Acts of Archelaus (Latin version) 30–37

Archelaus said: "Since the prudence of the judges has put a full end to all the matters we have disputed, the rest must be passed over in silence and kept for another time. For as, when someone crushes a serpent's head, the remaining members of its body are no longer to be counted for anything, so, when the question of duality has been thrown out, as we have shown to the best of our strength, the rest that was asserted through it has been driven off together with it. But I will say a few words against the man himself who is here as the champion of these things, so that all may know who he is, where he comes from, and what he is like. For he had said that he is that Paraclete whom Jesus, at his departure, promised that he would send to the human race for the salvation of faithful souls; and as though Paul, the vessel of election and called apostle, could not come near him, Paul who, preaching the true doctrine, said: 'Or do you seek proof of him who speaks in me, Christ?'

"What I say will become clearer by an example of this kind. A certain man shut up a great quantity of grain in a storehouse, so that the place was full, and he ordered that place, closed and sealed with sufficient seals, to be guarded; and the master himself went away. After a long time another man came to the storehouse, saying that he had been sent by the one who had shut the place with seals, so that he too might gather wheat into the same storehouse. When the guards saw him, they asked him for the warrant of the seal, so that they might open the storehouse to him and obey him as one sent by the man who had sealed it. But since he neither showed the keys nor brought the warrant of the seals (for he did not have the right), he was thrown out by the guards and put to flight. For he was found by them to be rather a thief and a robber, proved and driven off also by the fact that he wanted to be present long after the time that had been promised, bringing the guards neither keys nor seals nor any sign at all, and not knowing the quantity of grain stored up. All these are plain signs that he had by no means been sent by that man, and so the guards rightly rejected him."

"Let us also tell another example, if you please. A certain householder, very rich, being about to go abroad for a time, promised his sons that he would send another to distribute the property to them fairly in his place. And not long after, he sent a certain blessed man, just and true, who, when he had come and taken over the whole property, first of all set himself to put it in order and manage it, labouring a great deal on journeys, sitting down himself and doing work with his own hands and serving. Then, when he was about to die, he wrote a will, leaving the inheritance to all his relatives and kin; and he gave them seals, and, calling each of them by name, commanded them to keep the inheritance and to guard and manage the property as they had received it, and themselves to enjoy the goods and fruits, being left as masters and heirs. If anyone asked to receive some of the fruits of this field, they were to give it kindly; but if he demanded it calling himself a co-heir, they were to shun him, and declare him a stranger; rather, one who wished to be received ought to do work.

"How then, when all these things have been well and rightly arranged and settled and have continued in that state for a very long time, shall we not reject the one who comes after about three hundred years and claims to be an heir? Shall we not justly declare a stranger one who does not show himself to be one of the relatives, who did not stand by our departed one in his sickness, who did not go to the funeral of the crucified one, who did not stand by the tomb, who does not know at all how or in what way he died, who, in short, wants to enter the storehouse of grain without bringing any sign from the one who sealed it? Shall we not reject him as a robber and a thief and drive him out by every means? This man, then, is here without bringing these signs that we have included in the examples above, saying that he is the Paraclete who was foretold by Jesus to be sent; in this, perhaps unknowingly, he will declare Jesus a liar. For the one who had said that he would send the Paraclete not long after is found to have sent this man after three hundred years and more, as he bears witness to himself.

"What will those who have departed this life from that time until now say to Jesus on the day of judgment? Will they not plead this before him: 'Do not torment us if we did not do your works. For why, when you promised under Tiberius Caesar that you would send the Paraclete, who would convict us of sin, of judgment, and of righteousness, did you send him only under Probus, the Roman emperor? Why did you leave us orphans, when you yourself said, "I will not leave you orphans," when you yourself said that, as soon as you went, you would send the Paraclete? What could we orphans do, having no guardian? We did no wrong; you deceived us.' But far be this from our Lord Jesus Christ, the Saviour of every soul. For he did not delay in his promises; but when he had said, 'I go to my Father, and I send you the Paraclete,' he at once sent him, distributing gifts to his disciples, but conferring them more abundantly on Paul."

