Against Five Heresies

I am a debtor, I confess, not under the compulsion of necessity but, what is stronger, of love. The collector cannot be as pressing in his demand as the debtor is devoted in his payment. But that I may fulfil what I promised, help me with your holy prayers, that almighty God may give grace to my words, and that I may satisfy your devout minds and ears. If those of you who were present then will be so good as to remember, we said there were five kinds of enemies, and to overcome them we asked for a truce, so that we could prepare the necessary arms. The promised day has dawned, and we too, with the Lord’s help, have come forward eagerly to the contest. Our help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He who gave the courage to fight will give the fighter victory. Let not the crowd of enemies nor the look of the warriors call us back; let not their shining arms, brittle as glass, terrify us. Goliath, great, strong, with terrible arms and protected by a huge crowd, David alone, a small boy and unarmed, laid low with a single blow of a stone, and threw the whole camp of the Philistines into confusion and flight. And what did the stone thrown by David’s hand against Goliath signify, but Christ, who was to come from the seed of David against the devil? Let us now advance to the attack and set out the five kinds of errors we mentioned. The pagans say: “Why do you abhor and reject us as worshipers of many gods? See, you too say that the God whom you preach as the one to be worshiped has a son, and you make up the story that he was born without the joining of the other sex.” The Jews say: “How do you worship one God, when you call Lord the man whom our fathers crucified, and force people to venerate and worship him with you as the Son of God?” The Manichaeans say that it is a phantasm when it is said that the Lord Christ could have been born from a woman’s womb. “For it is not fitting,” they say, “to believe that so great a majesty passed through the filth and squalor of a woman.” The Sabellians, who are also the Patripassians, say: “God the Father and the Son is one, since he who is the Father is himself also the Son. For if we say otherwise, we will be called worshipers of many gods.” The Arians say: “The Father is one, the Son another, but the Son is less. For how can the begotten be equal to the begetter?”

See, the questions of the errors have been set out, like enemy battle lines drawn up. Against these deadly lines, most holy brothers, take up the armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day and stand perfect in all things. Gird your loins with truth; let no one tremble, no one be afraid. There is the breastplate of righteousness; there is the shield of faith, on which the fiery arrows of the wicked are caught and quenched. There is the helmet of salvation; there is the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Whoever of Christ’s faithful soldiers is armed with these arms will fear no one’s person, and will not be called back from the contest by the terror of the times. Come, brothers, the contest is at hand, the work is hot, the adversary presses on, he readies his darts and tries to throw them: let no one be afraid. Brothers, there are more with us than with them. With us is that great Moses, the friend of God, who, to defeat the enemy in battle, stretched out his hands to heaven, showing even then the figure of the cross of Christ; at God’s command, with one stroke of his rod, he turned the rolling waves of the swelling sea, with their winding curves, into dry plains for the people to cross. With us is Joshua, leader of the people of Israel after Moses, a most valiant warrior, whose very name points to the Savior: by his power and his confidence in God he stopped the day, so that it would not complete the bounds of its course, and commanded the night not to come on. He overcame, captured, humbled, and killed the kings of the nations, not one by one but all together. With us is David, strong of hand. What shall I say? Servant of God, chosen of God, friend of God, ancestor of God: he knew well not only “to spare the subdued and war down the proud,” but also to show virtues and keep patience. When he pursued his enemies he was not destructive, and when he conquered he was not impious. With us are more and more holy men, who foresaw and foretold all things to come. There is nothing, then, to frighten you: only wait, listen, and pray. Let your prayer for me be more intent and more abundant. Let us not delay longer, but follow through what we have set out.

What do you say, pagan? “God,” you say, “if he delighted in a son, needed a marriage; if he abhorred marriage, he is alone, without a son. For what could be found like God, to be joined to God and bear a son to God? Then, if, as you say, God has a son, you no longer worship one God.” What shall we do? We have caught a dart sent by the Philistine; what shall we send back? Whatever dart we send, though it reach him, it does no good. Why? Because he is hard. How hard? He is of stone: he worships idols; and it is written, “Let all who make them become like them, and all who trust in them.” He does not accept the holy Scriptures. Let us look, then, for a stone to strike him with, so that, struck, he may be shaken; shaken, broken; broken, turned to dust; turned to dust, rained on; rained on, sown; sown, may bear fruit, not to be burnt in the fire but stored in the barn. Hermes, who in Latin is called Mercury, wrote a book called Logos teleios, that is, “The Perfect Word”: a great name for this book, because he of whom it was written is great. For what is more perfect than the Word, who alone is free among the dead? Let us hear what Mercury says of the perfect Word: “The Lord,” he says, “and maker of all the gods made a second Lord.” And a little later, to show what he meant, he repeated it and said: “Since, then, he made him first, and alone and one, he seemed good to him and most full of all good things.” How full, let John the evangelist say: “From his fullness we have all received, grace for grace.” “He seemed good to him and most full of all good things.” And it continues: “He rejoiced.” In whom, or with whom, did he rejoice? Let the Wisdom of God, the Son of God, say: “I was the one in whom he delighted.” So “he rejoiced, and loved him greatly as his only-begotten.” He whom he first said was made, he afterwards called only-begotten. Again in another place he said: “The Son of the blessed God and of good will, whose name cannot be told by human mouth.” Were you looking, pagan, for God’s wife? Hear Mercury: brace your brow, and take, stone that you are, the stone: fall, that you may be raised; be broken, that you may be made firm; be destroyed, that you may be built up. Let the blow of the stone not split the skin of your brow, nor burst a vein, nor open the pit of a wound, but make the sign of the cross. You seek God’s wife? Let impure depravity be cast out of your heart, I beg you. The wife of God is good will. How God is Father and God is Son, and yet they are not two gods but one God, I ought not to dispute with you, because unless you believe you will by no means be able to understand. And yet Mercury