Dialogue with Trypho (chapters 99–131)

Dialogue with Trypho

continued

Chapter 99

In the Commencement of the Psalm are Christ's Dying Words.

1 When I had said this, I went on: “I will show you that the whole psalm was spoken about Christ, by going through it again and explaining it. Look at what it says right at the start: ‘O God, my God, attend to me; why have you forsaken me?’ This foretold long beforehand what Christ was going to say. For when he was crucified he said, ‘O God, O God, why have you forsaken me?’^[379] [Psalm 22:1; Matthew 27:46] 2 “Then come the following words: ‘The words of my transgressions are far from my salvation. My God, I will cry out to you by day, and you will not hear, and by night, and it is not for lack of understanding in me.’ These words were spoken in advance, just like the things he was going to do. On the day he was to be crucified, he took three of his disciples to the hill called Olivet, which lies right next to the temple in Jerusalem, and prayed: ‘Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me.’ Then he went on praying: ‘Not as I want, but as you want.’ By this he showed that he had truly become a man who could suffer.^[380] [Matthew 26:39]

3 “But so that no one would say, ‘Then he did not know he was going to suffer,’ the psalm adds at once: ‘and it is not for lack of understanding in me.’ God was not ignorant when he asked Adam where he was, or asked Cain where Abel was. He asked in order to expose what sort of man each one was, and so that knowledge of everything might reach us by being written down. In the same way Christ indicated that the lack of understanding was not his own. It belonged to those who thought he was not the Christ. They supposed they would put him to death and that he would stay in Hades like any ordinary man.^[381] [Genesis 3:9; Genesis 4:9]

Chapter 100

In What Sense Christ is [Called] Jacob, and Israel, and Son of Man.

1 “The next words are: ‘But you dwell in the holy place, you the praise of Israel.’ This showed that he would do something worthy of praise and wonder. After being crucified he was going to rise from the dead on the third day, and this he has received from his Father. I have already shown that Christ is called both Jacob and Israel. I also showed that what concerns him was proclaimed in a mystery, and not only in the blessings of Joseph and Judah. It is also written in the Gospel that he said: ‘All things have been handed over to me by the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son, nor the Son except the Father and those to whom the Son reveals him.’^[382] [Matthew 11:27] 2 “So he has revealed to us everything that we have also come to understand from the Scriptures by his grace. We know him as the firstborn of God and before all created things. We know him also as the son of the patriarchs, since he was made flesh through the virgin who came from their family. He endured becoming a man without beauty, without honor, and able to suffer.^[383] [Colossians 1:15; Isaiah 53:2-3]

3 That is why, when he spoke in his teaching about his coming suffering, he said: “The Son of Man must suffer many things, be rejected by the Pharisees and scribes, be crucified, and rise on the third day.” So he called himself Son of Man. One reason may be his birth through the virgin, who was, as I said, from the family of David, Jacob, Isaac and Abraham. Or the reason may be that Adam himself was the father of those I have just listed, from whom Mary traces her descent. For we know that the fathers of women are also the fathers of the children their daughters bear.^[384] [Mark 8:31; Luke 9:22] 4 For he gave the name Peter to one of his disciples, who had earlier been called Simon, because that disciple, by revelation from the Father, recognized him as the Christ, the Son of God. We find it written in the memoirs of his apostles that he is the Son of God, and we call him Son. So we have understood that before all created things he came forth from the Father by the Father’s power and will. (In the words of the prophets he is called by various names, in one way and another: Wisdom, Day, East, Sword, Stone, Rod, Jacob and Israel.) We have also understood that he became man through the virgin, so that the disobedience that began with the serpent might be undone by the same road by which it began.^[385] [Matthew 16:16-18]

5 For Eve was a virgin and undefiled. She conceived the word of the serpent and gave birth to disobedience and death. But the virgin Mary received faith and joy. When the angel Gabriel brought her the good news that the Spirit of the Lord would come upon her and the power of the Most High would overshadow her, and that therefore the holy thing born from her is the Son of God, she answered, “Let it be to me according to your word.”^[386] [Luke 1:35; Luke 1:38] 6 And through her was born the one about whom we have shown that so many Scriptures speak. Through him God destroys the serpent and the angels and people who have become like him. But for those who repent of their evil deeds and believe in him, God brings release from death.

