Questions on the Old and New Testament 127.8–127.36

And because being born is a benefit, when he was already leaving the world he entrusted his mother to his disciple John. For this reason we too are taught by all the commandments of the old and new law to honor our parents; and the law warns that if we do not, we will incur a curse.

So what presumption is it, or from what law does it come, to shut off the way to marriage, when both the new and the old law are seen to favor it in every respect? It is what we read: that whatever goes beyond this comes from evil. Hence the apostle says that people of this kind have a seared conscience, who forbid marriage and teach abstinence from foods that God created to be received. They are marked out as doing this in hypocrisy, out of hostility, so as to bring a charge against the law that God handed down.

These people stretch out their hands against saving precepts in order to commend the commands of a perverse doctrine, and therefore they are said to have a seared conscience. With a corrupted mind they know one thing and profess another, like the Jews, who knew that the Savior’s deeds were works of the Holy Spirit, yet out of envy said that he cast out demons by Beelzebul, so as to turn the people away from faith in him. Such is the cunning of those mentioned above. To pretend that they love chastity and holiness, they even say that marriage is to be condemned, so as to win esteem by this and turn the people from the truth; and, feigning devotion to abstinence, they teach abstaining from foods, so as to show by this that they are strangers to the world and hastening to the heavenly kingdom. By enticing people’s minds in this way, they go on to teach that unlawful things are lawful, and to condemn lawful things as though they were not permitted.

These are Satan’s tricks: to turn things upside down, so that, as if introducing something new, he shuts out the truth, in which nothing is new, because the whole of it is eternal. Who would not notice that this view was put together by the adversary? Who would dare to reject what God devised, something that never harmed anyone, except the adversary of truth? To cover his own impurity he preaches holiness, which he does not love; and while he shows himself by this to be well meaning, he urges unlawful things as lawful. He commends himself in order to deceive more readily, and so, having caught the unwary, he suggests things by which to make them greater sinners. To bring some relief to his own case, he persuades people to sin greatly, seeking great consolation from this, since he can show many partners in his crime; he thinks his punishment light, though it is heavy, if he sees many with him in Gehenna. As for other sins, let people look to it, when they are overcome by vices, or when out of ignorance they defend what is not punished here.

What contrary desire deceives, or what fog stands in the way, so that what is true is not seen! Written words often seem to mean something else when they are either badly read aloud or wrongly punctuated. But when it is read, “God made,” and “he blessed what he made,” who would dispute it? Who would doubt it? Who, hearing that something was blessed, would think it cursed, unless he were driven by another spirit? If this were said to be a man’s voice, some deceit might perhaps be suspected; but God is said to speak, and do you doubt? God blesses, and is it to be rejected?

But perhaps Moses introduced error under God’s name! Let the signs and wonders done through Moses in Egypt satisfy you; let the marvels done at the Red Sea to free the sons of Israel persuade you; hear the magicians confessing, “This is the finger of God”; agree with the apostle, who says: “For I do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ.” And from where did the apostle say these things? Scripture is at hand, in which we read that Christ our Lord said to the Jews: “If you believed Moses, you would believe me too, for Moses wrote of me.” Who would refuse faith to this harmony? Who would dare to say that what is one is at odds with itself? Who has so evil a mind as to claim that undivided love looks like enmity? See, you have both the testimony of words and the examples of mighty works to bring your mind under the truth, so that you think nothing true except what the books of the catholic church contain.

Since it has been proved, then, that the same God who is ours now was in the old covenant, and that he is shown to be true by many tokens of mighty works, his authority ought to be preferred so far that even what we think harsh and perhaps absurd should be accepted, and thought of otherwise than we suppose, if it is commended by God’s judgment; for we ought to believe God more than ourselves. Our weakness and inexperience often judge harmful things useful and take false things for true, which it is impious even to suspect of God, for his is not a nature that can be deceived. How much more, then, should there be no doubt about marriage, when God has spoken! It is a plain and simple matter.

Certainly every person rejoices when he has obtained God’s favor, and believes himself made better as he learns the mystery of the Creator; and he would certainly not attain this unless he had been born. Why, then, does he lament what he rejoices in, and condemn what he boasts of having learned? If he rejoices that he has learned, and he would not have learned unless he had been born, it is without doubt good to be born, because the fruit of birth is knowledge of the truth. But if it is evil to be born, knowledge will not be good either; for what good will knowledge do if birth is condemned? If it is neither expedient nor right to be born, it is pointless for one who is to be condemned to learn. But since no one is so dull as to deny that the knowledge of God profits human beings, it is good and useful. Through it birth is made better, so that it merits more than was given to Adam; for believers will reign in heaven, not on earth, in the paradise of God the Father, not in the one in which Adam had been ordered to work with his body.