confesses the Son of God as God. Struck by this stone, let the sacrilegious man cease to be of stone. Let us hear also what the Sibyl, their prophetess, says of the same: “God,” she says, “gave another to the sons of men to worship.” As is plain, in these sayings of Mercury and the Sibyl Sabellius too is judged. Mercury calls both the Father and the Son God, and the Sibyl speaks of another God. Sabellius says not another, because he asserts that the Father is the same as the Son. It is very good if with one blow we strike not one adversary only, but as many as our missile can reach once thrown. Again the Sibyl says: “Know that he is your Lord, the Son of God.” This verse rebukes both the pagan and the Jew. In another place she calls the Son of God symboulos, that is, counsel or counselor. And the prophet says, “His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, God strong and mighty.” Here the Arian is refuted, who, when he calls the Son of God less, says that God once did not have a son. And if he was without a son, he was without counsel. See into what dangers we are drawn. But since God was never without counsel, even though the Arian contradicts, the Father could never be without the Son. What are you doing, pagan? Open your ears; do not be like the deaf asp that stops its ear so as not to hear the voice of the charmer. I do not bring you authorities of mine; Mercury is yours, to whom you paid such honor and worship among the gods that you named a day after him. Hear him; let him convince you, let him overcome you, so that when he has conquered you, you may yield to him and believe me. Mercury said: “God loved his Only-begotten.” He said: “The Son of the blessed God and of good will.” And so as not to suffer the tedium of being asked his name, he added next: “whose name cannot be told by human mouth.” What, Mercury, do you say that the name of God’s Son cannot be told by men? Let it be told by you, whom men regard not as a man but as a god. But he speaks to his son, saying: “There is.” What? “The word of the ineffable Son, of wisdom, holy, holy.” Is this not “In the beginning was the Word”? Tell us, Hermes, has this word of wisdom a mother? It continues: “It is from the only God, the Lord, God who rules over all mortals.” And since it cannot be searched out by men, he adds: “It is above men.” So, since it is above men, (he means:) I cannot tell the name of God’s Son, because I am not a god; let men, as men, say what I am not; I acknowledge what I am. The word of wisdom is from God alone. Do not suppose there, then, pagan, or invent a human marriage: it is from God alone, and it is above men. The Sibyl rebukes you, saying: “Know that he is your Lord, the Son of God, God”: him, not another, not Mars, not Jupiter, not Mercury, but the one whom Mercury confesses. Why do you wonder, Christian, that these say such things of the Father and the Son? “The demons also believe, and tremble.” Indeed in the Gospel, as the Lord passes by, they say: “We know who you are, Son of God; you have come before the time to torment us.” Would that, as demons recognized the judge, so men might recognize the Savior!

What does the Jew say? “We have one God; besides him we know no other. But the one you call Christ our fathers killed, not as God but as a man.” This is just what I said: Would that, as demons recognized the judge, so men might recognize the Savior! See, demons saw and trembled; men saw and killed. Demons confessed; men persecuted. What unhappiness, and how great a misery, to be found inferior even to demons! Yet men believe, demons perish; men are saved, demons are punished. But this change is the grace of the right hand of the Most High, not the presumption of a man trusting in his own strength. Against this Jew, however, I do not labor: his own books fight against him, the Law and the Prophets fight; and either, defeated and humbled, he will be saved, or, proud and stubborn, he will be punished. The Lord said to Moses: “Behold, I send my angel to go before you, guard you on the way, and bring you into the place I have prepared. Heed him and hear his voice, and do not think him one to be despised.” You heard “angel”: recognize the Lord, “and do not think him one to be despised.” Hear further what you should fear: “And do not think him one to be despised,” he says. Why? “For he will not pardon you when you sin, and my name is in him.” Who is he so great, to whom God gave both his power and his name? “The Lord of hosts, he is the king of glory.” And how do we prove that when “angel” is said, God must be understood? You have it in the book called Genesis: “Two angels came to Sodom in the evening,” it says, “while Lot sat before the gates of the city; and when he saw them, he rose and went to meet them.” Why say more? He received them and served them as strangers. By his custom of hospitality he was freed from the danger of the city, escaped the temporal fire, and won an eternal reward. Learn, Christians, to show hospitality without distinction, lest perhaps the one to whom you shut your house and deny kindness be Christ himself. Let us not wander further from the matter in hand. The angels came to Lot and said, see and note that angels are said to speak, what did the angels say? “Save your life; do not look behind you.” For no one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God. “Nor stay anywhere in all the region round about”: do not cling to earthly pleasures; “but save yourself on the mountain”: let God be your hope, lest you too perish with the Sodomites. “And Lot said to them.” See a man who sees: not blind, like the Jews and the Sabellians; not bleary-eyed, like the Arians; but with sound eyes, like Catholic Christians. He saw angels and understood the Lord. What did he say to the angels? “And Lot said to them: My Lord, since your servant has found favor before you, and you have magnified your mercy which you have shown me in saving my life.” A great thing: when I want to strike the Jew, Moses, that most valiant man, brandished and threw the spear of his word so that it passed through the Jew to the Sabellian and struck the Arian. What are you doing, holy Lot? You see angels, not one but two, and you say, “My Lord.” You address one, you entreat one: are you not afraid of seeming to wrong the other? “Far from it,” he says. “Go away, Jews; go away, Sabellians, for you do not see; go away, Arians, for you see too little. I see; and because I see what I see, I neither despise nor err. I see two; I see them equal. I entreat one and wrong neither, because I do not divide the Father from the Son. And so that you may understand that I am not mistaken when I entreat two as one, see whether two or one answers my prayers.” He asked to have refuge in a small, nearby city and to live. He is answered. Let us see how many answer. The words of the book follow: “And he said to him”: the answer is in the singular. Follow further, let us see: “Behold, I have accepted your prayers in this too, that I will not overthrow the city for which you have spoken. Hurry and be saved there; for I can do nothing until you enter there.” Do you see, Jew, that he is called an angel and is God? Do you hear, Arian, two, Father and