Tractates

Contents

Reading pages: 1.1.1–1.1.6 · 1.2.1–1.3.7 · 1.4.1–1.5.9 · 1.6.1–1.8.3 · 1.9.1–1.12.9 · 1.13.1–1.15.6 · 1.16.1–2.5.2 · 2.6.1–2.12.2 · 2.13.1–2.17.3 · 2.18.1–2.35.1 · 2.36.1–2.61.1 · 2.62.1–2.77.1

1. 1.1.1Zeno opens his discourse on faith: faith is born of one's own will, not lent by a teacher, and the simple believer is better than the clever disputer.
2. 1.1.2Zeno explains what the law is good for, warning and exposing sin, and how it differs from faith, which disputation cannot produce.
3. 1.1.3Zeno argues that faith cannot belong to the theological treatise, since treatises multiply rival faiths, whereas the one ancient faith is older and greater than the law.
4. 1.1.4Zeno asks whether faith consists in teaching or believing, laments a faith built of arguments and factions, and warns against curious disputation.
5. 1.1.5Zeno challenges the disputer to show real powers of faith instead of probing the divine nature by argument, citing Sirach, Romans and 1 Timothy against curiosity.
6. 1.1.6Zeno concludes that God's servant should avoid quarrelsome questions and honour the Trinity by faithful living rather than argument.
7. 1.2.1Zeno begins a discourse on hope, faith and love, showing that without hope no human labour, and no Christian faith, has any point.
8. 1.2.2Zeno praises faith as the foundation of hope and, from the example of Abraham, shows that faith and hope live or die together.
9. 1.2.3Zeno lists the heroes of faith, from Enoch to the apostles, to show what faith accomplishes.
10. 1.2.4Zeno praises love as queen of the virtues, surpassing faith and hope, and describes its works in society, marriage and the household.
11. 1.2.5Zeno shows love at work among animals and the elements, and from the great commandment argues that the law hangs on love yet is to be revered.
12. 1.2.6Zeno concludes that Christianity rests chiefly on love, citing Judas and 1 Corinthians 13.
13. 1.2.7Zeno explains that love's first duty is toward God, then toward the neighbour, who bears God's image, so that wrong done to him is done to God.
14. 1.2.8Zeno contrasts true love with the destructive erotic love pictured as Cupid, which ruined Adam and Eve and assailed Susanna and Joseph, citing 1 John 2:15–16.
15. 1.2.9Zeno hymns the love of God, which created and redeemed man, brought about the incarnation and cross, inspires martyrs and almsgiving, and is one in the Trinity.
16. 1.3.1Zeno begins a discourse on justice, rejecting the philosophers' civil and natural justice and citing Romans 10:3.
17. 1.3.2Zeno shows from Paul and Jeremiah that the world's wisdom is folly, and describes worldly wisdom, strength and riches as the foundations of vice.
18. 1.3.3Zeno argues that justice and wisdom cannot be separated: no fool can be just and no unjust man wise.
19. 1.3.4Zeno describes true justice, which works for others, ransoms captives, cares for the sick and the dead, gives alms secretly and returns good for evil.
20. 1.3.5Zeno rebukes Christians who think it just to keep their own and seek more, citing Christ's command to sell all and give to the poor.
21. 1.3.6Zeno answers the claim that it is just to keep one's own: in the church all things are common, and the rich who do not help the dying poor are killers.
22. 1.3.7Zeno answers the excuse of providing for one's children from the Psalms, the widow of Zarephath and Abraham's love of God above his son.
23. 1.4.1Zeno praises chastity, which guards family life and makes the church, Christ's virgin bride, fruitful in holy children.
24. 1.4.2Zeno describes unchastity, which, like Antichrist under Christ's name, poses as chastity while ruining families, nations and kingdoms.
25. 1.4.3Zeno describes unchastity's cosmetics and its link to idolatry, since the pagan gods Jupiter, Hercules and Venus were exalted through lust.
