this which has come to pass, and is now being fulfilled. Isaac is the law and the prophecy: even by the mouth of the Jews Christ is blessed by prophecy as by one who knows not, because it is itself not understood. The world like a field is filled with the odor of Christ's name: His is the blessing of the dew of heaven, that is, of the showers of divine words; and of the fruitfulness of the earth, that is, of the gathering together of the peoples: His is the plenty of corn and wine, that is, the multitude that gathers bread and wine in the sacrament of His body and blood. Him the nations serve, Him princes adore. He is the Lord of His brethren, because His people rules over the Jews. Him His Father's sons adore, that is, the sons of Abraham according to faith; for He Himself is the son of Abraham according to the flesh. He is cursed that curses Him, and he that blesses Him is blessed. Christ, I say, who is ours is blessed, that is, truly spoken of out of the mouths of the Jews, when, although erring, they yet sing the law and the prophets, and think they are blessing another for whom they erringly hope. So, when the elder son claims the promised blessing, Isaac is greatly afraid, and wonders when he knows that he has blessed one instead of the other, and demands who he is; yet he does not complain that he has been deceived, yea, when the great mystery is revealed to him, in his secret heart he at once eschews anger, and confirms the blessing. "Who then," he says, "has hunted me venison, and brought it me, and I have eaten of all before you came, and have blessed him, and he shall be blessed?" Genesis 27:33 Who would not rather have expected the curse of an angry man here, if these things had been done in an earthly manner, and not by inspiration from above? O things done, yet done prophetically; on the earth, yet celestially; by men, yet divinely! If everything that is fertile of so great mysteries should be examined carefully, many volumes would be filled; but the moderate compass fixed for this work compels us to hasten to other things.
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| − | ||<div id="c38"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXVIII] Mittitur Iacob a parentibus in Mesopotamiam, ut ibi ducat uxorem. Patris mittentis verba haec sunt: Non accipies uxorem ex filiabus Chananaeorum; surgens fuge in Mesopotamiam in domum Bathuel, patris matris tuae, et sume tibi inde uxorem de filiabus Laban, fratris matris tuae? Deus autem meus benedicat te et augeat te et multiplicet te; et eris in congregationes gentium; et det tibi benedictionem Abraham patris tui, tibi et semini tuo postte, ut heres fias terrae incolatus tui, quam dedit Deus Abraham. Hic iam intellegimus segregatum semen Iacob ab alio semine Isaac, quod factum est per Esau. Quando enim dictum est: In Isaac vocabitur tibi semen, pertinens utique semen ad civitatem Dei, separatum est inde aliud semen Abrahae, quod erat in ancillae filio, et quod futurum erat in filiis Cetturae. Sed adhuc erat ambiguum de duobus geminis filiis Isaac, ad utrumque an ad unum eorum illa benedictio pertineret; et si ad unum, quisnam esset illorum. Quod nunc declaratum est, cum prophetice a patre benedicitur Iacob et dicitur ei: Et eris in congregationes gentium, et det tibi benedictionem Abraham patris tui. Pergens itaque in Mesopotamiam Iacob in somnis accepit oraculum, de quo sic scriptum est: Et exiit Iacob a puteo iurationis et profectus est in Charran et devenit in locum et dormivit ibi; occiderat enim sol; et sumpsit ex lapidibus loci et posuit ad caput suum et dormivit in loco illo et somniavit. Et ecce scala stabilita super terram, cuius caput pertingebat ad caelum; et angeli Dei ascendebant et descendebant per illam, et Dominus incumbebat super illam et dixit: Ego sum Deus Abraham patris tui et Deus Isaac, noli timere; terram, in qua tu dormis super eam, tibi dabo illam et semini tuo; et erit semen tuum sicut harena terrae, et dilatabitur supra mare et in Africum et in aquilonem et ad orientem; et benedicentur in te omnes tribus terrae et in semine tuo. Et ecce ego sum tecum, custodiens te in omni via quacumque ibis, et reducam te in terram hanc, quia non te derelinquam, donec faciam omnia, quae tecum locutus sum. Et surrexit Iacob de somno suo et dixit: Quia est Dominus in loco hoc, ego autem nesciebam. Et timuit et dixit: Quam terribilis locus hic; non est hoc nisi domus Dei et haec porta est caeli. Et surrexit Iacob et sumpsit lapidem, quem supposuit ibi sub caput suum, et statuit illum titulum et superfudit oleum in cacumen eius; et vocavit Iacob nomen loci illius: domus Dei. Hoc ad prophetiam pertinet; nec more idololatriae lapidem perfudit oleo Iacob, velut faciens illum Deum; neque enim adoravit eundem lapidem vel ei sacrificavit; sed quoniam Christi nomen a chrismate est, id est ab unctione, profecto figuratum est hic aliquid, quod ad magnum pertineat sacramentum. Scalam vero istam intellegitur ipse Saluator nobis in memoriam reuocare in euangelio, ubi, cum dixisset de Nathanael: Ecce vere Israelita, in quo dolus non est, quia Israel viderat istam visionem (ipse est enim Iacob), eodem loco ait: Amen, amen, dico vobis, videbitis caelum apertum et angelos Dei ascendentes et descendentes super filium hominis. Perrexit ergo Iacob in Mesopotamiam, ut inde acciperet uxorem. Vnde autem illi acciderit quattuor habere feminas, de quibus duodecim filios et unam filiam procreavit, cum earum nullam concupisset inlicite, indicat scriptura divina. Ad unam quippe accipiendam venerat; sed cum