Questions on the Old and New Testament 95.1–96.1

There is no doubt that everything in our religion is strengthened by the testimony of truth and marked by the prerogative of the old law. For all things in the past are known to have been done and designed as a figure of our future faith, so that we would not doubt that we hold the truth, when we see that the things we now hear and believe were predestined before the ages, commended not only by words but also by powerful signs. But the question now is whether they are understood by us in the same way as they were designed, so that we may rightly discern from where and for what reason the day of Pentecost was derived. For the Lord’s Scriptures open their meanings to the careful and devout and close them to the careless. Nor was it fitting that things reserved for the deserving and worthy should be seen everywhere by everyone.

Pentecost, then, which is reckoned the fiftieth day from Pascha, has this rationale. Just as after the week the Lord’s day is the first, on which the mystery of Pascha was fulfilled for the redemption of human salvation (because after the course of seven days one must always return to the first, to show that the age of the world is completed by the number seven), so too after seven weeks the day of Pentecost is the first. Indeed Pentecost never falls on any day but the Lord’s day, so that everything concerning human salvation may be known to have been both begun and completed on the Lord’s day. For on the Lord’s day the world was made, and after the fall it was again re-formed on the Lord’s day. A figure of this re-formation was given first in circumcision, in which there was a sign of the faith to come. For after the week, the day called the eighth is the first in the mystery. For this is the day which the Lord made. He made one day, from which the others would receive their courses. And therefore he rose on the very day which he made; and, according to the number in the reasoning stated above, on that same day he also gave the law on Mount Sinai through his servant Moses, so that, as the lamb was a figure of the Lord’s passion in the sacrament of the Pascha, so the giving of the law was a figure of the gospel preaching, because the law was given on the same day, that is, Pentecost, on which the Holy Spirit fell on the disciples, so that they might receive authority and know how to preach the law of the gospel. This fact is confirmed by a double testimony, because it is both shown to have been predestined and proved divine and above the heavens by the manifest pouring out of the Holy Spirit; for the unlearned spoke the mighty works of God in various tongues.

The law, then, was given to the sons of Israel through Moses on the third day of the third month, as is contained in the book of Exodus; that day is the fiftieth from the fourteenth of the first month, on which the Pascha was kept in Egypt, that is, it is Pentecost. Hence it came about that the Holy Spirit descended on the apostles at Pentecost for preaching the law of faith, so that the deeds of the ancients might be held as images of things to come, for the security of our faith, because what was preached from the beginning cannot seem false. Therefore the time of forgiveness and re-formation is described in the fiftieth psalm, so that the same providence of the fiftieth day, which is also the first, might be known. Hence it came about too that the manna was given from heaven to the Jewish people on the first day, which is the Lord’s day; that this is so is proved by the sequence of six days on which they gathered it, and on the seventh day, that is, the Sabbath, they rested. And the manna is a type of the spiritual food which by the Lord’s resurrection became truth in the mystery of the Eucharist.

It now remains for us to prove whether what we have said is to be understood as we stated above. In the first month, on whose fourteenth day the Pascha was celebrated in Egypt, that day was the fourth day of the week; hence the law too was given on the fourth day of the week. This is given to be understood from the fact that the fifteenth day of the second month after the departure of the sons of Israel appears to have been a Sabbath; therefore the flock of quails was not sent to them by day, but in the evening. And in the morning manna rained on them from heaven, that is, on the Lord’s day, which is found to be the first after the week in the repeating cycle. Then for six continuous days they gathered manna, and on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, they rested. From this day, then, to the third day of the third month, on which the law was given, search and you will find that it was the fourth day of the week when the law was given. For from the fifteenth day of the second month, when it was the Sabbath, to the third day of the third month, on which the law was given, there are nineteen days. Hold on to these nineteen, then, and go back past the fifteenth day of the second month, on which it was the Sabbath, which counting from the first is the fourteenth, and come back to the first day of the second month, and you will have another fourteen; add these to the nineteen mentioned above, and you will find that the first day of the second month was a Sabbath. Add further, toward the beginning of the first month, seventeen days, because the thirteen days of the first month that were before the Pascha are to be subtracted, for the Pascha was kept on the fourteenth day of the first month. So with thirteen subtracted and seventeen added, you will find that the fourteenth of the first month was the fourth day of the week.

And so that you are not wearied by reading, nor have to examine each part of the question minutely, I give a summary, so that you may be sure of the number of days from the Pascha to the giving of the law, and may learn more easily from it on what day of the week the Pascha was kept. The law was given on the third day after the second month; there are therefore two months and three days. Subtract from these the thirteen days that were before the Pascha, and fifty days will remain. That the law was given on the fourth day of the week is easily seen from this. The manna was given on the first day of the week, because they gathered it on six continuous days; this first day of the week was the sixteenth of the second month. From this first day, then, to the eighteenth day, on which the law was given, you will find it to be the fourth day of the week. And from a fourth day, whether you count forward or back, the fiftieth day is a fourth day. Therefore, since the Jews kept the Pascha in Egypt on the fourth day of the week and received the law on the fourth day of the week, and set out from Egypt on the fifth day of the week, Pentecost is the dedication of the law.

The apostle could not be mistaken when he says, “Christ our Pascha has been sacrificed,” which is not his own word but that of the law, since Moses says: “And when your sons say to you, What is this service? you shall say, This is the sacrifice of the Pascha of the Lord.” What more is needed as testimony? The law speaks, the apostle confirms; it remains only that the gainsayer be rejected as obstinate. For it is plain that the passing over came after the Pascha. They put some of the blood of the sacrificed lamb on the doorposts and on the threshold, so that the angel passing through at night would not strike the house where the sign of blood was. So the blood gave salvation, not the passing, because the blood prevented the passing from doing harm.