Son, and one speaking? Yet the Father is not the same as the Son, against the Sabellians, but there are Father and Son. Do you hear what was said: “I have accepted your prayers”? Do you hear what he says: “I will not overthrow the city”? Do you hear: “I can do nothing”? Let the Jew read “angel” and understand God; let the Sabellian read that two came; let the Arian read that one answered: and let them not despise it but flee their error, lest they come to the fire. But to show more fully that the one called an angel must be understood as God, let us recite what follows in this reading: “Then,” it says, “the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulphur and fire from the Lord out of heaven.” What is “the Lord from the Lord,” if not the Son from the Father? As in another place too: “The Lord said to my Lord,” that is, the Father to his Son, “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet.” Again in Exodus: “The angel of the Lord,” it says, “appeared to Moses in a flame of fire from the bush, and he saw that the bush was burning with fire, but the bush was not consumed. And Moses said: I will go over and see this great sight, why the bush is not consumed. And when the Lord saw that he came near to see, the Lord called him from the bush.” See, the angel himself is the Lord himself. And it continues: “Moses, Moses.” And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” The Lord said to him, “Do not come near here unless you take the sandals off your feet; for the place where you stand is holy ground.” Hear further what he said to him: “I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob.” So let the Jew so hear “angel” as to understand the Lord and fear God; let the Sabellian so confess the Father as not to deny the Son; let the Arian so confess Father and Son as not to diminish the Son. Joshua the son of Nun too, as the book written under his name says, when he was fighting against the enemy and stood ready for battle, saw a man standing before him holding a drawn sword; and he went to him and said: “Are you ours, or our adversaries’?” He answered: “No, but I am the prince of the army of the Lord, and now I have come.” And Joshua fell on his face to the ground and worshiped. Now, Jew, follow your leader. He sees, he asks, and he worships. Sight is shared: for both what is recognized and what is not recognized are seen. So sight is shared, the question shows ignorance, the worship shows faith. Whom does he see? A man. Who is this man? He whose coming against the hostile nations was foretold, desired, and awaited. [“And he is a man,” it says, “and who shall know him?”] Who is the prince of the army of the Lord? Is it not he who, asked in the Gospel who he was, answered, “The beginning, who also speak to you”? Why are you troubled, Joshua? “Why have the nations raged, and the peoples devised vain things against the Lord and against his Christ?” You see an armed man: do not fear. I come not against you but for you; for I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. What is it, Joshua, that you see, ask, and worship? Hear: “I see a man; I ask the one I see; I hear one I do not see; I worship not what I see but what I believe: for faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of God.” What, then, do you seek? “Attend and follow. I see a man, but what I understand is fairer than the sons of men. Something flashes upon me, and something bright shines as from a hiding place. I go to him, because he has come to me: I will search out what I see, this great sight. He whom I see is both man and not man. Indeed he is man, because of the Manichaean, and more than man, because of the Jew.” Go on, my Joshua, my leader, go on. Why, unless because when you seek me, you win me? “See, I come, I find a man: within I perceive something; it is obscure, I do not yet see. Moses’ face is unveiled, but a veil hinders the gaze; the truth is hidden. I do not recognize what it is; I must ask. Tell me, you man: are you ours or our adversaries’? If he is the adversaries’, he is both man and enemy; if he is ours, he is both man and Savior. He comes after me, but he was before me. If he is Jesus, he is also Savior.” Let Jesus question Jesus, the earlier question the later, yet the lesser the greater; let the one who wanes question the one who grows; let the figure question the truth, or rather let the figure understand the truth, so that the day may dawn and the darkness of time be taken away. “See, I come; I know that a spirit does not have flesh and bones; I touch flesh; I look, I behold an armed man. Still the mystery is hidden. I question the man, I hear the Word; I take away the veil, I worship God.” In that Joshua saw and did not recognize, he signified the raging nation of the Jews, which, had it recognized him when it saw him, would never have crucified the Lord of glory; but in that he believed by hearing and worshiped, he signified this people of whom it is written, “A people I did not know served me; at the hearing of the ear it obeyed me.” Hear further, you who deny that God begot a Son; hear what the Father says through the prophet Isaiah: “Shall I, who make others give birth, not give birth myself? says the Lord. Shall I, who grant generation to others, remain barren? says the Lord your God,” to whom it was said, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you.” Why do you goad me, Arian, and laugh when you hear “today”? With God there is never a tomorrow, never a yesterday, but always today: there the year does not roll on in the circles of months, nor does the month pass with days following and departing; hours do not change, times and moments do not vary, where the day is neither closed by an end nor begun by a beginning. Let the Jew hear further what the Lord says through the prophet; let the Arian hear; let all hear who say that the Son of God either does not exist or is less. “I,” he says, “am God, and there is no other.” And what of the Son, Lord, if you alone are God? Hear further; why do you hurry? “By myself I have sworn.” Where there is an oath, there is no doubt. “By myself I have sworn: a word of righteousness shall go out from my mouth.” See, you have the Son: “A word of righteousness shall go out from my mouth and shall not return.” What is “shall not return”? So that the Sabellian may not say that the Son is the same as the Father, the word that has gone out shall not return: because the Father is the Father, the Son is the Son. Let the shameless talkativeness of the heretics be silent for a little; let the Lord complete his sentence, and either no one will oppose the Son of God, or whoever stands as his adversary will be put to shame. “A word of righteousness,” he says, “shall go out from my mouth and shall not return; for to me every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall confess.” And what of the Son? Hear, then, what is said in the Lord: “Mine are the highest righteousness and dominion.” Go on, then; and what after that? “To him they shall come, and all who resist him shall be put to shame.” Go now, all of you, pagans, heretics, Jews; oppose and resist the Son of God: to him you will come, and all of you who resist him will be put to shame.