illi altera <pro altera> supposita fuisset, nec ipsam dimisit, qua nesciens usus fuerat in nocte, ne ludibrio eam videretur habuisse, et eo tempore, quando multiplicandae posteritatis causa plures uxores lex nulla prohibebat, accepit etiam illam, cui uni iam futuri coniugii fidem fecerat. Quae cum esset sterilis, ancillam suam, de qua filios ipsa susciperet, marito dedit; quod etiam maior soror eius, quamuis peperisset, imitata, quoniam multiplicare prolem cupiebat, effecit. Nullam Iacob legitur petisse praeter unam, nec usus plurimis nisi gignendae prolis officio, coniugali iure servato, ut neque hoc faceret, nisi uxores eius id fieri flagitassent, quae corporis viri sui habebant legitimam potestatem. Genuit ergo duodecim filios et unam filiam ex quattuor mulieribus. Deinde ingressus est in Aegyptum per filium suum Ioseph, qui venditus ab inuidentibus fratribus eo perductus fuit atque ibidem sublimatus. ||Jacob was sent by his parents to Mesopotamia that he might take a wife there. These were his father's words on sending him: "You shall not take a wife of the daughters of the Canaanites. Arise, fly to Mesopotamia, to the house of Bethuel, your mother's father, and take you a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban your mother's brother. And my God bless you, and increase you, and multiply you; and you shall be an assembly of peoples; and give to you the blessing of Abraham your father, and to your seed after you; that you may inherit the land wherein you dwell, which God gave unto Abraham." Genesis 28:1-4 Now we understand here that the seed of Jacob is separated from Isaac's other seed which came through Esau. For when it is said, "In Isaac shall your seed be called," Genesis 21:12 by this seed is meant solely the city of God; so that from it is separated Abraham's other seed, which was in the son of the bond woman, and which was to be in the sons of Keturah. But until now it had been uncertain regarding Isaac's twin-sons whether that blessing belonged to both or only to one of them; and if to one, which of them it was. This is now declared when Jacob is prophetically blessed by his father, and it is said to him, "And you shall be an assembly of peoples, and God give to you the blessing of Abraham your father."When Jacob was going to Mesopotamia, he received in a dream an oracle, of which it is thus written: "And Jacob went out from the well of the oath, and went to Haran. And he came to a place, and slept there, for the sun was set; and he took of the stones of the place, and put them at his head, and slept in that place, and dreamed. And behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven; and the angels of God ascended and descended by it. And the Lord stood above it, and said, I am the God of Abraham your father, and the God of Isaac; fear not: the land whereon you sleep, to you will I give it, and to your seed; and your seed shall be as the dust of the earth; and it shall be spread abroad to the sea, and to Africa, and to the north, and to the east: and all the tribes of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your seed. And, behold, I am with you, to keep you in all your way wherever you go, and I will bring you back into this land; for I will not leave you, until I have done all which I have spoken to you of. And Jacob awoke out of his sleep, and said, Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. And Jacob arose, and took the stone that he had put under his head there, and set it up for a memorial, and poured oil upon the top of it. And Jacob called the name of that place the house of God." Genesis 28:10-19 This is prophetic. For Jacob did not pour oil on the stone in an idolatrous way, as if making it a god; neither did he adore that stone, or sacrifice to it. But since the name of Christ comes from the chrism or anointing, something pertaining to the great mystery was certainly represented in this. And the Saviour Himself is understood to bring this latter to remembrance in the gospel, when He says of Nathanael, "Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" John 1:47, 51 because Israel who saw this vision is no other than Jacob. And in the same place He says, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, You shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man."Jacob went on to Mesopotamia to take a wife from thence. And the divine Scripture points out how, without unlawfully desiring any of them, he came to have four women, of whom he begat twelve sons and one daughter; for he had come to take only one. But when one was falsely given him in place of the other, he did not send her away after unwittingly using her in the night, lest he should seem to have put her to shame; but as at that time, in order to multiply posterity, no law forbade a plurality of wives, he took her also to whom alone he had promised marriage. As she was barren, she gave her handmaid to her husband that she might have children by her; and her elder sister did the same thing in imitation of her, although she had borne, because she desired to multiply progeny. We do not read that Jacob sought any but one, or that he used many, except for the purpose of begetting offspring, saving conjugal rights; and he would not have done this, had not his wives, who had legitimate power over their own husband's body, urged him to do it. So he begat twelve sons and one daughter by four women. Then he entered into Egypt by his son Joseph, who was sold by his brethren for envy, and carried there, and who was there exalted.
