On First Principles 4.1.1–4.1.7

But since, in discussing such great and weighty matters, it is not enough to entrust the whole matter to human senses and common understanding, and, so to speak, to make visible pronouncements about invisible things, we must also bring in the testimonies of the divine Scriptures to prove what we say. That these testimonies may have sure and undoubted credibility, whether for what we are to say or for what has already been said, it seems necessary first to show that the Scriptures themselves are divine, that is, inspired by the Spirit of God. As briefly as we can, then, we shall set out on this subject too, bringing forward from the divine Scriptures themselves the things that have rightly moved us; that is, first concerning Moses, the lawgiver of the Hebrew nation, and from the words of Jesus Christ, the author and head of the Christian religion and teaching. For though there have been very many lawgivers among the Greeks and barbarians, and countless teachers or philosophers professing to assert the truth, we remember no lawgiver who was able to instil such affection and zeal into the minds even of foreign nations that they would either willingly receive his laws or defend them with all their strength of mind. No one, then, has been able to make what seemed to him the truth so welcome and so deeply rooted, not only in many other foreign nations but even in one nation, that the knowledge or belief of it reached everyone. And indeed it cannot be doubted that lawgivers wished their laws to be kept by all people, if it could be, and that teachers wished the truth as they saw it to be known to all. But knowing that they could not do this at all, and that there was no such power in them as might call even foreign nations to the observance of their laws or doctrines, they did not dare even to attempt or begin this at all, lest the attempt itself, ineffective and impossible to complete, should mark them as imprudent in this too. But throughout the whole world, in all Greece and in all the foreign nations, there are countless and immense numbers who, leaving their ancestral laws and those whom they thought to be gods, have given themselves to the observance of the law of Moses and to the discipleship and worship of Christ; and this not without immense hatred stirred up against them by the worshippers of images, so that they are often subjected by them to tortures and sometimes even led to death; and yet they embrace and keep the word of Christ's teaching with all affection.

And one may see how in a short time this religion has grown, advancing through the punishments and deaths of its worshippers, and through the plundering of their goods and every kind of torture endured from these people; and this is the more wonderful because its teachers themselves are neither very skilled nor very numerous; yet “this word is preached throughout the whole world,” so that “Greeks and barbarians, wise and unwise” receive the religion of the Christian teaching. From this there is no doubt that it is “not by human” strength or “resources” that this comes about, that the word of Christ Jesus grows strong, with all power and belief, in the minds and hearts of all. For that these very things were foretold by him and confirmed by his divine oracles is plain when he says, “You will be brought before governors and judges for my sake, as a testimony to them and to the nations”; and again, “This Gospel will be preached among all the nations”; and again, “Many will say to me on that day: Lord, Lord, did we not eat and drink in your name, and cast out demons in your name? And I will say to them: Depart from me, workers of iniquity; I never knew you.” If these things had indeed been said by him and yet what was foretold had not come to pass, perhaps they might have seemed less true and to have no authority. But now, since the things foretold by him are coming to pass, and were foretold with such power and authority, it is most plainly declared that he who became man and delivered saving precepts to human beings is truly God.

What, then, must be said of the fact that the prophets had foretold of him that “rulers would not fail from Judah, nor leaders from his thighs, until he should come for whom it is reserved,” namely the kingdom, and “until the expectation of the nations should come”? For it is most plainly apparent from history itself, and from what is seen today, that from the times of Christ there have been no more kings among the Jews. And all those Jewish ambitions in which they took great pride and in which they exulted, whether in the beauty of the temple or in the ornaments of the altar, and all those priestly fillets and vestments of the high priests, were all destroyed together. For the prophecy was fulfilled which had said: “For many days the sons of Israel shall sit without king, without prince; there shall be no sacrifice, nor altar, nor priesthood, nor oracles.” We use these testimonies, then, against those who seem to assert, concerning what Jacob said in Genesis, that it was said of Judah, and who say that a ruler still remains from the race of Judah, namely the one who is the ruler of their nation, whom they call the patriarch, and that those of his seed will not fail who are to remain until the coming of that Christ whom they picture for themselves. But if what the prophet says is true, that “for many days the sons of Israel shall sit without king, without prince, and there shall be no sacrifice, nor altar, nor priesthood”; and if, as is certainly the case, since the temple was overthrown “no sacrifices” are offered, “no altar” is found, and “no priesthood” exists, then it is most certain that “rulers have failed from Judah,” as it is written, and “a leader from his thighs, until he came for whom it is reserved.” It is established, then, that “he has come for whom it is reserved,” in whom is also “the expectation of the nations.” And this is plainly seen to be fulfilled in the multitude of those who from different nations have believed in God through Christ.

In the song of Deuteronomy, too, it is indicated by prophecy that because of the sins of the former people there would be the election of a foolish nation, none other than this which was made through Christ. It says thus: “They provoked me with their idols, and I will provoke them to jealousy; with a foolish nation I will provoke them.” It is quite clearly to be recognized, then, how the Hebrews, who are said to have “provoked” God by those who are not gods and to have angered him “with their idols,” were themselves provoked to jealousy by “a foolish nation,” which God “chose” through the coming of Christ Jesus and his disciples. For so the apostle says: “Consider your calling, brothers: not many of you are wise according to the flesh, not many powerful, not many noble; but God chose what is foolish in the world, and the things that are not, to destroy the things that were before.” Let not “carnal Israel boast,” then, for so it is called by the apostle; let not, I say, “flesh boast in the presence of God.”

