OF THE HOLY GREGENTIUS, ARCHBISHOP OF THE TEPHRENSES, DISPUTATION WITH THE JEW HERBAN
THIS DIALOGUE CONFIRMS THE CHRISTIAN FAITH, BOTH THROUGH THE EXPOSITION OF DIVINE ORACLES AND THROUGH THE EFFECT OF MIRACLES.
FIRST CONGRESS
AWhen the appointed time of forty days had finally passed, the Jews came together to dispute, as they had been ordered. The examination took place in the Threlletus (for this is the largest and foremost of the royal halls), and when every rank had assembled and was present, and the sacred senate was in attendance, the king also arrived along with the most holy archbishop. And after they had taken their seats, the entire city gathered in a crowd to listen. The Jews, having entered, appointed Herban as the author and leader of their discussion. For this man was indeed exceedingly learned in the law, in the divine scrolls of the prophets, in the Octateuch, and in the remaining scriptures. BAnd when the multitude of Scribes, Pharisees, and teachers of the Law stood around him—for their leaders and those powerful in speech had been gathered together from all the cities by the king's decree—and when an no small silence had fallen, the archbishop spoke to him, or rather to the entire congregation of the Jews:
THE HOLY ARCHBISHOP. Since the night has passed and the Sun of Justice has risen, for what cause do you stubbornly resist his light, acting as adversaries, and failing to believe in him?
HERBANUS. If, then, the Sun has risen, and we, who believe in the God of the Law, as you say, are adversaries to his light, how much more so are you, the foreign nations, who treat things alien to our God-given and divine Law as if they were oracles?
S. ARCHBISHOP. Who, then—we who are from the nations—are we, if not a creation and a work?
HERBANUS. Of God, clearly. For He made us both.
S. ARCHBISHOP. What prerogative, then, do you possess over us?
HERBANUS. That which we obtained over the Egyptians.
S. ARCHBISHOP. Show, then, this prerogative.
HERBANUS. Are you ignorant of the great wonders that God performed through Moses in the land of Egypt and in the Red Sea and in the desert, at the exodus of Israel, drowning the Egyptians beneath the water while He himself was saved? B
S. ARCHBISHOP. There is no difference between you and the Egyptians. For He drowned them in the sea, but He struck you down in the desert. And those who crossed the Red Sea as if on dry land, you suffered shipwreck in the very harbor, finishing your lives miserably in the desert. For out of the six hundred thousand and more of the people, only Caleb and Jesus, son of Nave, were deemed worthy to inherit the Promised Land. See, then, how God preferred you over the Egyptians!
HERBANUS. And for whom did God cause manna to rain from heaven in the desert, for the people of Israel, or for the Egyptians?
S. ARCHBISHOP. Which do you think appeared more honorable and excellent, the food and victuals you ate in Egypt, or the heavenly manna in the desert? C
HERBANUS. The manna, certainly.
S. ARCHBISHOP. How, then, in the desert, did you turn back in your mind and thought to your former state, craving onions and garlic, the pork boiled in pots, and all the food of the Egyptians, while loathing the manna to the point of nausea?
HERBANUS. Our fathers did wrong when they voluntarily and willingly translated the sacred books of Israel into the Greek tongue, so that, by applying yourselves to these studiously and zealously, you might stop the mouths of us all.
S. ARCHBISHOP. When God saw that you were not approved in them, He kept them for us in many ways, like hidden treasures. D
HERBANUS. If we were not approved, as you say, from where are the prophets derived?
S. ARCHBISHOP. The prophets were sent to us from the Lord, as certain angels, that is, as messengers, revealing to us the will and counsel of the Almighty God, since they did not originate from you.
HERBANUS. Moses and Aaron, and Jesus, and Samuel, and David, and those after them—are they not the seed of Abraham?
A S. ARCH. I say indeed that they are truly the seed of Abraham. For they themselves displayed the works of Abraham, and are justly called his sons; but you are far removed from the just actions of Abraham. For this reason, God caused yours to cease and raised us up to be children of Abraham, for God had said to him: "And all the tribes of the earth shall be blessed in you" (Gen. XXII, 15). Behold, therefore, He has spoken, and it has come to pass. For from the ends of the world, peoples, tribes, and tongues have believed in the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and are blessed by the Almighty on account of their excellent faith, together with His faithful and honorable servant, Abraham. HERBANUS. Whence, then, did you receive the instruction to believe in Father, Son, and Spirit, and do you bring into our midst three monstrous and portentous gods? B S. ARCH. As ones beholding with the eyes of the mind, so we think: believing in one God in three hypostases or persons. But he who introduces three gods is accursed. For the mind of the Almighty, as the cause of all, we call the Father; the Word, as born from the mind, we rightly call the Son; but the Holy Spirit, as proceeding from the mind, resting in the Word, and providing life to all, we call the Spirit. HERBANUS. How is it that God did not command Moses and the prophets to believe in the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but only to you, who have newly invented this, as you claim? C S. ARCH. God indeed showed Abraham in a figure that He has a Son, and that He would be born as a man, and that He would be sacrificed, and that He would die, and yet would not die. For Abraham, having been commanded for the love of God to sacrifice his son Isaac, sacrificed him in his intent, and did not sacrifice him; he completed it, and did not complete it. For he led him back home alive from the unexpected. So too, the Lord God sacrificed His Son for the salvation of the world; but nevertheless, rising on the third day, although He was sacrificed, He was not sacrificed; although He died, He did not die. For He conquered the sacrifice, and having overcome death by death, as true God and perfect man, He demonstrated in truth that He was the Son of God. And Moses, too, in the work of the creation of the world, speaks, signifying the Son of God: "And said," he says, "the Lord God." The Lord indeed is the Son, and God is the Father Himself, and He who spoke is the Holy Spirit; for the word without the spirit is dry and does not know how to proceed. D HERBANUS. And if this is so, for what reason did God speak with His own mouth to His people in the desert the so-called Decalogue, in which His first utterance is this: "Hear, Israel: The Lord your God, the Lord is one, and besides Him there is no other god" (Deut. VI, 4)?
A S. ARCH. I too acknowledge that it is so. For when He says "Lord," He indicates His Word and names His Son; and when He says "God is one," along with this Word, He indicates the Father. Does it not seem to you that God possesses a Mind B, as I have already told you? Does it not seem to you that He also possesses a Word? Therefore, is there not also a Spirit? These are the three persons we acknowledge, believing that each person possesses his own hypostasis. But the three persons unite into one and the same divinity. We therefore confess a Trinity of persons, or hypostases, in one and the same divinity, believing both to be one God. For David, the ancestor of God, also bears witness to my statement, speaking the truth just as I do, when he says: "By the word of the Lord the heavens were established" (Ps. XXXII, 6); this Word is the Son of God. "And by the spirit of his mouth all their power." This spirit, which he says is of His mouth, is the Holy Spirit.
HERB. What need is there to inquire too curiously into the nature of God, and to make triune that which is one?
S. ARCH. David makes it triune, and shall I not? Look at the sequence of the discourse. You Jews, by confessing a divinity that is most singular and overly solitary, attribute poverty and scarcity to its simplicity and unity, representing the divine matters in an impoverished and jejune manner. The Greeks, on the other hand, serving vain idols and multiplying the divinity, are of necessity addicted to many gods who contend with one another, and they fall into the deception and fraud of idolatry. But we Christians, by making the divinity triune, proclaim it to be excellent and surpassing in riches and power; confessing one God and a trinal authority, we equally reject and flee from both your penury of divinity and their multitude of gods. You see, therefore, the wisdom and intelligence of Christians. C
HERB. You speak indeed very well. Nor do we have anything by which we might oppose or contradict you in this matter. Nevertheless, listen to God speaking, while He testifies that Israel is loved by Him: "Israel is my firstborn son" (Exod. IV, 22), says He; then: "Out of Egypt I called my son" (Osee XI, 1). If, therefore, God calls Israel His firstborn son, how do you Gentiles, who are held in the darkness of error and ignorance and do not possess the Law, regard this same Israel as execrable, wicked, and impure, when you ought to honor him rather than treat him with reproach and disgrace?
S. ARCH. We do not by any means deny that Israel is the firstborn. For he is in truth the firstborn, and it is not permitted to lie. I also believe, and gladly acknowledge, that you were led out of Egypt into Palestine and liberated from servitude. But the younger born supplanted the elder. Is this not true? And as for this firstborn—
A and indeed he received the right of primogeniture; nay, he even snatched away his blessing, his favorable prayer, and fled from the face of the legal cult into another region. I speak of the exposition of the precious faith, which is of the only-begotten Son of God.
HERB. But in truth, Jacob supplanted his brother Esau. But to what end do you claim this foreign supplantation for yourself?
S. ARCH. That supplantation was the beginning of our own supplantation. There, indeed, the younger son by birth supplanted the elder; but here, the younger people supplanted the older people.
HERB. In what respect have you supplanted us? Have you become Jews, and we Greeks? Are we not Hebrews, and are you not Gentiles, as you used to be?
S. ARCH. But God sent His only-begotten Son from heaven to you, and you did not receive Him. For this reason, God dismissed you as impious and lawless; and He came to us, and we received Him. And He took away all that was yours, and gave it to us; but you, as degenerates, He banished and scattered to the ends and limits of the earth, and you have been alienated from Him.
HERB. And what did He take from us that He gave to you?
S. ARCH. First, He took from you the kingdom, then the law and the prophets; He took away the rites, the divine cults, and the sacrifices. He took away your city, the temple, Mount Sinai, and the bush; and, to say it in a word, everything that was honorable and worthy of proclamation among you, this He took from you and handed over to us Christians. But you, just as He spoke in Deuteronomy: "Because I will scatter them," He scattered; and, "That I may cause their memory to cease from among men." You see that He has caused everything to cease.
HERB. Do you mean the Nazarene, B and do you assert that He is the only-begotten Son of God? He was a man, for which reason our fathers put Him to death as a criminal and an evildoer.
S. ARCH. They did not put Him to death as simply and utterly as you allege. Indeed, He rather raised the dead, of whom one is the blessed Lazarus, who had been dead four days.
HERB. He who raised Lazarus from the dead, as you say—how did He Himself, having been crucified, die?
S. ARCH. You were informed above that He is the Son of God, and here you say that the Nazarene is not the Son of God.
HERB. You said that the deity is threefold, and you cannot contradict it. But now you say that this condemned one is the Word of God, whom the furthest ends of the earth know to have been crucified and to have died.
S. ARCH. Just as the law previously testified C and
the prophets, he was incarnate, was crucified, died in the flesh, not in his divinity, and rose again after the third day.
HERB. Recite furthermore the demonstrations: where, and what, and how great things the law and the prophets have testified.
S. ARCH. The prophet Moses says: *The Lord God will raise up to you a prophet from your brethren, like me. It shall be, therefore, that every soul which will not hear that prophet shall be rooted out from its people.* A Who, then, is that prophet of whom he has spoken?
HERB. It certainly prophesies about David. For no one has been raised up from Moses until him: God forbid that it be otherwise!
S. ARCH. Are we to conclude, then, that David is like Moses? By no means. For the one, a prophet and lawgiver, though not a king, led the people out of the land of Egypt, and received the tablets from heaven, and fed the sons of Israel with manna. But the other was raised from poverty to the kingdom, and, occupied with wars, and having composed the Psalter, he ended his life. What, then, does David have in common with Moses? Nothing.
HERB. Both were leaders of the people, and both were prophets of the same and one people.
S. ARCH. B David fell and was defiled by murder and adultery, but Moses was in no wise contaminated by these crimes.
HERB. Yet Moses committed murder, though he did not commit adultery.
S. ARCH. Moses, in killing a foreigner, namely an Egyptian, was guiltless of murder.
HERB. Come now, tell me about Christ, and leave aside the prophets.
S. ARCH. Moses says: *You shall see your life hanging before your eyes.* C
HERB. What is this life, and where did it hang?
S. ARCH. Jesus the Christ is the Life, whom you suspended on the wood, namely on the cross, before your eyes.
HERB. Moses did not say this—that "You shall see your life hanging"—but he spoke of the continuous captivity and the abduction of those people, which they were destined to suffer as time went on at the hands of their adversaries. For this—"You shall see your life hanging"—declares this: either that, being led away into captivity, D you shall be miserably afflicted concerning your life, whether those who lead you away kill you, or enslave you to themselves.
S. ARCH. You are introducing an uneven word to the expression. For he said, "You shall see your life hanging." Now, whatever hangs is either a body or some material object; and these things do not hang without some force sustaining them, because they cannot hang of themselves. There is no doubt, therefore, that he spoke this regarding the humanity of the only-begotten Son of God, that he was to hang in the flesh upon the wood of the cross.
A
HERBANUS. Just as you do not give credence to my statements, in the same way I do not believe yours.
S. ARCHBISHOP. Jacob, blessing his sons, said: *The prince shall not fail out of Juda, nor the leader from his loins, until that which is reserved shall come; and he is the expectation of the nations.* What, then, do you say about this prophecy? Are these things not so?
HERBANUS. We indeed know that he is about to come, but he has not yet come; when he comes, we shall believe in him.
S. ARCHBISHOP. You are full of folly. Do you pay attention to what it says: *The expectation of the nations, he who is coming*—and you say that he has not yet come? If the nations did not believe in him, just as Jacob said, you might reasonably say that he has not arrived. But if, according to the patriarch’s prophecy, the nations have hoped in him, it is evident that he has come, and you are raving in vain, laboring for nothing. B
HERBANUS. I am amazed that God took on flesh for the contempt and ignominy of his own person, having entered into the world for no other reason than to be conceived and born and grow, and to be sold and seized and imprisoned and crucified, and to drink vinegar and gall, and to be pierced in the side with a lance, and to die crying out. I am amazed that he came for these reasons, O Archbishop, as you claim. But it would be better and more advantageous for you to be ignorant of such things as those you preach.
S. ARCHBISHOP. Indeed, he came for the ignominy of his own countenance, so that through his ignominy those who believe in him might be honored, having been freed from the ignominy of the transgression C committed in Eden. Nevertheless, what does Jeremiah prophesy concerning his glorious advent, saying: *This is our God; no other shall be accounted equivalent to him? He has discovered every way of knowledge, and has given it to Jacob his servant, and to Israel his beloved by him*?
HERBANUS. He said this regarding the God of the Law, and this statement serves me as an aid; for God has discovered and given every way of knowledge to us, the children of Jacob, as to his beloved ones and his children and heirs.
S. ARCHBISHOP. Israel, who is beloved, is my Lord, O senseless one; and Jacob the child is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. But you, through David, he named as alien children, and through John, as a brood of vipers. And if you do not believe, O foolish one, consider what follows in the verse: *After these things*, he says, *he was seen on earth and conversed with men.* D After what things? After the law was given, after he sent the prophets, after he fulfilled everything that he willed in the Law.
HERBANUS. Do you conjecture that he is our God, of whom the prophet said: *No other shall be accounted equivalent to him*?
S. ARCHBISHOP. Do you pay attention to what it says, *This is our God*
A and that he himself afterwards appeared on earth and walked among men; and do you say, "You conjecture"? How did he appear to men? In the naked divinity? By no means. For who can behold God in his naked essence, as he is? No one, I think, unless he had surely and voluntarily become man. HERBAN. I have said before that he came into the world for his own ignominy and contumely.
S. ARCHBISHOP. Is it contumely, O blind one, that when he came here, he cleansed your lepers, O miserable man? That he drove away every disease and every infirmity from those among you who were ailing, and cast out the throngs of demons? That he walked upon the sea on foot, and with five loaves fed and satisfied five thousand men? And yet, for all these things, you did not turn your mind and attention to him; on the contrary, you rather afflicted and uselessly condemned this same person, who was distressed and vexed, and raised him upon the cross. B It is for this reason, therefore, that you say he was dishonored. Therefore, he submitted to being dishonored all the more, so that by this means your wickedness might be exposed—which you always carry in your hearts outside of him—by which, even before he came to you, you stoned Naboth, you pursued Elijah for a forty days’ journey with a terrible threat, you sawed Isaiah asunder, you cast Jeremiah into the mire, you slaughtered the multitude of infants, you murdered Zechariah, and you beheaded John. What (is it to be said) that you even murdered their very Master? For I omit saying the rest. How then do you say that he came for his own ignominy?
HERBAN. If he was God, why, since he was able, did he not cast aside the cross?
S. ARCHBISHOP. If he had cast it aside, how would the prophecies have been fulfilled?
HERBAN. Relate to me the prophecies concerning the cross, and which prophets have spoken about it.
S. ARCHBISHOP. God, declaring and prefiguring the cross beforehand, C saved the remnant of the human race in the time of Noah by the wood of the ark. For the ark was wood, and the cross is wood. The ark then miraculously saved those who believed there would be a destructive flood and entered into it. And the precious and honor-worthy cross delivers those who worship it and believe in him who was fixed upon it from the tyranny of Satan and from eternal punishment. And the bush of Sabec, to which the ram was tethered in the time of Abraham, providing salvation for Isaac, prefigured the precious cross; for the ram prefigured the flesh of the Word of God nailed to the cross, while the bush of Sabec signified the cross itself.
HERBAN. You have learned many things, and you investigate aptly those things which contribute to your purpose. D
A S. ARCH. I do not engage in subtle hairsplitting, but I persuade you from your own Scripture, which contains the goal of truth; pay attention to what is said. When Jacob the patriarch was about to bless his sons, did he not raise himself slightly from the bed on which he was lying, and, leaning on the top of his staff—which signified the precious cross—did he not, by crossing his hands in the fashion of the cross, thus pray for fausta and happy things for them? Did he not leave aside the first, who was an image of your people, and extend the entirety of his blessing and auspicious prayer to the second, who was an image and figure of the Christian people? I tell you that this was carried out in the case of Joseph. Furthermore, did not the staff of Moses, by which he performed signs and prodigies, show forth the type of the cross? And the wood which Moses cast into Mara, by which the water was made sweet and drinkable, did it not prefigure the honorable cross? When Moses, extending his hands in the likeness of a cross, put Amalek to flight, did he not foreshadow the cross in some form?
HERBAN. If you find useful wood here in the Old Testament, it is time for you to liken it to your cross.
S. ARCH. Not only did [various] woods prefigure the cross, but also the lifting up of hands, and the tokens of wars—that is, the struggles and battles—and things similar to these.
HERBAN. I have already told you that, endowed with much great learning, you bring forward and articulate directly and aptly those things that serve your purpose.
C S. ARCH. When Joshua the son of Nun waged that horrific and internecine war against the nations, as evening approached, did he not command the sun to stand still over Gabaon, and likewise the moon over the valley of Aialon, until he had achieved victory over his enemies? But this was a prefiguration of the passion of my glorious Lord Jesus Christ. For that person was Jesus, and this person is also Jesus. That one was commander-in-chief of Israel; this one is King and God, not only of Israel, but of the entire world. That one put nations to flight; this one puts the armies of the demons to flight. That one made the sun and moon stand still until he had destroyed all the phalanxes of his adversaries; but at the passion of my Lord, the sun shivered and grew dark, and the moon did not give its light, the day immediately passing into darkness out of fear. That one destroyed the nations with spear and lance; this one, by the power of his divinity, crushed the bolts of Hades and reduced demons to ashes with his precious cross. That one achieved these things with the help of a multitude of troops—for he was a human, and could do nothing more or greater—but this one did it alone, or rather, he is twofold, according to both divinity and humanity. D For the prophet says of him: *I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the nations there is no man with me* (Isa. LXIII, 3). For since he called his passion, spiritually, a grape,*
and intended to show that his passion would be salvation for the nations, and that no one from among the nations contends with him, he added: *And of the nations there is no man with me.* Not that A he needed the help of the nations, but that he was declaring that the nations had been saved through his sufferings.
HERB. How is it that none of the prophets spoke with freedom of speech and boldness that the Word of God, that is, the Son, would descend from heaven, assume flesh from the woman Mary, become man, be crucified, die, and on the third day rise from the dead, and the rest?
S. ARCH. O senseless man, does not the prophet Isaiah proclaim all things about him with boldness? Does not David also cry out in the psalms or canticles, and the rest of the prophets with might and power? Hear what the prophet Jeremiah says B about your fathers, declaring long beforehand how they were to plot and meditate against their Lord: *Come, and let us put wood into his bread, and let us root him out of the land of the living* (Jer. XI, 19). And a little before: *I was like a gentle lamb led to the slaughter, and I did not know* (Jer. XI, 19). Show me, then, where Jeremiah was slaughtered, and where they put wood into his bread? Perhaps, according to the sense, you cannot say. For we find only that he was cast into the mire and buried. It is therefore clearly evident that the prophet was prophesying concerning Christ and his passion.
HERB. These things Jeremiah spoke enigmatically and obscurely: whether C about himself or about another, it is no concern of mine. But tell me what I ask: which of my prophets spoke with freedom of speech, and not in a parable, concerning your Christ?
S. ARCH. Since you are truly carnal, you seek carnal and gross thoughts of the mind. Do you suppose that the prophets were subject to your ignorance and folly and madness, so that they poured forth common and trivial words as simple vaticinations? Hear, then, what David says concerning his heavenly descent to the Virgin in order to be clothed in flesh: *He shall descend like rain upon a fleece, and as a drop distilling upon the earth* (Ps. LXXI, 6).
HERB. David said these things concerning Solomon; and you, to whom do you pervert and adapt these?
S. ARCH. D What does the psalm say as it proceeds? *In his days shall righteousness arise* (Ps. LXXI, 7). And who among you will convict him of sin? But Solomon, having done that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, died.
HERB. He was the author of countless seditions in the days of our fathers.
S. ARCH. Alas! Because he bore your infirmities, and healed your diseases, and raised your dead from the underworld to life: you, like dogs stirred up by rabies, raged against him. Who, then, is the author of the tumults, you yourselves, or he? But hear also what follows: *He shall
have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the rivers unto the ends of the earth.* Is it not so? Does not the faith in him shine forth unto the ends of the earth? B *Before him the Ethiopians shall fall down.* Did not all Ethiopia believe in him, and does it not daily worship him as the true God? *And his enemies shall lick the dust.* Who are his enemies? Is it not you, O Jews, who by reason of your great and rabid hunger lick the dust? That is, being unable to eat from the spiritual concepts of Christians, you lick the earthly, dusty, fleshly, and impassioned thoughts, because you are dead.
HERB. You have acquired a lofty and grandiloquent tongue with which to utter these things. But what does this clause of the verse mean and signify: *And there shall be an abundance of peace, until the moon be removed?* What is this abundance of peace?