26. 1.4.4Zeno condemns husbands who commit adultery, citing Christ's saying on putting away a wife and Paul's equal rule for husband and wife, and teaches that a Christian must be either continent or married.
27. 1.4.5Zeno gives Joseph's refusal of Potiphar's wife as an example of chastity rewarded by God.
28. 1.4.6Zeno tells the story of Susanna, falsely accused by the elders and vindicated by Daniel, as an example of chastity.
29. 1.4.7Zeno ends with a hymn to chastity, the treasure of souls and temple of God, which brings fruit thirty-, sixty- and a hundredfold.
30. 1.5.1Zeno begins a discourse on continence: he does not condemn marriage but, with Paul, sets virginity and widowhood above it.
31. 1.5.2Zeno compares the married woman, anxious for husband and children, with the virgin, who seeks to please God alone.
32. 1.5.3Zeno answers the objection from Mary's marriage by her perpetual virginity and urges virgins to keep their state, as the angels in the resurrection.
33. 1.5.4Zeno rebukes widows who seek a second marriage, setting their earlier grief against their haste to adorn themselves for a new husband.
34. 1.5.5Zeno answers the widow who pleads youthful desire: if her husband were long absent, fear would restrain her; let her fear God instead.
35. 1.5.6Zeno deplores old women who marry again and again, and Christian women who marry pagans.
36. 1.5.7Zeno rebukes Christian women who marry pagans, so handing Christ's members to the slaves of demons.
37. 1.5.8Zeno describes the practical conflicts and dangers when a Christian woman married to a pagan must keep her worship and his.
38. 1.5.9Zeno warns virgins and widows against marriage with pagans and against many successive marriages, urging them, if they marry, to marry a Christian.
39. 1.6.1Zeno begins a discourse on patience, the harbour of all virtues, which cannot be moved by anything.
40. 1.6.2Zeno shows patience at work in the order of nature: the sun, moon, sea, crops, birds and fish.
41. 1.6.3Zeno traces the ruin caused by impatience from Adam and Cain to Sodom and the rebellions of Israel.
42. 1.6.4Zeno turns to examples of patience: Abel, the first martyr, and Noah, who built the ark patiently.
43. 1.6.5Zeno describes the sacrifice of Isaac as a supreme example of patience, in which both father and son obeyed God calmly.
44. 1.6.6Zeno gives Jacob and Joseph as examples of patience in exile, service and power.
45. 1.6.7Zeno describes Job's patience under the devil's attacks and declines to praise the Lord's patience, which surpasses all comparison.
46. 1.6.8Zeno ends with a hymn to patience as queen of the virtues, sustaining virgins, widows, the married, slaves, the poor, prophets, apostles and martyrs.
47. 1.7.1Zeno begins a sermon on Psalm 131 by rebuking the Greek philosophers, whose curious arguments about God have passed into the church.
48. 1.7.2Zeno expounds 'Lord, my heart is not lifted up', urging humility after the example of Christ, gentle and humble of heart.
49. 1.7.3Zeno expounds 'nor are my eyes lifted up' through 1 John 2:15–16 on the lust of the eyes.
50. 1.7.4Zeno expounds 'nor have I walked in great things' of worldly greatness, with David, the humble shepherd-king who spared Saul, as the example.
51. 1.7.5Zeno expounds 'if I did not think humbly' with the parable of the Pharisee and the publican.
52. 1.8.1Zeno begins a sermon on Psalm 128 by distinguishing the natural fear born in man from the fear of God, which is taught.
53. 1.8.2Zeno explains that the blessed fear of the Lord is not the dread all creatures feel in storms but a fear that consists in love and obedience.
54. 1.8.3Zeno illustrates the fear of God from Daniel, Jonah, the apostles, Peter on the sea and the martyr Thecla.
55. 1.9.1Zeno begins a sermon against avarice, the root of all evils, which no longer counts as a crime because it has seized everyone.