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| − | ||<div id="c39"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XXXIX] Iacob autem etiam Israel, sicut paulo ante dixi, vocabatur, quod nomen magis populus ex illo procreatus obtinuit. Hoc autem nomen illi ab angelo inpositum est, qui cum illo fuerat in itinere de Mesopotamia redeunte luctatus, typum Christi evidentissime gerens. Nam quod ei praeualuit Iacob, utique volenti, ut mysterium figuraret, significat passionem Christi, ubi visi sunt ei praeualere Iudaei. Et tamen benedictionem ab eodem angelo, quem superaverat, impetravit; ac sic huius nominis inpositio benedictio fuit. Interpretatur autem Israel "uidens Deum", quod erit in fine praemium sanctorum omnium. Tetigit porro illi idem angelus veluti praeualenti latitudinem femoris eumque isto modo claudum reddidit. Erat itaque unus atque idem Iacob et benedictus et claudus; benedictus in eis, qui in Christum ex eodem populo crediderunt, atque in infidelibus claudus. Nam femoris latitudo generis multitudo est. Plures quippe sunt in ea stirpe, de quibus prophetice praedictum est: Et claudicaverunt a semitis suis. ||As I said a little ago, Jacob was also called Israel, the name which was most prevalent among the people descended from him. Now this name was given him by the angel who wrestled with him on the way back from Mesopotamia, and who was most evidently a type of Christ. For when Jacob overcame him, doubtless with his own consent, that the mystery might be represented, it signified Christ's passion, in which the Jews are seen overcoming Him. And yet he besought a blessing from the very angel he had overcome; and so the imposition of this name was the blessing. For Israel means seeing God, which will at last be the reward of all the saints. The angel also touched him on the breadth of the thigh when he was overcoming him, and in that way made him lame. So that Jacob was at one and the same time blessed and lame: blessed in those among that people who believed in Christ, and lame in the unbelieving. For the breadth of the thigh is the multitude of the family. For there are many of that race of whom it was prophetically said beforehand, "And they have halted in their paths."
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| − | ||<div id="c40"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XL] Ingressi itaque referuntur in Aegyptum simul cum ipso Iacob septuaginta quinque homines, adnumerato ipso filiis suis. In quo numero duae tantum feminae commemorantur, una filia, neptis altera. Sed res diligenter consiederata non indicat, quod tantus numerus fuerit in progenie Iacob die vel anno quo ingressus est Aegyptum. Commemorati sunt quippe in eis etiam pronepotes Ioseph, qui nullo modo iam tunc esse potuerunt, quoniam tunc centum triginta annorum erat Iacob, filius vero eius Ioseph triginta novem; quem cum accepisse tricensimo anno suo vel amplius constet uxorem, quo modo potuit per novem annos habere pronepotes de filiis, quos ex eadem uxore suscepit? Cum igitur nec filios haberent Ephraem et Manasses, filii Ioseph, sed eos pueros infra quam novennes Iacob Aegyptum ingressus invenerit, quo pacto eorum non solum filii, sed etiam nepotes in illis septuaginta quinque numerantur, qui tunc Aegyptum ingressi sunt cum Iacob? Nam commemoratur ibi Machir, filius Manasse, nepos Ioseph, et eiusdem Machir filius, id est Galaad, nepos Manasse, pronepos Ioseph; ibi est et quem genuit Ephraem, alter filius Ioseph, id est Vtalaam, nepos Ioseph, et filius ipsius Vtalaae Edem, nepos Ephraem, pronepos Ioseph; qui nullo modo esse potuerunt, quando Iacob in Aegyptum venit et filios Ioseph, nepotes suos, auos istorum, minores quam novem annorum pueros invenit. Sed nimirum introitus Iacob in Aegyptum, quando eum in septuaginta quinque hominibus scriptura commemorat, non unus dies vel unus annus, sed totum illud est tempus, quamdiu vixit Ioseph, per quem factum est ut intrarent. Nam de ipso Ioseph eadem scriptura sic loquitur: Et habitavit Ioseph in Aegypto, ipse et fratres eius et omnis cohabitatio patris eius, et vixit annos centum decem, et vidit Ioseph Ephraem filios usque in tertiam generationem. Ipse est ille pronepos eius ab Ephraem