Chapter 101

Christ Refers All Things to the Father

1 Now the next words of the psalm are these: “Our fathers hoped in you; they hoped, and you rescued them. They cried out to you and were saved. They hoped in you and were not put to shame. But I am a worm and not a man, a reproach of men and an object of contempt to the people.” These words show that he acknowledges as his fathers those who hoped in God and were saved by him. These were also the fathers of the virgin, through whom he was born and became man. He also declares that he himself will be saved by the same God, and he does not boast of doing anything by his own will or strength.^[387] 2 For he did the same thing on earth. When someone said to him, “Good teacher,” he answered, “Why do you call me good? There is one who is good, my Father in heaven.” And when he says, “I am a worm and not a man, a reproach of men and an object of contempt to the people,” he was foretelling things that are clearly true of him and are happening to him. For everywhere he is a reproach to us, the people who believe in him. And he is an object of contempt to the people, because he was despised and dishonored by your people and suffered the things you did to him.^[388] [Matthew 19:16-17; Mark 10:17-18; Luke 18:18-19]

3 And the words that follow: “All who saw me mocked me. They spoke with their lips and shook their heads: ‘He hoped in the Lord; let him rescue him, let him save him, because he delights in him.’” He foretold that these same things would happen to him. For those who saw him crucified each shook his head and twisted his lips. They sneered at one another and said in mockery the words that are also written in the memoirs of his apostles: “He said he was the Son of God. Let him come down and walk about. Let God save him.”^[389] [Matthew 27:39-43; Mark 15:29-31]

Chapter 102

The Prediction of the Events Which Happened to Christ When He Was Born. Why God Permitted It.

1 And what comes next: “My hope has been from my mother’s breasts. I was cast upon you from the womb. From my mother’s belly you are my God, for there is no one to help me. Many calves have surrounded me; fat bulls have closed me in. They opened their mouths against me like a lion tearing its prey and roaring. All my bones were poured out like water and scattered. My heart has become like wax melting in the middle of my belly. My strength has dried up like a piece of pottery, and my tongue is stuck to my throat.” In these words he was announcing in advance what has happened.^[390] 2 Take first the words “My hope has been from my mother’s breasts.” As soon as he was born in Bethlehem, as I said earlier, King Herod learned about him from the Magi who came from Arabia and plotted to kill him. By God’s command Joseph took him, together with Mary, and went away to Egypt. For the Father had decided that the one he had begotten would be put to death only after he had grown to manhood and proclaimed the word that came from him.^[391] [Matthew 2:1-3; Matthew 2:13-14]

3 But suppose someone says to us, “Could God not rather have killed Herod?” I answer in advance: could God not have removed even the serpent at the very beginning, so that he did not exist, instead of saying, “And I will put enmity between him and the woman, and between his seed and her seed”? Could he not have made a great crowd of people all at once?^[392] [Genesis 3:15] 4 But because he knew it was good that things be this way, he made both angels and men free to practice righteousness. He also set limits of time, for as long as he knew it was good for them to have that freedom. And because he knew that this was likewise good, he carried out judgments, both general and particular, while still keeping their freedom intact. This is why the Word says the following about the building of the tower and the many voices and changing of languages: “And the Lord said, Behold, there is one race and one language for all, and this is what they have begun to do. And now none of all that they set their hands to do will fail them.”^[393] [Genesis 11:6]

5 The words “My strength dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue has stuck to my throat” were likewise a prediction of what he would do according to the Father’s will. His mighty word had power, and by it he always refuted the Pharisees and scribes who argued with him, and, in short, the teachers of your people. That power was halted, like a full and powerful spring whose water has been turned away. This happened when he fell silent and, before Pilate, no longer wished to give any answer to anyone, as is shown in the memoirs of his apostles. It happened so that what was said through Isaiah might bear effective fruit, where it says, “The Lord gives me a tongue, so that I may know when I must speak a word.”^[394] [Matthew 27:14; Mark 15:5; Isaiah 50:4] 6 His saying, “You are my God, do not stand far from me,” also teaches that everyone must hope in God, who made all things, and must look for salvation and help from him alone. They must not think, as the rest of men do, that they can be saved through birth, wealth, strength or wisdom. You too have always acted like that. At one time you made a calf, and you have always shown yourselves ungrateful, murderers of the righteous, and puffed up because of your descent.^[395]

7 The Son of God is shown saying that he cannot be saved on the ground that he is a son, or strong, or wise. Instead he says that, sinless as he is, he cannot be saved without God. Isaiah says that he did not sin even in what he said: “for he did no lawlessness, nor was there deceit in his mouth.” If that is so, how can you, or the others who expect to be saved without this hope, not see that you are deceiving yourselves?^[396] [Isaiah 53:9]

Chapter 103

The Pharisees are the Bulls: the Roaring Lion is Herod or the Devil.