We have spoken not a little of the Son of God according to his divinity, and as far as we could we have not spared the adversaries who resisted; now I wish to come to his incarnation, and the impure Manichaean stands in the way. Why? Because he does not want the Son of God to be called also the son of man. And where is what is written: “Drop down dew, you heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain the Just One; let the earth be opened and bud forth the Savior, and let righteousness spring up together; I the Lord have created him”? Again: “For to us a little child is born, and to us a son is given; and the government is upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, mighty God, Father of the age to come, Prince of peace”? Again: “Behold, a virgin shall conceive in her womb and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel”? Someone says: “You had arranged to fight with the Manichaean, not with the Jew. Against the Manichaean new weapons are needed, not old ones. Why? Because he accepts the New Testament, not the Old.” But I, who have taken up the fight against both, need weapons from every side; especially since these new ones were forged from the old: so those are not to be thrown away, and these are to be carried. For different adversaries fall to different weapons. So this order must be kept, that in speaking of the Gospel I am not silent about the Prophets. “But I,” says the Manichaean, “accept neither Moses nor the Prophets.” What do you say of the apostle Paul, who at the opening of his letter to the Romans wrote: “Paul, servant of Jesus Christ, called an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was made for him from the seed of David according to the flesh”? Do you hear that the Gospel would not be shown forth through the apostles unless it had first been promised through the prophets? Do you hear that the Son of God according to his divinity was made son of man from the seed of David according to the flesh? For in what are the Prophets contrary to the Gospel? The prophet said: “Drop down dew, you heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain the Just One”: let the angel come and preach the word. “Let the earth be opened”: let Mary hear; “and bud forth the Savior”: let her bear Jesus. The prophet said: “Behold, a virgin shall conceive in her womb and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel.” The evangelist too, in saying this, followed it and explained it, saying, “God with us.” In vain, Manichaean, do you try to oppose the Prophets. See, the Apostle says, “Concerning his Son, who was made for him from the seed of David according to the flesh.” What the prophets foresaw and foretold, the apostles saw and preached. He who was, was made. What was he? What was he made? He was the Word; he was made flesh. He was God; he was made man. He was Son of God; he was made son of man. He took up humanity without losing divinity; made lowly, he remained exalted; born a man, he did not cease to be God; born a little child, he was hidden as great. Let whoever gladly embraces God born not shudder at the virgin’s childbirth. God, the creator of man, the son of man, says to you: “What is it that disturbs you in my birth? I was not conceived by the desire of lust. I made the mother of whom I was to be born; I prepared and cleansed the way for my journey. She whom you despise, Manichaean, is my mother; but she was made by my hand. If I could be defiled when I made her, I could be defiled when I was born of her. As her virginity was not corrupted by my passage, so my majesty was not stained there. If the sun’s ray can dry up the filth of sewers and cannot be defiled by them, how much more can the brightness of the eternal light, which incurs no defilement, cleanse wherever it shines, while it cannot itself be polluted?” Fool, whence filth in a virgin mother, where there was no intercourse with a human father? Whence filth in her who suffered neither lust in conceiving nor pain in giving birth? Whence filth in a house which no dweller had approached? Her maker and lord alone came to her; he put on the garment he did not have, and left her closed as he found her. As he alone was born free among the dead, so the modesty of this mother, of whom he was born, alone is intact. Eve, disobedient, deserved punishment; Mary, by obeying, obtained grace: the one was cursed for tasting the forbidden fruit, the other was blessed for believing the angel; the one brought us death, the other bore us life. What are you doing, Manichaean? You oppress the Christian; you do not defend Christ. Let unclean vanity be silent, because clean truth has been born.

I would like to pursue the Manichaean further, but I am beset by the hostile Arian, who trusts in his strength and glories in his power. When we were answering the others we did not keep silent about him either; but now, following his own order, let us see what darts he throws. Let the person of the powerful frighten no one: “All flesh is grass.” You see the grass grow daily, you see it flower: why are you afraid? Such fruits a deserted land bears. I do not accuse the farmers; I look for them. Where are you now, good farmers? What are you doing? Why are you idle? You see how many evils this land is full of: here thorns spring up, here thistles, here grass. Burn the thorns, root out the thistles, cut the grass, scatter good seed; let not the winter frighten you; and though iniquity abounds, yet let your love be fervent. Sow in winter what you may reap in summer. But to whom am I speaking? Where are you, fountains of tears? To what farmers am I talking? Some are dead, others put to flight: “the earth has been given into the hands of the wicked”; tribulation and distress have found us. Lord, give us help from tribulation, that the salvation of man may not be vain but true. What do you say, Arian? Answer my questions, I pray. I would not have you despise the little one: your great form does not help you, your great arms do not protect you; the blow of one stone pierces the helmeted brow. Tell me, then, what I ask you. Do you believe in God the Father almighty? “I believe,” he says. Do you believe in Jesus Christ his Son our Lord? “I believe,” he says. Do you believe that Jesus Christ, God and man, was born of the Holy Spirit from the virgin Mary? “I believe,” he says. You do well. I ask further: As the Father is God, so is the Son God? “Yes.” Is the Father one, the Son another? “Certainly.” Is the Son equal to the Father? “Equal, equal,” he says. What remains? See, he has answered everything I asked. In that he says he believes God the Father and God the Son, he is with me against the pagan. In that he believes that Christ, God and man, was born of the Holy Spirit from the virgin Mary, he is with me against the Jew and the Manichaean. In that he believes that the Father is one and the Son another, he is with me against the Sabellian. Come, if you are with me in everything, why do we quarrel? If we have one inheritance, let us possess it together; we are brothers: “Behold, how good and pleasant it is for brothers to dwell in unity!” Why is there a new structure before the wall? Let us keep watch together to guard our inheritance. Our inheritance is splendid to us. We have the envious, we have enemies: they too want to possess it, not with us but against us. Let no one usurp anything for himself: this inheritance was left to us to be possessed undivided, not to be broken up into shares. Let us gather the fruit together, lest by dividing we lose it. Poverty makes me anxious; I beg you, do not gather outside, apart from me, lest you begin to scatter. For whoever does not gather with me scatters. I seem to have forgotten with whom I was dealing; but I have not forgotten: I am questioning the Arian, whom I long to see a Catholic. Someone says: “He has answered everything you wished, and nothing contrary is found in his answers: what more do you want?” Wait, brother, do not judge too easily; I still have something to ask. Do not quickly entrust yourself to him: the answer is clear, the poison hidden. What did you say, brother? Is the Son equal to the Father? “Equal,” you say. Come now, keep watch: now what was hidden will be revealed. How do you say the Son is equal to the Father? In operation, or in origin? In power, or in eternity? Or perhaps in both? “Far from it,” you say. “He is equal in operation and power, not in eternity: for how can the begotten be equal to the unbegotten?” There he is, the one