S. ARCH. This multitude or abundance of peace declares the great love of the Churches of God, which they possess among one another. He named the moon, indicating the Catholic and Apostolic Church. C For until the Lord comes and the Church shall pass away, until then there shall be the peace of God, superabounding in the midst of the Churches. But when the Church shall pass away, then also peace shall be taken from the midst, for the consummation will have arrived. But that you may be sufficiently profited by this psalm, pay attention to what is said. What does this psalm say above? *And he shall humble*, it says, *the calumniator, and he shall endure with the sun.* For you see that he has died. Where, then, was he in existence before the moon? For on the fourth day, in the creation of the world, God created the moon and the stars. And David begot Solomon long ago from her who was the wife of Uriah: but before the sun, where was his name? Nor was David prophesying these things at that time.
HERB. That he did indeed humble the calumniator, I can show you: for he humbled not one alone, but he subdued infinite tyrants, struck with terror; D and he overcame all evil demons, and kept them bound in chains and fetters. But as for his enduring with the sun, he figuratively indicated the splendor of his kingdom, because the sun is the leader of the day, and thus he likened his power to the sun. He called the first day the moon, hinting at his birth. And thence he says, *He shall remain safe unto generations of generations.* And likewise, *Before the sun his name remains,* this declares that before his kingdom in the whole world, his name will obtain distinction and honor. And *before the moon*, unto generations of generations. You, therefore, say that these things were spoken concerning Solomon. Show me, then, what calumniator Solomon humbled. And where does it say, *He shall endure with the sun?* You see, etc.
A S. ARCH. Solomon humbled the demons? You do not know what you are saying. For a time, indeed, you confined them in vessels, and having sealed them, you buried them. But consider this with me: that, having been defeated in mind and spirit by those very demons and conquered, he was endangered regarding his own salvation, just as the Scripture testifies. For, having gathered together, like a horse inflamed with love for females and burning with lust, a herd of women, he built temples for idols and served them, and offered up the abominations of error; and having shamefully consorted with a foreign woman, when he returned to his kingdom or palace, he suddenly ended his life, having wrought evil before God, and was unable to show even a trace of repentance. But that which David sang, *He shall remain with the sun,* does not declare the splendor of a kingdom, but foretold it concerning my Christ and God, that His immaculate humanity, in virtue of which He was twofold—both God and man—will remain with the sun in the ineffable splendor of His divinity; and, having been taken up to heavens to His own Father and God, and sitting at the right hand of His power. And that *before the moon* does not signify the first day of the moon, nor the second, nor the third, but calls the Catholic and Apostolic Church B "the moon." For, he says, before this existed, He was with the sun—with the Father and God—not only in the generations from the beginning, but even before all ages. And this, *Before the sun his name remains,* you have also explained obscurely. For the sun does not indicate kingdom, but clearly and plainly it states that before this sun was made, His name was wonderful.
HERB. You look after your own side, and accommodate everything to it, and distort my interpretation. But I, struggling, and anxiously laboring for my own part, do not admit nor approve of your explanation.
S. ARCH. Truth draws you to agree and assent, even against your will. But I say to you concerning what is written a little further down: *And in him shall all the tribes of the earth be blessed.* C All nations shall call him blessed. And a little before: *His name shall be blessed for ever.* Tell me then, now: where were all the tribes of the earth ever blessed in Solomon, or at what time did they call him blessed, or in what ages has his name been blessed? Who, furthermore, blesses Solomon? For all hold him condemned, as one who wrought evil before God.
HERB. Did not Solomon publish the book Ecclesiastes in writing? And not only that, but also the entire book of Proverbs? Which indeed demonstrates that this is he. Are not his writings read? See, then, in what places the grace of his wisdom rings out and is celebrated, is praised by those who hear, and is glorified by those who read, and is blessed D by those who understand his aphorisms; how then did you say that there is no one who blesses him?
A S. ARCH. The author of the Canticle says in spirit: His name is blessed, and not only blessed, but also unto the ages. How then will Solomon's name be blessed, who ended his life in sins? For he was not God, nor the Son of God, in the way my Lord Jesus Christ is. For the name of no one else is blessed unto the ages, except only the name of my Lord Jesus Christ and Savior. Solomon, in truth, was corrupted in the end and perished, separated from the love and charity of God, and held and detained by the intemperances and frenzies of demons. And if our Lord Jesus Christ, when he was crucified and died and descended into Hades, had not reached out a saving hand to him, he would have had nothing at all. For not only will his name not be blessed, as you say, unto eternity, but he will also be punished with sinners unto infinite ages, as a transgressor and one who has lost every good.
HERB. Did your Christ also, having died, possess the power to grant salvation and the ability to save, tell me? Observe how he recently delivered himself, and whether he could have rescued and saved Solomon?
S. ARCH. Come then, tell me, what does the prophet say, and of whom: “For you will not abandon my soul to see corruption?”
HERB. He says this plainly of himself, supplicating and beseeching God.
S. ARCH. You have lied directly against the truth. Is not David's monument in Palestine, and his body in the sepulcher? How then does he proclaim: C “For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, nor will you give your holy one to see corruption,” seeing that he in no way rose again, but lies still in the tomb, having been utterly corrupted? But the truth demonstrates that the prophet indicated these things concerning my Christ, foreknowing that he would rise again after the third day, not having awaited corruption, as one who was powerful. Furthermore, he made the prophecy his own, as if speaking about himself, knowing that according to the flesh, Christ would be born from his loins, rising incorruptible.
HERB. Meanwhile, even if it is as you say, the expression, “You will not abandon my soul to Hades,” is not the voice of the Lord, but that of some servant, or of an inferior directing a supplication to a superior. You must know, therefore, that he was not the Son of God, D but a servant.
S. ARCH. My Master was both God and man, possessing two natures, and two essences, and two wills, but one and the same hypostasis. Therefore, on account of the nature of humanity, as having been created and united to divinity, he uttered this submissive voice as a supplication. And this ought not to be a scandal.
A For the resurrection of his body, and the fact that his flesh did not suffer corruption in the tomb, was worked by the divine power of his divinity upon his humanity. When, therefore, his humanity calls upon his divinity, I, for my part, am not ashamed.
HERBANUS. If it is so, then it follows that the same one is both servant and Lord; and it is necessary that the same one should, as a servant, submit himself to himself as to his Lord.
ST. ARCHBISHOP. You struggle in vain with empty words. That he is both servant and Lord, I do not deny. For he is one and the same, the Son of God, because he exists in his divinity and his humanity in one hypostasis, whereby the Word of God became flesh, as Scripture testifies: *And he dwelt among us*.
HERBANUS. That he is your Lord, very well; but as for his being a servant, for what reason?
ST. ARCHBISHOP. He is B Lord, indeed, as pre-existing; but a servant he became willingly, to the end that, in the form of a servant, having struggled against and defeated the adversary, he might free from servitude and the curse him who had been miserably enslaved to sin in paradise through transgression.
HERBANUS. I am dizzy and distraught, and I am not myself, if the son of Joseph the carpenter and Mary his wife is the same Son of God who comes into this world.
ST. ARCHBISHOP. So I think. Concerning him, God spoke by the mouth of the prophet: *The Lord said to me: Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee*.
HERBANUS. All that David uttered concerning himself, you C appropriate and twist toward your Christ.
ST. ARCHBISHOP. You rave, understanding the Holy Scripture neither by experience nor by reason. Pay attention to what it says afterwards: *Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thy inheritance, and for thy possession the ends of the earth*.
HERBANUS. But David ruled over not a few nations, which he defeated and routed.
ST. ARCHBISHOP. And did his possession extend, of necessity, to the ends of the inhabited world? He ruled only over Palestine, and was king of the Jews; but not at all over the ends of the earth. And even if he did subdue nations for a time, it was not forever. Therefore, one thing is the end, D and another is the taking of a defeated nation; perhaps a whole and entire inheritance. You prattle and bluster in vain, therefore, against these things. For these things refer to our Lord Jesus Christ, reigning spiritually. For if you go to the ends of the inhabited world, you will find Christ reigning spiritually. About this, therefore, David prophesied. Observe, moreover, that Christianity has prevailed everywhere, and in all nations churches have been erected and, as it were, established to him who was crucified. But that the discourse is not about David, but about my Lord and God, hear what the end of the psalm indicates: *Thou shalt shepherd them with*
a rod of iron*—the rod of iron is the precious cross. Whom will he shepherd? Those concerning whom he said: *And now, O kings, understand; be instructed, all you who judge the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice in him with trembling.* Then he says: *Take hold of instruction, lest the Lord be angry, and you perish from the just way.* Whom, then, does David indicate as Lord—himself? The argument is superfluous. For no one of those who is of sound mind would call himself lord, and certainly not in writing. Furthermore, how great a prophet would he be if he transferred the name of his own Lord and God to himself, or again, prophesied about himself? Understand, therefore, even at the end, whom he declares: *When his anger is quickly kindled, blessed are all who trust in him.* For what cause? Is he not God? For he was a man, like one of men, and served as a prophet. You see how frivolous and trifling are the things you say. HERB. Prophet Moses, if you have read the Pentateuch, established for us Israelites great curses from God and the angels and the holy ones, adding even all the elements that are under heaven into a malediction and curse, if ever we should receive another god besides the God of our fathers. Why, then, do you busy yourself further? For God himself warns us through the prophet, saying: *There shall not be among you a new god, nor shall you worship a foreign god. For I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt.* What, then, does it seem to you regarding these things? B THE SAINT. Regarding the statues and idols of the Canaanites this command and instruction was given to you, that you should not worship a foreign god, but not regarding the only-begotten Son of God. Whom, then, does he bring in and signify, saying: *The Lord said to my Lord: Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool*? Which Lord, and to which Lord do you suppose these things were spoken? Explain now and tell me. HERB. The Lord of things celestial, and terrestrial, and subterranean, the God who is in heaven; the Lord was also David in the days of his reign over all the earth, of which he was king. Therefore God said to him, saying: *Sit at my right hand*; that is, do not turn to the right C or to the left from the right-hand commandments of the law, but keep the law, and I will subject all the nations to you, and I will make your enemies the footstool of your feet. For they are called weapons of the wars of justice, and a guard among the people. These things having all been spoken between the most holy archbishop and Herbanus the doctor of the law, with the most pious king also present, and certain bishops, and the multitude of the Jews, and the whole city, the doubt D finding its solution or
had its outcome. For the day turning into evening interrupted their dissertation and the judgment of the case. The Jews rejoiced over Herbanus, because he had been able to stand against the archbishop in the disputation uprightly and bravely, and had not fainted: and they all kissed him and followed him with great benevolence. But Herbanus said to them: "Nay, A brothers, let us rather pray to the God of the Law, that He may be present with us and help us: for, as you see, the archbishop is a man very shrewd and subtly exercised in the holy Scriptures: and there is no small force required for us to gain credibility with him. You know that he knows and understands our own doctrines better than we do." The Jews encouraged him and added presence of mind to him, that he might not grow weak through fear.
SECOND DAY'S CONGRESS
On the morrow the king again ordered the assembly and the disputation to be restored with applause. The rest being in place, with the king sitting in the first seat and the archbishop, the Jews arrived, then they stationed Herbanus. And the holy archbishop said:
S. ARCH. Yesterday you said that Moses the prophet had laid a curse and execration upon the Jews from God, and from the angels, and from the elements. I do not doubt this myself. And the prophet did well, knowing your slippery faith B and the inconstancy of your mind and counsel. For if, even with this having been done and established, you nevertheless sacrificed your sons and daughters to demons: what would you not have done and shown, if He had not reserved this curse for you as if in a treasury? But as for us Christians, do we believe in idols? Do we bring in a strange god into the midst? No, we acknowledge the Word of the great and almighty God—that God, I say, who loved Abraham and his descendants—who took flesh by the power of the Holy Spirit from the Virgin Mary, the most upright and chaste Mother of God, for our salvation; and with the same Father and His Holy Spirit, we worship and adore one true God, C neither taking away anything, nor adding anything, save that we believe, having recognized the Godhead more truly and purely than you. But Moses, and the things that were well instituted and sanctioned by him, and well fulfilled, and which have ceased, we approve.
But as to that which was said: "The Lord said to my Lord," David spoke it. For there, having brought the discourse to that point yesterday, we rested, and from there it is necessary to begin again. If, therefore, David was lord of the land of which he was king, which I confess, he was a lord full of shadow and dream, just as we all are men. But that he should call himself lord is invalid, infirm, unwarlike, and doubtful, and not yet judged. For we have D never found this custom, that anyone should call himself his own lord. But the Lord said to His Word, that is, to the Son: to Him, I say, who was made man, and who died, and who rose again from the dead on the third day, and after forty days from the Mount of Olives was taken up into the heavens in the presence of His holy disciples and apostles, and who passed through all the rank of the powers above, and sat at the right hand of His majesty. For this He said...
the power of His divinity, speaking to His immaculate humanity: "Sit at my right hand, until the end of the world shall come, and I shall send thee as judge of the living and the dead." And then every knee shall bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, to thy authority; and thine enemies shall be placed as a footstool, a foot-rest for thy feet, and thou shalt render to each according to his works. This the truth interprets and explains, if only thou art willing to assent and approve.
HERB. You certainly bring a great blasphemy into the world, saying that He who was nailed to the stake and the cross sits at the right hand of the Divine majesty in the highest.
S. ARCH. If He was nailed to the cross, is the cross for that reason a scandal to thee? But that thou mayest be confirmed that I have rightly interpreted that saying, namely: "The Lord said to my Lord: Sit at my right hand," observe what follows in the next verse, how it points toward the grace of the cross, for which thou preferrest to be offended: "The Lord shall send the rod of thy power out of Sion: rule thou in the midst of thine enemies."
HERB. Do you suspect the rod of which he speaks to be the cross? If it were so, it should have said "cross," and not "rod." But as for his affirming that the rod would be sent from Sion, was that wood from which the cross was made hewn from Mount Sinai? But thou couldst not prove this.
S. ARCH. O senseless man, the prophet spoke of the rod anagogically and by enigma. Just as a rod cannot move of itself, or strike anyone, if the hand is absent which strengthens it by its own touch; in like manner also the precious cross: for it itself was from the earth, but it needed power from Sion, so that it might be raised up against the enemies of King Christ, or rather against the adversaries of the creature of the King, the Lord. But when thou hearest "out of Sion," do not look downwards. Consider Mount Sinai in thy mind; for this also was spoken anagogically. For Sion is the supernal metropolis of the Lord, in which He Himself dwells, and all His angels. The divine power, therefore, arrived from the supernal Sion, that is, the Word of God from heaven, and took up the rod from the earth: I mean the precious and life-giving cross. And stretching out His right hand and high arm, He struck all the adversaries, and conquered; that is, Hades, death, sin, condemnation, and that very malign serpent himself, who by impious fraud ensnared Eve with Adam in Eden, that is, in paradise; and immediately He held dominion in the midst of His enemies. To this King, God the Father has given the power to judge D
A all His world, when the end shall come and the resurrection shall have taken place. And all the saints shall shine around Him like beacons. And see how He introduces this, saying: "With thee is the beginning in the day of thy power, in the splendors of thy saints."
HERB. Do you say that he who was born of Joseph is to come to judge the world? O, what a great deception and massive error!
S. ARCH. Truly, one who is blinded cannot look upon the sun. That Joseph did not beget my God and Lord from his own seed—God forbid!—as you, blinded and ensnared in your mind, assert. But nevertheless, I will tell you from whence my beloved Lord Jesus Christ sprung forth. God says, therefore, concerning Him: "From the womb before the morning star I have begotten thee." And lest you, O senseless one, say that this was spoken in a mere figure of speech, He added: "The Lord has sworn and will not repent." And lest you say afterwards that He is not of the very essence of God, He conversely added: "From the womb before the morning star I have begotten thee." "He has sworn," He says, "our God, that thou art of my essence." Then, lest you say that the priesthood of Aaron is not transferred, He said: "Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek." And as to how His humanity walked in the world, Isaiah says: "Behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel," which is, if you wish to interpret it, "God with us." There, therefore, David speaks of how, in His naked divinity, "from the womb before the morning star I have begotten thee." Here, however, Isaiah speaks of that generation of His according to the flesh, and how He was born from the Ever-Virgin and Theotokos. But if you apply these things that David foretells to this man B—was David, or anyone else, begotten before the morning star? Or was it only my Master, and my God, and my Lord?
HERB. I know that your Christ was born, but that He was sired entirely from the seed of Joseph is clear and known to everyone, as was said before.
S. ARCH. Do not speak insolently and impiously. For He was not begotten from the sowing of Joseph, as you imagine, but from the Holy Spirit. For the prophet has spoken concerning Him, and in pointing out that the Virgin was not corrupted by Joseph, he says this: "And the sealed book C shall be given to a man who knows letters; and the man shall say, 'I cannot read, for the book is sealed.'" What is the sealed book, if not the Virgin and Mother of God? Who is the man? Joseph the carpenter. And what of "who knows letters," that is, he who had had relations in marriage with another wife, by whom he had acquired children? And what of that he could not "read" the divine tablet, that is, the book? That is to say, he could not have intercourse with her himself, having understood from God that she was closed and reserved for the Lord Jesus, incor-
incorrupt and entire, so that God, bearing flesh from the Holy Spirit, might be born of her, and this mortal being, according to his essence, might be born of her. A
HERB. I have already told you that you have thoroughly premeditated everything so that you might think up these things: but Mary gave birth only to a man, and not to God. In what way, therefore, do you call him God, who was born of Mary?
S. ARCH. She worthily gave birth to the same one, both God and man.
HERB. And how could a woman’s womb contain that fearful magnitude of the Godhead?
S. ARCH. Just as the fire did not consume the bush in the desert; so, furthermore, the Virgin gave birth, and after the birth remained a Virgin again.
HERB. Then he was born of her in vision or imagination, and not in truth; for this is impossible, and altogether incredible. B
S. ARCH. In those days, how did Habakkuk enter to Daniel in the lions' den, with the door of the pit fastened with bands and seals? Tell me how he entered and went out, and neither opened the door nor destroyed the seals and the bolts.
HERB. You have thought up ready contradictions, as no one else has; nevertheless, the fact that your Christ died by a violent death greatly scandalizes and offends my spirit.
S. ARCH. Ignorant of the divine mystery of his passion and death, you are deservedly offended. Hear first what the Prophet says about the traitor Judas: "He who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me." And afterwards he says concerning him: "And he clothed himself with cursing as with a garment, and it entered like water into his inward parts, and like oil into his bones; because he did not desire a blessing, and it shall be far from him." C And concerning the Scribes and the chief priests, and their counsel against the Lord, he says: "All my enemies whispered against me; against me they devised evil. They framed a wicked word against me; and they rendered me evil for good, and hatred for my love." And elsewhere Isaiah says under the person of you who are wicked: "Let us lie in wait for the righteous, because he is not profitable to us." And concerning his price, Jeremiah declares, which price you gave to Judas the traitor as the reward of murder: "And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of him that was valued, whom they valued from the children of Israel; and gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me." D And concerning his betrayal he says: "Why did the nations rage, and the peoples imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ."
A
HERB. We are nations, perhaps named as peoples. But for what reason have we been called kings?
S. ARCH. Did not God speak to Abraham, saying, "I will make of you a great and populous nation"? From this, you too are called a nation. Did not Moses also say to God, "That I may be glorified, and this people above all nations"? And afterwards, he says, "I shall know that this people is thy people, and a people and a nation." But the text, "The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ," as you were addressed by Moses as a "royal priesthood," you are kings; but as you were the first chosen above all nations, you are rulers. You gathered together against the Lord as God and Savior, but against Christ as true man, since he was God and had become man. If you wish to understand it more clearly and plainly: Herod and Pilate stood up, and Annas and Caiaphas with the others, against the Lord and against his Christ. And so that you may be confirmed that they raged in such a way against God, the Prophet, subjoining the retribution that was dealt to them by God on account of their raging, says: "He who dwells in the heavens shall laugh at them, and the Lord shall mock them. Then shall he speak to them in his wrath, and in his fury he shall trouble them." Do you see the indignation of God the Father against those who crucified him? And that they also bore false witness against him, he affirms: "Why have unjust witnesses risen up against me, and iniquity has lied to itself?" And that they struck him with scourges, and inflicted blows upon him, and spat upon him, the prophet Isaiah testifies in his prophecy: "I gave my back to the scourges, and my cheeks to blows; and I did not turn away my face from the filth of spittings." B And if you say that he endured these things out of insanity and madness—you will not find it to be so. But that he was led to be crucified, contradicting nothing, Isaiah again predicted: "As a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and as a lamb before the shearer is dumb, so he opened not his mouth." And that the soldiers mocked him and crucified him—and that the light was darkened, and the sun was suddenly obscured by darkness, and the moon was shrouded in gloom; furthermore, that you gave him vinegar and gall to drink, and divided his garments—David predicted: "Because they mocked me with mockery: they gnashed upon me with their teeth. Lord, when wilt thou look?" And Jeremiah concerning the cross: "Come, and let us cast the wood into his bread, and let us blot him out from the land of the living, and his name shall be remembered no more." And concerning those who reviled him when he was hanging on the wood, David says: "All who saw me mocked me. They spoke with their lips, they wagged their head. He hoped in the Lord, let him deliver him: let him save him." C D
because he desires him. And concerning the nails, with which they nailed his feet and hands when they hung him, while the people stood around Jerusalem and watched, he says: "Dogs encompassed me." And that they were from your synagogue—that which has been afflicted and laid low—listen: "The counsel of the malignant has besieged me." And A concerning the nails: "They dug my hands and my feet; they have numbered all my bones." And concerning the dividing of his garments: "They divided my garments among themselves, and upon my vesture they cast lots." And concerning the vinegar with which he was given to drink, and the gall: "They gave me gall for my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink." And concerning the darkening of the day, the prophet Amos hinted at it, saying: "The sun will set at midday," and "It will grow dark upon the earth in the day, the light." B That he would die upon the cross, Isaiah says: "As many shall be astonished at thee; seeing the signs you perform before the passion: so shall your visage be marred by men, and many nations shall marvel at you; for we saw him, and he had no form, nor beauty, nor glory, but his form was dishonorable, falling short of his form from the sons of men." That his side was pierced with a lance, he says: "A man in a stroke, and knowing how to bear infirmity." That "his face was turned away," "He was dishonored and not esteemed." To show that the prophet meant that he had C to suffer, not for his own sake (for he did not possess sin), but for our sins, he adds, saying: "He bears our sins, and suffers for us, and we esteemed him to be in pain, and in stroke, and in affliction from God. But he suffers because of our sins; he was wounded and afflicted." Do you perceive then, O Herbanus the Jew, what Isaiah the prophet says concerning the sufferings of Christ, and for what cause he suffered? And yet you say that, because he suffered, you are offended all the more in your spirit. Do you see that for the sake of our sins, or rather the world's, he was delivered to death? Listen also to what follows: "For the discipline," he D says, "of our peace was upon him"; that is, while we were transgressing, he was disciplined, so that he might reconcile us to the Father, having destroyed the enmity caused by the transgression in his own sufferings, so that from this time forward we might have peace with God. Listen therefore to the prophet, O Herbanus, and be convinced, for he says: "By his stripes we were all healed." For our Lord delivered himself to death for our own sins. "From my iniquities," he says, "he comes to death, and I will give the wicked for his burial, and those who abound in injustice for his death." And David says: "Who did not do wrong in his tongue, nor did evil to his neighbor." Yet they, seeing the truth concerning him, bore witness; but you are blind, mindless, foolish, wicked, dull, and perfidious.