tertius. Generationem quippe tertiam dicit filium, nepotem, pronepotem. Deinde sequitur: Et filii Machir, filii Manasse, nati sunt supra femora Ioseph. Et hic ille ipse est nepos Manasse, pronepos Ioseph. Sed pluraliter appellati sunt, sicut scriptura consuevit, quae unam quoque filiam Iacob filias nuncupavit; sicut in Latinae linguae consuetudine liberi dicuntur pluraliter filii, etiamsi non sint uno amplius. Cum ergo ipsius Ioseph praedicetur felicitas, quia potuit videre pronepotes, nullo modo putandi sunt iam fuisse tricensimo nono anno proavi sui Ioseph, quando ad eum in Aegyptum Iacob pater eius advenit. Illud autem est, quod fallit minus ista diligenter intuentes, quoniam scriptum est: Haec autem nomina filiorum Israel, qui intraverunt in Aegyptum simul cum Iacob patre suo. Hoc enim dictum est, quia simul cum illo conputantur septuaginta quinque, non quia simul iam erant omnes, quando Aegyptum ingressus est ipse; sed, ut dixi, totum tempus habetur eius ingressus, quo vixit Ioseph, per quem videtur ingressus. ||Seventy-five men are reported to have entered Egypt along with Jacob, counting him with his children. In this number only two women are mentioned, one a daughter, the other a grand-daughter. But when the thing is carefully considered, it does not appear that Jacob's offspring was so numerous on the day or year when he entered Egypt. There are also included among them the great-grandchildren of Joseph, who could not possibly be born already. For Jacob was then 130 years old, and his son Joseph thirty-nine and as it is plain that he took a wife when he was thirty or more, how could he in nine years have great-grandchildren by the children whom he had by that wife? Now since, Ephraim and Manasseh, the sons of Joseph, could not even have children, for Jacob found them boys under nine years old when he entered Egypt, in what way are not only their sons but their grandsons reckoned among those seventy-five who then entered Egypt with Jacob? For there is reckoned there Machir the son of Manasseh, grandson of Joseph, and Machir's son, that is, Gilead, grandson of Manasseh, great-grandson of Joseph; there, too, is he whom Ephraim, Joseph's other son, begot, that is, Shuthelah, grandson of Joseph, and Shuthelah's son Ezer, grandson of Ephraim, and great-grand-son of Joseph, who could not possibly be in existence when Jacob came into Egypt, and there found his grandsons, the sons of Joseph, their grandsires, still boys under nine years of age. But doubtless, when the Scripture mentions Jacob's entrance into Egypt with seventy-five souls, it does not mean one day, or one year, but that whole time as long as Joseph lived, who was the cause of his entrance. For the same Scripture speaks thus of Joseph: "And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he and his brethren, and all his father's house: and Joseph lived 110 years, and saw Ephraim's children of the third generation." Genesis 50:22-23 That is, his great-grandson, the third from Ephraim; for the third generation means son, grandson, great-grandson. Then it is added, "The children also of Machir, the son of Manasseh, were born upon Joseph's knees." Genesis 50:23 And this is that grandson of Manasseh, and great-grandson of Joseph. But the plural number is employed according to scriptural usage; for the one daughter of Jacob is spoken of as daughters, just as in the usage of the Latin tongue liberi is used in the plural for children even when there is only one. Now, when Joseph's own happiness is proclaimed, because he could see his great-grandchildren, it is by no means to be thought they already existed in the thirty-ninth year of their great-grandsire Joseph, when his father Jacob came to him in Egypt. But those who diligently look into these things will the less easily be mistaken, because it is written, "These are the names of the sons of Israel who entered into Egypt along with Jacob their father." Genesis 46:8 For this means that the seventy-five are reckoned along with him, not that they were all with him when he entered Egypt; for, as I have said, the whole period during which Joseph, who occasioned his entrance, lived, is held to be the time of that entrance.
