On First Principles 3.6.1–3.6.9

About the end and consummation of all things we have already discussed above as well as we could, as far as the authority of divine Scripture allowed, and we think this sufficient for instruction; now we add a few reminders, since the order of the inquiry has brought us to this place. The highest good, then, toward which all rational nature hastens, which is also called the end of all things, is defined by very many philosophers too in this way: that the highest good is to become like God as far as possible. But I think this is not so much their own discovery as something they took from the divine books. For Moses indicates it before all others when he narrates the first creation of man, saying: “And God said: Let us make man after our image and likeness.” Then he adds: “And God made man; after the image of God he made him; male and female he made them, and he blessed them.” When he says, then, “after the image of God he made him,” and is silent about the likeness, he indicates nothing other than that man received the dignity of the “image” in his first creation, while the perfection of the “likeness” was reserved for him in the consummation; that is, that he should acquire it for himself by the efforts of his own diligence through the imitation of God, so that, the possibility of perfection having been given him at the beginning through the dignity of the “image,” he might at the end, through the fulfilment of works, bring the perfect “likeness” to completion in himself. But the apostle John defines more openly and clearly that this is so, declaring thus: “Little children, we do not yet know what we shall be; but when it is revealed to us” (speaking without doubt of the Saviour), “we shall be like him.” By this he most surely indicates both the end of all things, which he says is still unknown to him, and the likeness to God that is to be hoped for, which will be granted according to the perfection of merits. The Lord himself too, in the Gospel, shows that these same things are not only to come but are to come through his own intercession, when he deigns to ask this of the Father for his disciples, saying: “Father, I will that where I am these also may be with me”; and, “as I and you are one, so these also may be one in us.” In this the likeness itself seems already, if it may be said, to advance, and from being like to become “one,” because without doubt in the consummation or end God is “all things and in all.” Here some ask whether the nature of bodily being, even if it has been cleansed thoroughly and made wholly spiritual, does not seem to stand in the way either of the dignity of the likeness or of the property of oneness; for a nature that is in a body does not seem able to be called like the divine nature, which is certainly in the first place incorporeal, nor to be truly and rightly called one with it, especially since the truth of the faith teaches that the Son's being “one with the Father” must be referred to the property of their nature.

Since, then, God is promised at the end to be “all and in all,” it follows that we must not think that animals, or cattle, or wild beasts come to that end, lest God be indicated to be in animals or cattle or beasts as well; nor wood or stones, lest God be said to be in these too. So too we must not think that any malice reaches that end, lest, when God is said to be “in all,” he be said to be in some vessel of malice too. For even if we say that God is now too everywhere and “in all,” because nothing can be empty of God, yet we do not say that he is now “all” in those in whom he is. Hence we must consider more carefully what this is that signifies the perfection of blessedness and the end of things: that God is said not only to be “in all” but also to be “all.” Let us inquire, then, what these “all things” are which God is to be “in all.”

And I for my part think that the saying that God is “all in all” means that he is also “all” in each one. He will be “all” in each in this way: that whatever the rational mind, cleansed from all the dregs of vices and with every cloud of malice wholly wiped away, can feel or understand or think, will all be God, and it will no longer perceive anything other than God; it will think God, see God, hold God, and God will be the measure and limit of its every motion; and so God will be “all” to it. For there will no longer be any distinction of evil and good, because evil is nowhere (for God is “all” to it, and evil no longer lies beside it); nor will the one who is always in the good, and to whom God is “all,” desire any longer to eat of the tree of the knowledge of “good and evil.” If, then, the end, brought back to the beginning, and the outcome of things made to match their beginnings, restores that state which rational nature had when it had no need to eat of the tree of the knowledge of “good and evil,” so that, with every sense of malice removed and the mind wiped clean to sincerity and purity, he alone who is the one good God becomes “all” to it, and not in a few or in many, but so that “in all” he himself is “all,” when there is no longer “death” anywhere, nor the “sting” of death anywhere, nor any evil at all: then truly God will be “all in all.” But some think that this perfection and blessedness of rational natures remains in the state we described above, that is, that they have God as “all” and God is “all” to them, only if no fellowship with bodily nature draws them away; otherwise, they think, the glory of the highest blessedness would be hindered if an admixture of material substance were inserted. About this matter we have treated and set out more fully above what could occur to us.