A and darkened; you said to him, "You have a demon," and taking up stones, you pursued him from behind, saying: "It is for no good work that we stone you, but because (33) you, being a man, make yourself God." O your misery! You are more miserable than all men. Nevertheless, pay attention to what is said: "There was not found," he says, "guile in his mouth." The Father and God says this through the mouth of the prophet concerning his only-begotten Son, because he suffered though he himself was innocent and without sin: "I will give to him those who abound in the wealth of iniquities for salvation"; these are the tax collectors, and fornicators, and sinners who have believed in his name. And because he consented to be buried like other men, my beloved and dearest Son, for the salvation of the human race: "I will give him all the nations," which are busied in vain in the perversity of idols and impious worship; and they shall believe in him, and they shall be deemed worthy of the kingdom of heaven. A reward, he says, I will provide him in these, for as much as my Son suffered while innocent, and in their place has overcome the ancient supplanter and his power. All these things, O Herban, are so, and you yourself know better that they are so; but wittingly and willingly you deny the truth, and do not wish to come to what is profitable and expedient.
His omnibus auditis, Herbanus exanimatus fuit, C and for a long time he stood mute, as one who could answer nothing and defend himself. But the crowd of Jews that was standing and listening was astonished, recognizing that by the voices and prophecies of Isaiah he had condemned them themselves. The Christians, however, were crowning the prelate or chief priest with praises, and the king with his magnates rejoiced greatly, hearing things which he had never before heard so purely and clearly from anyone.
HERB. Stunned by the vertigo of your disputation, I can now do nothing, and my mind and thought in such matters are now distracted and divided this way and that. For when I hear Moses, or rather God himself speaking through him: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one, and besides him there is no other God"; and then: "You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve"; here, on the other hand, hearing David D and Isaiah speaking in truth concerning this one who is thought to be the Christ, I do not know what I should do or where I should turn.
S. ARCH. For this reason, therefore, Isaiah again has spoken, knowing your slippery inconstancy and the mutability of your mind, and your incredulity in all things; he says, "Lord, who has believed our… of my people.
report? and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?" A Not to others, I think, but to all nations. For Isaiah knew your perfidy and obstinacy. And therefore elsewhere, against your impudence, he says: "By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive. For the heart of this people has waxed gross, and they have heard heavily with their ears, and have closed their eyes, lest at any time they should see with their eyes and understand, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them." Are these things not so? For if your fathers saw Him raising their dead, bracing the paralyzed, and performing other ineffable works; if, seeing Him performing these things, they did not believe, will you, a brood of vipers, having seen nothing of the sort, be able to believe in Him from hearing alone? By no means.
HERBANUS: Listen, O Archbishop, your words are indeed true and valid and firm; for you do not speak with affectation, and as for the things that appertain to the word, there is no guile in your mouth. For you have not B moved us by arguing from your own inventions, but from the divine Scriptures of the Law. Therefore, you are worthy of belief, attention, and docility. Nevertheless, because our Law was given to us first, and then yours, I think that the Law given first is the stronger one and prevails. Wherefore, it is necessary that we should keep our own, and you, indeed, your own.
S. ARCHBISHOP: Since Moses said, "The Lord your God will raise up to you a Prophet, like unto me," that is, a lawgiver, "And every soul that does not hear that prophet shall be rooted out from among its people," since he said these things, it is clear that until the coming prophet, the Law was acceptable. But C when the one who is sought has arrived, and brings another law, it was necessary for the former one thenceforth to be silent. Therefore, the Lord is no longer well pleased with your Law, even if you exercise yourselves in it all day long.
HERBANUS: Yet the Lord is very well pleased with it, since he says through the Prophet concerning it: "The Law of the Lord is blameless," that is, perfect and lacking all reproach, "converting souls so that they may understand the Lord." How, then, is the Lord not well pleased with it?
S. ARCHBISHOP: First consider and understand of what Law the Prophet has spoken; then apply its authority and validity, and do not from that point distort what has been written. D For the prophets did not prophesy concerning things that happened before them, but concerning things to come. For this which the Prophet has uttered, he has said concerning the Law which, as it were, by a *brabeutes*—that is, by the moderator and arbiter of the contest and judge of the prize (who is Christ)—was awarded to the nations. For the Law, he says, of the Lord is blameless.
A converting souls. What souls is it converting, and from whence, and toward what way is it guiding them? HERB. Those souls that stray errant from the law; the same law, while it is being expounded, quickly converts them to itself, and through itself leads all to God. S. ARCH. You are deceived in a confused and disorderly manner. For all of you have strayed from the law, with adulteries and with the frenzies of men; then, while you read the law every Sabbath, you do so rashly and in vain, since in the meantime no soul of yours is truly converted to the Lord. For who among you fulfills the law? None, I suppose. Therefore, God also has turned away from you, and has pursued you, and has dissipated you to the ends of the earth. For what cause, tell me, have you been dispersed to the four winds of heaven, and are among all the nations as a curse and an abomination? HERB. Doubtless on account of our sins. S. ARCH. I have already foretold to you that on account of your sins you have been dispersed and were cast out from the land of promise: how then did you say that the law converts your souls to the reception of the grace of the Lord? Or does God B really expel, reject, and dissipate those who please Him? See how your words contain an infinite calumny. HERB. Do you yourself set forth what the head [of the chapter] declares. S. ARCH. The Law of the Lord is my Jesus Christ, who when He descended from heaven and became man, converted the multitude of the sons of Israel to the goodness of the Father, having taught them to become Christians, the first of whom was Peter, and the rest. And not these alone, but also from all the nations He converted thousands and myriads by His Holy Spirit, through His disciples, to the knowledge of the Holy Trinity. So blameless was He that Isaiah cried out concerning Him: *And He Himself committed no sin, nor was guile found in His mouth* 81. HERB. The Prophet indeed, C having counted virtues in that place, spoke these things: since he added to these, *The testimony of the Lord is faithful, making wise the simple. The justifications of the Lord are right, gladdening the heart: and the commandment of the Lord, and the fear* 82, etc. But you, by certain impostures and by malicious interpretation and craftiness, and by an art most acute, draw it to yourself: for by a direct tongue you compel every meaning and notion, subtly and accurately twisting it to your own aid and advantage. S. ARCH. Do you not hear what Habakkuk says about the things you have said, that enumerating virtues the prophet spoke? For these virtues were of God and my Christ D, which the prophet Habakkuk also enumerated: *His virtue covered the heavens, and the earth is full of His understanding* 83.
A
HERBANUS. He spoke this concerning the God of the Law entirely. For who is equal to Him in virtues?
SAINT ARCHBISHOP. Let no one deceive you into thinking that the Word of God, who descended from heaven, was not the God of the Law; speak nothing to me of these things, you fool. For my Lord is also the Lord of your Law, and He is the God and King of the new grace. For Habakkuk says: *God will come from Teman, and the Holy One from the shaded, wooded mountain*.
HERBANUS. What does "Teman" signify? And what does the "shaded mountain" denote?
SAINT ARCHBISHOP. "Teman" declares that He comes from the heights, that is, from heaven, which is to say, from the East. But the truth demonstrates that the prophet affirms that He would have His incarnation from a virgin body, just as it came to pass, and from our holy Lady, the Theotokos and ever-virgin Mary. The "shaded mountain" is this Virgin, from whom He proceeded, having been ineffably incarnated. He calls her a "mountain" because, just as on Mount Sinai, God descended into her and overshadowed her; perhaps also because of the impassable access of virginity, since the density of mountains is difficult to approach, or rather, completely impassable. B And he indicates that she is "shaded" because the mystery of her virginity overshadows itself within her by the multitude of her virtues: add to this that it is unknown how she brought forth. For a Virgin gave birth, and after the birth, she remained a Virgin, safe and entire.
HERBANUS. He does not say this concerning Christ, nor concerning the Virgin whom you enumerated, but rather concerning the God of the Law, who was manifested to Moses on Mount Sinai. For if it were thus, he ought to have said: "Christ will come from Teman," and not "God." But we call "Teman" the place from which the south wind blows.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP. But we call "Teman" the place whence we worship. For we have been taught to pray toward the East, because there we find the God who fashioned man and created paradise. It is clear, therefore, that He who fills all things dwells in those regions. And you call "Teman" the place from which you worship. For you worship toward the West; and there is no doubt about this. Your words, which you introduce, are full of folly, as you do not understand the prophecies correctly. God, he said, will come from Teman, and the Holy One from the mountain. C Who is the God, and who is the Holy One, explain to me.
HERBANUS. It is God himself and the Holy One, two appellations placed upon one reality.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP. Which is the greater: "God," or the "Holy One"?
HERBANUS. "God" is greater than "Holy One."
A SAINT ARCHBISHOP. Observe how you fall into error, and do not understand. For you said earlier that it is in the nature of "God" to be more potent than "Holy One." There is, therefore, in God a name that is small or great. HERBANUS. Explain to me yourself what this head signifies. SAINT ARCHBISHOP. That He will come, but through a body. For the Divine does not pass from place to place, as bodies do. But the phrase "And the Holy One from the mountain"—that is, His humanity—will come with the Godhead, from the undefiled womb of the ever-virgin and Theotokos Mary. We say, therefore, "God" on account of the essence of the Godhead, and [we say] "Holy One" on account of the essence of the humanity; since, as I have spoken above, my Lord Jesus was twofold, both God and man. The same prophet says concerning Him above: "In the midst of two animals Thou shalt be known"; that is, in the midst of two essences, and of the natures of each, one and the same Son of God, subsisting, shall be known. And that He will come and will not delay, he says: "As the years draw near, Thou shalt be known; as the time draws on, Thou shalt be revealed."
HERBANUS. You answer wisely. Nevertheless, we Jews are always suffering and vehemently vexed at abandoning that ancestral and fatherly faith and approaching the new one. For old wine is better than new.
B SAINT ARCHBISHOP. Old wine is your law; but having turned sour, it has become useless. Yet I know that a veil is always laid upon your hearts, which does not allow you to nod toward the truth as you ought, and to embrace and approve it, and to hear the words of life and true faith, and to believe worthily. Nevertheless, your Prophet, justly renouncing and deserting [your ways], has said: "O Lord, divide them from a few of the earth in their life. Appoint, O Lord, a lawgiver over them; let the nations know that they are but men."
HERBANUS. The Prophet has spoken regarding another subject, for the same one says concerning us: "Deliver, O God, Israel from all his tribulations." And then: "Praise, Jerusalem, the Lord; praise thy God, O Sion; for He hath strengthened the bars of thy gates, He hath blessed thy sons in thee." And Isaiah saith: "Israel shall be saved by the Lord."
C SAINT ARCHBISHOP. That phrase, "Divide them from a few of the earth," declares, indeed, your dispersion from the land of promise among all the nations, which happened in a short time. But the passage, "Appoint, O Lord, a lawgiver over them," and what follows, the Prophet prophesied concerning our Saviour Jesus Christ. For the Father appointed Him as lawgiver unto the nations, while you, being unbelieving, disbelieve.
A That the Prophet said, "Deliver, O God, Israel," and the rest, is nothing strange or unexpected. For he was entreating the Lord on behalf of his own nation. But we Christians, as is befitting, fearing God, pray daily on your behalf, that you may recognize what is useful and salutary. And that which says, "Praise, O Jerusalem, the Lord," and the rest, this too is true. For before Christianity came into being, the saying was appropriate, and I do not myself deny it. For even before the Lord had come down from heaven into the world, if I had been in existence, I would have been a Jew. For in those times, salvation was provided only in the law of Israel. But as for what you have said, that the old wine is better than the new, that old wine has been emptied and exhausted, and nothing has been left in your vessels except the dregs, B according to the Prophet. For he says, "A cup is in the hand of the Lord, full of pure wine mixed; and He poured from this to that." From the old law God poured into the new, with the filling up of the honey-flowing words of the divine prophets and the meanings. And nothing more remained for us in the Old, once it had been emptied into the New, except the dregs—that is, the fulfilled Scriptures, which are henceforth empty and useless.
HERB. You entirely exclude the things of Israel, and adapt your own things through the crucified One to the Almighty, not knowing the word of the Lord crying out, "That the Lord will not cast off His people, and will not forsake His inheritance." C
S. ARCH. And how did you fail to read the rest of the verse of the passage? For that the Lord will not cast off His people, I know better than you do; and that He will not forsake His inheritance, I know for certain. But tell me, until when? For the verse that precedes this statement contains a definition of a prescribed time, saying, "Until when?" "Until justice shall turn into spiritual judgment"—I mean Christianity. When my Christ and Lord came, He is the true justice. He will convert those who are obedient; for these are they who attain to this new grace, they who are right in heart, both those from the Jews and those from the Gentiles who have believed in Him. But concerning you, the unbelieving Jews, the same Prophet says, "Who will rise up for me against the malicious, or who will stand with me against those who work iniquity?" D And it is entirely clear that in the last times Vespasian and Titus rose up, according to the prophecy, and destroyed them; and then, tormented by pain, you said, as Isaiah prophesied, saying, "Now the Lord has taken away my judgment, and departed from me, and strangers eat us up"—and very justly so. [notæ]
A HERB. Again, we Israelites shall rise, and our city shall be rebuilt, and you who preach Christ shall be put to shame. For it is written to us by the Lord: "The Lord building Jerusalem, will gather together the dispersions of Israel; who healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their bruises." Whether, therefore, it happen soon or long after at the end, this word shall be fulfilled; and what is it to me and to you, O Archbishop?
S. ARCH. If you had rebuilt one city, and all had been gathered into one, what would that be to you more than to me? Did not Nebuchadnezzar take Jerusalem captive into servitude, carry away its people, and overthrow it? Did not the Lord afterward, showing mercy, rebuild it, and gather you who were dispersed into one? Was not your city, in the times of the prophets Jeremiah and Baruch, delivered to the enemies, plundered, and utterly destroyed; and yet, through mercy and benevolence, deemed worthy to be restored? And finally, that I may not recount its many dangers, it has been utterly destroyed by the Romans and has perished forever. Why then do you still sit waiting for a prophecy to be fulfilled that has already been fulfilled twice and three times over, and which now has no further assurance? Therefore, hear the verdict that God has spoken universally concerning you, that you may know accurately and certainly that God has cast you off from His heart. For seeing and knowing that your sacrifices to Him would no longer be of any use, He shortened His speech and said: "I will not assemble their conventicles of blood, nor will I be mindful of their names by my lips." And concerning the inheritance that belongs to Him, the only-begotten Son of God said to God Himself: "Thou art He who will restore my inheritance to me." You see, therefore, Herbanus, how from His very heart God hates you; and He B pronounced against you and all your synagogues: "I will not assemble their conventicles of blood, nor will I be mindful of their names by my lips." Since, therefore, God does not wish to remember you even with His lips, of what are you henceforth worthy, being darkened, blind, utterly corrupted, and unremembered?
HERB. See, does not the Prophet say: "Blessed is he whose helper is the God of Jacob, his hope is in the Lord his God"? Does not Moses also say: "You shall perish, unless you have the law for your help"? And concerning you Gentiles, David added: "You shall perish, O nations, from His land." And again Moses: "For it is a nation void of counsel, and there is no understanding in them." Does not Isaiah also say: "Rejoice not, all you aliens; for the yoke of the one D striking us is broken"? Since, therefore, you were forbidden and disowned by the prophets, you exult in vain, expecting empty and vain things.
A S. ARCH. First, recognize and distinguish what the words declare, and then condemn us accordingly. For that statement, "Blessed is he whose God is Jacob," was spoken regarding the patriarch Jacob, and you say that our hope is in the Lord God, as it signifies. But I say: it was so in the past, but it is no longer so now. For hope has now perished for you, especially since you have denied that hope, both noble and divine, which God sent down to you from heaven. But as for what he says, "You shall perish, O nations, from his land," he does not say this simply regarding us, but rather regarding you, the Jews. For since you misused the law given to you, and mingled with the nations, and learned their works, he called even you, O foolish ones, nations. But tell me this: which of us perished from his land, we the Gentiles, or you the Jews, who are transgressors and wicked, impious and deniers of God, as you yourself define it? Do we not dwell in the land of your fathers, while the Lord God, pursuing you as the law-breakers, drove you out of the land of the nations—nations whom he said he would deliver to you, that you might destroy them and dwell in their land—and yet you did not destroy them, but mingled with them and learned their works? You were indeed so wretched that you never even possessed your own land. Lo, therefore, according to that which was said by the Lord, when he said, "I will scatter them," you were scattered among all nations and [you] are B a disgrace to yourselves and for destruction. And regarding those of whom Isaiah spoke, "Do not rejoice, all you foreigners," prophesying about the destruction of the Assyrians, he hinted at these things through a certain veil. For later he reveals regarding him: "As I have deliberated," he says, "so shall it remain, to destroy, of course, the Assyrians from my land and from my mountains, and they shall be for a trampling." What, then, does this seem to you?
HERB. Who could be capable of responding to a peddler of words and a gossip? For whatever we say to you, you slander everything. What, then, does the prophet Zechariah say, as if from the person of the Lord? "Behold, I am saving my people from the land of the East (and from the land of the setting sun), and I will bring them (into their land), and they shall dwell C in the midst of Jerusalem, and they shall be my people, and I will be to them a God in truth and in righteousness." And after a little: "And it shall be, as you were a curse among the nations, O house of Judah and house of Israel, so will I save you, and you shall be for a blessing. Take courage and be strong in your hands, because thus says the Lord: Just as I deliberated to afflict you with evils when your fathers provoked me to anger, and I did not D turn back, so have I determined in these days to do good to Jerusalem and to the house of Judah; take courage."
These are the words of God. What then do you say to these things, O Archbishop?
A S. ARCH. In truth, the prophet prophesied these things, and twice and thrice you were recalled by the nations, and you recovered Jerusalem, and for some time you continued in blessings; then you were given up to plunder and spoil, and to be devoured and to be an execration to the nations, because you sinned grievously. Did I not, therefore, recount to you a little while ago how many times Israel was led captive, and how many times you were recalled? Not anymore unto the age, right? Unless when Satan and the Antichrist shall come into the world. For you were rejected and found to be utterly useless, because God called the nations in your stead. B And hear Isaiah saying: *Thus says the Lord Almighty: That many peoples shall come, building many cities, and they shall assemble into one city, saying, Let us go, let us go, to pray before the face of the Lord Almighty.* Do you see how the prophet Isaiah, or rather God himself, foretold the impulse and concurrence of the nations toward God? He says: *Many peoples and many nations shall come to seek the face of the Lord Almighty.* What do you think you must answer to this?
HERB. The prophet Micah said: *In those days, says the Lord, I will gather the broken, and I will receive the rejected. And I will call those whom I rejected, and I will set the broken as a remnant, and the rejected as a strong nation: and the Lord shall reign over them in Zion from now and even forever.* C Therefore, does it not seem to you that at some time the Lord God is going to recall Israel, whom he rejected, and that it is necessary for it to become a strong, royal, and most formidable nation?
S. ARCH. You are mistaken, O Herban, undoubtedly, by appropriating the prophecy to your own nation. For when he said "broken," he foreshadowed the sojourn of the nations. And when he said "rejected," he obscurely hinted at the idol worship of those same nations, which was rejected, he says. And now, is not the Roman Empire a great and strong nation? Is not Jerusalem full of churches and holy and divine temples of Christ the Crucified? D Did not Jesus Christ, the Son of God, whom you denied, come forth from Bethlehem? Does he not reign over almost all the ends of the whole earth, from Mount Zion, that is, from the heavenly height? Listen most attentively to what Micah says after this: *And you, Bethlehem, house of Ephrata, not the least—*
A *among the thousands of Judah; for from you shall come forth for me a ruler to be a prince in Israel. His goings forth are from the beginning, from the days of eternity.* For he says that, as a man, he was born recently; but his "goings forth" are from the days of eternity, because he is also God by nature, existing before the ages. For this reason, *he shall give them until the time of one who is giving birth*; that is, he shall give you Jews [the right] to hold fast to the law of Moses until the time of the one who brings forth the divine law, and the leader who comes out of Bethlehem; that is, from the Ever-Virgin and Theotokos Mary. For the maiden shall bring forth, he says, the ruler of Israel. For it is written that not even his brothers, who were thought to be such because of Joseph, believed in him. And he himself, he says, *shall stand and see* what his flock shall be. And *he shall discern*, because the nations were given to him, *and the Lord shall shepherd his flock in strength. And in the glory of the name of the Lord his God the nations shall be present.* Therefore, now the good shepherd shall be magnified even to the ends of the earth—that is, from the Virgin and Theotokos Mary until the consummation. And if you wish to deny that the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who shepherds the nations, has been magnified, open your eyes and look at the ends of the inhabited world, how our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is magnified from now and unto eternity, until the consummation. For this indicates that he shall be magnified even to the end of the earth.
HERB. And if this is so, for what reason did the prophet not say: *That from you shall come forth for me,* to be a ruler *among the nations*, but added, *in Israel*?
ST. ARCH. "Israel" is interpreted as "a mind beholding God." B Since, therefore, you Jews, who were once minds beholding God, when the Only-begotten Son of God came to you, by your own will you closed your eyes so as not to see the sunless light, you were blinded immediately and lost your being as minds beholding God. Because of this, the nations, who formerly were blind, looked up to God and believed in his Only-begotten Son, immediately receiving their sight and receiving the holy baptism. And immediately the name of Israel was also placed upon them, having been taken by the hand of God from you. Now, therefore, those who behold God are worthily called "Israel" in truth; but those blinded by unbelief have lost both the being and the name of Israel. Since, therefore, the name has been transferred from you, and was placed upon the nations, it is known and clear that the prophet spoke of the nations, the new Israel, that the Lord would come to be a ruler in Israel.
HERB. C You say many things for the despair of D the race of the Jews, so that they no longer expect a return...
[GREEK COLUMN] [LATIN COLUMN]
await. But I will no longer endure your words: since I hear the prophet Isaiah saying: *God will shine forth in that day in counsel with glory upon the earth, to lift up and glorify the remnant of Israel in Sion, and what is left in Jerusalem. And all shall be called holy, who are written for life in Jerusalem.* A And furthermore, *That the Lord will wash away the filth of the sons and daughters of Sion, and the blood of Jerusalem He will purge from their midst, by a spirit of judgment and a spirit of burning.* It behooves us, therefore, to be recalled, as you hear the oracles of the prophets, and to be restored again to our ancient honor, or indeed, to an even more excellent one. Wherefore, no longer rely on your manifold flow of words to oppose me, nor gainsay me, but believe and hold it most certain that this shall be: whether it happens soon or later, it matters not.