who walked with me as a co-heir: the deceit that was hidden has appeared. He was thought to possess with me; he wants to divide. But I do not allow it; I resist outright. The laws require that the testator’s will be obeyed in all things: if anyone wishes to act against the testator’s will, let him lose the inheritance. But “are the laws silent amid arms”? Not at all: the toil and the fight are for this, that the laws may be served. I bring out the testament, I read the testator’s words: if there is anything to be divided, I find it there; if there is nothing to be divided, I answer you from the testament itself. Hear what the testament contains: “My peace I give you, my peace I leave you.” This is the inheritance. And who is the testator? Read the Testament, and you will find him. When the prophet spoke of the Lord, he said: “He shall be magnified to the ends of the earth, and he himself shall be peace.” “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men”: not to those who divide the holy unity, but “to men of good will.” He himself is the inheritance, he himself the testator, and you seek to divide him. Why do you divide the one? If you divide the one, you will have nothing whole. O Arian heresy, cruel and impious harlot, blush at Solomon’s judgment. A harlot, lest she lose the one living child, conceived no matter how and already born, would not allow her son to be divided; and do you divide your God-man? She, though a harlot, was yet devoted, because she was a mother; you are both a harlot and impious, because you are not a mother: what you bear you smother, what you do not bear you gather. How do you suckle another’s child, you who kill your own? Your heart has grown hard; hers trembled. What did she say? “Give her the child, and do not divide him.” He is my son, but I would rather rejoice that he lives whole with her than mourn him divided and dead. “He is my son,” she says; “but what use am I as a mother to the child if I take away the life I cannot give? I want to drive the cruel woman’s breasts away from the little one, but I am the more compelled to fear the judge’s sword. Give her my son: he was born mine; but let him go wholly to her, and let the love remain with me. Give her the whole child; let not the life of his limbs be taken away; let his wholeness not be divided, and my devotion is not taken from me.” What did she say? “Give her the child and do not divide him.” See, I too say: possess the whole, and do not divide God. “No,” he says; “but if you want peace without prejudice, divide the inheritance.” And how am I to divide it? “The Father is greater, the Son less”? O shares! O justice! O equality! One part is greater, the other less. I do not consent; I make no share, because I do not divide peace. For if peace is broken, it will no longer be peace. But how can peace be unimpaired with you, in whom faith is not whole? Therefore, since you do not want to possess with me and want to divide peace, you cannot obtain the inheritance. Finally, if in your mouth you strive not for peace but for perfidy, go, appeal to the judge; let us see what he will say to you. You have the ordinary judge; I would not have you bring me other and other powers from different quarters. I need not an armor-bearer but a lawgiver. “And where,” you say, “do I find him?” Where will you not find him? Hear the prophet saying: “The Lord is our judge, the Lord our lawgiver.” And do not think the judge one to be despised; hear what follows: “The Lord is our king, the Lord himself will save us.” See, you have the judge. If that is too little, our king too is before you. He is in heaven in such a way that he does not desert the earth. “Heaven and earth,” he says, “I fill.” “I am with you all days until the end of the age.” He is both with us and with the Father: for he neither left the Father when he came down to us, nor deserted us when he ascended to the Father. Appeal to him, say to him: “Lord, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.” Hear the divine answer, hear the just judge; hear peace fleeing strife. What does he say? “Friend, who appointed me a judge or divider over you?” You want to divide peace, and you seek to have peace as your judge? “I will not be your judge; let me be peace. I do not know how to quarrel; I sit with those who agree, I flee those who quarrel. If, when you were an enemy of my Father, I reconciled you through myself, how then will you separate me from my Father? When you were far off, I came to bring you back; when you were wandering among mountains and woods, I sought you; I found you among stones and wood; you stumbled on stones and clung to them, because you worshiped wood and stones. And lest you be torn by the greedy mouth of wolves and beasts, I gathered you, carried you on my shoulders, and gave you back to my Father. I labored, I sweated, I put my head under the thorns, I offered my hands to the nails, a lance opened my side; I was torn by so many, I will not say insults, but harsh things; I shed my blood, I laid down my life, to join you to myself: and do you divide me?” Hear what is answered to the disciple who knew the Son and was seeking the Father. Philip said to the Lord: “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” Was not he too separating the Son from the Father? “We know you already,” he means, “but we do not know your Father.” And what do you want? “Show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” And the Lord answered him (if you are willing to hear, Arian: you erred with the apostle; come back with the apostle; let his rebuke be your cure too). What does the Lord say? “Have I been with you so long, and you have not known me?” Philip, I came to bring you to my Father; do not separate me. Why do you seek someone else apart from me? “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father as well.” So great is the unity in us, so great the likeness, so great the love, that I am in the Father and the Father in me. I sense, Sabellian, what you are muttering: you are eager either to shut me in with the Arian or to call me away from the Arian. But in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, not of three gods but of one God, when I answer him I do not pass you by. What did the Lord say? “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father as well.” Did he say, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father,” or, “I am Son and Father at once”? But he said, “I am in the Father, and the Father in me,” and, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father as well.” The insertion of one syllable, “et” (“as well”), distinguishes the Father and distinguishes the Son, and shows that you have neither Father nor Son. Tell me, Arian: do you call the Father God? “Certainly.” And the Son? “Him too I confess as God.” How do you know? “Because, when it was foretold that he would come in the flesh, the prophet said of him: Say, you faint-hearted, be strong; do not fear; behold, our God will bring the vengeance of recompense; God himself will come and save us.” Acknowledge it, then, in what you say you acknowledge, if you do not oppose the prophet. What then do you say of the Father? “He is God.” And the Son? “He is God.” Is the Son coeternal with the Father? “No.” Then, according to you, there was a time when the Son was not. If there was a time when the Son was not, then there was a time which the Son did not make. If there was a time which the Son did not make, not all things were made through him: for there was already a time when the Son was not. If there was a time when the Son was not, John the evangelist ought not to have said, “In the beginning was the Word,” but, “In the beginning was time.” John says, “All things were made through him”; but the Arian contradicts. Tell me, Arian: how do you know that there was a time when the Son was not? Or will you perhaps say, “And how does John know that in the beginning was the Word?” Because he reclined on the Lord’s breast, and drew from there what he drank at Christ’s banquet: that in the beginning was the Word. Yet tell me: when in the beginning was the Word, or when John reclined on the Lord’s breast and learned from the Word of the Lord that the Word was in the beginning and the Word was God, where was Arius? I do not know whether you dare to say he was there. For it is known and read at what time he was born, and how deservedly he was condemned. It is known too how he lived and how he died; and so you do not dare to say of Arius, as of