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| − | ||<div id="c41"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XLI] Igitur propter populum Christianum, in quo Dei civitas peregrinatur in terris, si carnem Christi in Abrahae semine requiramus, remotis concubinarum filiis occurrit Isaac; si in semine Isaac, remoto Esau, qui est et iam Edom, occurrit Iacob, qui est et Israel; si in semine ipsius Israel, remotis ceteris occurrit ludas, quia de tribu Iuda exortus est Christus. Ac per hoc cum in Aegypto moriturus Israel suos filios benediceret, quem ad modum Iudam prophetice benedixerit, audiamus: Iuda, inquit, te laudabunt fratres tui. Manus tuae super dorsum inimicorum tuorum; adorabunt te filii patris tui. Catulus leonis Iuda; ex germinatione, fili mi, ascendisti; recumbens dormisti ut leo et ut catulus leonis; quis suscitabit eum? Non deficiet princeps ex Iuda et dux de femoribus eius, donec veniant quae reposita sunt ei; et ipse expectatio gentium; alligans ad vitem pullum suum et cilicio pullum asinae suae lauabit in vino stolam suam et in sanguine uuae amictum suum. Fului oculi eius a vino et dentes candidiores lacte. Exposui haec adversus Manichaeum Faustum disputans et satis esse arbitror, quantum veritas prophetiae huius elucet; ubi et mors Christi praedicta est verbo dormitionis et non necessitas, sed potestas in morte nomine leonis. Quam potestatem in euangelio ipse praedicat dicens: Potestatem habeo ponendi animam meam et potestatem habeo iterum sumendi eam. Nemo eam tollit a me; sed ego eam pono a me, et iterum sumo eam. Sic leo fremuit, sic quod dixit implevit. Ad eam namque pertinet potestatem, quod de resurrectione eius adiunctum est: Q vis suscitabit eum? hoc est, quia nullus hominum, nisi se ipse, qui etiam de corpore suo dixit: Solvite templum hoc, et in triduo resussitabo illud. Ipsum autem genus mortis, hoc est sublimitas crucis, in uno verbo intellegitur, quod ait: Ascendisti. Quod vero addidit: Recumbens dormisti, euangelista exponit, ubi dicit: Et inclinato capite tradidit spiritum; aut certe sepultura eius agnoscitur, in qua recubuit dormiens, et unde illum nullus hominum, sicut prophetae aliquos vel sicut ipse alios, suscitavit, sed sicut a somno ipse surrexit. Stola porro eius, quam lauat in vino, id est mundat a peccatis in sanguine suo, cuius sanguinis sacramentum baptizati sciunt, unde et adiungit: Et in sanguine uuae amictum suum, quid est nisi ecclesia? Et fului oculi eius a vino spiritales eius inebriati poculo eius, de quo canit psalmus: Et calix tuus inebrians quam praeclarus est; Et dentes eius candidiores lacte, quod potant apud apostolum paruuli, verba scilicet nutrientia, nondum idonei solido cibo. Ipse igitur est, in quo reposita erant promissa Iudae, quae donec venirent numquam principes, hoc est reges Israel, ab illa stirpe defuerunt. Et ipse expectatio gentium; quod clarius est videndo quam fit exponendo. ||If, on account of the Christian people in whom the city of God sojourns in the earth, we look for the flesh of Christ in the seed of Abraham, setting aside the sons of the concubines, we have Isaac; if in the seed of Isaac, setting aside Esau, who is also Edom, we have Jacob, who also is Israel; if in the seed of Israel himself, setting aside the rest, we have Judah, because Christ sprang of the tribe of Judah. Let us hear, then, how Israel, when dying in Egypt, in blessing his sons, prophetically blessed Judah. He says: "Judah, your brethren shall praise you: your hands shall be on the back of your enemies; your father's children shall adore you. Judah is a lion's whelp: from the sprouting, my son, you are gone up: lying down, you have slept as a lion, and as a lion's whelp; who shall awake him? A prince shall not be lacking out of Judah, and a leader from his thighs, until the things come that are laid up for him; and He shall be the expectation of the nations. Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass's foal to the choice vine; he shall wash his robe in wine, and his clothes in the blood of the grape: his eyes are red with wine, and his teeth are whiter than milk." Genesis 49:8-12 I have expounded these words in disputing against Faustus the Manichжan; and I think it is enough to make the truth of this prophecy shine, to remark that the death of Christ is predicted by the word about his lying down, and not the necessity, but the voluntary character of His death, in the title of lion. That power He Himself proclaims in the gospel, saying, "I have the power of laying down my life, and I have the power of taking it again. No man takes it from me; but I lay it down of myself, and take it again." John 10:18 So the lion roared, so He fulfilled what He said. For to this power what is added about the resurrection refers, "Who shall awake him?" This means that no man but Himself has raised Him, who also said of His own body, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." John 2:19 And the very nature of His death, that is, the height of the cross, is understood by the single words "Thou are gone up." The evangelist explains what is added, "Lying down, you have slept," when he says, "He bowed His head, and gave up the ghost." John 19:30 Or at least His burial is to be understood, in which He lay down sleeping, and whence no man raised Him, as the prophets did some, and as He Himself did others; but He Himself rose up as if from sleep. As for His robe which He washes in wine, that is, cleanses from sin in His own blood, of which blood those who are baptized know the mystery, so that he adds, "And his clothes in the blood of the grape," what is it but the Church? "And his eyes are red with wine," [these are] His spiritual people drunken with His cup, of which the psalm sings, "And your cup that makes drunken, how excellent it is!" "And his teeth are whiter than milk," Genesis 49:12 -that is, the nutritive words which, according to the apostle, the babes drink, being as yet unfit for solid food. And it is He in whom the promises of Judah were laid up, so that until they come, princes, that is, the kings of Israel, shall never be lacking out of Judah. "And He is the expectation of the nations." This is too plain to need exposition.
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| − | ||<div id="c42"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XLII] Sicut autem duo Isaac filii, Esau et Iacob, figuram praebuerunt duorum populorum in Iudaeis et Christianis (quamuis, quod ad carnis propaginem pertinet, nec Iudaei venerint de semine Esau, sed Idumaei; nec Christianae gentes de Iacob, sed potius Iudaei; ad hoc enim tantum figura valuit, quod dictum est: Maior seruiet minori): ita factum est etiam in duobus filiis Ioseph; nam maior gessit typum Iudaeorum, Christianorum autem minor. Quos cum benediceret Iacob, manum dextram ponens super minorem quem habebat ad sinistram, sinistram super maiorem quem habebat ad dextram: grave visum est patri eorum, et admonuit patrem velut corrigens eius errorem et quisnam eorum esset maior ostendens. At ille mutare manus noluit, sed dixit: Scio, fili, scio. Et hic erit in populum, et hic exaltabitur; sed frater eius iunior maior illo erit, et semen eius erit in multitudinem gentium. Etiam hic duo illa promissa demonstrat. Nam ille in populum, iste in multitudinem gentium. Quid evidentius quam his duabus promissionibus contineri populum Israelitarum orbemque terrarum in semine Abrahae, illum secundum carnem, istum secundum fidem? ||Now, as Isaac's two sons, Esau and Jacob, furnished a type of the two people, the Jews and the Christians (although as pertains to carnal descent it was not the Jews but the Idumeans who came of the seed of Esau, nor the Christian nations but rather the Jews who came of Jacob's; for the type holds only as regards the saying, "The elder shall serve the younger" Genesis 25:23 ), so the same thing happened in Joseph's two sons; for the elder was a type of the Jews, and the younger of the Christians. For when Jacob was blessing them, and laid his right hand on the younger, who was at his left, and his left hand on the elder, who was at his right, this seemed wrong to their father, and he admonished his father by trying to correct his mistake and show him which was the elder. But he would not change his hands, but said, "I know, my son, I know. He also shall become a people, and he also shall be exalted; but his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his seed shall become a multitude of nations." Genesis 48:19 And these two promises show the same thing. For that one is to become "a people;" this one "a multitude of nations." And what can be more evident than that these two promises comprehend the people of Israel, and the whole world of Abraham's seed, the one according to the flesh, the other according to faith?