B S. ARCH. Not understanding at all the accurate subtlety of Divine Scripture, you amuse yourself with vain, adulterous, futile, and useless notions. For what it says: *God will shine forth in that day in counsel with glory upon the earth, to lift up and glorify the remnant of Israel*, has already been fulfilled. For the only-begotten Son of God, shining forth from the holy Virgin and Theotokos in Jerusalem, lifted up the remnant of Israel with glory and honor: C but He glorified it spiritually, and not corporally, as you, a carnal Jew, imagine in your mind. But what this "remnant" is, and why it is written, attend to carefully, that you may learn some good from it, and may understand what for your salvation, if you so will, is convenient and conducive. That which remains from Israel is the multitude of the Hebrews who, when Christ arrived, believed in Him: for it was "left" by the Lord, that is to say, chosen. For the human race was saved from the tyranny and vexation of demons—which is understood in soul and mind—so that it might believe in the Son of God and be saved: D so that the race of the Hebrews might not perish utterly, if it had not possessed faith, and had remained altogether incredulous. For concerning this summary the prophet says: *Except the Lord had left us a seed, you would have become as Sodom, and you would have been made like unto Gomorrah*, signifying those among you who believed and were saved. And that which is written, *for life*, signifies the heavenly life written by the only-begotten Son of God. That He washed away the filth of the sons and daughters of Sion, he says, refers to those who believed: and that He purged the blood of Jerusalem from their midst by the precious and holy baptism, there is no one who would gainsay. For Isaiah prophesies concerning this: *Wash yourselves, be clean*, and the rest. Because by a "spirit of judgment," having judged with philanthropy, by the Holy Spirit, He discovered such great good. Because by a "spirit of burning," He consumed with the fire of His own Spirit the debts of those who, through faith, approach the font. For the Holy Spirit is a consumer of pollutions. And the phrase *to lift up and glorify the remnant*, is the multitude of Israel, which...
having been devoured by perfidy, A by Satan (as God fiercely threatened him for acting against the whole race of the Jews through unbelief), has been so exalted and glorified that all the nations who believe in my Lord and God Jesus Christ, from then until this very day, honor and glorify them, and build houses of prayer, and call them holy and righteous, and celebrate their holy commemorations year by year, as it is written that *all shall be called holy*—from the nations, of course—who have inscribed their name to the law, and have been written into the life which is Christ himself, through faith and baptism. You have the twelve apostles, you have the seventy disciples; you have the two thousand, you have the five thousand men who ate the loaves; you have the four thousand, all of whom you killed, making them all martyrs—that is, witnesses—of my Lord Jesus Christ. There are also many other souls, not only men but also women, who turned from among the Jews and approached the holy baptism; about all of whom the prophet writes that the remnant of Israel shall be saved.
HERBANUS. You have twisted the words of the prophecy directly to fit your own outlook. Yet, if it is so, when was the Crucified One walking in the city of Jerusalem, just as the prophet adds thereafter, *The area around Zion will be overshadowed by a cloud by day, and like smoke and like the light of a burning fire by night?* And when was he himself veiled in all glory, and caused himself to rise as a shadow by day for the obedient against the heat and scorching, and as a veil and covering against hardness and rain? For after these words, *He shall purge the blood of Jerusalem from their midst by a spirit of judgment and by a spirit of burning*, the prophet adds these things. B C
THE HOLY ARCHBISHOP. Were you, then, present in the days of his advent, and did you see whether a cloud was overshadowing, or whether he was illuminating with the light of a burning fire, or doing some other thing, that you speak such nonsense about him? For, not knowing the true sense of Divine Scripture, you attempt to judge all things by corporal notions, and you hasten to do so. But listen attentively and understand the things spoken, what they signify. Since, O blind Jew, when you think you are gathering figs, you are reaping thorns. For the prophet says that the Lord shall come; and we know that he has come. And it shall be, he says, *every place of the mount of Zion, and all things that are in its surroundings.* That Zion was a mountain, and a lofty mountain. Therefore, conceive for me, in your mind and soul, Zion and the mountain as the city which is in heaven, the metropolis, and understand by it the Church of the nations. But that every place of the mount of Zion and its surroundings is under his authority, the truth itself bears witness. For after the Lord was clothed in flesh, he renounced and bade farewell to the devil: D and that which is the lower Zion submitted and subjected
A itself to the upper Zion, to my Lord Jesus Christ, having believed. Tell me then, yourself: is there any place under the sun, B where churches have not been dedicated and consecrated to the crucified God? For these things are understood spiritually, and not carnally. And as for what was said, *It shall be overshadowed by a cloud*, it is written that when he was transformed and transfigured 60 on Mount Tabor in the presence of his disciples, a bright cloud overshadowed them. And again, when he was taken up into heaven, it is written that a cloud received him away from the sight of his disciples. As for what the prophet cried out, *As of smoke, and as of the light of fire burning by night*, and that *It shall be covered by all glory*, this indicates the following: by “smoke,” he refers to the gloom perceived by the mind, namely the body, which, by wearing it, he veiled his divinity from the eyes of you, you unbelieving and stubborn Jews, performing signs so that he might not be known, in order that there might be fulfilled what Isaiah also said, *For their heart has been hardened*, and the rest. And David says, *And he made darkness*, namely the body, his hiding place, that is, of his divinity, from the unbelievers. And smoke is darkness, which allowed nothing to happen except to irritate and blind the eyes, so that the one being smoked might not see clearly, nor the darkness being cast before him. For God always blinds the intellectual faculties of the unbelieving. But as for *the light of fire burning by night*, he himself was the light; for he also said, *I have come as light into the world*. And it was burning, that is, it was shining forth with inaccessible divinity, through signs and miracles to the Jews who were then dwelling in the C night of this life. But the phrase, *It shall be covered by all glory*, signifies this: for having been crucified, he was so greatly glorified by God the Father, and honored on earth by true men, that all the kingdoms under heaven, confessing him to be the true God and Lord and Master, and King and Redeemer, honor and worship and serve him. And when he says, *That it shall be as a shadow 61 of the day from the heat*, by “day” he means spiritual activity; and by “heat,” the fiery darts of the evil one. Therefore, in all the days of this age, the Lord himself overshadows and guards and protects all who love him: not only from the scorching heat of the evil one—which inflames the souls of men to work the iniquity of the devil—but also from the onset of the midday demon, and the rest of the tyranny of Satan, which is cruelty and evil rain. But are these D distortions and irrational and impure notions? These, O Herban, are to be interpreted and compared in this way. As for the Synagogue of you Jews, take heed of what the same prophet proceeds to say in his prophecy: *Thus saith the Lord: I have planted a Sorech vine*. And “Sorech” is interpreted as a right-hand shoot; this was evident because of Abraham. And the hedge
A I placed around it, and I fenced it in, and I built a tower in its midst, and I dug a winepress in it, and I waited for it to produce grapes, but it produced thorns. And now, O men of Judah and you who dwell in Jerusalem, judge between me and my vineyard. What shall I do more to my vineyard, and I have not done to it? For I waited that it should bring forth grapes, but it brought forth thorns.
In bringing forward your destruction and ruin, and what ought to be done concerning you, He says: *Now therefore I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard*. Here, O Herbanus, mark carefully the B exact destruction and ruins of your Synagogue. For *I will take away its hedge, and it shall be for a spoil*. What is this hedge? It is, in every way, the Law, which surrounds and encompasses and girds with the fences of the commandments the vineyard that was moved from Egypt to the land of promise. Who are those that despoiled it? Sensibly, the Assyrians, the Persians, the Romans; but intelligibly, the intelligible demons, who snatched it away into heresies. For you, too, shaken by various heresies, have at times perversely wounded the Law of Moses. *And I will pull down*, He says, *its wall, and it shall be for a trampling*. What is this wall? The right hand of the Most High, the tower-like protection of those who love Him. Who are those who trample it? The enemies who brought you into servitude, who presided C in mind and sense over your Synagogue, the last of whom I see to be Pilate and those who were before him. *And I will neglect*, He says, *my vineyard*, that is to say, I shall leave it desolate and waste and uncultivated; and it shall not be pruned, nor shall it be dug—that is, I will bestow no care or diligence upon it. *And there shall come up upon it, as upon a wilderness, thorns*—that is, much sin shall be brought upon it, as upon a lawless and unapproachable nation, existing in much iniquity and ignorance. *And I will command the clouds, that they rain no rain upon it*. What are the clouds? The prophecies and the books of the Law; the words are the irrigations, and the rains are the deeper senses of the mind and intellect. For you have been blinded altogether, and you are D unable to read the true meaning of your divine Scripture.
And that you may not say that the prophet hinted at these things concerning another chapter, and not concerning your Synagogue, having made the prophecy clear, or rather, having made it manifest, he added: *For the vineyard of the Lord of Sabaoth, He says, is the house of Israel, and the man of Judah is his pleasant plant*—that is, the royal genealogy of David from Judah. So, do these things not stand and are they not understood in this way concerning you, O senseless and unbelieving Jew? Yet you sit and wait to be called back. *Salvation is far from sinners*. For if what God has destroyed—or rather, what He has fulfilled—He were even now to set about rebuilding, it would be bold to say that He makes Himself a transgressor. But God can never be a transgressor. For forgetfulness does not fall upon Him, as it does upon you.
A HERBANUS. You have learned to pour out many words, while excluding and exterminating the hope of Israel. Yet you will not entirely overwhelm me; because Isaiah speaks concerning the recall of Israel, revealing the truth more purely. "And it shall be," he says, "in that day, the Lord shall add to show His hand, to be zealous, and to seek the remnant of the people of Israel," 63 which shall be left from the Assyrians, and from Ethiopia, and from the Elamites, and from Egypt and Babylon, and from the rising of the sun, and from Arabia, and from the islands of the sea. "And He shall lift up signs to the nations, and shall gather the lost" 64 "of Israel, and the dispersed of Judah He shall gather from the four corners of the earth. And the jealousy of Ephraim shall be taken away, and the enemies of Judah shall perish. And it shall be for Israel as in the day when he went out of the land of Egypt. And you shall say," he says, "in that day: I will bless Thee, O Lord, because Thou hast been angry with me. And then, Thou didst turn away Thy wrath from me and hast had mercy on me." Is it not so? Show it. For not only Israel will be recalled, he says, but also the enemies of Judah, who you Christians indeed are, shall perish. These things are true, unless the prophets are liars. B S. ARCHELAUS. You have indeed spoken only what is convenient for you; but what favors my cause, and makes for me, you have passed over in silence. In the sum of the things you have recited, what does the prophet imply? HERBANUS. What does he say? Answer it yourself. S. ARCHELAUS. "So says the Lord," he says: "There shall be in that day the root of Jesse, and He who rises to rule over the nations: in Him shall the nations hope." 31 But lest you say that He who rises to rule over the nations is an enemy of God, he added that He would be from the root of Jesse: "And it shall be," he says, "His rest, honor." Do you understand, O rude and unlearned one, C that the prophet has called His rest divine honor? Therefore, know for certain that He who rises to rule over the nations is from God, since His rest has also been called honor. But as to what he subjoins afterward, that "He shall lift up a sign to the nations, and shall gather the outcasts of Israel, and shall bring together the dispersed of Judah," 32 I have already foretold that He did not gather them once or twice, but often. But you are in that same contumacy and incredulity: then, after you had remained for a time, you were dispersed again, and in this dispersion you remain to this very day. And this indeed has been given to you by me as a defense of your word. But if you wish to perceive and understand the true and open meaning of this prophecy, take note thus. "So says the Lord," he says, "the prophet says: 'There shall be in that day the root of Jesse, and He who rises to rule over the nations.'" 33 What is that root of Jesse, other than my Lady and the Theotokos Mary, who is of the tribe of Jesse? Who is He who rises to rule over the nations? Jesus Christ who was born of her. And as for the D
A fact that the nations will hope in Him, you see it entirely. And that nations will hope in Him, you observe. And that His rest is glory, it is not satiety. For by His rest He means His sleeping, that is the death which He endured while hanging on the cross. And the prophet immediately adds, saying: *And it shall be in that day.* What day? It is clearly the day in which He stood, He who rises to rule the nations. But if you say it is not of this day that he speaks, show me of what day he speaks. For if you say it refers to the consummation, the prophet ought to have named the consummation. But you would not be able to demonstrate this. Therefore, he says, *In that day, the Lord shall add to show His hand.* What means, *The Lord shall add*? Namely, He who took in the converted nations, shall also add from Israel the true Israelites, and those who had observed the law well, and who had promptly inclined toward Christianity, to recall them through faith in Him, and to bring them over to Christianity, not only from Jerusalem, but from all the ends of the earth. For when His disciples were scattered to the twelve winds of the earth that is under heaven, a great multitude even from the Jews scattered throughout the whole world believed with their whole house, and were gathered together with the believing nations in the Church. Therefore he says that B *He shall lift up a sign for the nations.* What is the sign, if not the precious and life-giving cross? For through it He shall gather the perishing of Israel to salvation, and the rejected of Judah into the kingdom of heaven. But if you should ask, where in the Old Testament is the cross called a sign? David says to the Lord, prophesying concerning the cross: *Show me a sign for good*, etc. These things are thus firm and established according to the divine judgment of the Spirit.
HERB. The prophet says in general to seek the survivors of the people. But you say that those who were separated from the law, and who adhered to Christ through faith, these alone the prophet undoubtedly predicted: How is that? C
S. ARCH. What is it that is written concerning the law? *Cursed*, he says, *is everyone who does not persist in all things that are written in the book of the law, to do them.* Therefore, those who do not keep the law are not worthy to be numbered with the people who observe the law, even as the Christians—for all are called Christians, but those who observe the commands of the Christians, these alone are Christians; those, however, who do not keep them, are not Christians. Thus, in those days, in truth, all who observed the law of Moses accurately, when they merely heard that my Christ had arrived, they were immediately pricked to the heart by God, the Author of the law, and believed in His only-begotten and most beloved Son. As for those who even before Christ did not keep the law of God, but D through their own evil works were serving the devil...
A, God, who knows the law, knowing that it brought them no benefit under the law of Moses, similarly will not benefit those who have not believed in Christ; but rather, the forbidden things which they were doing while under the law, these very things they will continue to perform even after becoming Christians. For He has blinded their heart, and having hardened it B, has made it dull, as if covered by a callus; and these same people, by not believing, have perished. For this reason, then, the prophet rightly named these perfect ones alone, and Israel, and the people of God, and Judah. But you yourself, what do you say to these things?
HERB. If these things are so, for what reason did the prophet say: *And the zeal of Ephraim shall be taken away, and the enemies of Judah shall perish*? What is Ephraim C, and who are the enemies of Judah, explain to me now.
S. ARCH. The tribesmen of Ephraim, O foolish one, were Hebrews in the days of the prophet Isaiah, and they ruled separately, having split off from the tribe of Judah; while the others from the tribe of Judah, holding the dominion of all Palestine, were reigning. Therefore, the kingdom of Ephraim had a zeal against Judah—that is, the kingdom of David—which was no small thing, and so great that even civil wars broke out between them. Since, therefore, Isaiah, as a prophet of God, foresaw that in truth Christ was about to rise in the flesh from the tribe of Judah, and that the kingdom of Ephraim was to be destroyed, he added this statement: that when the Lord Jesus Christ should have risen from the tribe of Judah, the zeal of Ephraim—that is, the hatred—would be taken away as his kingdom was overthrown; and they themselves, as enemies of Judah—that is, of the Lord and King who was to ascend from the tribe of Judah—would suddenly perish. For the prophet, prophesying concerning the end or consummation of the kingdom of Ephraim, uttered this statement obscurely. When, in the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, who was the son of Uzziah king of Judah, Rhaasem king of Aram and Phacee the son of Romelia king of Israel—that is, of the tribe of Ephraim—marched up to besiege Jerusalem, *These things, he says, saith the Lord of hosts: This counsel shall not stand* D. And a little later: *And five and sixty years, he says, and the kingdom of Ephraim shall fail from the people.* For this cause, therefore, he said that *The zeal of Ephraim shall be taken away*, and so forth.
HERB. Why does the prophet then add, saying that, *It shall be to Israel as on the day that he went out from the land of Egypt*? For he announced that this departure would be like that departure which was once from the land of Egypt.
S. ARCH. Israel went out from Egypt corporally, and having been freed from corporal slavery, they possessed the land of promise as an inheritance. Now
A spiritually having gone out from sin, he was first liberated from the curse of the law; then, having put off the old tunic of sin, he put on the new one, which is renewed through water and the Spirit; and having gone out perfectly from all sin, as from the land of Egypt, he dwelt in the new Jerusalem, that is, the Church, as in another land of promise. And such was the joy and greatest delight, so that he obtained that exceptional region, an auspicious and favorable inheritance, which is D better than the departure from the land of Egypt. For this reason the prophet spoke: And it shall be for Israel as on the day that he went out from the land of Egypt.
HERB. I have already told you that if we argue based on the etymology of the name, we will never be masters of the matter in question, however many testimonies we may quickly adduce from the law or from the prophets. But still, I have something to say; I will not make an end to my spinning of arguments or my speech. The prophet Ezekiel proclaims: Thus saith the Lord: I will take you from the nations, and gather you from all the generations, and I will bring you into your land; and I will sprinkle upon you clean water, and you shall be cleansed from all your impurities, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will give you; and I will take away the stony heart from your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh, and I will give my spirit within you, and I will cause you C to walk in my justifications, and to keep my judgments; and you shall dwell in the land which I gave to your fathers, and you shall be to me for a people, and I will be to you for a God. If, therefore, the prophet does not say this, give an account. For behold a clear testimony, possessing no room for contradiction in anything.
S. ARCH. I will not bring forward many words concerning this prophecy to win your faith. For the prophet did not speak about the Jews, but about the Church of the nations; since he said, "I will cleanse you from all your idols." Tell me, did God cleanse Israel from the worship of idols, or rather the nations who served idols? Did the nations, wavering in the errors of their minds, have a stony heart, or did the Israelites, who worshipped the holy God through the law of Moses? D Did the Israelites walk in the legal justifications first, or the nations who did not have the law? Was Israel not already the people of God before, or was he, as the prophet promises, subsequently called the people of God, having never existed as such before? Did he truly never receive the Spirit of God, but is he owed this only after this time? You expect in vain, O most senseless Herbanus. For the prophet spoke concerning those things which were expected, and not concerning those things which had already long since passed away, heaven forbid!
A
HERBANUS: I will take you, he says, from the nations, and I will bring you into your land; and you yourself declare strange things. And you shall dwell upon the land which I gave to your fathers. And you yourself interpret them as alien things. Tell me then, yourself, would the Lord really gather nations from nations, as you say? Tell me, shall nations dwell in the land of their fathers? For what communion is there for nations with the Hebrews? Do you speak justly, O Archbishop? It is not so, it is not.
ST. ARCHBISHOP: You have said that God will choose nations from nations. Indeed, God did choose nations from nations. In what way? The nations that believed from the nations that were disbelieving. But because you have said that the Lord would cause nations to dwell in the city of Jerusalem as in the land of their fathers—if you did not have eyes, this would be a concern to me. But look up and see how all Jerusalem is filled with Christians, and by no means with Jews. For this oracle, which was spoken to Abraham by the Lord, that *in you shall all the nations be blessed* (Gen. XII, 3), God, in His judgment, has fulfilled. But because you argued: "What communion is there for nations with the Hebrews?", open your ears to what Isaiah has spoken: *Thus says the Lord*, he says, *Behold, I come to gather all nations and tongues; and they shall come and shall see My glory, and I will leave a sign upon them, and I will send out from them those who are saved to the nations* (Isa. LXVI, 18-19). And who are those saved from the nations whom the Lord shall send, if not the heralds of Christ, the hierarchs chosen by the twelve apostles to shepherd the churches of Christ everywhere in the world? B *From them*, he says, *I will send forth those who are saved to the nations, into Tarsus, and Phud, and Somoch, and into Thobel, and into Greece, and into the remote islands, which have not heard of My glory* (Isa. LXVI, 19). *And they shall declare My glory among the nations, and they shall bring your brethren from all the nations as a gift to the Lord, with horses and chariots* (Ibid. 20). Do you perceive, therefore, O Herbanus, that Isaiah, speaking to the Jews beloved of God, was discussing the advent of Christ, and saying: *They shall bring your brethren from all the nations as a gift to the Lord*? So that the faithful Jews before the advent of Christ, and those who after this, when Christ had come, believed in Him, and all who from among the nations believed in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, are become brethren, just as Isaiah has testified. But you, in what way have you said, "What community is there for nations with the Hebrews?" Yet Hebrews who believe in Christ are seen as more honorable than those who from the nations believe in Christ. If, therefore, O madman, I speak from usage and experience, refute me. D
HERBANUS: As the Lord God lives, I praise your words,
A which express and explain [things] with the greatest intelligence and experience. Nevertheless, Isaiah says: The Lord said: I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Judah, and [it] shall inherit my holy mountain. Since, therefore, God has given us Jerusalem as an inheritance, who contradicts it? For a brief and short time we were cast out and driven away: but yet again, I think, we shall receive our things and all our former inheritance, as from the beginning.