Now, since we find in the apostle Paul mention of a “spiritual body,” let us inquire, only as far as we can, how we ought to think about this from there too. As far as our understanding can grasp, we think that the quality of the spiritual body is such as befits not only all holy and perfect souls to dwell in, but also all that creation which “will be set free from the bondage of corruption.” Of this body the apostle also said, “We have a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens,” that is, in the dwellings of the blessed. From this we can form a conjecture of how great the purity, the subtlety and the glory of the quality of that body is, if we compare it with those bodies which now, though they are heavenly and most splendid, are nevertheless “made with hands” and visible. But of that one it is said that it is a house “not made with hands” but “eternal in the heavens.” Since, then, “the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal,” that which is neither visible nor “made with hands” but is “eternal” far surpasses all these bodies that we see, whether on earth or in heaven, and which can be seen and are “made with hands” and are not “eternal.” From this comparison one may conjecture how great is the beauty, the splendour and the brightness of the “spiritual body,” and that it is true, what was said, that “eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered the heart of man, what God has prepared for those who love him.” We must not doubt that the nature of this body of ours can, by the will of God who made it such, be brought by the Creator to that quality of a most subtle, most pure and most splendid body, as the state of things shall call for and the merit of rational nature require. Indeed, when the world needed variety and diversity, matter offered itself in complete service to its maker, as to its Lord and creator, through the different appearances and kinds of things, so that he might draw from it the different forms of heavenly and earthly things. But when things have begun to hasten toward this, “that all may be one,” as “the Father is one with the Son,” we are given to understand as a consequence that, where all are “one,” there will no longer be diversity.

For this reason the last enemy also, who is called death, is said to be destroyed, so that there may no longer be anything sad where there is no death, nor anything adverse where there is no enemy. The destruction of the last enemy must be understood thus: not that its substance, which was made by God, perishes, but that its hostile purpose and will, which came not from God but from itself, perish. It will be destroyed, then, not so that it no longer exists, but so that it is no longer an enemy and death. For nothing is impossible to the Almighty, nor is anything incurable to its maker; for he made all things that they might exist, and the things that were made to exist cannot cease to exist. Therefore they will undergo change and variety, so that according to their merits they are placed in a better or worse state; but the things made by God in order to exist and to remain cannot undergo destruction of their substance. For the things that in common opinion are believed to perish are not at once agreed to perish by the reasoning of faith or truth. Indeed our flesh is thought by the unlearned and by unbelievers to perish so completely after death that nothing at all of its substance is believed to remain. But we who believe in its resurrection understand that only a change is brought about in it by death, while its substance certainly remains, and by the will of its Creator, at a definite time, it is restored again to life, and a change is made in it again; so that what was at first flesh from the earth, earthly, then dissolved by death and made once more ash and earth ("For you are earth," he says, "and to earth you shall go"), is raised again from the earth, and after this, as the merit of the soul that dwells in it requires, advances to the glory of a spiritual body.