56. 1.9.2Zeno describes how avarice overrides every law and bond, sets families against each other, and ends in shameful death.
57. 1.9.3Zeno warns the avaricious that death fears neither riches nor honour, and a little earth will at last satisfy rich and poor alike.
58. 1.9.4Zeno describes the usurer, the man who closes common land, and the grain-hoarder who profits from famine.
59. 1.9.5Zeno shows that gold, the idol of the nations, can neither heal nor save nor go with its owner into the grave.
60. 1.9.6Zeno praises his congregation as God's living gold and describes the heavenly city where all is common and no one fears theft.
61. 1.10.1Zeno begins a second sermon on avarice, which seizes every class of people, never grows old, and spares no one.
62. 1.10.2Zeno asks why the avaricious hoard what they cannot take with them, since silver and gold are the idols of the nations.
63. 1.10.3Zeno rebukes Christian women who condemn idols yet come to church loaded with gold, whose coins bear the images of kings.
64. 1.10.4Zeno shows how avarice sets spouses, parents and children against each other and leads to contempt of God.
65. 1.10.5Zeno praises his congregation's generosity to captives, strangers, the poor and widows, by which they lend to God.
66. 1.11.1In a short address Zeno sums up why God hates avarice and promises eternal life to those who conquer it.
67. 1.12.1Zeno begins a sermon on 1 Corinthians 15:47 and John 3:13, explaining how the heavenly 'second man' and the Son of Man 'who was in heaven' are to be understood.
68. 1.12.2Zeno tells how God made the world for man, made man in his image, and how the devil's deceit brought death on the whole race.
69. 1.12.3Zeno explains the incarnation, death and resurrection of the Son of God, by which, as Romans 5 says, justification and life come to all.
70. 1.12.4Zeno explains that man is made of body and soul, with a bodily life and an eternal life gained by faith in baptism, and that the two are at war.
71. 1.12.5Zeno portrays the flesh as a seductress singing the song of the ungodly from Wisdom 2.
72. 1.12.6Zeno sets against the flesh's song the spirit's call to spiritual warfare and to renounce the world, quoting 1 John 2:15–17.
73. 1.12.7Zeno explains why the spirit so often loses: the flesh's goods are present and easy, the spirit's hidden, steep and future.
74. 1.12.8Zeno shows the frailty of the flesh, whose strength and beauty disease and death soon destroy.
75. 1.12.9Zeno urges his hearers, who have put on Christ, to choose the soul over the flesh, since the choice of life or death is given to the will.
76. 1.13.1Zeno begins a sermon on circumcision, defining it as a mere scar and comparing Jewish pride in it with the self-castration of the priests of Cybele.
77. 1.13.2Zeno argues that circumcision cannot profit the soul and conflicts with the sabbath law when a child is born on the sabbath.
78. 1.13.3Zeno argues from Abel, Enoch, Noah, Melchizedek and the Ninevites that circumcision is not necessary for salvation.
79. 1.13.4Zeno argues from Romans 4 that Abraham was justified by faith before circumcision, which was a sign for the Jewish people.
80. 1.13.5Zeno argues that circumcision marks the place of Adam's sin but cannot heal women or the heart, which needs spiritual circumcision.
81. 1.13.6Zeno cites the prophets and Moses against the Jews to show that God requires circumcision of the heart.
82. 1.13.7Zeno answers the Jewish appeal to Joshua's second circumcision by showing that it cannot be understood carnally.
83. 1.13.8Zeno interprets Joshua's stone knives as the apostles formed by Christ, the rock, who circumcise the heart by their teaching.
84. 1.13.9Zeno explains that Christ was circumcised to fulfil the law and show his true flesh as son of David.
85. 1.13.10Zeno describes the spiritual circumcision that began with Mary's conceiving through the ear and was completed on the cross, from whose pierced side the church was formed.