If the encaenia were celebrated at Jerusalem, that is, the festival of the dedication of the Lord’s temple, how much more should the birthday of man himself be celebrated, who is more truly the temple of God, and for whom a temple made with hands was built for giving thanks to God! Our body is a better temple, because it was built by God’s work, the other by human labor; and this one is in hope of eternity, that one of destruction. So one who knows that he was born by God’s design, to give him thanks, having come to know his mystery, ought to rejoice on his birthday, seeing the profit of his birth. Those, indeed, ought not to have been born who abandon their Creator and give his glory to others; their birth leads to punishment. Yet it is not birth that incurs guilt, but the will.

But who are you who forbid marriage? Perhaps you are Marcion, since you think the body was fashioned not by God but by the devil, and you contend that the soul suffered a fall through some error, so as to come to the regions of darkness in which the world now is. How, then, could it be freed from here if begetting were forbidden? Having been born, you came to know your fall and took pains to return to your ancestral home, restored to your source. Indeed you say that you give thanks to Christ, through whom you rejoice to have gained this knowledge. Come now: if you had not been born, there would be no knowledge, and no liberation would follow. So if you rejoice that the soul is set free, favor birth; for if you oppose birth, you are an enemy of souls.

Or if you are a Manichaean, who reject marriage as hostile, I ask you: if bodies were not begotten, how would the soul, which you say has been poured out into the region of darkness and clings to material things, be rescued from here? You have it written in your books that it is freed by being born, so that souls leaving their bodies are received by the moon and handed on to the sun, which you claim is the god of your souls. You rejoice when you are called Manichaeans, for by this name you claim your liberation, which you certainly would not know unless you had been born. It is plain from afar, then, that you condemn marriage in hypocrisy. Professing holiness, you secretly pursue uncleanness, which has been exposed not only privately but also by the edicts of the emperors.

Hear now, catholic, with the gospel as witness, that human birth is a benefit. When Simeon, a righteous man, wished to depart from the world, thinking that knowledge of the Creator without knowledge of his mystery was enough for him, he was not permitted to do so until he had grown in the perception of God, so as to have the full reward of his faith. Indeed, taking the newborn Savior in his arms, he blessed God and said: “Lord, now let your servant depart in peace according to your word, for my eyes have seen your salvation.” It is clearly shown that God’s benefit lies in human birth, when the righteous man who was thinking of death was told that he would not die before he had seen the Lord’s Christ. He advanced so far in life that he became worthy to see even in the present the one he hoped for as his deliverer after death. How, then, can it be said that birth did not benefit one who was kept alive and not permitted to die until he had seen the fruit of his hope, so that he might be secure that he was passing from life to life?

If it were an evil that we are born, we would not be promised paradise, or eternal life, or the kingdom of heaven, but punishment, Gehenna, and perdition; so that one who knew he was born for perdition would fear to beget another, and it would not be lawful for one unlawfully born to beget.

But perhaps it will be said: “The kingdom of heaven has indeed been promised, but to the faithful and to those who do good.” Rightly so. You see, then, that people become guilty not because they were born but because they lived badly. The kingdom of heaven was not promised to the unborn, so that those to whom it will not be given could blame their birth; it was promised to the born who do good, so that birth neither profits the one who does evil nor can harm the one who does good.

By the faithful and those who do good, birth is made better; by the faithless and those who do evil, it is made worse. Birth is like a tree that is grafted: if it is grafted with a good shoot, it becomes better and is called good; but if it is grafted with a bad shoot, it becomes worse and is called not good but bad. So too, if good teaching is added to birth, it will produce good fruit; if bad teaching, bad fruit. As a tree is needed so that there is something to graft into, so birth is needed so that there is something that can make progress.

But someone replies: “If birth is useful, why is a person reborn?” We would not be reborn unless birth were useful. To be reborn is to be renewed, and one who is renewed is restored. So rebirth does not accuse birth but re-forms it; and what is re-formed is shown to have been well established from the beginning. When we are reborn, then, we are changed in purpose, having received the cleansing of the body, so as to be brought back to Adam’s original state. The body was stained by the soul’s sin, and once the purpose has been restored and improved through faith, it is washed, so that, as it was defiled through contempt of God, it may be washed through obedience, escape the sentence given to Adam, and be able to rise again.

So if sin began from the soul, why is the nature of the body accused? In Adam’s sin there was no bodily desire; rather the soul, lured by the hope of deity, transgressed God’s command, so that it subjected its body to sin and human beings came to be born under sin. This does a person no harm, provided he obeys God’s law, except that he dies; and for this God’s goodness has promised a reward. Since they are found faithful in devotion to the Creator, but were made subject to corruption and death through Adam’s transgression, they will receive for this from God the judge more than was granted to Adam: in the future they will be glorious, have eternal life, and be called adopted sons of God, so that it is a gain that they were born.