But what must be said of the things prophesied about Christ in the Psalms, especially in the one entitled “A song for the beloved,” where it is said that his “tongue” is “the pen of a swiftly writing scribe, fair in beauty above the sons of men,” because “grace is poured out on his lips”? The sign of “the grace poured out on his lips” is this: that although only a short time passed in his teaching (for he taught for a year and some months), the whole world was nevertheless filled with his teaching and with the faith of his religion. For “there arose in his days righteousness and abundance of peace,” lasting “until” the end, which end is called “the taking away of the moon”; “and he rules from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth.” A “sign” was also given to the house of David: “For a virgin conceived in the womb and bore Emmanuel,” which is interpreted, “God with us”; and what the same prophet says was fulfilled: “God is with us. Know this, you nations, and be overcome.” For “we have been overcome” and conquered, we who are from the nations, and we are, as it were, spoils of his victory, we who have bowed our necks to his grace. The place of his birth too was foretold in the prophet Micah, who says: “And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah, are by no means least among the leaders of Judah; for from you shall come a leader who shall rule my people Israel.” The weeks of years also were fulfilled up to Christ the leader, which the prophet Daniel had foretold. Present too is the one who was foretold through Job as about “to destroy the great beast,” who also “gave power” to his own disciples “to tread on serpents and scorpions and on all the power of the enemy, without being harmed at all by it.” And if anyone considers the journeys of Christ's apostles to each place, where, sent by him, they preached the Gospel, he will find that what they dared to undertake is beyond human strength, and that their being able to accomplish what they dared is from God. If we consider how people hearing a new teaching brought in by them could receive them, or rather that often those who wished to destroy them were restrained by a divine power that was present with them, we shall find that nothing in this was done by human strength, but all was brought about by divine power and providence, “signs and mighty works without doubt bearing clear testimony to their word and teaching.”

These things having been briefly shown, namely concerning the divinity of Jesus Christ and the fulfilment of all that had been prophesied about him, I think it is proved at the same time that the Scriptures themselves which prophesied about him are divinely inspired, those which foretold either his coming, or the power of his teaching, or the taking up of all the nations. To this must be added that both the prophecy of the prophets and the law of Moses were shown and proved to be divine and divinely inspired chiefly from the time when Christ came into this world. For before the things foretold by them were fulfilled, although they were true and inspired by God, they could not be shown to be true, because they had not yet been proved to be fulfilled. But the coming of Christ declared that what they had said was true and divinely inspired, since before it had certainly been held uncertain whether the outcome of what had been foretold would be fulfilled. And if anyone considers the prophetic sayings with all the zeal and reverence they deserve, it is certain that in the very act of reading and examining them more carefully he will be struck in mind and sense by some more divine breath, and will recognize that the words he reads were not produced by human beings but are the words of God; and he will perceive for himself that these books were written not by human art nor by mortal eloquence but, so to speak, in a divine style. The splendour of Christ's coming, then, illuminating the law of Moses with the brightness of truth, drew away the veil that had been laid over its letter, and opened to all who believe in him all the good things that were covered and hidden within it.

It would be a laborious task to list one by one the things foretold by the prophets long ago and how or when they were fulfilled, so as to seem to strengthen those who doubt by means of them; since anyone who wishes to know these things more carefully can gather proofs more abundantly from the books of truth themselves. But if to those less learned in the divine disciplines the sense that is above man does not at once appear on the first face of the letter, it is no wonder; for divine things come down to human beings rather hiddenly, and are the more hidden the more one is unbelieving or unworthy. For though it is certain that all things that exist or are done in this world are ordered by God's providence, some appear plainly enough to be arranged under the government of providence, while others are unfolded so secretly and incomprehensibly that the reason of divine providence is wholly hidden in them; so that sometimes some people do not believe that certain things belong to providence, because the reason is hidden from them by which the works of divine providence are ordered with a kind of ineffable art; yet this reason is not equally hidden from all. For even among human beings it is perceived less by one and more by another; and better than by any human being on earth, whoever he may be, it is known by the inhabitant of heaven. The reason of bodies is clear in one way, that of trees in another, that of animals in another; but that of souls is hidden in yet another way; and how the different motions of rational minds are ordered by divine providence is hidden more from human beings, but not a little, I think, from the angels too. But just as divine providence is not refuted, least of all for those who are certain of it, because its works or dispensations cannot be grasped by human minds, so neither will the divine inspiration of holy Scripture, which extends through its whole body, be thought not to exist because the weakness of our understanding cannot trace out in each phrase the hidden and secret meanings; for the treasure of divine wisdom is hidden in the humbler and coarser vessels of words, as the apostle also indicates when he says, “We have this treasure in earthen vessels,” “so that the power of divine strength may shine out the more,” since no colouring of human eloquence is mixed into the truth of the doctrines. For if our books had enticed people to believe by the art of rhetoric or by philosophical cleverness, “our faith” would without doubt be thought “to consist in the art of words and in human wisdom, and not in the power of God.” But now it is known to all that “the word of this preaching” has been received by very many throughout almost the whole world in such a way that they understood that what they believed rested “not on persuasive words of wisdom but on the demonstration of the Spirit and of power.” Therefore, since we have been led to faith and belief by heavenly, indeed by more than heavenly, power, so that we worship God alone, the creator of all, let us also strive with all our might, “leaving behind the elementary teaching of Christ,” which is the first beginning of knowledge, to “be carried on to perfection,” so that the “wisdom” that is handed on to “the perfect” may be handed on to us also. For so he promises, to whom the preaching of this wisdom was entrusted, when he says: “But we speak wisdom among the perfect, yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the rulers of this world, who are coming to nothing.” By this he shows that this wisdom of ours has nothing in common with the wisdom of this world as regards elegance of speech. This wisdom, then, will be inscribed in our hearts more clearly and perfectly if it is laid open to us “according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept hidden for eternal ages but has now been made manifest through the prophetic Scriptures” and “through the coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,” “to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.”