To this state, then, we must think that all this bodily substance of ours will be brought, when all things are restored so as to be one, and when God is all in all. This, however, must be understood to happen not suddenly but gradually and by stages, over infinite and immeasurable ages, as amendment and correction proceed little by little in each individual: some running ahead and pressing toward the heights with swifter course, others following at the next interval, and others far behind; and so, through many and countless ranks of those who are advancing and being reconciled to God from being his enemies, the last enemy is reached, who is called death, so that he too may be destroyed and be an enemy no longer. When, then, all rational souls have been restored to such a state, then the nature of this body of ours also will be brought to the glory of a spiritual body. For as we see concerning rational natures that those who lived in unworthiness because of their sins are not different from those who were invited to blessedness because of their merits, but we see the very same ones who were sinners before, afterwards converted and reconciled to God, called back to blessedness, so too we must think about the nature of the body: that the body we now use in dishonour, in corruption and in weakness is not one body, and the one we shall use in incorruption, in power and in glory another; but this same body, casting off the weaknesses in which it now is, will be transformed into glory and made spiritual, so that what was a vessel of dishonour, this very thing, cleansed, becomes a vessel of honour and a dwelling of blessedness. In this state we must believe that it remains always and unchangeably by the will of the Creator, as the saying of the apostle assures us: "We have a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." For the faith of the church does not accept, as certain Greek philosophers hold, that besides this body which is made of the four elements there is another, fifth body, in every way other than and different from this body of ours. For no one can bring forward from the holy Scriptures even a suspicion of such things, nor does the very sequence of things allow it to be accepted, especially since the holy apostle plainly defines that no new bodies are given to those who rise from the dead, but that they receive the very bodies they had while living, transformed from worse to better. For he says: "It is sown a natural body, it will rise a spiritual body; it is sown in corruption, it will rise in incorruption; it is sown in weakness, it will rise in power; it is sown in dishonour, it will rise in glory." As, then, there is a kind of progress for a human being, so that one who is at first a natural man and does not understand the things of the Spirit of God comes by instruction to become spiritual, and judges all things while he himself is judged by no one, so too we must think about the state of the body: that the same body which now, because of its service to the soul, is called natural, will by a certain progress, when the soul joined to God has become one spirit with him, advance, as a body serving the spirit, to a spiritual state and quality; especially since, as we have often shown, bodily nature was made by the Creator such that it easily follows into whatever quality he wills or the matter requires.

This whole line of reasoning, then, comes to this: that God created two general natures, a visible nature, that is, bodily, and an invisible nature, which is incorporeal. These two natures undergo different changes. The invisible one, which is rational, is changed in mind and purpose, because it has been endowed with freedom of choice; and through this it is found sometimes in good things and sometimes in their contraries. This bodily nature, on the other hand, undergoes a change of substance; hence, for whatever God the maker of all wishes to devise, fashion or refashion, he has the service of this matter in all things, so that he transforms and transfers bodily nature into whatever forms or kinds he wills, as the merits of things demand. The prophet plainly indicates this when he says, "God, who makes all things and transforms them."

Now we must certainly ask whether, when God is all in all, at the consummation of all things, the whole nature of body will consist of one kind, and every quality of body will be that one alone which will shine in that unspeakable glory which we must think will belong to the spiritual body. For if we understand rightly, this is what Moses writes at the beginning of his book, saying, "In the beginning God made heaven and earth." For this is the beginning of all creation; to this beginning it is fitting that the end and consummation of all things be brought back, that is, that that heaven and that earth be the dwelling and rest of the godly; so that first all the holy and the meek receive the inheritance of that earth, since the law and the prophets and the Gospel teach this too. In that earth, I think, are the true and living forms of that worship which Moses handed down through the shadow of the law; of which it is said that they "serve the copy and shadow of heavenly things," that is, those who served under the law. And to Moses himself it was said, "See that you make everything according to the pattern and likeness that was shown you on the mountain." Hence it seems to me that, as on this earth the law was a kind of tutor for those who were to be led by it to Christ, instructed and trained by it so that after the training of the law they might more easily receive the more perfect institutions of Christ, so also another earth, receiving all the holy, first steeps and forms them in the institutions of the true and eternal law, so that they may more easily be perfected also by those perfect institutions of heaven, to which nothing can be added; in which there will truly be what is called the eternal Gospel, and the Testament ever new, which will never grow old.

In this way, then, we must think it will come about in the consummation and restoration of all things that, advancing gradually and ascending in due measure and order, they come first to that earth and to the instruction that is in it, in which they are prepared for better institutions, to which nothing can be added. For after “stewards” and “guardians,” Christ the Lord, who is king of all, will himself take up the kingdom; that is, after the instruction of the holy powers, he himself will instruct those who can receive him in so far as he is wisdom, reigning in them until he subjects them also to the Father “who subjected all things to him”; that is, so that when they have become capable of God, God may be to them “all in all.” Then, consequently, bodily nature also will receive that highest state, to which nothing can be added. Having so far discussed the account of bodily nature and of the spiritual body, we leave it to the reader's judgment to choose from the two whichever he judges the better. And with this let us make an end of the third book.