86. 1.13.11Zeno contrasts the carnal circumcision of the Jews with the spiritual circumcision of baptism, given to both sexes at every age.
87. 1.14.1Zeno begins a sermon at the dedication of a new church, saying that fine buildings are not the church's chief glory, as Solomon's temple shows.
88. 1.14.2Zeno teaches that God's true temple is not walls but the faithful people, and rejoices that the new church is too small for the crowd.
89. 1.14.3Zeno describes the spiritual church built on Christ, the one cornerstone, with seven columns, the living sea of the font, three members of one fullness, and twelve gates guarded by the cross.
90. 1.14.4Zeno lists the 'wages' given to all the builders of the spiritual church, sacramental gifts, and promises riches to those who persevere.
91. 1.14.5Zeno describes the virtues that serve in the spiritual temple and calls elders, youths, children, the married, widows, virgins, rich and poor to rejoice.
92. 1.14.6Zeno concludes the dedication sermon by calling the virtues of the people the true building of the spiritual Jerusalem.
93. 1.15.1Zeno argues from Psalm 50 that the speaker who defers to 'the Most High' is the Son, refuting Jews and Arians who deny that the Son is God.
94. 1.15.2Zeno distinguishes three kinds of sacrifice and begins with the detestable sacrifices of the pagans to idols that are demons.
95. 1.15.3Zeno shows from Isaiah and Joel that God rejected the sacrifices of the Jews, which have now ceased altogether.
96. 1.15.4Zeno cites Malachi 1:10–11 on the clean sacrifice of the Gentiles and explains Psalm 50:14–15 of the Son, who is one in majesty with the Father.
97. 1.15.5Zeno describes the Christian sacrifice as spiritual, offering oneself like Isaac as a living sacrifice with a pure heart.
98. 1.15.6Zeno warns Christians who tolerate pagan shrines on their estates, feast at tombs, observe omens or wrong their wives that their sacrifice is unacceptable, and that eating the Eucharist unworthily is deadly.
99. 1.16.1Zeno begins a sermon on the resurrection: even the wisest pagan held that the soul survives the body's prison, so a Christian should not doubt.
100. 1.16.2Zeno argues that souls survive death and are punished or refreshed, citing pagan rites, philosophers and Virgil's two ways in the underworld.
101. 1.16.3Zeno argues from exorcisms, in which possessing spirits name themselves as dead persons, that the souls of the dead live.
102. 1.16.4Zeno proves the survival of souls from Samuel's appearance to Saul, Moses and Elijah at the transfiguration, and the rich man and Lazarus.
103. 1.16.5Zeno argues from Christ's promise to the penitent robber, his resurrection, Paul and Ezekiel that the dead live and will rise.
104. 1.16.6Zeno rebukes Christians, especially widows, who mourn the dead like pagans and then quickly remarry, as if they did not believe in the resurrection.
105. 1.16.7Zeno teaches that the dead will be raised to judgment and argues that it is easier for God to restore what was than to create from nothing.
106. 1.16.8Zeno illustrates resurrection from nature: falling stars, the daily death and rising of the sun, and the moon's monthly waning and renewal.
107. 1.16.9Zeno takes the phoenix, reborn from its own ashes, as a sign that Christians will rise the same and better.
108. 1.16.10Zeno illustrates the resurrection by the seed that dies and rises, quoting 1 Corinthians 15:36, 42–44.
109. 1.16.11Zeno distinguishes two resurrections: of the saints to the kingdom, and of the ungodly to everlasting punishment.
110. 1.16.12Zeno reconciles 'flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom' with the creed's resurrection of the flesh: the flesh is renewed in baptism by the seed of the Spirit and will rise glorious.
111. 1.16.13Zeno compares the resurrection to the grafting of a wild olive, which becomes a true olive, and cites Galatians 6:8 and the parable of the weeds.
112. 1.16.14Zeno explains that the risen will be recognised, since only what is useless in the body is changed, and that death brings the just into rest.