S. ARCH. The same Isaiah clearly and plainly predicted this: They shall bring, he says, to me, among the children of Israel, those who are from the gentiles, their sacrifices with psalms into my house: and from them I will take to myself priests and Levites. See how the Lord, who fulfilled the law, also indicated beforehand the change of the priesthood through his prophets: "From them," he says, "I will take to myself priests and Levites," says the Lord. Since, therefore, he says [this], what do you yourself ordain as remaining? "As," he says, "the new heaven and the new earth, which I make to remain in my sight, says the Lord; so shall your seed and your name stand," that is, through faith in Christ: which are they who from among us have believed in Christ. And there shall be, he says, month from month, B declaring the various Christian feast days. And Sabbath from Sabbath, the days of the resurrection. And all flesh shall come, he says, to worship before me in Jerusalem, says the Lord. Do you mark, O madman? "All flesh," he says, "shall come." He who said to you Jews that you shall not associate in any thing with a gentile, nor trade with him, nor eat, nor drink, and the rest; the same says: "All flesh shall come to worship before me in Jerusalem," says the Lord. And they shall go out and behold the limbs of men: namely, the bones of those who were previously dead in life, and who inhabited that place, of the wicked Jews. But that you may understand, you who do not understand, that Israel was rejected because of its sins, and was hated and odious because of its wickedness, and delivered to total destruction, not only in this age but also in the future; he subjoined: because of those who violated the commandments of the law and transgressed: for they who have come from all flesh to worship God through faith in Jesus Christ, shall see their bones C stripped and cast out for a greater disgrace. And in the future age, their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched: for they shall be for a spectacle to all flesh. When you hear the Lord saying through the prophet that: "Behold, I come to gather all nations and languages," and that, "All flesh shall come to worship before me in Jerusalem," say nothing further: but see that seventy languages [of those who] worship the God of the Law, and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, constantly ascending into
Jerusalem, worship [Him], lamenting the unbelieving Jews. And seeing all these things, be silent, be hushed, and do not fight against God, but yield to the truth. But as to what you have said, "The Lord said: I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob and out of Judah, and he shall inherit my holy mountain," pay heed: for it is not interpreted as you have surmised, but as I myself declare to you. The seed of Jacob is the twelve tribes, and [the prophet] mentioned none of his seeds, but only that of Judah. For Judah is the seed of Jacob; and my Lord Jesus Christ is of the seed of Judah. But every Christian is spiritually the seed of Christ. It is of this seed, therefore, that the prophet has spoken, which has been grafted through Jesus Christ into the seed of Judah. And he will bring it forth after the spiritual labor of this present life, and it shall inherit the kingdom of heaven. And that holy mountain is the mother city on high, the heavenly Jerusalem. For the sensible mountain, Sion, will not, I think, be called holy, being [but] dust and ash of the earth; nor has any of those who dwelt in it of old possessed this as an inheritance. For all who have had a seat therein have passed away: and those who now dwell there shall die. B
HERB. Having found a great workshop filled with a multitude of words, the Christians have placed you as a champion and prelate upon their throne: for you are terrible with a whirlwind of words. For you will quickly pervert heaven and earth and the things beneath the earth, if it seems good to you, with your words. But neither will you utterly overturn us, so that we have nothing to answer you. In order that you may understand more clearly that the Lord loves Israel greatly, hear what the prophet Isaiah, or rather God Himself, says about us: "I," He says, "am the first God, and to things coming, I am. The nations saw and were afraid. The ends of the earth were terrified; they drew near and came together, everyone judging his neighbor, to help his brother." Therefore, you too, O archbishop, in accordance with this purpose, being one of the nations struck with fear, judge your neighbor to help us, and [to help] your brother, the nations of your own kin: for it is to them that you claim to bring salvation. But you reject and repudiate the royal priesthood, the nation of Israel, ordering it to be despised and in despair. D What then does the same prophet say about those who fashion new idols? "The metalworker has grown strong," he says, "and the smith striking, driving the hammer together. Then he will say: It is a good joining." He has strengthened them with nails, that is, the idols. They shall place them—the laborers—on the earth, and they shall not be moved. In these do the nations that pertain to you boast. But
A attend diligently to what He commands regarding Israel: The nations, He says, are in these. But you, Israel, my servant Jacob, whom I have chosen, seed of Abraham, whom I have loved, whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth, and from its watchtowers I have called you. Do not fear, for I am with you. Do not be led astray; for I am your God, who has strengthened you; and I have helped you, and I have secured you with my righteous right hand. Attend, great Lord, that you may marvel at how much love God possesses for Israel. Hear words full of affection and infinite fervor. "I have secured you," He says, "with my righteous right hand." And behold, all your adversaries shall be ashamed and confounded. You shall seek them, and you shall not find them, the men who have done you despite. For they shall be as though they are not, and those who fight against you shall not exist; for I, your God, am holding your right hand, who says to you, "Do not fear; I have helped you; do not fear, O worm of Jacob, O little one of Israel. I have helped you," says God, "who redeems, the Holy One of Israel." Is it not therefore so? Does not God say these things through the prophet about the Hebrews? Therefore, put an end to it yourself, and do not cause further trouble.
S. ARCH. You have indeed recited the oracle; but of whom it speaks, you do not understand at all.
HERB. It prophesies entirely about Israel, and about Jacob, and about the seed of Abraham. And do I indeed not understand what I am saying? He declares that He called him from the end of the earth, that is to say, from Egypt, to the land of promise, and do you yourself speak these things and those?
S. ARCH. That saying, "You, Israel, my servant Jacob, whom I have chosen, seed of Abraham, whom I have loved," B give ear, O Herban, who wanders in the wilderness, and take heed with attentive ears, lest with a preoccupied mind and shifting spirit you suppose that the prophet has predicted this concerning any of the people of the Jews, but [rather] concerning my Christ, who was God from God, and for the sake of the salvation of men in the last days became man, from the seed of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob; since Ishmael, like Isaac, was a son of Abraham. Lest you say that perhaps he was born of the tribe of Ishmael, for this reason the prophet said: "My servant Jacob, whom I have loved." But if you say it is not so, show me yourself at what time God has not forsaken you. Are you not dispersed to the ends of the inhabited world? Are you not a reproach? Are you not forsaken by God and among men? The prophet says: "For I am with you, and I am the God who has strengthened you, and I have helped you, and I have secured you with my righteous right hand." Therefore, where D now is God with you Hebrews? Especially
seeing that even those small nations A that have not yet believed in Christ beat and harass you, and hold you as a laughingstock? By what manner do you now receive strength from the Lord, being so weak and infirm that you do not even possess the power of a gnat to bite back at your enemies? Where at this time is the Lord seen to bring you aid? In what matter? In what obedience? In what glory, or honor, or power? Are you not as ash, and like an extinguished coal, and as darkness, if one contemplates your countenance? Behold, the Hebrews are here; behold, you yourself are here. Let those who wish look upon your faces; are they not dust, are they not ash, are they not squalor? And whence is this? Because neither grace nor help from God is with you, and because you do not have the Holy Spirit. On account of your perfidy, obstinacy, and malice, are you not divided B and scattered one from another to the ends of the earth, like a torn tunic and a garment worn thin by age? And when have all those who opposed you been put to shame and confounded? Where are your adversaries, as though they had ceased to exist? When have you sought them and they were not found? Where, moreover, is God holding your right hand and directing you toward some prosperous outcome? Where is he who is said to be "a worm humbled" by the Jews, who are arrogant and possessed of a heart of stone and are obstinate? Where, furthermore, are you, those few who have obtained liberation from the Lord; you who in all the earth sit as if struck by terror, astonished, and mute, and are spat upon by all, receiving no liberation from the Lord? You are altogether astray, O Herban. For the prophet prophesied these things concerning my Christ and God. And God C chose him, and called him, and sanctified him, and loved him, and did not abandon him, and strengthened him, and helped him, and secured him with his great and most powerful right hand. Answer, who now is glorified, who reigns, who is strong and most powerful, if not Jesus Christ my Lord and God? Are you not, Hebrews, in greatest shame and disgrace and confusion, as those who have assaulted him and still continue to oppose him? Do you not behave as though you do not exist? For where are you even seen? You seek the enemies of him who was crucified, and you do not find them, because you acted insolently, crucifying the just, the holy, and the innocent, who is devoid of all sin. Know, therefore, that the prophet spoke concerning you: "Behold, all who oppose you shall be ashamed and confounded." For no one among men is so hostilely and bitterly opposed to my Lord Jesus Christ as you, who are execrable, perfidious, and faithless. For those from other sects who resist and contend D are opposed to him only in some partial way, if they are compared with you. Do not, therefore, O Jew, lead me astray by wasting words in vain. For God has given me enlightened and understanding eyes, with which I may thoroughly perceive the truth that lies deeply hidden in holy Scripture. You, however, being blinded, will not be able to ensnare me.
A
HERB. If this is so, how do you call your Christ God, for the reason that my God chose Him, loved Him, and so forth? Therefore, He is not God, as you affirm, because the prophet says of Him: "I am He who made you strong." How, then, do you call Him your God and Savior, who, as the prophecy testifies, can do nothing without my God?
S. ARCH. O wretched man, have I already shown you so many demonstrations and testimonies regarding Him, and have you not yet understood of what natures my Lord consists? Did I not say earlier that my Jesus Christ is God and man? But what kind of God? It is He who says: "I, He says, am the first God." And that which follows, "I am He who is to come," what other "coming" does He speak of than the mystery of the dispensation in the flesh? Since, therefore, He became God and man, He was entirely aided in terms of His humanity. "I chose you," so that you might become mine by subsistence, "and I aided you," that is, through you I aided the whole of humanity, which is baptized into the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. B
HERB. And where has any of the prophets prophesied that Christ would be God and man, as you have said?
S. ARCH. I told you that the divinity fashioned unto itself a humanity, which indeed has suffered. Jesus Christ came forth into the world from the pure and chaste blood of the Virgin and Theotokos, who was of the seed of David, without the union of a man, one from two natures even after He became man. And His humanity possessed everything that I also possess, except for sin; but His divinity possessed everything that the Father possessed, except for the property of being unbegotten. For God is unbegotten, but His Word is begotten; yet in one hypostasis both His divinity and His humanity are established. Because His flesh was not sown, but the Word of God, in place of seed, introduced Himself in flesh into the womb of the Virgin, without undergoing any conversion or change at all of His divinity; for the divinity is unchangeable and immutable. Since, therefore, we have said that the divinity fashioned unto itself humanity, it did not wish to converse with men in its bare essence. For Isaiah says of this: "Thus says the Lord God who fashioned him, who made the things that are to come," that is, the mysteries of the new grace. "I," He says, "have raised him up as a king with justice, and all his ways are right," that is, Christ's. "He shall build my city"—I believe the Catholic Church—"and He shall turn the captivity of my people" from the error and captivity of the devil. C "Not," He says, "with ransom and with gifts," says the Lord God, "but by the power of the divinity." And listen to how the nations will subject themselves and submit to His rule. Thus says the Lord God Sabaoth: "Egypt has labored," that is, while it served error; "and the merchandise of the Ethiopians. And those who are now in Sabba, men of high stature, shall come up to you," that is, having believed, "and they shall be your servants; and behind you D
A they shall follow, bound in fetters, which denotes the firmness and certainty of their submission. And they shall pass over to you and adore you, through faith, and shall pray in you. And because in you is God, that is, in His humanity, you are God. Observe: "And there is no God except you," because He is the true Word, the prophet says truly: "For you are," he says, "God, and we knew not," because we were detained and occupied by the error of idols or of false gods, "the God of Israel," and even if, after you were covered and clothed with flesh, they do not accept you, yet you are God the Savior. Then, adding concerning those who do not believe in Him: "All your enemies shall blush and be confounded, both those of us of the nations, and those of you of the Hebrews. And they shall walk," he says, "these in shame, as alienated from the truth and faithless." Do you observe, Herban, what the prophet says? What then will you say to these things? Does He who spoke these things by the mouth of God lie? HERB. God forbid! For the prophet says exactly as you have recited. But I do not think that he (namely, the Messiah) has yet come: but he will come without doubt in his own time. S. ARCH. You seem like a certain serpent, which someone pursues and strikes: here it sets its whole body against the striker, but it cannot surrender its wicked head to death; that is, its B wicked perfidy and the denial of the only-begotten Son of God. Indeed, I know that the demonstrations of the prophets compel you to have faith, but you do not wish to come to the truth. For through the length of time, a perverse habit has been confirmed in you and has become inveterate, difficult to cure, or has turned out to be altogether incurable; and how often will you repent, when the eyes of your soul are opened, when this life is ended, and you see how those who did not believe in Christ are seized and judged? HERB. Moses announces to us in the Pentateuch, saying: "I know, he says, that in the last times you shall be scattered among all nations. I call to witness against you, therefore, the heaven which is today, and the earth itself, that you may not have faith in a strange god, nor invoke any other than our Lord God." Therefore it is grievous and bitter to me to desert the God of the Law, whom even you testify to be the God of truth, and to adore a junior God, since I do not know whence he was introduced. For who is he who can give me full and exact faith that this is truly the Christ of whom the oracles of the prophets justly and truly speak; or is it rather some other one who has not yet come? S. ARCH. Since you do not believe your own prophets, how do you have faith in another? For he who is opposed to his own eyes, how will he approve the eyes of another who goes before him? You have said concerning my Christ and God that you cannot be brought to believe in a junior God: as I think, you were full of darkness when you said these things. Do you call the Word of God and the Father a junior God?
A And Him who was begotten of the Father before the ages, through whom the heaven and the earth and all things that are in them were made and consist? I will demonstrate to you that without this "junior" God, as you call Him, God the Father does nothing at all. Attend closely: if any man, a king or someone else, were altogether unable to speak, in what manner would he be able to communicate his edicts and commands to the public and to the senate, so that they might care for him?
HERBANUS: In no way at all, unless he knew how to write letters frequently, and with a silent mouth could scratch his words upon the scroll, and present them, and thus they are brought to pass.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP: But if he does not know letters, what happens?
HERBANUS: If he ignores letters, he remains altogether powerless, and can accomplish nothing.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP: Does God, then, seem to do all things by His Word, or by some silence and knowledge?
HERBANUS: By His Word and by His command.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP: It is written that "by the Word of the Lord were the heavens established, and all the power of them by the Spirit of His mouth" (Ps. XXXII, 6), and so forth. We find this Word, in the last days, having become man from the seed of David for our salvation; and we recognize Him to be one God with the Father and the Spirit, and we believe in Him. How, then, do you say that He is a junior God, without whom God the Father is naturally unable to accomplish anything? Be silent, then, and do not blaspheme, even if you do not yet believe in Him.
HERBANUS: And what prophet commands me C to believe in Him?
SAINT ARCHBISHOP: God Himself, of the Law, exhorts you through Isaiah the prophet, saying: "Behold," he says, "I will cast into the foundations of Zion a precious stone, and he who believes in Him shall not be put to shame" (Isa. XXVIII, 16). Since your God, therefore, commands that you believe in Him, for what cause do you reject, and shut your eyes, and stop your ears, and keep deferring to come to Him? If you despise and provoke to anger your God, who commands you to worship His Son, would you ever listen to me or anyone else upon this matter? I do not think so—not even if you were to spend on earth the years of Methuselah.
HERBANUS: As I see it, the prophets themselves are caught contradicting and opposing themselves. For in certain chapters they are found to favor us Jews, while in others they favor you who are from the Gentiles.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP: Nowhere are they found to be self-contradictory, or to be favoring you Jews as you say; rather, they are found to condemn you—inasmuch as from the beginning you were "stiff-necked" D of heart and "uncircumcised in your ears,"
have hearts that are blind, deaf, and entirely stony, uncircumcised in ears: refractory and stubborn to God, resisting the Holy Spirit, you have greatly grieved His most holy name. A
HERBANUS. Who could gather thy magnificent and elegant words upon the sand which is on the seashore? Who could encounter thy twisted and barbed sophisms? Did not God say to Moses when He dwelt in the bush: *Seeing I have seen the affliction of my people which is in Egypt, and am come down to deliver them*? And did not Moses say to God: *If I have found grace in thy sight, and that thy people is this nation, shew me thy glory*? And did God, loving His people—which we are—shew him His glory? And Balaam, when summoned by Balak the king to curse and devote to destruction our first fathers who were B encamped in his land, when he saw that it was the people of God, did he not rather bless them than curse them ill? And Joshua, who is called Nave, when confronting the enemies for the salvation of the people with a strong and mighty war, did he not say to the greatest elements which emit light in the firmament of heaven: *Sun, stand thou still over Gabaon, and moon, over the valley (Ajalon), that I may crush the enemies of the Lord*? And did He not obey, being indulgent to the people of the Lord? And did not God speak familiarly with Samuel for the salvation of Israel, loving His people? And did not King David, suffering for Israel, say: *Be mindful, O Lord, of thy congregation which thou hast possessed from the beginning? Thou hast redeemed the rod of thine inheritance*? And did not the prophet Elijah say to Ahab: *Spare the people; thou art he who perverts Israel, and the house of thy father*? And Elisha, defending the people, said to himself: *O Lord, spare thy people*, and He did not reveal it to me, and I am tortured with pains all the day C long. And did not Jeremiah, when weeping for the people, say: *Woe is me, Lord, wilt thou destroy the remnant of Israel*? And Isaiah: *Where is the multitude of thy mercy, O Lord, for thy mercies have kept themselves back from us? For thou art our father: deliver us. From the beginning, O Lord, thy name is upon us. Why hast thou made us to err from thy way? Thou hast hardened our heart, that we should not fear thee*, and the rest. Since, therefore, all these suffer for the Israelite people and defend their cause, how have you yourself said that the prophets condemn us and do not rather help us? D
ST. ARCHBISHOP. I did not say that you are condemned by the prophets with such an appearance or in this sense. Those things which precede, I have passed over; look to those things which follow at the end.
HERBANUS. What things are those at the end, declare to me.
S. ARCH. I will explain to you one word or one prophecy without any longer narration, and you may strongly labor under vertigo.
HERB. Explain and expound rather, without delaying.
S. ARCH. Isaiah spoke concerning you, having seen from afar with the eyes of prophecy the immense and unusual tumor of your crimes, and that you will no longer be able to stand upon your former feet—that is, upon Jewish characters and figures—unless in the new law of Christ, saying: "Hear, O heaven, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord has spoken: I have begotten and exalted sons, but they have disowned me" (Isa. I, 2). Hear attentively, that you may understand and be gripped by vertigo. "The ox knows his owner, and the ass the crib of his master; but Israel has not known me, and my people has not understood" (ibid. 3). Do you see the mystery, how he spoke even of the crib of the beasts, at which they take their food daily? Israel, however, has not known me, and my people has not understood. Do you see the mystery, how he affirmed you to be more senseless than the beasts?
B Then he adds: "Woe to the sinful nation, a people full of iniquities" (ibid. 4), not in part, but full; he called them a seed no longer of Abraham, but a wicked seed; sons, no longer sons of God, as he said in the beginning, "I have begotten sons," but he calls them nefarious sons. And he adds the denial, when he says: "You have forsaken the Lord, and have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel," by crucifying him. See now with certainty the divine oracles. You have not only forsaken him, he says, denying him who came into your midst—that is, our Lord Jesus Christ—but you have also provoked the Holy One of Israel himself, by nailing him to the cross and the gallows. See now with certainty the divine oracles.
C Why were you struck and wounded in heart by the devil, adding iniquity? It was not enough, he says, that the prior tumor of your crimes existed, but you, still blaspheming and bringing punishments upon the only-begotten Son of God, are heaping iniquity upon your heads. "Every head is toiled," he says; so that you may not say that some of you were pious and some impious, and that some sinned simply and less, but rather he says it was in toil and in wickedness: "And every heart to grief" (ibid. 5). Each one was vexed against his neighbor out of envy and wrath and malice, because iniquity was multiplied, and because the love of many has grown cold in you.
D "From the feet even to the head," he says, so that you may not say that the common people alone acted iniquitously and impiously, but that the king himself and his council also acted impiously and wickedly. For this is what is declared by "From the feet even to the head of them, there is not in them soundness, nor wound in part, neither bruise, nor wound festering..."
but from the highest part even to the lowest, there is a deep sickness and a wild, indomitable pain. Neither art nor experience exists which might help and be able to cure. It is not permitted to apply a poultice, nor to pour in oil, because of the obstinacy of sin, as if it were a persistent and ineluctable malady: it is not permitted to apply a bandage because of the impenitent heart. Your land is desolate, that is to say, your earthly tabernacles, as being alienated from the Holy One, because they are filled with sin and wickedness. For the temple of God is the pious man. Your cities are set on fire: B that is, the wicked synagogues are ignited by the flame of sin, because there is no council of divine action there, but a conflagration of pestilence and impropriety, which rages with wanton embraces. Strangers devour your region, and that while you look on: namely, wicked demons consume human life and the knowledge of the Divine; and it is devastated, ruined, and dug up by alien peoples—that is, the mind and heart are devastated by strange, wicked actions. Do you observe, O Herban, how Isaiah speaks of the absolute abandonment by God, and the departure from you?
HERB. Proceed further, and you shall find. S. ARCH. What shall I find? Nothing else than your most exact ruin. HERB. Speak, and I shall know what our ruin and subversion is. S. ARCH. If you wish, attend diligently. "There shall be left," he says, "the daughter of Sion, as a shade in a vineyard, C and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, and as a city besieged." What do you have to say to these things? Just as, he says, those who dwell in huts and guard their vineyards and cucumber patches for no other reason than plainly for the sake of their fruits, when the fruit has been gathered and the vintage harvested, they subsequently leave their huts deserted and return to their own homes, and no longer guard the bare vine or the cucumber patch: so God has been disposed toward your synagogue. For as long as, before the coming of Christ, you bore some fruit according to the Law, as a good guardian of the temple, as if in another tabernacle perfected for Himself, He who fills all things dwelling in it, He guarded your tribes. But when you remained entirely without fruit, and propagated a copious offspring of iniquity: D God, having looked upon your evil, which was incurable by the Law, devised another way of salvation for you, and sent down His only-begotten Son and Savior from heaven. But since, having been helped neither by the Law nor approved by grace, God withdrew and departed to the Gentiles, and they received Him, and He called them the new Israel, and constituted them heirs of all that was yours, and of the kingdom of heaven. Was not, therefore, the daughter of Sion abandoned as
A a booth in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, and as a city besieged? And you persist in behaving like shameless dogs, babbling and fighting against God, since you have no argument whatsoever for your defense.
HERB. Recite the prophecy to me, and you shall know what follows.
S. ARCH. What it says after this is plain: “Except the Lord had left us a seed, we should have been as Sodom, and we should have been made like unto Gomorrah.”
HERB. This is sufficient for us, that the Lord has not utterly destroyed us, but has left us a seed. For this seed, which it says was left by the Lord, is clearly us, who are now dispersed throughout the whole world, and who are preserved so that from B a small seed, in the last days, the land of promise may be sown; and the fields of the most glorious tribe of Israel shall be multiplied, namely the cities of Judea, which is the vine of the twelve tribes of the people.
S. ARCH. Having been checked so many times by this hope, have you not yet restrained your shamelessness? Nevertheless, why do I bring these reproaches against you? You occupy the place of a dog. For it is the custom of dogs always to be beaten with a rod and driven from the house, but, relying on their shamelessness and forgetting the beating, they return into the house, and are beaten again, and cast out. Therefore, I will strike your shamelessness again, and I C will pursue it vehemently, because you revile rashly and in vain. I will show you that unless you are baptized in the holy Trinity in the sacred laver, you will have no life in yourselves. As for the passage, “Except the Lord had left us a seed,” I have already explained to you that its emphasis refers to the Israelite who believed in Jesus Christ and were saved. But as for you, who are among the part of the infidels, it is said by the same Isaiah: “Hear,” he says, “the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom; attend with your ears to the law of God, you people of Gomorrah.” You know the rest, and he adds: “To what purpose is the multitude of your D sacrifices unto me? saith the Lord” — lest you yourself boast, as if the Lord has any need of your sacrifices, or that for this reason He will restore your synagogues. “I am full,” he says, “of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of lambs, and the blood of bulls and of goats, I desire not, nor if you come to appear before me.” Woe, woe, it is hatred and abomination. How many and how great are the evils cold sin perpetrates! It rendered you, the beloved of God, abominable and execrable. “I do not want it,” He says, “not even if you come to appear before me. For who,” He says, “has required these things,” namely the sacrifices, “at your hands? You shall not continue to trample my court.” Therefore, to whom shall we listen?