Manes said: "You are caught by your own evidence; for you do not know that you have spoken these things against yourself, since, while you want to throw reproaches at me, you yourself fall under a greater fault. Come, tell me this: if all who died from Tiberius to Probus will say to Jesus, 'Do not judge us because we did not do your works, for you did not send us the Paraclete, though you said that you would send him as soon as you went,' will not those who departed this life from Moses until the coming of Jesus Christ himself say this much more, and with better right: 'Do not hand us over to torments, since we did not receive knowledge of you'? And not only will those who died before his coming seem to plead this rightly, but also those who died from Adam until the coming of Jesus; for they neither attained knowledge of the Paraclete nor were taught by Jesus' teaching. But only this last race of men, as you say, the one from Tiberius on, will be saved; for Christ himself redeemed them from the curse of the law, as Paul bore witness: 'The letter kills' and gives life to no one, and 'The law is the ministry of death' and 'the power of sin.'"

Archelaus said: "You are wrong, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God. For many even after the coming of Christ have perished up to now and are perishing, namely those who did not wish to serve the works of righteousness; but only those who received him and receive him have received power to become sons of God. For he did not say 'all,' nor did he set a limit of time: 'as many,' he says, 'as received him.' And he is always present to just men from the creation of the world, and does not cease to require their blood, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah. How, then, are righteous Abel and all those others in order counted among the righteous, when there was not yet the law of Moses, when the prophets had not yet arisen or fulfilled the office of prophecy? Were they not made righteous because they fulfilled the law, each of them showing the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness to them? For when someone who does not have the law does by nature the things of the law, he, not having the law, is a law to himself. And consider the multitude of laws through each of the righteous who led their lives well: sometimes bringing forth from themselves the law of God implanted in their hearts, sometimes seeking it from their own parents, sometimes also learning it from those older and elder. But because few could climb to the height of righteousness in this way, that is, through the traditions of parents, with no law written in letters, God had pity on the human race and willed to give men a written law through Moses, since the equity of the natural law was not firmly kept in their hearts. So the legislation in letters, which is given through Moses for the salvation of very many, is in harmony with the first creation of man. For if we hold that a man is justified without the works of the law, and Abraham was reckoned righteous, how much more will those who have fulfilled the law, which contains what is profitable for men, attain righteousness? And since you mentioned only three sayings, of which the apostle said that the law is the ministry of death, and that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, and that the power of sin is the law, add more still, and tell me all that seem to you to be written against the law."

Manes said: "Is it not the same thing that Jesus said to the disciples, showing them to be unbelieving: 'You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father'? He says this, of course, because whatever the evil prince of this world willed and whatever he desired, he wrote through Moses and gave to men to do. 'For he was a murderer from the beginning, and did not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him; when he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own, because he is a liar, as is his father also.'"

Archelaus said: "Are these enough for you, or do you have other things to say?"

Manes said: "I have many, and greater than these; but I will be content with these."

Archelaus said: "Let us take, then, an example from those you say you have, so that if these are found to be rightly put, the rest may also be counted with them; but if not, I will be liable to the judges' sentence, that is, I will bear the disgrace of the defeated. You say, then, that the law is the ministry of death, and that death, the prince of this world, reigned from Adam to Moses; for it is written: 'Death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin.'"

Manes said: "So death reigned, without doubt, because there is a duality, and in no other way unless it were unbegotten."

Archelaus said: "And how did an unbegotten death take the beginning of its reign from a fixed point in time? For it says 'from Adam,' and did not say 'before Adam.'"

Manes said: "Tell me, then, how it held its reign over both the righteous and sinners."

Archelaus said: "When you have first confessed that it reigned from a point in time and not from eternity, then I will tell you."

Manes said: "This is written: that it reigned from Adam to Moses."

Archelaus said: "Then what began in time also has an end, and what was said is true, that death has been swallowed up in victory. And it will not be unbegotten, since it is shown to have both a beginning and an end."

Manes said: "Then God made it."

Archelaus said: "Not at all, far from it; for God did not make death, nor does he delight in the destruction of the living."

Manes said: "God did not make it, yet it was made, as you say; tell me from whom it received its rule, or by whom it was created."

Archelaus said: "If I show most fully that death cannot have the substance of an unbegotten nature, will you not confess that there is one God, and that he is unbegotten?"

Manes said: "Speak; for you want to make fine distinctions."

Archelaus said: "Because you put forward those words as though they would help you to show an unbegotten root. Yet what was treated above is enough for us, in which we showed most fully that it is impossible for the substances of two unbegotten natures to exist."

The judges said: "Speak to what he proposed just now, Archelaus."