113. 2.1.1Zeno answers those who deny the Son's equality with the Father from 'Let us make man in our image', which shows one work and one image of both.
114. 2.1.2Zeno answers that the Son who executes the Father's word is not inferior, since Father and Son are in each other with the Holy Spirit.
115. 2.2.1Zeno refutes the view that matter is eternal and teaches that God alone is the principle, the Father begetting the Son with the Spirit in one co-eternity, illustrated by two seas joined by a strait.
116. 2.3.1Zeno teaches that Christ is the Beginning, eternally embraced in the Father's mind and born as God from God, equal in all things.
117. 2.4.1Zeno teaches that the Son came forth from the Father's mouth to create the world, equal to the Father in all things.
118. 2.5.1In a second sermon on 'In the beginning' Zeno teaches that the Father uttered the Son as Word from his heart, that how he was begotten cannot be known, and that the Son created the world as one with the Father's will.
119. 2.5.2Zeno concludes that man, who does not understand his own soul, cannot pry into God's secret, and should fear, love and honour him.
120. 2.6.1Zeno explains that Scripture speaks of Christ sometimes as pure God and sometimes as God joined with the man he assumed, giving texts of each kind.
121. 2.6.2Zeno summarises Christ as God born of the Father before all things, born in the flesh, who died, rose, received all power, and will hand over the kingdom to the Father.
122. 2.6.3Zeno explains 1 Corinthians 15:24: the kingdom handed to the Father is the temporal kingdom of the assumed man, while as God the Son always reigns with the Father in one kingdom.
123. 2.6.4Zeno concludes that the Son's subjection to the Father is one of love, not inferiority, since Father and Son share one kingdom, substance and majesty.
124. 2.7.1Zeno names three errors about Christ, the Photinian, the Arian and the Jewish, and answers by Christ's two births, eternal from the Father and in time from Mary.
125. 2.7.2Zeno warns against prying into God's nature and from John 1:1–3 and 10:30 teaches two persons with one substance and one power.
126. 2.7.3Zeno argues against placing time between Father and Son and gives prophecies of the incarnation, the virgin birth and the forerunner.
127. 2.7.4Zeno contrasts the conceptions of Elisabeth and Mary and teaches that Christ became what he was not without ceasing to be God.
128. 2.8.1Zeno teaches that only God knows God and distinguishes Christ's eternal birth, not to be inquired into, from his birth in the flesh.
129. 2.8.2Zeno describes Christ's birth from the virgin Mary without pain or impurity, her virginity before, in and after birth, and the story of the doubting midwife.
130. 2.9.1Zeno describes the incarnation: the Son enters the virgin's womb, prepares his own body, and is born without a father, Mary remaining a virgin.
131. 2.9.2Zeno marvels at God become an infant in the manger and presents Christ as the true sun, crowned by the twelve apostles and carried by the four Gospels.
132. 2.10.1Zeno begins a sermon on Abraham, praising the faith by which he and Sarah received Isaac in old age.
133. 2.10.2Zeno retells the sacrifice of Isaac, stressing the joy and willingness of both father and son.
134. 2.10.3Zeno marvels at Abraham's joyful obedience and God's substitution of the ram for Isaac.
135. 2.10.4Zeno begins to interpret the ram caught in the thicket as a figure of Christ, sacrificed in Isaac's place.
136. 2.11.1Zeno begins another sermon on Isaac, born to aged parents by God's promise and offered to God as an innocent martyr.
137. 2.11.2Zeno describes Isaac's miraculous birth to the aged Sarah, fulfilling the prophecy of the barren woman's joy.
138. 2.11.3Zeno continues the story of the sacrifice of Isaac, stressing the constancy of father and son.
139. 2.11.4Zeno interprets Isaac's sacrifice as a figure of Christ's virgin birth, passion and resurrection, in which, as with the ram, what sinned in Adam is freed in Christ.