the Word, “He both was and is”: for Arius neither was then nor is now. But that the Arian may be shut out on every point, hear what is said through Solomon: “The Lord made the regions and the uninhabited bounds under heaven. When he prepared the heaven, I was present with him.” And a little later: “I was with him ordering all things; I was there when he made the strong foundations of the earth; I was the one in whom he delighted.” But you say: “The question is about time: whether the Son was before there was time.” Hear him saying through the prophet: “From time,” he says. What is “from time”? Is it from when time began to be? Not so, impious Arian, not so; but: “From time, before it was made, I was there.” See, before time was made, he was there. Look now for when he was not, who was before the times. “In the beginning was the Word.” The Greeks say it better: Logos, for it means both word and reason. You see, then, that he always was, of whom you dare to say, “He was not.” Or if you say that God was at some time without word or without reason, you will be an adversary not only of the Son but also of the Father. “I,” he says, “came forth from the mouth of the Most High.” Who says this? The Word. And what is this Word? Let John say: “The Word was God.” So the Word, and he whose Word it was, are not two, but one. “No,” you say, “because a word is later than him whose word it is; whence it appears that the Son is less than the Father.” So you deny that the Son of God is God. “I do not deny it,” you say. “I call the Father God, and the Son God; but the Father greater, the Son less.” For how long is the Father greater, the Son less? Tell me, since I see you want to trample on eternity: by how many years does God the Father precede his Son? Where did you read the birthday of the Son of God? Of the Son of God, I say; I do not say of the Son of God and man. Where then did you read his birthday? With what astrologer did you look up and work out the horoscope of the Creator of the stars? What times, what hours, what moments, what numbers, what minutes of moments of the birth of him who made all things have you collected? Let it rest, I beg you, let it rest, this heresy of yours, not religion but superstition: on the beginning of Christ calculation fails. For when eternity is heard to be without beginning, no age is sought in it. If the Father is God and the Son God, the Father greater, the Son less, then there is no longer one God, but two gods. If there are two gods, what is it that the Lord says through the prophet: “Before me no god was formed, and after me there shall be none”? What do you say, Arian? To whom do you assign these words? If they are the Father’s, then in saying “Before me no god was formed, and after me there shall be none,” either he himself will not be Father, or the Son will not be God. For if he said only “Before me no god was formed,” and did not add “and after me there shall be none,” you would be free to apply these words to the Father alone. But since he goes on to say “after me there shall be none,” then according to you, as I said, he denies both that he is Father and that the Son is God. Again, if these words are the Son’s, he denies that his Father is either God or Father. For if he did not say “Before me no god was formed,” but only “after me there shall be none,” perhaps it could be said that the Son spoke it. But now, when he says, “Before me no god was formed, and after me there shall be none,” he says that his Father is neither God nor Father. Again, if these words are the Father’s, who says, and to whom, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you”? Or is God, far be it, to be convicted of lying? But if they are the Son’s words, who says, and of whom, “My Father is working until now”? Or is he perhaps to be judged both insulting and ungrateful to the Father? But would it be said to an ungrateful one, “Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, and the ends of the earth as your possession”? Or did the prophet perhaps not know what he was saying, or want to deceive; or, to say something milder of the prophet, are we to believe that he imagined two people talking together, the Father and the Son, and that when the Father said, “Before me no god was formed,” the Son added, “And after me there shall be none”? Is what we are doing a mime and a joke, or something divine? O crime! O grief! Spare us, spare us, heretical impiety. Since you do not grasp God, you provoke us too to blasphemy. The holy Church does not teach this. The Father is Father, the Son is Son; the one was never not Father, and the other was never not Son: both eternal, they neither began to be nor cease. What the Father speaks, the Son speaks, because he is the Word of the Father; and what the Son speaks, the Father speaks, because he is the Father of the Word. The Word himself says: “The words that I speak, I do not speak from myself.” Grant to the Creator, I pray, what he himself has granted to the creature, and in what is created, if you can, grasp the Creator. See, fire and brightness are two: one is from the other, and neither is without the other: the fire is father, the brightness son. If the brightness could, it would say: “That I shine, I do not shine from myself; but he who sent me gave me to shine.” For fire sends out brightness. And as the Son says of God the Father, “The Father is with me,” so the brightness could say, “The fire is with me.” Put out the fire, and the brightness will appear nowhere. If, then, fire and brightness, father and son, the one a father without a wife, the other a son without a mother, cannot be divided from each other; and if, though one is from the other, the beginning of the one still cannot be without the other; and if this power has been granted by the Creator to the creature: what can the Creator himself do? Let the pagan come, let the Sabellian come, let the Arian come: let them contemplate a lamp, and see in it what they cannot see in God. I do no wrong if, wishing to show in some measure the power of so great a Creator, I bring forward so small a likeness of fire or of a lamp. For it is written, “Your word is a lamp to my feet, Lord, and a light to my paths.” And it is said of God, “A consuming fire.” Come, then, consider the lamp carefully, and remove your foolish darkness. Let the pagan look, and learn there that Father and Son are without marriage, and how the Son was born: if you are not blind, see it there; look for something between the fire and its brightness. If there is nothing between, there is no marriage. Do not try to search out something between, lest you suffer a great burning. Let the Sabellian come and see two in one, fire and brightness. Can the brightness not rightly say, “I am in the fire, and the fire in me,” as the Son says, “I am in the Father, and the Father in me”? Let the Arian come too, and let him see one from the other, yet the one unable to be born without the other: neither of them is earlier, neither later; father and son, brightness and fire, are of the same age; fire cannot be without brightness, nor brightness without fire. Or, if you like, put out your hand and divide one from the other: show me fire without brightness, or brightness without fire. Far be it, far be it: you will only be able to burn yourself; you will not be able to separate one from the other. For as fire and brightness are one from the other, and yet one cannot be without the other, so God the Father and God the Son are one from the other, and yet one cannot be without the other. They have no rising, which does not exist, but one eternity and substance. Fire and brightness are temporal; but the Father and the Son, God, are eternal. “Are,” I say, because they are Father and Son; “God,” I say, because they are one. Duality in the offspring, unity in the deity. The birth of the one makes another, but the divinity shows them to be one. When I say “Son,” he is another; when I say “God,” he is one. He is another person, because he is the Son; he is not another thing, because he is God. Blush, Arians. Pilate’s executioners did not dare to tear the tunic of a man already condemned and hanging on the cross; and do you try to divide the love of God, who sits in heaven, or rather to divide God himself, who is love? Try, then; try as much as you can: you have already plunged into hell; for that tunic you will never tear. Again the Lord says through the prophet: “There is no God besides me; a just God and a Savior, there is none but me.”