From here I will now return to the rest of the reading. When man had been placed in paradise, he received these commands: “From every tree that is in paradise for food you shall eat; but from the tree by which good and evil are known, you shall not eat.” All the trees it mentions were created bearing fruit for eating. They are called trees by one name but are understood to differ in their fruits; yet all are trees, and eating is one kind of act, though what is eaten differs. When God had created many fruit trees for man to eat, as I said, he forbade eating from one tree, so that those who had received all things into their power might show reverence for the Creator in some respect, one tree being reserved over which they had no freedom, so that they would remember the law of their condition.

How could the kind of sin be understood from the sentence? This sentence fits the murderer, the sorcerer, the adulterer, and the disgraced alike. Achan son of Carmi, when he had sinned, was sentenced to be consumed with all his household. How can the kind of sin be understood from the sentence? It can be known that the offense was great, but not what kind of offense it was. We know that others too were condemned to this sentence, though they are known to have sinned differently: both Haman and the Sodomites are known to have perished with all their families. So it happens that people guilty of one sin are struck with different sentences, and sinners guilty of different crimes are punished in one and the same way. Therefore the kind of sin committed by Adam and Eve cannot be understood from the sentence given them.

Although their sin was one, the man and the woman received their sentences each according to their own person, and the serpent too, so that they would not only fail to remain as they had been made but would also have toil added to them as punishment. When all the cattle and animals had been subjected to man, as we read, the serpent rose up against this order and, getting the better of man by deceit and fraud, had made him its subject; for whoever captures someone without doubt makes him his own. For this reason the serpent, so that its cunning would not achieve its effect, is brought back by God’s sentence and pressed down below what it had been made, so as not to be above man, and so that it grieves not only that its cleverness gained it nothing but that it has been made worse. For though it is read to have been more cunning than the other beasts, after it deceived man it was made cursed above all the beasts of the earth.

After the sentence on the serpent, it follows that the woman too, whom it had made its partner in despising God’s law, receives a sentence. For he says: “I will greatly multiply your sorrows and your groaning; in sorrow you will bear children, and your turning will be to your husband, and he will rule over you.” No one confirms what he himself condemns. If children were granted because she had usurped intercourse, then the usurpation gave more than it took. If, because he said, “in sorrow you will bear children,” you think that generation began from this point, what becomes of the saying, “Increase and multiply”? Understand, then, that this was added only as punishment: what had been granted before with gladness had sorrow added to it as a penalty. And so that it might press on the woman all the harder and more often, the turning to her husband is added, so that there would be occasion for the same pain to be renewed for her again.

If the Lord condemned intercourse in his servants, why did he add, “your turning is to your husband”? No one imposes as a punishment the very thing he condemns, since a punishment is surely the opposite of what is condemned and never comes from the same thing, but from its contrary; if the two coincided, no one would fear condemnation. Would anyone sentence a person to the very thing by which he saw the law broken? That would be to confirm sin, not to punish it. Some believe that the woman’s turning to her husband arose from the fact that she had had intercourse; but the truth is that the turning, simply granted before, was laid on her now with the utmost servitude as a punishment. Since the man had been made subject through the woman, and she seemed without doubt to be the superior, for he followed her counsel, thinking what she urged would profit him, so that God’s work seemed to be undone by the serpent’s subtlety, God’s sentence restores the original order: the woman returns to the subjection of her condition, humbled under the man, as had been established, and what is added as punishment is added to her, when she hears: “I will greatly multiply your sorrows and your groaning; in sorrow you will bear children, and your turning will be to your husband, and he will rule over you.”

Was it ever decreed otherwise than that the woman should be subject to the man’s authority? From this it appears that the woman was brought back to what she had been made, with an addition. Hence he says, “I will greatly multiply your sorrows and your groaning.” What does he multiply? He adds to what is less; he is not seen to work on what does not exist. Here, then, the sentence does not begin the work of creating, which had been granted before in “Increase and multiply,” but brings harm to the creation that had been granted. For the woman, pain is added in bearing children and difficulty imposed; no new form of procreation is established. If generation is rightly thought to come from this sentence, it might be understood that generation came into being by the serpent’s will rather than the Lord’s, and then it would truly be, as he said, a brood of vipers. But if anyone thinks he was born in this way, let him consider what he deserves: that because of sin the pain of childbirth was increased for the woman, so that she who would have had little pain in bearing children had it increased because of the offense; for children are borne with groaning and sorrow, and once born they are not had without sadness.