140. 2.12.1Zeno tells of Abraham's faith, his call, the visit of the three guests and Isaac's miraculous birth.
141. 2.12.2Zeno describes Abraham's unwavering obedience in offering Isaac and concludes that faith alone keeps one safe, making believers sons of Abraham.
142. 2.13.1Zeno interprets Jacob's dream: Jacob and the stone are Christ, and the ladder is the two Testaments, like the two-edged sword and Isaiah's tongs.
143. 2.13.2Zeno compares the two Testaments to the split pen and the two coins in the fish's mouth, which is Christ risen from the dead.
144. 2.13.3Zeno interprets the ladder's wood as the two Testaments pointing to the cross, linking them with the householder's old and new treasures and the Good Samaritan's two denarii.
145. 2.13.4Zeno interprets the angels ascending and descending Jacob's ladder as righteous and backsliding people, or as angels serving Christ.
146. 2.13.5Zeno sums up: the two Testaments are one in Christ, the ladder's steps are the virtues, and the ladder itself is the cross.
147. 2.14.1Zeno retells the story of Judah and Tamar from Genesis 38.
148. 2.14.2Zeno interprets Judah as a type of the prophets and patriarchs, and Er, the firstborn, as the first people of deified kings destroyed by God.
149. 2.14.3Zeno interprets Onan as the Jewish people, who failed to raise up seed for the nations and spilled the word of God on idols.
150. 2.14.4Zeno allegorises the story of Tamar: Shelah is the Gentile people, Tamar the church, and Judah's pledges the law, the cross and the seal of faith, by which the church is justified.
151. 2.15.1Zeno retells the story of Job's trials and patience.
152. 2.15.2Zeno draws a point-by-point comparison between Job and Christ.
153. 2.16.1Zeno takes Susanna, condemned by false witnesses and saved by Daniel, as an example that God is with the just.
154. 2.17.1Zeno begins a sermon on Psalm 130, teaching that the cry 'out of the depths' is the heart's cry in affliction, as with Peter on the sea and Paul in his sufferings.
155. 2.17.2Zeno retells the story of Jonah's flight, the storm, the whale and his preaching to Nineveh.
156. 2.17.3Zeno allegorises Jonah: the ship is the synagogue, Jonah's sleep Christ's passion, the whale the underworld, and Nineveh the church of the nations, whose repentance Christians should imitate.
157. 2.18.1Zeno begins a sermon on the martyr Arcadius by describing a persecution in which Christians were forced to sacrifice to idols.
158. 2.18.2Zeno tells how Arcadius withdrew during the persecution, then gave himself up when a relative was arrested in his place and defied the governor.
159. 2.18.3Zeno describes the governor's sentence that Arcadius's hands and feet be cut off, and the martyr's fearless constancy.
160. 2.18.4Zeno describes the cutting off of Arcadius's hands and feet and compares him with the Maccabean martyrs and Eleazar.
161. 2.19.1Zeno teaches that the image of God in man is not the changeable body but the invisible spiritual image of the heavenly man, given in rebirth.
162. 2.20.1In a second form of the same sermon Zeno teaches that the image of God is the heavenly man's spiritual image, citing 1 Corinthians 15:49 and 3:16.
163. 2.21.1Zeno reconciles Psalm 101 with John 3:18: believers are not judged and unbelievers are already condemned, while sinners stand between.
164. 2.21.2Zeno identifies those reserved for judgment as half-hearted Christians, who profess God but serve the world.
165. 2.21.3Zeno distinguishes three judgments, of the just, the ungodly and sinners, illustrated by how a householder treats faithful, criminal and fraudulent slaves.
166. 2.22.1Zeno begins a sermon on Isaiah 1:2, interpreting the call to heaven and earth as the turning of God's word from the Jews to others.
167. 2.22.2Zeno interprets 'heaven' in Isaiah 1:2 as the apostles and 'earth' as the Gentiles, who would hear Christ when the Jews did not.