Here the Sabellian exults. For he believes himself fortified by such testimonies to show that the Father and the Son are one and the same. The Arians, on the other hand, to prove that the Father is one and the Son another, bring forward other testimonies and say: “So far is the Father one and the Son another, one greater and the other less, that the Father says to the Son, I have given you as a light to the nations; and the Son says, The Father sent me.” As far as I understand, this light of the nations is so clear and evident that the heretics, unable to grasp and look at it, are blinded by it, and cannot walk in it but rather stray. The Arian says one thing, the Sabellian another. What kind of war is this? What does the Catholic say to it? “The arms they carry,” he says, “are mine; they fight for me. Both fight against each other, but for me. Would that both might fail, and that neither pass over to the other, but to me!” Let me too bring forward something by which both may be struck. You, Arian, say that he who sends is greater, he who is sent less. I too ask you: who is greater, the one who goes before, or the one before whom another goes? Again, who is greater, the one for whose coming something is prepared, or the one who prepares it; the one to whom service is rendered, or the one who renders it? Surely, if you ask mankind, it will answer that the greater is the one before whom another goes, for whom things are prepared, to whom service is rendered. You want to prove from this that the Son is less because he was sent; I show that he who sent goes before the one he sent; and I call neither of them greater, because I do not dare to call either of them less. The prophet Isaiah says: “Thus says the Lord to my Christ, the Lord, whose right hand I have taken, to subject nations before his face.” See, the Father is already the companion of the Son who was sent. Follow further: “And I will turn the backs of kings, and open doors before him, and the gates shall not be shut.” See, he who had sent became the forerunner. For what greater or superior person opens doors before a lesser one? Or how could he do it unless he went a little ahead? Hear further: “And the gates,” he says, “shall not be shut.” How? “I will go before you.” You see that he who sent both accompanies and goes before: he sends and does not depart. It is not enough that he does not depart: he even goes before. Now distinguish who is greater, who is better: I see no distinction; rather I behold equality. The Son says of the Father, “He sent me.” The Father says to the Son, “I will go before you.” Let quarrelsome disaster withdraw from our midst: this shows equality, not inequality. Follow further, that it may appear more clearly who says what to whom: “I will go before you, and humble the glorious of the earth.” Stand here, you too, pagan. Hear what the prophet says. I did not write what I wanted for myself: the book in which these things are read is kept in the Jew’s book-chest. My enemy is my witness; ask him; open, read, and believe. “I will turn the backs of kings,” he says, “and humble the glorious of the earth.” Do you not see that the kings of the earth, who formerly persecuted Christians, are now Christians? Do you not see that those who humbled the Church now enter the Church humbly? Do you not see that the Church now has as defenders those she formerly had as persecutors? “I will go before you,” he says, “and humble the glorious of the earth. I will shatter doors of bronze and break bars of iron. And I will give you hidden treasures and the mysteries of secret things, that you may know that I am God, who call your name, the God of Israel.” Let the Sabellian hear: God speaks, and to God he speaks. So there are two, the one who speaks and the one to whom he speaks. Let the Arian hear too: “I am God, and there is no other besides me.” I have long labored in fighting against these two heresies, and I am nearly worn out. Come, my Lord Jesus, most valiant warrior, prince of the army of the Lord, who conquered the devil and the world: “Take up arms and shield, and rise to help me.” When he was about to go out to battle and to conquer the world in the world, he prayed, not as though lacking strength, since he was almighty, but to give us, for the purpose for which he had come, a lesson in humility. And what did he say? “Father, glorify your Son.” Now the cursed Arian says: “Do you see that he is less, and would not have glory unless he had asked the Father?” Wait, man, why do you hurry? You see the man, in which form he is less not only than the Father but also than the angels: the man appears, God is hidden. You show me a lowly man: open your eyes and see God exalted, not less than the angels but equal to the Father. “Father,” he says, “glorify your Son”: see one who is less. Follow further: “that your Son may glorify you”: see one who is equal. We find the Son acknowledging the Father, praying, and joined to him, not ungrateful as was thought. Let us see what the Father too says of the Son. “Jesus took Peter and James and John his brother” (these are the Gospel’s words) “and led them up a high mountain apart, and he was transfigured before them. And his face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as snow. And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with him.” Moses and Elijah, the Law and the Prophets: they talked with him because they had spoken of him; they pointed out the one they had foretold, they made manifest the one they had prophesied. They talked: what, do you think, were they talking about? That the Jews might be convicted, the pagans converted, the Manichaeans confounded, the heretics crushed, the Catholics confirmed. Light and grace were talking together, harshness and gentleness, terror and mildness, command and help, the knife and the physician, shadow and light, herald and judge, sentence and mercy. And what after this? “And Peter answered and said to Jesus: Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, let us make three tents here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” What are you saying, holy Peter? The world is in labor, and you look for seclusion? You see so many nations come together into one, and you seek rest? You see the darkness of the world, and you hide the light? “No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bushel, but on a lampstand, so that it gives light to all who are in the house.” This house is the whole world; the lighting of the lamp is the incarnation of the Word; the lampstand is the wood of the cross; the lamp shining on the lampstand is Christ hanging on the cross. “No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bushel, but on a lampstand, so that it gives light to all who are in the house.” You have seen; let us see too. It is dark: let us not stumble among the pagans, let us not stray among the heretics; let the lamp shine for us, let the Word in the flesh teach us. Let us see what the Evangelist says, let us see whether Peter’s counsel was accepted. “While he was still speaking,” he says, “behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them. And behold, a voice from the cloud, saying.” Let us all listen; let no one shut his ears. Let the mocking pagans hear, let the persecuting Jews hear, let the Manichaeans, dreamers of phantasms, hear, let the heretics, erring quarrelers, hear; let