Archelaus said: "He says that the prince of the world, the evil one, darkness, and death are one and the same, and that the law was given by him, because it is written 'ministry of death,' and the other things he objected. Since, as we said above, the law, written by nature in the hearts of those of old, did not cling carefully to their memory, and the tradition among the elders was not firm enough, since forgetfulness, always the enemy of memory, had crept upon them (and a man is taught one way by a master and another way by himself), transgression of the law written by nature came about easily, and from the breaking of the commandments death held its reign among men; for the human race is of such a kind that it needs to be ruled by God with a rod of iron. So death exulted and reigned with all power until Moses, even over those who had not sinned, in the way we have said: over sinners as its own and subject to it, as Cain and Judas were; over the righteous because they did not consent to it, but rather resisted, cutting off from themselves the vices of lusts and desires, like those from Abel to Zechariah. So the evil one, settled in Cain, killed righteous Abel, and kept passing (himself) on, right up to the time of Zechariah, into those like Cain.

"But when Moses came and gave the law to the sons of Israel, and recalled to their memory all the ordinances of the law that they had to keep and do, and handed over to death only those who transgressed the law, death was cut short so that it should not reign over all; for it reigned over sinners alone, the law saying to it: 'Do not touch those who keep my commandments.' So Moses delivered the ministry of this word to death, handing over to destruction all the rest, the transgressors of the law. For Moses did not come so that death should not reign in any part at all, since very many even after Moses were held under the dominion of death. For this reason it was called the ministry of death, since only the transgressors of the law were punished, not also those who kept it, like Abel, who did and kept the things of the law, whom Cain, having become the vessel of the evil one, killed.

"But even after this death wanted to break the covenant that had been set through Moses and to reign again over the righteous; and it fell upon the prophets, killing and stoning those who had been sent by God, up to Zechariah. But my Lord Jesus, guarding the justice of the law of Moses, indignant against death for its breach of the covenant and of that whole ministry, deigned to come in a human body, to avenge not himself but Moses and those who in order after him had been overwhelmed by the violence of death. The evil one, not knowing a dispensation of this kind, entered Judas, so as to kill him through him, as he had killed righteous Abel before. But when he had entered Judas, Judas, led by repentance, hanged himself. Because of this the divine word says: 'Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?' And: 'Death has been swallowed up in victory.' For this reason, then, the law was called the ministry of death, because it handed over to death those who sinned and transgressed, but defended from death those who kept it and set them in glory, by the help and aid of our Lord Jesus Christ."

"Hear also about what was said: 'Christ, who redeemed us from the curse of the law.' In this place I perceive that the magnificent servant of God, Moses, handed down a figurative law to those who wish to see rightly, and also the true law. For as God, when he had made the world and everything in it in six days, rested on the seventh day from all his works (I do not say that he rested because he was tired, but because he had brought to completion all the creation he had planned to make), he then says: 'My Father is working until now, and I am working.' Does he make heaven, or the sun, or man, or animals, or shrubs, or anything of the kind? No; when these visible things had been completed, he rested from such work; but working until now, he saves things invisible and within. So the lawgiver also wants each of us, as God himself is, to be bound unceasingly to this work, and commands us to rest from worldly things at once and to do no worldly work at all; and this is called the sabbath. He added this too in the law, that nothing out of order should be done, but that we should keep and direct our life according to what is fair and just. And this law pressed hard, bringing a curse most sharply on those who had transgressed it. But since they too were men, and, as often happens to us also, quarrels arose and wrongs were done, and the law at once turned back the strictest punishment of sin, so that if one of the poor wanted to gather a bundle of wood on the sabbath, he came under the curse of the law and was at once put to death. So the men who had been brought up with the Egyptians were hard pressed by the constraint of the law, and could not bear the penalties and curses of the law.

"But again, he who is always Saviour, Jesus our Lord, came and freed them from such torments and curses of the law, forgiving them their wrongs. He did not, like Moses, use the severity of the law, pardoning no one a wrong; but he said that if anyone suffered a wrong from his neighbour, he should forgive not once only, nor a second or third time, nor only seven times, but seventy times seven; but if after this he persisted in doing wrong, then at last he must submit to the law of Moses, and no further pardon should be given to one who persists in wrongs, when he has been forgiven seventy times seven. And not only to this man, but also if anyone had done wrong to the Son of Man, he gave pardon. But if to the Holy Spirit, he subjected him to two curses, that is, of the law of Moses and of his own: Moses' in the present, his own at the time of judgment. For he says this: 'It will not be forgiven him either in this age or in the age to come.' So the law of Moses is the one that gives pardon to no one in the present age, while the law of Christ is the one that punishes in the age to come. From this see how he confirms the law, not only not abolishing it but fulfilling it. So he will redeem them from the curse of the law that was set in the present, from which it is called the curse of the law. This is the whole reasoning of this saying.