Is it to David, or to the Lord our God? Turn your attention here. For you say: “The Lord building will gather the dispersions of Israel,” but here that very Master and God says to you: “You shall not continue to trample my court.” We ought to listen to both; for these principal points have been spoken harmoniously in their proper place.
But you, slow of heart and sluggish, knowing nothing, conceive and fashion monstrosities in your mind. Since you have now heard my Lord saying, “You shall not continue to trample my court: do not offer,” why are you impudent? For even if you offer the marrow of wheat, it is a vain sacrifice; incense, He says, is an abomination to me. “Your new moons and your Sabbaths, and your feasts, my soul hates, and the great day I do not tolerate.” Hearing these things, then, for what reason do you have the face of a dog and a hardened mouth, and thrust your victims upon Him, and impudently celebrate your feast days? Your feast days, I think, have become a war against God. For God says: “Your fasts, and idleness, and feasts, my soul hates; you have become a satiety to me.” God says, therefore, that everything you do according to Jewish rites, my soul hates—yet you are impudent, and offer Him your sacrifices. Desist! For you only endure labor, you oppose God, and you possess no reward forever. For He also says: “You have become a satiety to me; I will no longer bear your sins.” Behold the indignation and the weight of God. As when someone has suffered infinite evils from another and can no longer bear them, but sinks down, exhausted by the burden, and says, bearing great hatred: “I no longer bear you, but I will show vengeance upon you”; so God says: “You have become to me a satiety and a fullness of wrath and indignation; therefore I will no longer bear”—that is, I will no longer carry your sins; “but I will repay, or rather, I will cast you from my face.”
For He brings in the consequence of the prophecy when He says: “And when you stretch out your hands to me, I will turn my eyes from you.” Spare, O Lord, those who have hoped in Thee! For the word of the Lord is dreadful, and the hatred of God toward the Jews is unspeakable, because of their wicked transgressions, and their own stubbornness, and their accustomed manner of murmuring, and their intemperate rebellion. Listen, therefore, Herbanus, and tremble. Indeed, I have not invented these things, lest you say at some point that I brought these things forward out of a desire to oppose your religion. But God Himself rebukes you and says: “Do not extend your hands to me, O Jew, from the day I send my only-begotten Son to you. But if you do not, I will avert my eyes from you. And if you increase your prayer, I will not listen.” All the years of your life, from the time you heard that the Son of God has come, and you did not believe, if you increase your prayer to me, I will not listen to you. For what reason? Because your hands, He says, are full of blood—that is, from the murder of my Son, and...
your hands, he says, are full of blood; that is, from the murder of my Son and of his other saints; because they believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God, you killed them. Therefore, if you multiply your prayer, I will not hear you. Why then do you worship according to the law of your God, when He does not accept your supplications? And what is the cause? Because your hands are full of blood. Of what blood? I call to witness to you the heaven, which exists today, and the sea, and the one God in Trinity who is ceaselessly glorified, that He says this for no other reason than to accuse you of that precious blood of the Lord Jesus, which you shed as lawless men. If you are not baptized into the holy Trinity, you will not be cleansed from that sin for eternity. For this reason the prophet, or rather God Himself, adds afterwards, saying, "Wash yourselves, and be clean: put away your evil deeds from your souls," that is, be baptized, each one of you, into the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, having abandoned the law, and removing your evil deeds from before my eyes, that is, before my divinity, and so forth. If all these things persuade your senseless heart, grace and peace be yours; but if they do not persuade you, the sword shall devour you. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken these things. B
HERBAN. The prophet did not speak of your baptism, saying that you are washed by it, but rather that before the outer gate of the temple of Solomon there were always washing-basins exposed. For there was a law that anyone who sinned in any matter, and wished to repent, should tell the priests, and on account of the fault would be forbidden to enter the temple. But when the designated time was completed, having been absolved and cleansed in soul, he would then enter the temple fearlessly and perform his sacrifices. It is concerning this washing that the prophet hinted, and not concerning your baptism. C
TRANSITION TO THE DISPUTATION OF THE THIRD DAY
These things having been spoken on the second day between Herban and the archbishop, when the king had arisen, they withdrew again in disorder and confusion. The Jews, indeed, were rejoicing over Herban, because he was found capable of disputing with the archbishop, and the Christians were amazed at the blessed Gregentius, because the grace of the Spirit was with him. On the third day, when the king had again taken his seat first, and the archbishop, and all were gathered together into the same place, Herban also arrived with his guard. And when he stood there, the holy Gregentius spoke to him. D
A THE HOLY GREGENTIUS. Yesterday you said that the words, "Wash yourselves, and be clean," were spoken concerning the legal washings, and not concerning the baptism of the Christians. Does not God, therefore, who said to you, "The daughter of Sion shall be left as a booth in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers," speak metaphorically of His own protection; and that "I do not desire, even if you come to appear before me," and that "You shall add no more to trample my court; and if you bring me fine flour, incense is an abomination to me," and that "Your new moons and your Sabbaths and the great day I do not endure, because from this day forth I have no need of them," and that "Your fasting and holidays and feasts my soul hates," and that "You have become a satiety to me," and "When you stretch out your hands to me, I will turn my eyes from you," and "If you multiply your prayer, I will not listen to you"? Since God rejected all these things and hated them vehemently, and forbids your sacrifices to be offered to Him according to the Law, and swears that He detests and abominates the supplications of souls and prayers and meetings and the lifting up of hands, is it likely that the washings of the people were His concern? It is a redundant and absurd argument. For without any doubt, God hinted at the baptism of the Christians through the prophet in a hidden mystery.
HERBAN. What shall I do with you, O Archbishop, since there is no word that you do not pervert, and there is no prophecy that you do not twist in another direction? Why, then, does the prophet add words after these? That these things are so because of our sins and because we provoked the Holy One to anger is not disputed by those who are sober and of sound mind. Nevertheless, because you exclude us completely from all hope and assure us that from this time forward there is no help or protection left in the Law, the prophet adds, saying: "I will bring my hand upon you, and I will smelt you into a pure state; and I will destroy from you the faithless and the unbelieving, and I will remove all the lawless and wicked from you. And I will establish your judges as before, and your counselors as from the beginning. And after these things you shall be called the city of righteousness, the faithful mother-city, Sion." Attend to what is being said through the prophet, understanding that he bears witness to our restoration. For after he said those terrible things, he added, "I will establish your judges as from the beginning, and your counselors as before." If, therefore, he were about to raise up another law or to establish another faith, he would certainly not have said such things. "You shall be called," he says, "the city of righteousness, the faithful mother-city, Sion." What, therefore, do you have to say to this?
THE HOLY GREGENTIUS. D When Jerusalem was taken into captivity and servitude, then these things were accomplished. For the people returned from captivity, and those among them who were lawless having been destroyed...
A, those who were preserved, being of good and upright conscience, feared the Lord, and judged justly as from the beginning, and offered sound counsel as before, walking according to the law of God. Nor do I gainsay this. For the prophet himself declares, saying: "For with judgment," he says, "shall her captivity be saved," that is, of the city of Jerusalem.
HERB. If we enter within, you cast us out; and if we go out, you bring us back within. It is better to keep silent and depart.
S. ARCH. Why do you bid me to descend to your opinion and live by the Jewish rite? You will not be able, Herbane, to impel me to this. But hear what the prophet says B concerning you, that you may understand this too. "The word," he says, "which came to Isaiah the son of Amoz, concerning Judea and Jerusalem." From whom did it come? From God, naturally. Concerning what? Concerning Judea and Jerusalem, he says. In what way? Because "it shall be in the last days that the mountain of the Lord shall be manifest, and the house of God shall be lifted up from the tops of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills." What then? Until the last days was that mountain invisible and unseen? Or was the house which Solomon built constructed in the lowest part of the earth, and did both stand in need—the mountain, indeed, of being seen, and the house of being exalted and raised up? C By no means. But it shall be, he says, more manifest and conspicuous and delightful to behold; not, indeed, to the Jews who profaned it, but to the nations that were beginning to believe in Christ. "And the house of God shall be exalted above the tops of the mountains." What house? Is it the temple of Solomon? Far be it. Go and see that it has been razed to the foundations. But what house? Where the Nazarene was buried and dwelt for three days and three nights, and rose from there, and immediately a temple was built over the tomb, and it is called the holy Resurrection. And the words, "It shall be lifted up from the tops of the mountains," mean that it shall be lifted up in glory and honor. D Which mountains? Those of the world, evidently, upon which—ascending them in a hateful manner—they used to sacrifice to idols. "And it shall be exalted above the hills." Which hills? Those of the creation, upon which the temples of the idols were established. And the nations shall forsake the mountains and the hills and all their wandering in which they served demons. And they shall come to the most manifest mountain, and to the new temple of the holy Resurrection, that is, in Jerusalem. "And many peoples shall come and say, Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob, and He shall announce to us His way, and we will walk in it." Do you see a prophecy set forth in clear language, in which there is no parable, but true and free and open speech?
A HERB. The prophet declares that the nations will come into the house of God. But how do you transfer the saying to that temple which Queen Helena built?
S. ARCH. Yet who told you that the only-begotten Son and Word of God is not the God of Jacob? If you do not grow angry, [He is] also [the God] of Abraham, and Isaac, and Joseph, and Moses; and in this way He is God and Lord. For has someone led you into the error that there is some cutting off of the believers among the Jews who lived before Christ’s advent from you Christians? Far from it. For we clearly honor and revere those men, inasmuch as they piously and holily kept the law of God; but you who, from the advent of Christ, have appeared as unbelievers, contumacious and headstrong, we detest.
HERB. For what reason?
S. ARCH. Because He whom the law and the prophets testified would come, after He came, you denied and did not receive.
HERB. Who, disputing with you, would not suffer a headache? He whom the prophets testified would come, perhaps has not yet fully arrived. But when He does arrive, it is impossible that He would not seek His own people, whom He redeemed from the slavery of the Egyptians with fearsome signs and wonders.
S. ARCH. Truly, O wretch, you have babbled concerning the Antichrist: for him it is that you expect to come. But woe to you, because you will die in your sins, having accepted a savage beast and a fierce wolf in place of a shepherd.
B HERB. Isaiah prophesies concerning our, the Israelites’, final salvation. "It shall be," he says, "in the last day, the light of Israel as fire, and God will sanctify him in a burning flame. And He will burn up and consume the forest like hay. On that day the mountains and the hills and the thickets will be extinguished; and it will consume from the soul even to the flesh. And he who flees will be as if from a burning flame. And those burned by them will be a number, and a small child will write them down. And it shall be in that day, the remnant of Israel shall no longer be added to them. And those remaining will not rely on those who did them injury, but will have confidence in the holy God of Israel."
C S. ARCH. Interpret the prophecy for me. For I know that you are completely ignorant of its power.
HERB. If I were ignorant, I would not have brought it forward to you.
S. ARCH. Say, then, since you know it.
HERB. At the consummation of this life, fire will descend from God having a twofold power of acting. And to Israel, indeed, this fire will be viewed as light, and will illumine his neighborhood; but all the remaining nations, like lightning, transformed and passing through the whole world, it will consume and devour, so that men
shall be found to be strangers and aliens to the law of God. And not only them, but whosoever he shall find partaking with certain nations, or even trampling upon the approved precepts of the Law. But only those in the whole world shall be found who have been left behind from that fearful threat of the consummation, that is, of the burning by fire. And they shall neither lack nor grow any further, A but they shall be in the world as angels of God; not trusting in any other, whether Christ, or Son of God, or Jesus, but they shall be trusting in the holy God of Israel. This is the solution of the prophecy.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP: A worst interpretation, O Herbanus, and the things now said by you are full of absurdity and ignorance. I know that you have devised and twisted this interpretation to your own aid and protection, just as the previous ones.
HERBANUS: But do you yourself say what you wish and what you feel.
SAINT ARCHBISHOP: The summary of this prophecy is placed in this way. It shall be, he says, when the Lord shall have fulfilled all things, acting in Mount Sion and in Jerusalem. What "all things"? B It is manifest that it is whatever the prophet himself, having anticipated, prophesied: how the kingdom of the Jews shall fail; how the Hebrews shall be in exile, and in dire distress, that is, in captivity; how the princes of Israel shall perish, whom he likened to Sodom; how the people shall be utterly destroyed, whom he compared to Gomorrah; how the Law shall cease; how Israel shall be handed over to the Chaldeans and shall be for plunder to the Romans; how Christ the Son of the living God shall come, and shall perform signs and wonders, and shall be seized, not being received by the lawless Jews, and shall suffer many things, and shall be taken up into heaven, and shall send his disciples to the ends of the inhabited world, and shall convert all nations to the knowledge of Him. C When, therefore, having fulfilled these things, He who sits in the highest, doing all things on Mount Sion, and dwelling in the Jerusalem above of His kingdom, shall look—as someone might say, having found the opportunity—upon the great mind, the prince of the Assyrians, and upon the height of the glory of his eyes. For he said: "By the strength of my hand I will act, and by the wisdom of my understanding I will remove the boundaries of nations, and I will plunder their strength, and I will shake the inhabited cities, and I will leave the whole inhabited world by my hand like a nest, and as abandoned eggs I will take them, and there is no one who shall escape me, or speak against me, opening the mouth and chirping like a sparrow." D What then? Concerning whom does the prophet say that God will look upon the great mind that boasted of all these things which I have said? Who is that mind which breathed out such haughty things? The prophet himself will interpret, that the prince of the Assyrians, he says, that is, the kingdom of the Assyrians, that is to say, of the Persians. For to this kingdom God permitted, and Jerusalem [suffered] the extreme and most atrocious of evils...
when the chief executioner Nebuzaradan burned the house of God and took the people away into captivity. That kingdom, therefore, having done such things with God’s permission, did not bear them with meekness or humility of heart, nor did it understand that the ends of the earth are governed and managed by the judgments of God; but it seemed to it that these prosperous successes had befallen it by its own wisdom. A And immediately it was lifted up in heart and puffed up in mind, and raved with the arrogance described above, declaring that the whole world was subject to it. Therefore, God, rebuking its folly through the prophet and wishing to destroy it, added to the aforementioned things: "Listen, you who have said these things, attributing everything not to the judgments of God, but to yourself: Will the axe boast without him who cuts with it, so as to cut by itself? Or will the saw be exalted without him who draws it, so that it may cut whatever it wishes? Or will the rod be lifted up by itself, and strike whatever it wishes?" The prophet, introducing a parable against that proud kingdom, says that you ought, even by these signs and figures, to have been guided to perceive and understand that it is neither of the one who runs nor the one who pursues, but of God who permits, that these things happen—wars, and victories, and slaughters, and killings, and certain other previously prosperous deeds. B Since, he says, you were unwilling to consider the whole matter as the work of God with such an aim, but, being lifted up in heart, you breathed out arrogant and great things, imagining in your spirit about yourself and not about Me, "As I live," says the Lord, "things shall not be so; but I will send," he says, "upon your honor, infamy, and upon your glory, fire." I mean that this fire is the burning temptation, which fire will burn vehemently. "And the light of Israel will be as fire, and will sanctify him in a burning flame, and it will burn and consume the matter as grass." Here, Herbanus, lies what is being sought. You indeed have interpreted this word in a foolish manner. But I, for this reason, have been compelled to explain to you the head and sum of the prophecy from the beginning, so that, hearing it word by word, you may understand everything. C For the prophet, having said, "The light of Israel will be as fire, and will sanctify him in a burning flame, and it will burn and consume the matter as grass," signified tropically the distress that was in the captivity, the most violent dwelling in a foreign land, the reproach of the nations, the grief, the affliction, the fear of death which the king of the Assyrians inspired, and their captivity and sojourn, which they endured—needy—as captives in a foreign land, [signifying] the light of chastisement or correction, which necessarily consumes [the dross] within. For since, when they were in their own land and living in ease, they were darkened and sinned without fear, for this reason God roused the king of the Assyrians, and having encamped…
A against Jerusalem, he took it after the death of king Manasseh, and he carried the people away into the land of the Chaldeans, and made them dwell there, in order that those whom ease, drunkenness, gluttony, and luxury were darkening, and were causing to neglect and forget and fall away from the commandments of God, might have their minds kindled by pain, distress, and calamity, and by the sojourn in a foreign land, which consumes like a burning fire. And observe Manasseh, how the carrying away into captivity enlightened him. For having been saved from that place, and having repented, he found mercy from the Lord. It is toward this end, then, Herbanus, that the prophet hinted in his discourse, when he said that the light of Israel shall be as a fire, and shall sanctify him, which indeed came to pass, and what follows. B But concerning the king who had led them captive, because he was lifted up, and did not consider that all things were done by God, but was proud in his heart and mind, God declares the judgment against him through the prophet: *In that day the mountains and the hills and the thickets shall be consumed, and they shall be eaten up from the soul even to the flesh.* And he who flees shall be as one from a burning flame; and those who are left of them shall be few in number, and a small child shall write them down (Isa. X, 17-19). What then are the mountains that he says will be consumed, and the hills, and the thickets, which shall be eaten up from the soul even to the flesh? Attend carefully and understand diligently. By those mountains, he indicates the great ones, the satraps of the Assyrians; and by introducing the hills, he speaks of the lesser magistrates. By the thickets, he manifests the wildness of their nature, and their alienation from spiritual fruit. For C an acorn is the food of pigs, and the works of sinners are the food of demons. For he hinted at the entire nation of the Assyrians, saying "mountains and hills and thickets," as being fit for no good and useful fruit, but only for bringing forth sins, as I have said—bearing the acorn, from which pigs feed, as do demons D (39). And he does not say only that the great and honorable will be destroyed, but also their entire tribe. Yet hardly a few will be saved, and so few, he says, that a small child will write them down; that is, they will be easily inscribed in some humble, level place. But the rest, from the soul even to the flesh—that is, from one to many—will go to destruction and ruin, suffering the death of both soul and body. But those few who are saved, he says, will escape as if from a burning flame. And that these things overtook the Assyrians afterwards—because they rejoiced at the fall of the Jews and were lifted up—history is a witness. For due to the increasingly frequent wars brought against them by the kingdom of the Medes, all their splendor perished, and their great honor arrived at the most fearful disgrace, according to the word of the prophet. But that which was left of Israel in those days, that which was in the land of the Assyrians, from that most terrible threat of the Almighty, which He brought upon the kingdom
of their own people, shall no longer be subject to their hand, reduced to so small a number. And those who have been preserved from Jacob out of the land of the Assyrians and have returned to Judea, having been delivered from that grievous captivity, shall no longer place their trust in those who have inflicted injury upon them and who had led them away captive into their own land; but they shall strive and have confidence in the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, who has recalled them from captivity and servitude, and has brought them back delivered and safe into their own land. This, A Herban, is the true interpretation of the prophecy. For the things which you yourself have interpreted—or rather, will interpret—are old wives' tales and useless trifles.
HERB. As I see it, a different knowledge is stored up in you, and a different one in us. It is fitting, therefore, for each person to have faith in his own knowledge and to rest in it.
S. ARCH. If your knowledge is neither safe nor firm, what profit is there for you in a controversy that adheres to vanity and clings to deceitful and fallacious enticements?
HERB. Who will provide me with full faith and prove to me with certainty that my knowledge is vanity?
S. ARCH. I have changed the words by way of questioning, and I change them in turn; yet you say, "Who will render me persuaded and certain?"
HERB. But to have faith in your words ignorantly, and as chance has it, I cannot. For you are my enemy, and you stand in the battle line vigorously defending your own cause and those of your side; but mine and those of my side you despise, rashly and inconsiderately rejecting them. B
S. ARCH. Unless I have a concern for the truth both in myself and in you, I shall be alien to the communion and worship of the only-begotten Son of my God.
HERB. Behold, you say that God has no need of the law, which He left to us Israelites as a precious treasure. With what ears then, or with what heart, should I listen to you, who thrust and noise such things upon me?
S. ARCH. Am I dealing with you and refuting you with my own writings? Your own lips accuse you. Come now, O senseless one, will you accuse your own fathers? Walk with your prophets, and judge; anticipate and resist their predictions and prophecies. For I shall convince you by their own sentiments and notions, and I shall provide certain and full faith that, from this time forward, God does not require the use and exercise of your law. C D
HERB. Isaiah says that *Zion said: The Lord God has forsaken me, and the Lord the holy One has forgotten me.* And the Lord answered, saying: *Shall a woman forget the child of her womb, so as not to have pity on the offspring of her body? But even if a woman were to forget these, yet I will not forget you, says the Lord.* God says that He will not forget us, and you say that God has no care for us, nor even any need of our law.
A S. ARCH. You are angry with me, saying that you bring forward what is to your advantage, and hide what is serviceable to my position, and, as I see, you are acting out this drama; but I will not endure you any longer. Tell me, then, what the prophet says above those things recited by you? These things, he says, says the Lord: "In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you, and I have formed you, and I have given you, and I have set you for a covenant of the nations, to restore the earth, and to inherit the desolate heritages, saying to those in bonds: Go forth, and to those in darkness: Be revealed." Teach me, concerning whom does he say these things?
HERB. Even if this was said concerning Moses and those who were accounted as being in the bonds of sin, and who were fettered in the darkness of error, does it not appear that the God of the Law has rather made and formed Christ from what was not into what is, just as the prophet has spoken B there? How then do you dare make him equal to the Creator Himself by naming him God?