168. 2.22.3Zeno expounds 'I have begotten and exalted sons' of God's favours to Israel in the exodus, and 'they despised me' of the crucifixion.
169. 2.23.1In a short sermon on Isaiah 1:2 Zeno urges Christians to learn from God's rebuke of Israel.
170. 2.24.1In another short form of the sermon on Isaiah 1:2 Zeno explains why God rebukes Israel publicly.
171. 2.25.1In a third short form Zeno sees the call to heaven and earth fulfilled at the crucifixion, when the sun darkened and the earth shook.
172. 2.26.1In a fourth short form Zeno notes that Isaiah sets the ox and ass above Israel to shame them into repentance.
173. 2.27.1Zeno begins a sermon on the vine of Psalm 80, which passed from Israel, which bore wild grapes, to the church.
174. 2.27.2Zeno describes the cultivation of the vine, from planting the slip to pressing and storing the wine.
175. 2.27.3Zeno allegorises the vine's cultivation as baptism, the Christian life and martyrdom, the persecutors sometimes coming to believe.
176. 2.28.1In a short Easter address Zeno warns Christians by Israel's example and rejoices over the newly baptized, new vines of the church.
177. 2.29.1A fragment: Christ entered the world in secret so that the devil, who deceived man, should not recognise him.
178. 2.30.1Zeno invites the candidates to the font, where Mother Church gives them a new and joyful birth.
179. 2.31.1Zeno invites the candidates to enter the font and put off the old man, to come forth clothed in white with the gift of the Spirit.
180. 2.32.1Zeno urges the candidates to hasten to the font, the mother who gives birth to a countless crowd without labour.
181. 2.33.1Zeno calls the candidates of every race, age and sex to the font, the virgin mother who makes them one body.
182. 2.34.1Zeno urges the candidates to plunge into the font, where the old man dies so that they may live.
183. 2.35.1Zeno invites the candidates to the font like a bath, where they will be anointed, given the threefold coin of the Trinity, and clothed in white.
184. 2.36.1Zeno invites the thirsty candidates to drink at the font, warning that baptism can neither be lost nor repeated.
185. 2.37.1In a shorter form of the same invitation Zeno calls the candidates to run like the deer to the font.
186. 2.38.1Zeno invites the newly baptized after the Easter fast and vigil to a spiritual banquet in which the figures of Scripture serve the dishes.
187. 2.39.1Zeno, on Psalm 32:1, describes baptism as a judgment in which confession brings acquittal and the old man dies so that a new one may live.
188. 2.40.1Zeno contrasts imperial pardons, which free the body but leave guilt, with baptism, which removes sin, kills the old man and gives life.
189. 2.41.2In a combined form of the two preceding addresses Zeno tells the newly baptized that their debt is cancelled and the old man has died without wound.
190. 2.42.1Zeno greets the newly baptized, freed from the chains of sin, and praises the church as a mother who gives one birth to all.
191. 2.43.1Zeno greets the newly baptized, now all infants of equal age, and promises to explain their 'horoscope'.
192. 2.43.2Zeno reinterprets the twelve signs of the zodiac as Christ, the Testaments, the church's warfare against the devil, and baptism, which makes Jews and Gentiles one people.
193. 2.44.1Zeno compares the newly baptized to loaves made from purified wheat and baked not in an oven but in the font.
194. 2.44.2Zeno playfully assures his hearers that every newly baptized 'loaf', large or small, has the same weight, stamped with the Trinity.
195. 2.45.1Zeno interprets the Easter day and the four seasons: winter is idolatry, spring the font, summer the faithful people, autumn martyrdom, and the day Christ's resurrection.
196. 2.46.1Zeno compares the returning Easter day, which sets and rises again, to Christ's passion and resurrection and to the baptism of the candidates.
197. 2.47.1A second form of the Easter address comparing the returning day to the baptism of the candidates.
198. 2.48.1A third form of the Easter address on the day as an image of Christ's death and resurrection.