the Catholics too hear, and hear above all, God’s faithful worshipers. Let these hear so as to be instructed, those so as to be corrected; or these hear so as not to be seduced, those so as to be punished. What does the voice from the cloud say? “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Where are you who oppose the Son of God? The Father says, “This is my Son,” and you say, “God has no Son.” You, pagan, why do you stand outside and murmur? Come in here to God’s school, open the ears of your heart, hear the voice of the Lord, and learn of the Son of God. What will you do, Jews, who killed the Son of God? Where will you flee, where will you hide? What mountains, what rocks will fall upon you? “And if you hide in the caves of the rocks, from there I will drag you out, says the Lord.” But you too, come, come in, hear my counsel, do not despair: for “there is a remnant for the peaceable man.” You raged, you killed, you shed the blood of Christ; you are in danger; you were unbelieving toward the Son of God. What then must you do now, if not believe and be baptized, and drink the blood you shed? There is nothing to shudder at: the physician’s blood was shed and became a medicine for the madman. Why do you hesitate? “Taste and see that the Lord is sweet.” And you, Manichaean, how long will you dream phantasms? Wake up and see: the clouds thunder. What do they thunder? “This is my beloved Son.” See on earth a true man; hear from heaven the true God: see on earth the son of man; hear from heaven that he is the Son of God. Know that both are true, that is, God and man: that the Son of God and the son of man are one and the same, God and man. Acknowledge the man, and you will appease God. Beware lest you stumble on the rock and suffer the ruin of death: for what you dream is vanity; what God thunders is truth. Hear, you Sabellian: hear the Father from heaven, see the Son on earth, and do not say, “The Father is the same as the Son.” Hear, you too, Arian, and do not err about the Father and the Son, but follow the unity and see the divinity. Lord, let us hear what you say of your Son: “This,” he says, “is my Son.” See on earth the son of man; hear from heaven that he is the Son of God. “My beloved, in whom I am well pleased.” And what then? “Listen to him.” Thanks be to God. God’s command thundered, and Peter’s counsel was set aside. Thanks to you, God, the Power; thanks to you, God the Father, who have both shown your Son and given me a teacher. Let the Sabellian withdraw, let the Arian withdraw, let the other plagues withdraw, let all unjust teaching withdraw. Let God teach, not Arius; let the Son of God teach, not the Son’s adversary. Speak, my Lord Jesus, teach, that I may learn what to teach. The Sabellian says: “The Father is the same as the Son.” The Arian says: “The Father is one, the Son another; the Father greater, the Son less.” He opposes, shouts, quarrels, fights, gathers crowds, contends against Christ. Christ shed his blood to redeem; this man scatters money to destroy. He builds a cave; there he smothers the Catholic, calls the Christian a pagan, forces baptism on the baptized, against what is written: “He who has once been washed does not need to be washed again.” The man cries out: “I am a Christian: why do you say I am what I am not?” He cries out, “I am one of the faithful”; and the other says, “Take money from me.” He cries out, “I am redeemed”; and the other says, “Take gold from me.” What do you give, or what do you take away? You give money to take away grace; you give money to take away life; you give a price to take away that by which I was bought. What do you buy from one who has been bought? My price is not gold but the blood of Christ: you do not seduce me, you do not deceive me; however much you give me, you do not take my price from me. Your money perish with you; for my price is beyond price. The man cries out, “I am one of the faithful,” and you blow on him to exorcize him. He cries out, “I was baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” and you blow on him. What, then, do you leave to the Christian, in whom you blow out the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit? Or have you perhaps brought a new faith, a new baptism, a new god from overseas? Speak, my teacher, holy Paul; teach, expert in divine law, friend of the bridegroom: this man has just come, overturns the world, tears the unity of faith, divides the Trinity, strives to rebaptize whoever does not agree with him: what am I to do? “In Christ Jesus through the gospel you begot me”; in Christ I was baptized. Is there perhaps another baptism, or another faith? “Far from it,” you say: “One faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all.” If, then, there is one faith, or rather because there is one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all: I have already believed, I have already been baptized, I already have God as Father: why do I suffer the murderous Arian? Help, my Lord Jesus, and “gird your sword upon your thigh, O most mighty.” Most mighty of all, go forth; kill them in themselves, that they may live in you and cease to persecute me. The Sabellians take you away, the Arians diminish you: what do you say of yourself? The Father said that we should listen to you: when we listen to you, we listen to him. Strike both adversaries with one blow. “Let them perish,” he says, “the empty talkers and seducers of minds, the Arian and the Sabellian: for I and the Father are one.” He did not say, “I and the Father am one,” but, “I and the Father are one.” When I say “one,” let the Arian hear; when I say “are,” let the Sabellian hear. Let the Arian not divide the “one”; let the Sabellian not blot out the “are”; but let both come, and let them too be one in us, as I and the Father are one. So if the Father and the Son are one, or rather because they are without doubt one, not two gods but one God, then the prophet wrote nothing theatrical but spoke the truth, when the Lord said, “Before me no god was formed, and after me there shall be none.” Truth has taught truth, and with a two-edged sword has slain all error. If the heretics still resist, let the Catholics hear the definitive sentence, and follow it.

You have heard what the Father said of the Son; you have heard what the Son said of the Father and of himself. “If anyone preaches to you a gospel other than what you have received, let him be anathema.” We have said of the Father and the Son what we could and as much as we could, if indeed we could say anything worthily. Of the Holy Spirit we have been silent, but we have not separated him; for whatever we have said of the Father and the Son, we have said also of the Holy Spirit. For he is in them and with them, equal and one, not a lesser or a third god. What else shall I, weary, say to you who are weary? Whoever separates the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son in eternity and substance or communion, and whoever denies that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father and of the Son, is full of an unclean spirit and empty of the Holy Spirit. For God is called love because he does not divide the unity into parts but ineffably binds the Trinity together. For this Trinity is one God, a tower of strength against the face of the enemy, who keeps those who believe in him for ever and ever. Amen.