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| − | ||<div id="c43"><b>BOOK XVI</b> [XLIII] Defuncto Iacob, defuncto etiam Ioseph per reliquos centum quadraginta quattuor annos, donec exiretur de terra Aegypti, in modum incredibilem illa gens crevit, etiam tantis adtrita persecutionibus, ut quodam tempore nati masculi necarentur, cum mirantes Aegyptios nimia populi illius incrementa terrerent. Tunc Moyses subtractus furto trucidatoribus paruulorum ad domum regiam, ingentia per eum Deo praeparante, pervenit nutritusque et adoptatus a filia Pharaonis (quod nomen in Aegypto omnium regum fuit) in tantum provenit virum, ut ipse illam gentem mirabiliter multiplicatam ex durissimo et gravissimo, quod ibi ferebat, iugo seruitutis extraheret, immo per eum Deus, qui hoc promiserat Abrahae. Prius quippe exinde fugiens, quod, cum Israelitam defenderet, Aegyptium occiderat et territus fuerat, postea divinitus missus in potestate spiritus Dei superavit Pharaonis resistentes magos. Tunc per eum Aegyptiis inlatae sunt decem memorabiles plagae, cum dimittere populum Dei nollent, aqua in sanguinem versa, rana et sciniphes, cynomyia, mors pecorum, ulcera, grando, lucusta, tenebrae, mors primogenitorum. Ad extremum Israelitas, quos plagis tot tantisque perfracti tandem aliquando dimiserant, Aegyptii in mari Rubro dum persequuntur extincti sunt. Illis quippe abeuntibus divisum mare viam fecit; hos autem insequentes in se rediens unda submersit. Deinde per annos quadraginta duce Moyse Dei populus in deserto actus est, quando tabernaculum testimonii nuncupatum est, ubi Deus sacrificiis futura praenuntiantibus colebatur, cum scilicet iam data lex fuisset in monte multum terribiliter; adtestabatur enim evidentissima mirabilibus signis vocibusque divinitas. Quod factum est, mox ut exitum est de Aegypto et in deserto populus esse coepit, quinquagensimo die post celebratum Pascha per ovis immolationem; qui usque adeo typus Christi est praenuntians eum per victimam passionis de hoc mundo transiturum ad Patrem (Pascha quippe Hebraea lingua transitus interpretatur), ut iam cum reuelaretur testamentum nouum, postea quam Pascha nostrum immolatus est Christus, quinquagensimo die veniret de caelo Spiritus sanctus, qui dictus est in euangelio digitus Dei, ut recordationem nostram in primi praefigurati facti memoriam reuocaret, quia et legis illae tabulae digito Dei scriptae referuntur. Defuncto Moyse populum rexit Iesus Nave et in terram promissionis introduxit eamque populo divisit. Ab his duobus mirabilibus ducibus bella etiam prosperrime ac mirabiliter gesta sunt, Deo contestante non tam propter merita Hebraei populi quam propter peccata earum, quae debellabantur, gentium illas eius provenisse victorias. Post istos duces iudices fuerunt, iam in terra promissionis populo conlocato, ut inciperet interim reddi Abrahae prima promissio de gente una, id est Hebraea, et terra Chanaan, nondum de omnibus gentibus et toto orbe terrarum; quod Christi adventus in carne et non ueteris legis observationes, sed euangelii fides fuerat impletura. Cuius rei praefiguratio facta est, quod non Moyses, qui legem populo acceperat in monte Sina, sed Iesus, cui etiam nomen Deo praecipiente mutatum fuerat ut Iesus vocaretur, populum in terram promissionis induxit. Temporibus autem iudicum, sicut se habebant et peccata populi et misericordia Dei, alternaverunt prospera et adversa bellorum. Inde ventum est ad regum tempora, quorum primus regnavit Saul; cui reprobato et bellica clade prostrato eiusque stirpe reiecta, ne inde reges orerentur, David successit in regnum, cuius maxime Christus dictus est filius. In quo articulus quidam factus est et exordium quodam modo ivuentutis populi Dei; cuius generis quaedam velut adulescentia ducebatur ab ipso Abraham usque ad hunc David. Neque enim frustra Matthaeus euangelista sic generationes commemoravit, ut hoc primum interuallum quattuordecim generationibus commendaret, ab Abraham scilicet usque ad David. Ab adulescentia quippe incipit homo posse generare; propterea generationum ex Abraham sumpsit exordium; qui etiam pater gentium constitutus est, quando mutatum nomen accepit. Ante hunc ergo velut pueritia fuit huius generis populi Dei a Noe usque ad ipsum Abraham; et ideo in lingua inventa est, id est Hebraea. A pueritia namque homo incipit loqui post infantiam, quae hinc appellata est, quod fari non potest. Quam profecto aetatem primam demergit oblivio, sicut aetas prima generis humani est deleta diluuio. Quotus enim quisque est, qui suam recordetur infantiam? Quam ob rem in isto procursu civitatis Dei, sicut superior unam eandemque primam, ita duas aetates secundam et tertiam liber iste contineat, in qua tertia propter uaccam trimam, capram trimam, arietem trimum et inpositum est legis iugum et apparuit abundantia peccatorum et regni terreni surrexit exordium, ubi non defuerunt spiritales, quorum in turture et columba figuratum est sacramentum. ||Jacob being dead, and Joseph also, during the remaining 144 years until they went out of the land of Egypt, that nation increased to an incredible degree, even although wasted by so great persecutions, that at one time the male children were murdered at their birth, because the wondering Egyptians were terrified at the too great increase of that people. Then Moses, being stealthily kept from the murderers of the