"Why the law was called the power of sin, we will briefly explain to the best of our strength. For it is written: 'The law is not laid down for the righteous, but for the unrighteous and disobedient, the ungodly and wicked.' So before Moses no law of the letter had then been laid down for offenders; and so Pharaoh too, not knowing the power of sin, offended, oppressing the sons of Israel with unjust burdens, neglecting the deity; and not only he but also all who were with him. But not to use too long a circuit, I will say it more briefly. Some of the Egyptians were mixed with the people of Moses when the people was being led by him in the desert; and when Moses was on the mountain to receive the law, the impatient people (not those who were truly Israelites, but those who had been mixed in from the Egyptians) set up a calf as god for themselves, according to their old custom by which they had worshipped images, in which they would never pay the penalties of their crimes; and so they did not know at all the power of their sin. When Moses returned and learned this, he ordered them to be slaughtered by the sword; and from this a beginning was made of their feeling the power of sin through the law of Moses, and for this reason the law was called the power of sin."

"As to what is written in the Gospel, 'You are of your father the devil,' and the rest, we say briefly that it is the devil working in us, who by the power of his own choice willed to be such. For God made all things that he made very good, and gave each one a sense of free choice; for which reason he also set a law of judgment, because it is placed in our choice to sin or not to sin. As you too, Manes, doubtless know, if indeed you gather your disciples together and warn them not to offend and not to do anything unjust, so that each of them may escape the law of judgment. And certainly those who wish keep the commandments; but those who despise them and turn aside to perversity will without doubt bear the law of judgment. From this cause too some of the angels, not submitting to the command of God, resisted his will; and one fell from heaven upon the earth like a flash of fire; while others, in a wretched happiness, having mingled with the daughters of men, afflicted by the dragon, deserved to undergo the punishment of eternal fire. So that one, falling to earth and no longer admitted to the regions of heaven, roams among men, deceiving them and persuading them to become transgressors like himself; and to this day he is an adversary to the commandments of God. But not all will follow his fall and ruin, because each has freedom of choice. For this reason he was also called devil, because he made a crossing over from heavenly things, and because on earth he became a detractor of the command of God.

"And that it is God who first gave the command, the Lord Jesus himself says to the devil: 'Get behind me, Satan.' And without doubt to go behind God is the part of a servant. And again what he says to him: 'You shall worship the Lord your God and serve him only.' Since, then, some men obeyed his wishes, they heard from the Saviour: 'You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father.' And again, when they do his wishes, they hear: 'Brood of vipers, who showed you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear, then, fruit worthy of repentance.' From this, then, see how great a force it is that man has free choice. Yet let him say himself whether there is a judgment of the godly and the ungodly."

Manes said: "There is a judgment."

Archelaus said: "I think that what we have said about the devil contains no little reason and piety. For each creature has its own order: one is the order of the human race, another that of animals, another that of angels. But the divine substance alone is one and unchangeable, eternal, invisible, as is known to all according to what is written: 'No one has ever seen God, except the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father.' All the other creatures, then, must be visible: heaven, earth, sea, men, angels, archangels. But God, since he has never been seen by anyone, what among these creatures can be homoousios with him? Therefore we say that each thing according to its order has its own substance. But you say that every living creature that moves was made from one, and that it received from God a like substance, and that it can sin and come to judgment; and since you do not want to accept the word that says that the devil was an angel and fell into transgression and is not of the same substance as God, you must do away with the reasoning of judgment, so that it may appear which of us is deceived. For if an angel created by God cannot fall into transgression, how can the soul, a part of God, sin? But if you say that there is a judgment of sinning souls, and say that they are of one substance with God, and yet, while you assert that they are of the divine nature, you nonetheless say that they do (not) keep God's commandments: even so my argument goes far ahead, saying first that the devil fell because he did not keep the commandment, for he was not of the substance of God; and he fell not so much to harm the human race, but rather to be mocked by it; for he has given us power to tread upon serpents and scorpions and every power of the enemy."

The judges said: "He has sufficiently shown the origin of the devil. For since both sides confess that there will be a judgment, each one is necessarily shown to have free choice; and when this has been clearly shown, no one doubts (that) each one is on whatever side he has chosen, using the power of his own choice."