199. 2.49.1A fourth form of the Easter address: the day on which Christ died and rose once for all, conquering death and the underworld.
200. 2.50.1A fifth form of the Easter address, listing the Easter gifts to priests, ministers, faithful, penitents, catechumens and candidates.
201. 2.51.1A sixth form of the Easter address: the day that sets and rises is an example of resurrection, but the baptized never fall into darkness.
202. 2.52.1A seventh form of the Easter address: the ever-returning day calls the church to celebrate Christ's passion and resurrection in concord.
203. 2.53.1Zeno tells the candidates that on Easter day they will pass through the four seasons: the end of sin, anointing, baptism, the Eucharist and the Spirit.
204. 2.54.1Zeno, on the Easter reading of the Exodus, interprets the crossing of the Red Sea as baptism and Miriam as the church.
205. 2.55.1Zeno explains the Passover lamb, from sheep or goats (Exod 12:5), as Christ, uniting human flesh and divine majesty, and lists its qualities.
206. 2.56.1In a short Easter address on the Exodus Zeno turns the gifts to Israel into reproaches against the Jews.
207. 2.57.1Zeno retells the crossing of the Red Sea and reproaches the Jews, who proclaim it yet do not believe.
208. 2.58.1In another short form of the Easter address on the Exodus Zeno turns Israel's deliverance into a reproach against the Jews.
209. 2.59.1Zeno argues that the Jews' boast in the Exodus turns against them, since its wonders foreshadowed their dispersion, and cites Jeremiah 2:13.
210. 2.60.1Zeno argues that the Jews cannot celebrate a lawful Passover, since the temple, priesthood and sacrifices have been taken away.
211. 2.61.1In another short form Zeno argues that the Jewish Passover has lost its temple, altar, priesthood and true lamb.
212. 2.62.1In a third short form Zeno argues that the Jews have lost temple, priesthood and sacrifice, and that the true Passover lamb, both human and divine, is Christ.
213. 2.63.1Zeno compares the Exodus with Christian salvation point by point: baptism is the true sea, Christ the true leader, bread and drink.
214. 2.64.1In a short address Zeno reproaches the Jews' pride in the Exodus by their later dispersion under Rome.
215. 2.65.1Zeno mocks the Jewish Passover, which lacks the true lamb of two natures, and bids the Jews fulfil the rest of the law by setting out into the desert.
216. 2.66.1In a short address Zeno argues that without temple, priests or accepted sacrifices the Jews cannot keep the Passover.
217. 2.67.1In another short address Zeno lists everything the Jews have lost: temple, altars, prophets, priesthood, sacrifice, anointing and kingdom.
218. 2.68.1Zeno gathers prophetic rebukes to argue that the Jews cannot keep a lawful Passover.
219. 2.69.1Zeno interprets the three young men in the furnace as a figure of baptism with the Spirit and fire, in the presence of the Trinity.
220. 2.70.1Zeno teaches that the three young men triumphed because they looked to God and the reward, not to the flames.
221. 2.71.1Zeno sees in the sevenfold-heated furnace the spiritual number and the grace of baptism for the three young men.
222. 2.72.1Zeno says that the story of the three young men moves him from horror to longing for their glory, since faith makes the elements serve it.
223. 2.73.1Zeno describes the contest of fire and faith in which, by the sacrament of the Trinity, the fire spared the three young men and burned their executioners.
224. 2.74.1Zeno retells the story of the three young men, fortified by the Trinity, who sang in the furnace while their executioners were burned.
225. 2.75.1In a short address on the three young men Zeno urges Christians to fear God and not the devil's fires.
226. 2.76.1Zeno retells the three young men's refusal to worship the image and their rescue in the furnace, where they found the one for whom they suffered.
227. 2.77.1Zeno introduces a sermon not about the saints of the Easter readings but about Christ, whom his own people dispute, to be defended by Scripture alone.