S. ARCH. Did I not tell you above, O senseless one, that God formed his humanity? Have I not also said before that he is twofold, true God, and perfect man, without sin? When, therefore, you hear of "formation" and "setting" and "giving" of his humanity, O thrice-wretched one, understand that these things are said of that. But pay attention to the remaining words, and see how the prophet testifies concerning the restoration of the nations. For after he said that he speaks to those in bonds, "Go forth," and to those in darkness, "Be revealed," he added, "They shall be fed in all the ways." Do you see? They shall meditate upon every spiritual way, or rather, C they shall walk in them, working what is pleasing to the Lord. "In all the paths their pasture." Do you pay attention to the testimony? Not one single path, he says, shall be left behind by those who have been found by the Lord, in which they shall not walk with joy and gladness, working what is pleasing to the Lord. They shall not hunger, that is to say, to hear the word of the Lord, nor will they thirst, failing to reach spiritual understanding, nor will the heat of fever, that is, of sin, strike them, nor yet will the Sun of Righteousness, Christ, strike them because they have sinned; but, anointing them with oil, that is, with the laver of regeneration, he will console them with the Paraclete and Holy Spirit; and through fountains of water he will lead them pure through the midst D of the knowledge of the concepts of sacred Scripture and the prophecies and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. "And I will set," he says, "every mountain as a way," that is, I will make the difficult and inaccessible places of the mountains passable and easy for them. "And every path into a pasture for them," that is, they will first meditate and ruminate upon all my commandments. Not from Egypt, whence the Hebrews, nor from the tribe of Jacob, whence the Jews: lest perhaps they should have said—
that he speaks concerning the Jews. But they shall come, he says, from the North A and the sea, and others from the land of the Persians. In these tracts or regions, which are thought to be those of the Gentiles, they dwell. Let the heavens rejoice, that is, the angels; and let the earth exult, that is, the people who have attained salvation. Let the mountains burst forth with gladness: that is, the nations, formerly unfruitful, coming to fruitfulness through faith. And the hills shall drip with righteousness: that is, the kings and princes of the nations, having recognized Christ, shall judge truth and justice, because God has had mercy on His people B; so that you may not say, O Herban, that He called only those who are of the house of Jacob His people. And the humble, he says, of the people He has comforted; that is to say, those severely afflicted and oppressed by sin, He will vehemently receive. And it shall be in that day, the mountains of the kingdom shall drip with sweetness: namely, with hymns and melody for the joy of the saints, which are the multitudes of the angels of God; and the hills shall flow with milk, an omen of the divine feast, which are the summits of God’s angels. And all the channels of Judah shall flow with water. By channels he means intelligible veins; emitting and bubbling fountains, the life-giving liquid of the kingdom of heaven. For just as on earth waters gush from veins, and the whole world drinks; so also in heaven, there are spiritual and mentally perceptible waters from God, and the angels and all the saints of God drink of them. Now by Judah he signifies the Lord Jesus C, who sprouted bodily from the tribe of Judah. And a fountain, he says, shall go forth from the house of the Lord, and shall water the torrent of reeds. He calls the fountain that ineffable joy and unexplainable gladness, and fruitions, and the sweetness of the odor of the Holy Spirit, which indeed flows ineffably and perpetually from the omnipotent God Himself, and will water the companies of the saints, and fill their hearts with that awesome and incomparable sweetness. Egypt shall vanish: that is, every error, and the slavery of brick-making, that is to say, of sin. And Idumea shall become a field of destruction. I mean all the race of the Gentiles, and of those who were not offspring of the precious pool through holy baptism. In what way? For the reason, he says, that they poured out the D blood of the just in their land, of the prophets, the apostles, and the martyrs. For these are the sons and friends and true brothers of my Savior Christ, who sprouted miraculously from the tribe of Judah, who indeed suffered atrocious injury, being slaughtered by them. But Judea shall be inhabited forever, that is, the Judea above, which is the region of the Word of God incarnate from Judah, and which is of the firstborn Jerusalem, unto generations of generations; not the one that is earthly and below, but the heavenly one; that is, as it befits one to speak distinctly, unto the ages of ages. And I will seek out their blood, namely of those who live under the law and after the law in the new grace, on account of their most beautiful martyrdom, who for the sake of God poured out their own blood, and
on account of the most immaculate incarnation of His Word. And I will not justify them, but I will consume them in unceasing fire. And the Lord shall dwell in the high Sion. This is the true interpretation, A Herbanus. But if I have still distorted it, as you said before, refute it.
HERB. Far be it from me to confess that it is so. Indeed, the prophet was a Jew, and he foretold these things to the Jews: for God is king of all the earth, just as He Himself created it. Wherefore David says, "Sing praises to Him as King and God."
S. ARCH. What, then, does the prophet add next? "God," he says, "reigned over the nations" (48), B He who also became man, and who was taken up into heaven after He had fulfilled the economy, and sat at the right hand of Him who begot Him upon His holy throne. For if you should even wish to say that this was spoken concerning the God who appeared incorporeally to Moses and Elias on the high and conspicuous mountains, I have the means to stop your mouth, because the expression "He sits" is used of one who possesses a body; and also: "Sit at my right hand"; and "Having reclined, He slept"; and things similar to these; and not concerning the incorporeal divinity, which no one has ever seen as to what kind it is—whether it sits, or stands, or does not sit, or whether it embraces and is reclined throughout the universe.
HERB. You tell me things altogether strange and unheard of. C But for what reason does the prophet afterward say: "He hath subdued peoples to us, and nations under our feet. He hath chosen for us His inheritance, the beauty of Jacob which He loved." He who, therefore, chose the nations and reigned over them, for what reason did He subject these to the "beauty of Jacob," namely, to us Israelites who have sprung from Jacob?
S. ARCH. This psalm is mystically chanted by the prophet through the Holy Spirit concerning the assumption of my Lord Jesus Christ, since it speaks of the flesh, which has been deified through incorruption after the resurrection from the dead, of the only-begotten Son of God: "God is ascended with jubilee, and the Lord with the sound of a trumpet." For in the flesh D the Lord ascended, and again He shall descend. First, indeed, when He was taken up into the heavens; and afterward, when He shall descend from heaven to judge all the sinners of the earth. For concerning the divinity, the expression "He ascended" and "He descended" is not used. And the witnesses of His resurrection and of His ascension were the apostles. Since, therefore, He sent them to teach all nations, and since they were from Israel and were the seed of Jacob according to the flesh, for this reason Jesus Christ our God chose them out from all who were from Israel as an inheritance for Himself; David, as if from a high and illustrious place, saw with the eyes of his mind that which afterward happened, before it was...
apparent, just as if from the person of the apostles, or rather, even as from the person of all Israel. For beholding the rejection of Israel, that the Lord God has cast off His people, and that He shall hold only those whom He came and chose on account of their blameless faith—"He chose for us," he says, "His inheritance," namely, the twelve apostles, "and the beauty of Jacob, which He loved." For He picked, as one might say, the flower which he perceived would be effective toward what He wills, while the remaining faithless and unbelieving people, as useless, He abandoned and scattered. B But that He subjected peoples to us, and nations under our feet, he speaks from the person of the apostles. For after our Lord Jesus Christ was taken up from them into heaven, they immediately, having gone forth into the whole world, preached the Gospel. And the Lord God Most High subjected to them not only peoples and tribes and tongues, as the prophet has spoken, but kings and satraps and leaders. And if I err in my mention, look and see whose people you have dominion and power over? What are the nations which God has recently subjected to you? Yet you cannot show them. Look at how almost the entire circle of the earth has become Christian, and is spiritually subject to those same apostles.
HERBAN. Since certain nations were subject to David’s empire when he reigned, the author of the psalms wrote, as I suppose, about that subjection. But you distort everything, snatching it to your own aid.
S. ARCH. When he says, "All nations, clap your hands," did David subject all nations? He subjoins then, "Shout to God C with a voice of exultation." You speak foolishly, Herban, having fallen into error. As I tell you, so are those things which were sung by David, and not otherwise.
HERBAN. He who wishes to argue with you must be of those about whom David said: "They set their mouth against heaven, and their tongue has passed over the earth." For the Jewish race has had you to punish me most severely because of me. But teach me here, whom does the prophet say: "O God, Thy way is in the sanctuary. Who is so great a God as our God? Thou art the God that doest wonders"? It is manifest that the God of Israel is great, and no other. "Thou hast made known Thy power among the D peoples," etc. Certainly He said the sons of Jacob and Joseph, and did not say the sons of foreign nations. Therefore, inferring about God, and about the knowledge of power or virtue, and about the price of liberation, how could you not have acted unjustly, speaking: "Who is so great a God as Jesus, the son of Joseph and Mary? This is the only one who does wonders." Or again, how did he not say: "Thou hast made known Thy power among the nations, and hast redeemed with Thy arm...
[...the people of the nations, and you redeemed with your arm your people, the children of the nations of idolaters; but, He says, you redeemed your people, the children of Jacob and Joseph? Tell me here what you think of this.]
AND THE SAINT. It is not the time for you to answer, most shameless one, since the hour has already passed.
The king therefore arose, and the silence was broken. A The Jews, having gathered into one place and awaiting the morning assembly, were rejoicing, because Herbanus seemed to satisfy the archbishop's responses; and they were encouraging him to be of strong spirit, saying: Speak, and do not fear: for God is with you. But Herbanus said to them: The man whom I see, and the wisdom which has sounded in my ears through his words, when I consider it, I shall not be able to the end to overcome or persuade. Therefore, brethren, I testify and affirm to you, in the meantime, truly and doubtlessly, that we will be defeated by him. For B I saw this night Moses the prophet, and Jesus the crucified, concerning whom there is a vehement contention between us. I saw, therefore, both standing on the pinnacle of a certain temple, and conversing. I saw Moses worshipping Jesus, and binding his hands as to the Lord God Jesus, and standing before him with fear. And I, being astonished at the thing, my mouth being suddenly opened, said: Lord Moses, these things which you do are noble! But he, turning, rebuked me, saying: Cease, most shameless one, for I am not mistaken. For I am not of your number. I know, however, my Maker and Lord. What have you, then, to do with this righteous archbishop, that you pursue business and troubles C in vain and rashly? Nevertheless, on the following day and the day after, you will see that you will be strongly overcome by him, and you will worship him, even as I do, my Jesus and Lord. These things I have seen, brothers, and what they may be, I do not know. In the meantime, however, I will not lose heart, nor will I neglect my affairs. These things having been said thus among them and many others, in the morning, the assembly having been prepared, the king arrived with the archbishop. Herbanus also stood with the priests themselves and the teachers of the law.
DISPUTATION OF THE FOURTH DAY
And the SAINT says: Yesterday you said that he who wishes to converse D with me ought to be of those concerning whom it is written: They set their mouth against the heavens, and the rest. But I say to you that he who wishes to confer words with me ought to be of Christ, that through him he may have the Holy Spirit, who opens the ears of the deaf, and renders the tongues of stammers and of those who hesitate incredibly fluent, and makes them clear. He ought not to be a Jew, as you yourself, living one's life in circumcision and uncircumcision, and in unbelief, and in iniquity, and in malice, and in wickedness.
A bearing a rebellious, contumacious, and hostile spirit against God, and carrying a heavy veil upon your heart. Nay, truly you are indeed of those profane and vain talkers, of whom you yourself have spoken: They have set their mouth against heaven, namely with blasphemies and impious mockery; and their tongue, because of the Lord Jesus Christ, has passed through the earth with reproach and detraction. For all the days of your life, even unto this day, you have never ceased to attack the living God, Jesus Christ, the ineffable shoot of God and the Father, with impious insults, curses, and atrocious reproaches in a pitiful manner. But as to what you have said—"Declare to me what this signifies: 'God, in the holy one is your way'—do you rather make known to me: Who is the holy one in whom the way of God has been established?"
HERB. That is, in your holy people, the Israelitic people. For it has been said to us in our law, and this is more sublime, by the Lord: "I have said, You are gods," etc.
S. ARCH. You have lied wickedly, most hostile one. Are you holy, you who corporally murdered the God of heaven and earth? Concerning whom it is said: "Seed of Canaan, and not of Judah." B Are you therefore holy, and the multitude that surrounds and encompasses you? If you are elect, as you say, and holy, ask of the Lord that the earth may open its mouth and gape; and we who oppose you shall all descend into its chasm and emptiness, just as those once did who were in the synagogue or faction of Dathan and Abiram. But this you cannot obtain—may it never be! Moreover, I know that which was said to you: "I have said, You are gods," and so forth. But where will you hide the rest of the verse? For it adds: "But you die like men, and fall as one of the princes." That is: in the same way as the prince of the higher powers, having fallen from the greatest glory—from the glory of the Only-Begotten Jesus Christ—you no longer die as sons of God, but as sinful and mindless men, hateful and hostile, you die miserably, undergoing C indeed both the death of the soul and the body.
But as for the text, "God, in the holy one is your way," it reveals the way of God and the Father, which works and acts effectively in his holy one, the Lord Jesus Christ. But who is our God? That One is the great God, whose way is in his holy Son Jesus Christ, who are one; of whose unity he says: "You are the God who works wonders." God the Father, and the Holy One the Son, in whom is the way of God and the Father—the way of the assumption of human nature—has saved those from among the Jews who believed in him, and has brought all the nations into his kingdom. By such a spirit, O Herban, are spiritual things judged, not as you yourself discern them, surrounded by carnal prudence and pride. As for that which follows: "You have made known your power among the peoples," D
A it signifies that God has made Himself known among us peoples, [through] Jesus Christ, who is the great power of God and the Father. For He Himself, as God from God, while conversing bodily in your synagogues, performed many powers and many signs and wonders, even if you did not heed them. Yet, enough of your crowd at that time, seeing His signs and wonders, believed in His name and did not perish. And, as I think, what was said by the prophet will fit these as well, saying: "You have made known your power to the peoples; You have redeemed with Your arm the sons of Jacob and Joseph." But you, having remained in faithlessness and incredulity, are nothing else than what John, the son of Zacharias, called [you]: "offspring of vipers," and so forth.
But let these things be as they are. Pay attention, however, B to what the prophet subsequently adds concerning the calling of the nations: "Bring to the Lord," he says, "not the tribes of the Jews, but the families of the nations." And what are you to bring? "Glory and honor." You see in every way how we, the families of the nations, glorify the holy God of the law, and we offer now honor to His name and to His only-begotten Son. "Take up," he says, "sacrifices, and enter into His courts. Worship the Lord in His holy court. Let the whole earth be shaken from His presence." Let it be shaken, yes, but struck with awe, and pondering the condescension of God the Word, and His incarnation, and His signs and miracles. "Say among the nations, that the Lord has reigned." In what way? The word "Lord" declares C the divinity, but "reigned" the humanity; therefore, this is said concerning His incarnation. Here the prophet announces to the nations, exhorting all the prophets destined to arise after him into life, to be stirred up to this. "Say among the nations" also, you too, since I also have spoken, "that the Lord is known." "He will rule among you, having become man, and He will govern the habitable world to lead a life in the knowledge of God and in works pleasing to God, which will not be shaken from Him." These things are so, O Herbanus, in truth and justice, and not in any other way. Therefore, for this reason, pay heed to me, and listen to me, and leave behind Judaism, and approach Christ, that it may be well with you, both in the present and in the future age.
HERBANUS. In what way did the prophet say, "Because the gods of the nations are demons, but the Lord made the heavens"? Since therefore all the gods of the nations are demons, do you dare D to open your mouth regarding such things?
THE HOLY ONE. That all the gods of the nations are indeed demons [is true] with all truth. But the Lord Jesus Christ, with great wisdom, made the heaven and the earth and the sea; furthermore, He has also fashioned the kingdom of the heavens, and I myself know this. Therefore, you will not be able to say [anything] concerning my Master and Creator.
A Indeed, rather, by His own authority and proper power, He bound as if with a bridle the demons and the fictional gods—those induced even by that impure and profane dragon, who was cast down headlong from heaven—and forced them to be silent; and He powerfully exterminated all of his institutions and strivings. Contemplate how, from the day He was fixed and nailed to the cross, all the gods and demons vanished and disappeared like smoke. For when Christ is named, the demons tremble. And do you not believe this? Come then, bring forward any demoniacs you wish, and I will only invoke the Lord Jesus Christ, and the demons will be seized with trembling, and they will vanish from them.
HERB. The prophet said concerning the gods of the gentiles, that they are demons. Since, therefore, the Jesus whom you speak of is the God of the gentiles, He is from among those of whom the prophet spoke.
S. ARCH. Cease, most impudent one, and do not rave, spewing forth impious insults with a sacrilegious mouth. For if we should arrive at the point where each of us must demonstrate the power of his own faith, you will fall into temptation and tribulation, and you will have the rest of the life of your days unstable, steep, and miserable. For the truth is not preached in dry and ineffective speech, but in the power of faith.
HERB. I have heard that at this time the prophets of the Christians perform many great signs, they who have bidden the world farewell and dwell in the wildernesses. What is there B amazing, and contrary to expectation? Since you are one of them, you will not be weak or powerless toward this, if indeed you wish to harm me. Nevertheless, first deal with me by the weight of arguments, and convince me; then, if it is permitted to you, do what you wish.
S. ARCH. Wretch, have you heard but a little? Let not the message be found to be one bandied about more than is proper. Nevertheless, since you seek to hear more, attend diligently: "The Lord has reigned," he says, "let many islands rejoice." C Tell me then, which are the islands? And in another place he says, "Sing to the Lord a new song, for the Lord has done marvelous things. His right hand and His holy arm have saved Him." Does God save Himself, and does He protect Himself with His own arm? From whom? For who is it that brings war against Him? Tell me what this signifies: "The Lord has made known His salvation; in the sight of the gentiles He has revealed His justice. He has remembered His mercy to Jacob, and His truth to the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God." Bring to bear here whatever wit and knowledge you have, and discern for what reason the prophet has spoken these things D and tells them to us.
A HERBANUS: He commands the islands by all means to rejoice when the Israelites dispersed among them have been gathered, when the Lord reigns in Jerusalem. But that "his right hand has saved him," and so forth, I think he speaks of the people whom he saved from the servitude of the Egyptians. And that "the Lord has made known his salvation," it is by all means to the house of Israel. "And before the nations he has revealed his justice." Therefore, "all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God," which he has performed with us Israelites, having led us out from the land of Egypt. And these things are as you ask.
ST. ARCHELAUS: "They shall rejoice," he says, "the islands," when you yourselves have been recalled from them, as those having been redeemed from your tyranny, rejoicing together with our calling as fellow-believers.
HERBANUS: God forbid that we have tyrannized anyone; and God forbid that they should rejoice at our recall. For we are not reckoned as fellow-believers with you Christians. He says this whole thing on account of us Jews, who are settled in the islands of the dispersion. For he had no care for you who are from the nations.
B ST. ARCHELAUS: He who said, "I will not gather their gatherings from blood, nor will I mention their names through my lips," will he then recall them? And will he reject the things that go forth through his lips? And will he show himself a liar, he who delivers all who speak falsehood to destruction? It will not be to your good that things are as you have said. But [as for] "Sing to the Lord a new song, for the Lord has done marvelous things," he said this concerning my Christ and God. For he said a "new" song, not an old one. But what is the new, if not the recent? That is, [the song] of the new grace; namely, the precious songs of the Christians. The Lord has done marvelous things in the midst of your synagogues, raising the dead, giving sight to the blind, and the rest. C For this reason the prophet says: "Sing to the Lord a new song"; a Christ-named song, because the Lord has done marvelous things. "His right hand and his holy arm have saved him." Namely, the Godhead has saved the humanity. Not from anywhere else, but from you lawless Jews and God-fighters, and from the evil doing of the demons most dear to you. Since he was God and man, one Son of God, in one person—that is, in one hypostasis—the super-infinite One existing in two natures and two essences. And "the Lord has made known his salvation," not to you Jews, who knew it long ago and are already known [to him], but before the nations who were ignorant. For this is what "He revealed his justice before the nations" indicates. D For the justice of God is nothing other than the Word of his divinity, which was incarnate from the Holy Spirit and Mary
A the ever-virgin. But as for the words, "All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God," you possess eyes and you see, how the whole earth is filled with the knowledge of its Lord. For from the ends of the earth even to the ends of the earth, as I have often said, the Gospel of the kingdom of Jesus Christ has been preached, and being deemed worthy of just and honorable reception, it has been believed and accepted.
HERB. Just as you yourself do not acquiesce to my words, nor assent to my interpretations, in like manner I have no faith in the things told to me by you.
S. ARCH. It is just that he who speaks extraordinary things should also listen. For if you assent to words out of anger, we waste time in vain and to no purpose in our discussion.
HERB. I am conscious within myself that I speak and discuss better and more excellent things than you. I know that you suspect the same thing regarding me. But then, what shall come of us?
S. ARCH. We ought not to dispute and contend with one another in pride and contempt, but according to the fear of God in truth and justice. For it is written: "He who loves iniquity, hates his own soul." B
HERB. I myself do not love iniquity, far be it. It is written in the law that every unjust and proud man shall fall into a fourfold punishment from the Lord. For he who steals an ox shall pay fourfold, and for every matter the like; but if, says the law, the theft has not been made manifest, the Most High will not repay for any other cause; C without any defense he shall repay it fourfold, nor shall he be judged innocent. And if you strike a poor man, it shall come upon you four times over, from where you did not suspect. Since, therefore, both word and action are punished, neither shall I myself dispute with you in pride and contempt; but only as far as my mind is fully persuaded that what is said is devoid of falsehood.
S. ARCH. Indeed, I know that these things are so; but our controversy and the discussion we have undertaken is not regarding these things, but regarding faith and truth. And in order that you may understand and come to know the truth which is in Christ Jesus, and become an heir of the kingdom of heaven; for truly I proclaim to you good news, that you shall be seen as a servant of Christ, whether in the beginning or in the end; and it is incumbent and binding upon you to serve him, and you must cleave and adhere to his footsteps, when you know him to be the one who comes, when he himself shall look down from the heavens, and shall open the eyes of your heart D and your mind, and shall illuminate, and sanctify, and show you the whole truth, and that he himself with all truth is the Messiah Christ, concerning whom the prophets have prophesied many things.
HERBANUS. It would be a great thing for me, to know for certain and to have full faith in your Christ, that he is the one who is to come. For that he who was God should have come down from the heavens, and become man, and of his own free will should have endured a criminal’s death, is strange, absurd, and A unspeakable. And if this is true, what force, what compulsion drove him, so that, with no one constraining him, he hastened to arrive and to deliver himself up to die? I am distraught when I ponder these things. For that fearful nature, that terrible power, that ineffable might, he who possessed fearful glory, hurried so much that he might simply disgrace his own majesty—this is impossible, and utterly inconsolable.
ST. ARCHILAUS. You do not know the power of the mystery, and for this reason you marvel. For he who is held and sits in the darkness of night cannot in any way see the things that fly in the ether. And one who has mutilated and damaged eyes, how will he be able to look clearly upon the ray of the sun? Similarly with you yourself. For in those in whom the Holy Spirit has not dwelt, spiritual things are discerned with difficulty. Believe, therefore, in the Lord Jesus Christ, and be baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, B and then you shall understand the things at which you now wonder and remain perplexed.
HERBANUS. It is impossible for me to be persuaded and to believe so simply and as chance would have it, if I do not, as I desire, receive full assurance. Explain, therefore, to me once again the things about which I ask you. For what reason did your Christ suffer those terrible things, and furthermore, has died?
ST. ARCHILAUS. Have I not told you this many times, and do you ask again?
HERBANUS. A certain ignorance besets my thoughts, and suddenly creeping in, it casts into oblivion the things that are being said to me by you.
ST. ARCHILAUS. So I think. For those who are not illuminated in the life-giving name of the Holy Trinity suffer things worse than these. But pay close attention to why Christ suffered, and for what reason, and how, after suffering many things, he died. C All men from Adam until the coming of Christ had miserably fallen into great error and most horrible transgressions. And I do not speak only of the nations, who had wandered away simply toward the vain idols of fictitious gods; but also of you yourselves, the Jews, who received the law of God and did not keep it. Whereto that wicked demon, who having seduced Adam, seeing the whole of creation gaping after him, was rejoicing and exulting with great clamor. What, therefore, came to pass? God, who had created humanity, was grieved, and as for snatching man out of the hands of the beast by tyranny, he did not wish to D do so. He deliberates upon a just pretext, and sends from the heavens his Word unto the holy Virgin. And having entered into her, he fashions...