Manes said: "If the devil is from God, as you say, you have said that Jesus is a liar."

Archelaus said: "First confess that the reasoning of what we have now set out is true, and then I will show you his father."

Manes said: "If you show me that his father is a liar and ascribe none of these things to God, then you will be given credence in everything."

Archelaus said: "Now that the whole account of the devil has been carefully set out and the dispensation brought forward, anyone of men whose sense is vigorous can also carefully notice for himself who it is that is called the father of the devil. But though you say that you are the Paraclete, you are greatly lacking even in human prudence. Since, then, you have betrayed your ignorance, I will tell who that father of the devil is."

Manes said: "Tell me." And he added: "Everyone who is the founder or creator of anything is called the father of what he has founded."

Archelaus said: "I wonder how you answered at least this with right reason, and did not hide the meaning or nature of this word. Hear now from this who his father is. When he had fallen from the kingdom of heaven, he was on the earth, watching and searching for someone to whom he could join himself, whom by fellowship with himself he could make a sharer in his wickedness too. And as long as man did not exist, he was neither called a murderer nor a liar with his father. But afterwards, when man had been made and had been deceived by his lie and his trickery, when he had put himself into the body of the serpent, the wisest of all the beasts, then he was called a liar together with his father, and the curse of the lie came not only upon him but also upon his father. So when the serpent had received him into itself, and received him whole, it became as it were pregnant, carrying a bundle of enormous wickedness, and was like a woman in labour pressed by the birth, wanting to vomit out the thoughts of his evil suggestion. For the serpent, taking hard the glory of the first man, entered paradise, and, having conceived the pains within itself, began to beget lying words and to bring forth death for men, who had been formed by God and had received life. But he could not make himself wholly manifest through the serpent; he kept back his completion, to show it in Cain, by whom he was begotten whole. Through the serpent he showed hypocrisy and deceit to Eve; but through Cain he gave the beginning of murder, putting himself into the first-fruits of the crops, which Cain divided wrongly. From this he was called a murderer from the beginning, and a liar because he deceived, saying, 'You will be like gods'; for those whom he deceived into thinking they would be gods were afterwards cast out of paradise.

"So the first to become his father, who conceived him in the womb, begot him, and brought him to light, is the serpent; the second is Cain, who brought forth the iniquities he had conceived, the pains and the murder of kin; for by killing his brother he committed iniquity, injustice, and impiety together. And whoever receive him and do his desires become his brothers. Pharaoh is his perfect father; each of the ungodly becomes his father; Judas became his father, because he conceived him but miscarried; for he did not bring forth a full-term birth, because he attacked a greater person through Judas. And I say that a miscarriage took place, because, as a woman conceives a man's seed and receives daily growth within herself, so Judas too advanced daily for the worse, occasions being given to him by the evil one like seeds. And the first seed in him was the love of money, and its growth was theft, for he stole what was put into the purse; the pains of birth were his talks with the Pharisees and the wicked bargain for the price; and he miscarried, not giving birth: the shapeless noose of death. And you too, if you bring forth the evil one from yourself and do his desires, have begotten him and will be called his father; but if you repent, you will also throw off the burden like a woman in labour. For as in the exercises of the schools, if someone, receiving a subject from the master, begets and produces from himself the rest of the body of the speech, he himself is called the author of what he has begotten, so too one who has received a little leaven from the height of wickedness must be called father and begetter of him who from the beginning resisted the truth. This can happen in the same way to those who strive after virtue; for I have heard the bravest men say to God: 'Because of fear of you, O Lord, we have conceived in the womb and been in pain and have brought forth the spirit of salvation.' So too whoever conceive from fear of the evil one and bring forth the spirit of iniquity must be called his fathers; for they are called sons while they still obey his service, but fathers when they have come to the completion of wickedness.

"For so too our Lord says to the Pharisees, 'You are of your father the devil,' making them his sons, while they still seemed to be troubled and were thinking evil things in their hearts in return for good against the righteous. So while they were thinking such things among themselves, Judas, their evil thoughts being transferred into him, the head of evils and bringing wicked counsels to completion, became the father of the crime, honoured by them with thirty pieces of silver as the reward of his savagery; for after the morsel of bread the devil entered into him whole. But, as we said, after the womb had swollen and the time of the pains had come, he poured out the miscarried burden of his wicked conception; and so he was not fully called a father except only during the time he carried what he had conceived in the womb; after he fled to the noose, he does not seem to have brought forth a full-term birth, because repentance followed."