Now, third, this sentence is pronounced on the man: “Because you listened to the voice of your wife and ate from the tree from which I had commanded you not to eat, cursed is the ground in your works, and in sorrows you shall eat from it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you,” and so on. Here too Adam is brought back to what he had been made for, but with loss. Before, he had been placed to work the ground simply, so that the fruit of his labor would follow; but when he despised God’s command, believing that the serpent’s counsel would provide better for him than God had made, he was brought back to his original task with the expense of toil, so that the ground, cursed not in itself but in his works, would in no way answer to his labor, and so that it might be shown that God’s purpose cannot be overthrown and that no one can provide better than God. No one can love another’s work more than the one who made it, as the apostle says: “For no one hates his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, as Christ does the church.”

Let us now see whether what follows in the law agrees with its beginnings. When Abraham had pleased God, among the rewards of his faith he was judged worthy, in old age, to beget a son. How then can that be blamed which was clearly granted as a reward, so that, because he had done God’s will, God fulfilled his? It would not have been fulfilled unless it were harmless; God would not fulfill what he saw asked badly or ignorantly, especially by one who pleased him; this does not befit even a human being. And Hannah, when she was barren and loved God, asked to have a son and received one. If it were contrary to God’s will, she could have been warned by him whom she loved not to ask for a harmful thing. And the most holy Samuel, born of her, begot sons and yet did not lessen the merits of his righteousness; from his youth he always grew, so as to be commended in old age by an even fuller testimony from God. And Zechariah the priest, a righteous man, begot a son in his old age at God’s bidding, and at his birth was found worthy to prophesy. On what grounds, then, is that blamed which is shown to do no harm at all? And who would deny that what harms no one ought to be called good?

And it strengthens the case if something is said here about the apostles too. Certainly holy John kept the holiness of celibacy; but his fellow disciple, the equally holy Peter, is known to have had a wife and children, and the begetting of children did not prevent him from receiving the primacy among the apostles. How then is that thought worthy of condemnation which does not hinder merit?

Hence the apostle shows that a man who has a wife can and should become a priest, if he keeps the commandments in other respects. If marriage were unlawful, he certainly could not say that a sinner ought to become a priest. And what could be plainer? It is the same apostle who says: “Concerning virgins I have no command of the Lord.” When the Corinthians were troubled by heretics who in hypocrisy taught that marriage should be condemned, they consulted the apostle by letter whether it was lawful to marry or to put away a wife. Then the apostle commanded that a wife ought not to depart from her husband, when he had occasion to say, if he had known it was to be taught, that it was in no way lawful for a woman to marry a husband. What he knew had not been handed down to him, he showed he could not teach. Which of his disciples, then, would dare to teach what was not handed down by the master, whom he hears declaring, “I want young women to marry and bear children”?

But perhaps it will be said: “If it is lawful and good to marry, why are priests not allowed to have wives, that is, why may those already ordained not come together with them?” Who does not know that each person has a law according to his person and rank? There are things that are not lawful for anyone at all; there are things that are lawful for some and not for others; and there are things that are lawful at some times and not at others. Sexual immorality is never lawful for anyone; but trading is sometimes lawful and sometimes not. Before someone becomes a cleric he may trade; once he has been made one, he may not. And for a Christian to come together with his wife is sometimes lawful and sometimes not. Because of the days of procession, it is sometimes not lawful to come together, since one must abstain even from what is lawful so that what is asked may be obtained more easily. Hence the apostle says that one must abstain by consent for a time, “so that you may devote yourselves to prayer.” For according to the law too, on a fast day it is not lawful to strike or quarrel, though afterward it is, because greater reverence is owed to the things of God.

Is everything that is lawful among others lawful in the emperor’s presence? How much more in the things of God! And therefore his overseer must be purer than others, for he is seen to bear his person. He is his vicar, so that what is lawful for others is not lawful for him, because he must every day act in Christ’s stead, pray for the people, offer the sacrifice, or baptize. And this is not lawful for him only, but also for his minister, because he too ought to be cleaner, since the things he ministers are holy. Compared with a lamp, darkness is not only dark but dirty; compared with the stars, a lamp is gloom; compared with the sun, the stars are cloudy; and compared with God’s brightness, the sun is night. So too things that are lawful and clean as far as we are concerned are, as it were, unlawful and unclean with respect to God’s dignity; for although they are good, they do not befit the person of God. Is not the tunic of a man of middling rank, though clean, dirty and improper for the emperor? And likewise a coarse cloak for a senator? And therefore God’s overseers ought to be purer than others, because they bear the person of Christ, and God’s ministers must be cleaner. No one serves the emperor carelessly; they serve dressed in bright, clean garments. But because God is by nature most bright, his ministers must be clean in their nature rather than in their clothing.