A for himself a man from the pure and unpolluted blood of the holy Virgin and Theotokos. He himself is united to the man immutably according to hypostasis, and is born from thence; and he grows, being God, by his humanity, having within him the mind of deity. He routs and confuses the demons. The wicked demons admire him. After this, they envy him who is without sin; they plot, as I have spoken to you before, through you Hebrews, his death, which he himself also desired. He is sold for thirty pieces of silver, is betrayed, bound, and buffeted as a man; he dwells in prison, because of the condemned Adam; he descends to the underworld; he struggles with the prince of the underworld and with corruption, for the sake of those detained there in darkness and the shadow of death; he conquers, and draws out and liberates those who were coerced there; he raises himself from the dead, and those who were with him; he makes his twelve disciples witnesses of his resurrection, then seventy, then five hundred. He ascends with his humanity into the heavens, having sent to you, who crucified him, his disciples. Then, when you had remained stubborn in treachery, contumacy, and incredulity, having given them the Holy Spirit, he sends them to all the nations, saying: Tell the nations, leave behind false and counterfeit gods; and believe in God the Almighty, and in his only-begotten Son, who was buffeted, crucified, and died, and arose miraculously, and in the Holy Spirit. He who believes and has been washed in the pure laver shall be saved; but he who does not believe shall be condemned. For this reason, therefore, Erban, our Lord Jesus Christ suffered.
HERB. If he wished all to be saved, for what cause did he place the scandal of his sufferings and pains before the faces and eyes of all, so that they might be a scandal and offense? Was it not more consonant with God that no one at all should stumble in any matter into the scandal of his sufferings, but that all, approaching him by a straight path, might believe and be saved?
S. ARCH. The holy God does not wish to do injury, nor in any way act unjustly, even toward the devil himself: to such a degree is he endowed with exquisite and perfect justice. For this cause he renders blessed and sanctifies those who proceed in justice and holiness. C For from the beginning God formed man to be of his own right and free will; and he prefers that we, by good will and counsel, should always submit to him in all his decrees, rather than by being compelled by a violent and tyrannical rule. Since, therefore, we have all sinned, and the approaching judgment hung over us, as well as the retribution of eternal punishment, the over-good and most merciful Lord, wishing to take pity and save his own creature, since no other just cause existed, of necessity conceived this out of kind compassion. And just as he hid from the devil, who attacked him as a man, and he D ran into his divinity and was confused, so it is with his sufferings
which are proofs of the faith of those who receive salvation. And he says: “Great is their faith.” Why, I ask, is it great? The Lord says: They hear that I was betrayed, and arrested, and buffeted, and mocked, and imprisoned, and scourged, and that I died a shameful death, such as even criminals and wicked men suffer, and that I was buried, and rose again; and hearing all these things, they are not scandalized—that is, they are not offended—but they confess God from God, and King, and Formator, and their own Creator. How, then, shall I not receive them, and have mercy upon them, and count them worthy of my incorruptible kingdom? For if I had come in naked divinity, A and they had believed upon seeing it, you yourself would have had a reasonable excuse for a defense, to accuse me of acting unjustly toward you. But since these things have followed thereupon, your justification has been broken before your face. Thus it is, Herbanus, and no deceit shall be found in my mouth. B The sufferings of Christ appear as a stumbling block to the unbelievers, and to some even as foolishness, so long as they are unbelievers and do not believe; but after they have been dipped in the sacred laver and reborn, these things appear to them as the understanding of God and the wisdom of God.
HERBANUS: A horrible mystery. Nevertheless, for what reason did he go about on the Sabbaths performing healings, which the law naturally forbids, and if anyone does not abide in it, it punishes him as an outlaw? For this reason, I think, our fathers, stung with sharp anger, crucified him, because he did not keep the Sabbath according to the law, but did things that were not permitted.
HOLY MAN: That he performed healings, you have indeed said truly. But he performed them not as a physician of this world, but as God; he spoke by word alone, and immediately the sick man, whatever disease he was held by, was found healthy and well. The rulers of the synagogue, and the Scribes, and the Pharisees, pining away with the envy of jealousy, wrought these things against him, because the people were magnifying him as he performed miracles above them. What transgression of the law is it to raise the dead, to open the eyes of the blind, and to say to the paralytic, "Arise, take up your bed, and walk," and things similar to these? C
HERBANUS: If he was the true Son of God, for what reason did he signify to his disciples, saying: I go to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God? Here, by his own mouth, he argues himself and demonstrates himself to be a man, similar to his apostles, and not God. For although you see me as a Jew, I have often read your Gospels, having said to a friend of mine who is a Christian: "Provide me with some from your books, so that, instructed by reading them, I may become a Christian."
HOLY MAN: You are not to be blamed or rebuked if you read the Scriptures of the Christians. D For we ourselves do this
and approve of it; if any of the unbelievers reads and understands, he will perhaps be helped immediately. A But as for your suspecting from that expression, "my Lord Jesus Christ," that he is only a man and not God, because he said to his disciples, "I am going to my Father," and so forth, pay close attention. Regarding his divinity, because he was God and the Son of God, he called God his Father by nature; but regarding the measure of his humanity, showing that he was truly a man fashioned by the hand of the Father, he made known his Father, calling him Lord and Master. And that he said this regarding his disciples, he did not lie at all. For that he called God the Father of his disciples, the prophet says the same: "I have begotten and exalted sons." And that God is the Creator and maker of every earth-born creature—nay rather, the Lord is the God of the holy ones. But the Lord is not the God of the impious and the sinners; rather, sin is their god, which they love and practice. For God is a Father to the righteous, not by nature, but by grace; but he is their God in that he fashioned them from what was not into what is.
HERB: These words will be made known to others also. (For he saw Palladius the scholasticus of the archbishop, whom he had brought from Alexandria, noting down the words of both.)
S. ARCH: Therefore the prophet said: "The unfolding of thy words gives light and gives understanding to the simple." B
HERB: Who are the simple, of whom he spoke?
S. ARCH: He called you, the Hebrews, simple, as infants, as though being nourished and instructed by other milk, because the law is imperfect, so that in the passing of time, when Christ had come, you might reach out for the perfect things through his grace, even if you strayed from your purpose.
HERB: Were not Moses and Elias seen as perfect through this imperfect law of ours, pleasing the God of the law brightly and well? For what reason, then, did you call the law imperfect? For the former is seen to have conversed mouth to mouth with God, as a friend with his beloved friend; and he scourged Egypt, as God (to) Pharaoh, with seven plagues; and perhaps you know the rest yourself. And did not Elias call down fire from heaven and shut up the distribution of rain, and cause it not to rain for three years and six months? Did he not also make a journey fasting for forty days? Did he not, in Horeb, walking in the finest breeze, D see the God of the law? And does he not live among the living to this very day? How, then, do you yourself declare the law to be simple, imperfect, and ineffective?
S. ARCH: I have indeed called the law imperfect...
A but not ineffective or without any outcome. For by many certain proofs, it rendered men fit and worthy of the kingdom of heaven. Concerning Elias and Moses, let there be no discussion for you, since all these things were performed by the Lord through them, and I myself know this with great precision. However, the perfection of a noble and blessed way of life is not discerned in these miracles, but in the cross of the Lord Jesus, through whom all sin has been taken away. For the law did not desire to overturn and abolish the error of idolatry and to remove sin, but rather [did] the grace of Jesus Christ and the truth.
Moses, indeed, was not able to withstand the unrestrained impulse of the people so that they might not sin, but [might] rather be pious and fear the Lord. B And even he is seen to have sinned before the Lord when he came with the people to Mara, and could not drink the water from Mara, for it was bitter. And the people murmured against the Lord, saying: "The Lord has done evil to us, having led us out of the land of Egypt," and we were not able to find water to be satisfied. At that time, truly, Moses is seen even to have murmured with the people against the Lord; whence not even the land of promise did [God] allow him to tread upon, but having [first] brought him up to a high mountain, he showed it to him from there. And thus he said to him: "Ascend this mountain and die. For you shall not inherit the land of promise, because you yourself also provoked me with the people." And on that very mountain he is seen dying, and he did not tread upon the land of promise—he who spoke with God mouth to mouth, and who, as a god to Pharaoh, C afflicted Egypt with seven plagues, and so forth.
Elias, also, was not able to withstand sin to such a degree as to remove it, and to rescue the people of the Lord from its harm, but having seen all the people bending the knee to Baal, angered because he could do nothing, he turned to cursing and put on ruthlessness, and went against the creation. And first, indeed, he asks for fire to come from heaven and consume the commander of fifty and the fifty soldiers with him; which also happened. Then, when another commander of fifty arrived to him with other fifty soldiers, he—angered at those who had done him no wrong—inflicts the same destruction upon them as upon the first. After these things, he slaughters the priests of shame, that is, of Baal, four hundred and fifty. D Then he binds the sky, carried away by ruthlessness, to utterly destroy the whole world with famine and drought. "For the Lord lives," he says, "if there shall be rain upon the earth, except by my mouth." And his word had become a deed; and for three years and six months, the whole world was miserably held fast by a most horrible drought and most bitter heat. And even while these things were happening, Elias was still raging. How were those who had fallen into such great sins perfect in the law, as you say? By no means. For
A because they were mere men, it was necessary for them to be found subject to sin. But there is one who is perfect. Who is he? Jesus Christ, who was not enslaved to the yoke of sin, who never committed iniquity, who was innocent in his hands and clean of heart; who did not deal deceitfully with his tongue, but rather remained in his perfect humanity, spotless, sanctified. He himself took upon himself the sin of the whole world, and through his own sufferings he took it away in righteousness; and having snatched the wandering nations from the jaws of the devil, he led them to the Father and God. And having deified this lower nature, he gathered it up into the heavens and made it to sit together with God the Father. This, Herbanus, is perfection; since Moses and Elias were able to accomplish nothing for the salvation of the common generation of mankind, except for the one holy one, the one Lord, Jesus Christ, to the glory of God the Father. Amen.
But if you also consider the miracles which you said that God performed through Moses and Elias to be the perfection of virtue, then it remains that those six hundred thousand who crossed the Red Sea on dry feet, whom the cloud of light also overshadowed by day, and whom the pillar of fire enlightened by night, should be considered by you as having been perfected in holiness, because God miraculously performed those mentioned wonders and signs and extraordinary portents. But you cannot affirm this. For all those thousands were utterly cast down and perished in the desert over forty years on account of their great iniquity. B And it is shown from this that perfection is not to be looked for in the fact that God might work miracles in some people, but rather in enduring punishment and torture for the Lord, in sustaining temptation, in bearing evils and accepting ignominy, in bravely persevering in adverse circumstances, in humility and thanksgiving, and in performing no sign or miracle unless perhaps by some necessity. This is the true perfection in the saints, when they are fastened and attached to God, adhering to him and intent upon him, having denied and abandoned all things and holding them as secondary to him. I have said these things, however, not accusing Moses and Elias—far be it—but most openly declaring by what marks and forms the perfection of virtue is to be measured. God rendered Moses and Elias perfect then, when he made them partakers of his own perfection, that is to say, of his grace; namely, when Jesus Christ, my Lord, clothed in flesh, was transformed on Mount Tabor in the midst of Peter and James and John: and his face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as the light 37. For then he commanded, and behold, Moses and Elias were brought to him by the spirit of his power, and they stood by him, shining together, when C also his Father testified from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear him 38.
HERB. Perhaps he made Elias attend, as he was alive, but Moses, who was dead, for what reason? For, indeed, a dead man does not return anymore. D
BISHOP. The whole of man is his soul, since his body is nothing. It is an innate garment of the soul; and when God commands, he sends his angels, and they strip the soul of its corruptible garment, that is, the body itself, since it must depart to God, where there is no one who wears such a fleshy garment; for all are spirits there. Furthermore, they carry it there as a spirit to the place God commands, and it dwells there, wearing the garments of angels. Thus, therefore, was the soul of Moses. And when God had need of her, A he fashioned for her a body of his own power, and made it stand by his arm on Mount Tabor, so that it might gaze upon his transfiguration, and again with his right hand he restored it to the place from which he had taken it.
HERB. Why do we waste time in discussions? I will settle the dispute. And if you wish for me to believe in Jesus without hesitation, show him to me alive, and having conversed with him, I will see him and speak with him; and immediately I will confess my defeat and become a Christian.
When Herbanus spoke thus, the surrounding crowd of Jews cried out with a loud voice: We beseech you, teacher, do not be deceived and become a Christian, but rather show yourself a man, and act bravely. For you know that nothing is truer and more certain than the God of our fathers. B And Herbanus answered them: You bring trifles into the middle of the debate. If he gives me certain and indubitable assurance that this is truly he of whom the prophets spoke so much, I will be a stranger to the God of our fathers if I do not believe in him without doubt. C The Archbishop, seeing that he spoke in truth and not in mockery, said to him:
BISHOP. And how do you wish for me to give you assurance?
HERB. Beseech your Lord, if he is in heaven as you say, to descend to me, so that I may see him and converse with him; and, as the Lord lives, whom you say is the Father of your Christ, I will be baptized immediately, and I will believe in him.
As Herbanus said these things, the multitude of the Scribes and Pharisees cried out, saying: Yes, great Sir, do it now, D and let us see if the clamor of your words is confirmed by works. Show us your Christ, and with fear and trembling we will believe in him, no longer having anything to say in our defense. But as they were shouting, they also said softly and quietly to one another: Do you want him to show him to us? Woe, because we will become Christians. Others were saying: If indeed he shows him to us, why should we not believe? Others were saying: Certainly he will show us a man who has been dead for such a long time until this day. But where will he appear, having been dissolved...
so to speak, even A to the very bones within the urn of his tomb? But the holy man, knowing that if he did not fulfill their request, his silence would result in the greatest victory for them, answered them, saying: Know that I shall by all means show him to you; and even though you may not wish it, you shall believe; if not, the sword shall consume you. But if I do not show him, you shall return by your own decision.
This pleased Herbanus and those who were with him. For they were saying among themselves: He will not be able to show him to us in any way, because he was killed by our fathers, and died, and was firmly shut up in the monument, and was stolen by his disciples. But the blessed Gregentius, knowing certainly and perfectly what the Lord said: If you possess faith like a mustard seed, etc., rising up, he went out alone from those who were there, having instructed the king to remain in the same place, so that that most crowded assembly might not be dispersed. Then the blessed man, having withdrawn far from the assembly, stood to pray; and having bent his knee to the ground three times, then rising and stretching his hands toward B heaven, with all watching, he said from the depths of his heart:
«O Word of the terrible and great and invisible Father, begotten of Him before the ages impassibly and without change, not made, shining forth alone, the only-begotten from the only unbegotten Light; You who through Him from the beginning strengthened the heaven and the earth, and founded them with Your Holy Spirit, and covered both over the waters; You who inclined the heavens and descended as rain upon the fleece into the holy Virgin Mary; who chose for Yourself disciples from Your land, that of the Hebrews, and were transfigured before the leaders on Mount Tabor; who worked stupendous signs and prodigies in the midst of the lawless Jews—O Jesus Christ, we invoke You who are present everywhere and filling all things; have mercy on this darkened multitude, and overshadow them with Your power; open their darkened eyes, which the devil has blinded; and according to the multitude of Your mercies, manifest Yourself to them, so that they may see You openly and clearly, and believe in You, the only true God, and in the true Father who sent You, and in Your holy Spirit. Amen.»
And as the faithful crowd and the king with his nobles said, "Amen" (for the eyes of all were turned C toward him, and they were watching), a great earthquake took place, and it thundered from the east with such great force that everyone was seized with terror, and they fell to the ground. And after a little while, when all had risen and were intent toward the east, behold, the gates of heaven were opened, and suddenly a shining cloud was spread out from the gate of heaven like a level plain reaching as far as them. And while they were still looking with intent eyes, behold, the Lord Jesus D
A came towards them, walking upon the cloud, right before their eyes. He was exceeding comely in beauty. He came, therefore, and stood at the edges of the cloud, near the archbishop and the council, about two hundred cubits above them, so that He was seen by all, clothed in a most beautiful purple cloud, from which rays of divinity shone forth. On His head was a brightness of lightning, and a diadem of inestimable beauty, and with its rays, like a crown of thorns; and he held a sword in His left hand, and with His right [hand] He held Himself. As the Lord stood before him, an indescribable trembling, mixed with joy, fell upon the king and the nobles, and upon the whole multitude of Christians; so that, because of that awesome spectacle, they could not even speak. They only looked upwards with delight, beholding Him, and were amazed with infinite gladness. But the Jews, together with Herbanus, seeing that awesome mystery, were struck with great fear, beating their breasts, and for trembling and dread looking hither and thither, they sought to flee. The archbishop then cried out to Herbanus in a loud voice: "Behold, O Herbanus, this awesome mystery, concerning which you have had much searching and disputation, and have an unshaken and certain faith, and believe indubitably that one is holy, one is Lord, Jesus Christ, to the glory of God the Father. Amen." But he still remained silent.
Then a voice came from the Lord to the Jews: "Because of the great supplication of the archbishop, I appear to you before your eyes, I who was crucified by your fathers." When the voice had been uttered, all were struck with amazement and fell B prone upon the earth; and that which once happened to the blessed Paul, when the Lord appeared to him, so that he was blinded, this same thing happened to them also; for although their eyes were open, they saw no one. When these things had thus occurred, the bright cloud that was underneath Him, taking root in the heights before the face of the Lord, hid Him from their sight; and thus, as the Saviour journeyed back to the interior [of heaven], the cloud gradually folded up behind Him, until the Lord had returned to the celestial dwellings. The king and the crowds of Christians, having then regained their confidence, cried out with a strong and firm voice: "Lord, have mercy." And the venerable archbishop lay prostrate C on the ground, and was pouring out prayers to the Lord our God. When these things had thus taken place, and all were gathered in the council, the king and the senate with him, fearing the archbishop with great religious awe, followed him with incredible honor, venerating and admiring him. But one of the Jews asked another: "Do you see [anything] also, brother?" He replied: "In no way." They said to Herbanus: "Woe to us, master, what shall we do now?" He said to them: "Have we alone been blinded by looking at the God of the Christians, or has this same thing happened to them, too?" But some of the Christians, when they heard these things, said in a loud voice: "Far from it! We Christians, indeed, by His ineffable grace D
A have looked upon Him, and we see much better now than we used to see. You alone have become blind because of your perfidy and unbelief." Since, therefore, all were blind and saw nothing at all, Herbanus was led by the hand and came to the Archbishop, and said to him:
HERBAN: Every man, having seen his God, is benefited by Him. We, however, have seen your God and have suffered evil things. If He bestows such benefits upon those who come to Him, He certainly does not possess the goodness of His Father.
S. ARCHBISHOP: The Lord is a God of vengeance, the God of vengeance [Psalm XCIII, 1] has now spoken freely; for it has happened to you according to your blasphemies—that is, your impious insults and sacrilegious revilings against Him.
HERBAN: And if He renders evil for evil, to whom, then, does He entrust the care of our affairs?
S. ARCHBISHOP: A physician cutting away a part that has rotted is not accused as the author of the injury. For you, having looked upon the Lord with unworthy eyes, were struck blind.
HERBAN: From all that we have heard and seen from you, only this one thing remains for you: that our eyes be opened and we all become Christians. But if you will not accomplish this with us, you shall render an account for us on the day of judgment.
S. ARCHBISHOP: If you wish, I will wash you in the spiritual laver, and you shall receive your sight.
HERBAN: And if you wash us, and our eyes are not opened, what is to happen?
S. ARCHBISHOP: Let me, he says, wash one of you; and if he does not recover his sight, then do not accept this.
B This pleased Herbanus and all of them. And when one of them had been bathed in the heavenly laver, his eyes were immediately opened and he received his sight, and he cried out, saying: "Jesus Christ is the true God, and I believe in Him." When the others heard this, they approached the most holy laver with great eagerness, and having received the seal in Christ, they were numbered among the Christians. And there was great joy and gladness in the Church of God on that day, and much loss for the devil. C And when Herbanus and all those with him had been bathed in the spiritual laver, immediately their eyes were opened and restored to their former state of vision, and they glorified God.
Then Herbanus, astonished at the manifestation or vision of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ which had appeared to him, was saying: "Our Lord Jesus Christ, whom our foolish fathers crucified and killed, was in heaven, and we, the senseless, supposed Him to be among those lying in the tombs." And beating his breast with tears, he was saying: "Master Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God in truth, forgive me for all the sins I committed against You out of ignorance of You." He also revered the blessed Gregentius and honored him greatly, and [held him] as an angel of God
and he did not choose to be separated from him. The king, seeing that Herban was a most distinguished and learned man, became his sponsor in holy baptism, and naming him Leo, declared him one of his senate, appointing him his A *hypoecclesion*, whom the Romans call *patrician* and *canicleion*.
When these things had thus progressed, and those who had been baptized with Herban, being about five thousand five hundred, having received no small gifts and having returned to their homes with joy, at the command of the king and the archbishop, the entire synagogue of the Jews, which dwelt in all the cities of his kingdom, was baptized. And immediately, by the counsel and judgment of the most holy archbishop, the most pious king broke up their tribes from one another and ordered them to mingle with the households of the Christians. The most blessed Gregentius also instructed the king to enact a law: That no one of the newly-illuminated B Hebrews should dare in the future to take a son-in-law for his daughter from his fellow Hebrews, but rather take a son-in-law for his daughter from the heathen Christians; and likewise for his son. And whoever should violate the law was to be subjected to the punishment of the sword. The law having been written and enacted, the whole race of the Jews was in this manner mingled and fused with the nation of the Christians, and in the course of time, it fell into complete oblivion of its former ways.
With the entire kingdom of the Homerites illuminated C and piously Christianized, there was very great joy in the Churches of God; all were celebrating the feast with longing, and a profound peace pervaded everywhere. The king, living in freedom from care, together with the most holy high priest of God, untiringly performed the doxologies and the all-night vigils to the benevolent Lord. As had been previously said, he was possessed of zeal and divine longing, bestowing many alms upon the helpless, and orphans, and widows. He was tearing up every unjust contract, and annulling every wicked decree, and demanding from the magnates signed assurances for the sake of D not harming the poor, nor indeed taking away justice from him who possessed it and giving it to him who did not, nor condemning the innocent. Those, however, who trampled upon the law of God and the decrees of his kingdom, he removed by fire, and the sword, and the depths of the sea, with none being spared from the vengeance for the law of God, neither prince nor pauper. His counsels, both those regarding peace and war, and any other matter whatsoever, he first took by inquiring of the Lord through the holy Gregentius, and he promptly fulfilled the things commanded to him, and never missed what was proper, inasmuch as he undertook these things as divinely ordered. Having ruled the kingdom, therefore, for thirty years, he departed this life in peace, the