infants, was brought to the royal house, God preparing to do great things by him, and was nursed and adopted by the daughter of Pharaoh (that was the name of all the kings of Egypt), and became so great a man that he-yea, rather God, who had promised this to Abraham, by him-drew that nation, so wonderfully multiplied, out of the yoke of hardest and most grievous servitude it had borne there. At first, indeed, he fled thence (we are told he fled into the land of Midian), because, in defending an Israelite, he had slain an Egyptian, and was afraid. Afterward, being divinely commissioned in the power of the Spirit of God, he overcame the magi of Pharaoh who resisted him. Then, when the Egyptians would not let God's people go, ten memorable plagues were brought by Him upon them,-the water turned into blood, the frogs and lice, the flies, the death of the cattle, the boils, the hail, the locusts, the darkness, the death of the first-born. At last the Egyptians were destroyed in the Red Sea while pursuing the Israelites, whom they had let go when at length they were broken by so many great plagues. The divided sea made a way for the Israelites who were departing, but, returning on itself, it overwhelmed their pursuers with its waves. Then for forty years the people of God went through the desert, under the leadership of Moses, when the tabernacle of testimony was dedicated, in which God was worshipped by sacrifices prophetic of things to come, and that was after the law had been very terribly given in the mount, for its divinity was most plainly attested by wonderful signs and voices. This took place soon after the exodus from Egypt, when the people had entered the desert, on the fiftieth day after the passover was celebrated by the offering up of a lamb, which is so completely a type of Christ, foretelling that through His sacrificial passion He should go from this world to the Father (for pascha in, the Hebrew tongue means transit), that when the new covenant was revealed, after Christ our passover was offered up, the Holy Spirit came from heaven on the fiftieth day; and He is called in the gospel the Finger of God, because He recalls to our remembrance the things done before by way of types, and because the tables of that law are said to have been written by the finger of God.On the death of Moses, Joshua the son of Nun ruled the people, and led them into the land of promise, and divided it among them. By these two wonderful leaders wars were also carried on most prosperously and wonderfully, God calling to witness that they had got these victories not so much on account of the merit of the Hebrew people as on account of the sins of the nations they subdued. After these leaders there were judges, when the people were settled in the land of promise, so that, in the meantime, the first promise made to Abraham began to be fulfilled about the one nation, that is, the Hebrew, and about the land of Canaan; but not as yet the promise about all nations, and the whole wide world, for that was to be fulfilled, not by the observances of the old law, but by the advent of Christ in the flesh, and by the faith of the gospel. And it was to prefigure this that it was not Moses, who received the law for the people on Mount Sinai, that led the people into the land of promise, but Joshua, whose name also was changed at God's command, so that he was called Jesus. But in the times of the judges prosperity alternated with adversity in war, according as the sins of the people and the mercy of God were displayed.We come next to the times of the kings. The first who reigned was Saul; and when he was rejected and laid low in battle, and his offspring rejected so that no kings should arise out of it, David succeeded to the kingdom, whose son Christ is chiefly called. He was made a kind of starting-point and beginning of the advanced youth of God's people, who had passed a kind of age of puberty from Abraham to this David. And it is not in vain that the evangelist Matthew records the generations in such a way as to sum up this first period from Abraham to David in fourteen generations. For from the age of puberty man begins to be capable of generation; therefore he starts the list of generations from Abraham, who also was made the father of many nations when he got his name changed. So that previously this family of God's people was in its childhood, from Noah to Abraham; and for that reason the first language was then learned, that is, the Hebrew. For man begins to speak in childhood, the age succeeding infancy, which is so termed because then he cannot speak. And that first age is quite drowned in oblivion, just as the first age of the human race was blotted out by the flood; for who is there that can remember his infancy? Wherefore in this progress of the city of God, as the previous book contained that first age, so this one ought to contain the second and third ages, in which third age, as was shown by the heifer of three years old, the she-goat of three years old, and the ram of three years old, the yoke of the law was imposed, and there appeared abundance of sins, and the beginning of the earthly kingdom arose, in which there were not lacking spiritual men, of whom the turtledove and pigeon represented the mystery.
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