1 What the psalm says next is this: “For trouble is near, for there is no one to help me. Many calves have surrounded me; fat bulls have closed in on me. They opened their mouth against me like a lion tearing its prey and roaring. All my bones were poured out like water and scattered.” This too was a prediction of what happened to him. On that night, men from your people came against him on the Mount of Olives, sent by the Pharisees, scribes and teachers. They surrounded him, and these are the ones the Word called goring calves, doomed to an early end.^[397] 2 By saying, “Fat bulls have closed in on me,” he foretold the men who did the same as the calves when he was led to your teachers. The Word called these men bulls because we know that bulls are the cause of there being calves. Just as bulls are the fathers of calves, so your teachers were the cause of their children going out to the Mount of Olives to seize him and bring him to them. The words “there is no one to help” also point to what happened. Not even one man was there to help him, sinless as he was.

3 The words “They opened their mouth against me like a roaring lion” point to the king of the Jews at that time, who was also called Herod. He was the successor of the Herod who killed all the children born in Bethlehem at the time Christ was born. That earlier Herod did it because he supposed that the child the Magi from Arabia had told him about must be among them. He did not know the plan of the One who is stronger than all. That One had ordered Joseph and Mary to take the child and go away to Egypt. They were to stay there until it was revealed to them that they should return to their own country. They went and stayed there until Herod, who had killed the children in Bethlehem, died and Archelaus took his place. Archelaus also died before Christ came to carry out the plan that was to be fulfilled by his being crucified, according to the Father’s will.^[398] [Matthew 2:13; Matthew 2:16; Matthew 2:22]

4 Then Herod, who succeeded Archelaus, received the authority given to him. Pilate, to do him a favor, sent Jesus to him bound. God had foreseen this and said beforehand: “And they bound him and carried him off to the Assyrian as a gift to the king.”^[399] [Luke 23:7; Hosea 10:6] 5 Or else, by the lion roaring against him, the Psalm meant the devil. Moses calls him the serpent. In Job and Zechariah he is called the devil, and Jesus addressed him as Satan. By that name Jesus showed that the devil had acquired a compound name from what he had done. In the language of the Jews and Syrians, “sata” means apostate, and “nas” is the word that, when translated, means serpent. From these two words together comes the single name Satanas.^[400] [Genesis 3:1; Job 1:6; Zechariah 3:1] 6 For it is written in the memoirs of the apostles that as soon as Jesus came up from the river Jordan, when the voice said to him, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you,” this devil came to him and tempted him. He went so far as to say to him, “Worship me.” Christ answered him, “Get behind me, Satan. You shall worship the Lord your God, and serve him alone.” For just as the devil had led Adam astray, he said he could do something against Christ as well.^[401] [Psalm 2:7; Luke 3:22; Matthew 4:9-10; Luke 4:8]

7 The words “My bones were all poured out like water and scattered; my heart became like wax melting in the middle of my belly” were a prediction of what happened to him that night, when men went out against him to the Mount of Olives to seize him. 8 It is written in the memoirs, which I say were composed by his apostles and those who followed them, that sweat poured down from him like thick drops while he prayed and said, “If it is possible, let this cup pass.” His heart was plainly trembling, and his bones as well, and his heart was like wax melting inside his belly. This was so that we would know that the Father willed that his own Son should truly go through such sufferings for our sake. It was also so that we would not say that he, being the Son of God, did not feel what was being done to him and what was happening to him.^[402] [Luke 22:44; Matthew 26:39]

9 The words “My strength was dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue is stuck to my throat” were also a prediction, as I said before, of his silence. He had shown all your teachers to be without wisdom, yet on that occasion he answered nothing at all. [Matthew 27:14]

Chapter 104

Circumstances of Christ's Death are Predicted in This Balm.

1 The words “You brought me down to the dust of death, for many dogs surrounded me; a gathering of evildoers closed in on me. They dug into my hands and my feet; they counted all my bones. They themselves looked closely at me and stared at me. They divided my garments among themselves, and cast lots for my clothing” were, as I said, a prediction of the kind of death to which the gathering of evildoers would condemn him. He calls them dogs, and by that he shows that they were hunters. They were the very ones who hunted him down and gathered together, struggling to get him condemned. This too is written in the memoirs of his apostles as having happened.^[403] 2 I have already shown that after he was crucified, those who crucified him divided his garments among themselves. [Matthew 27:35; John 19:23-24]

Chapter 105

The Psalm Also Predicts the Crucifixion and the Subject of the Last Prayers of Christ on Earth.

1 The next part of the Psalm reads: “But you, Lord, do not keep your help far from me; attend to my aid. Deliver my soul from the sword, and my only-begotten from the hand of the dog. Save me from the mouth of the lion, and my humiliation from the horns of the unicorns.” Again this is teaching and foretelling of what was true of him and what was going to happen to him. I have already shown that he was the only-begotten of the Father of all things, begotten from him in a unique way as Word and Power, and that he afterward became man through the virgin, as we have learned from the memoirs.^[404] 2 It was likewise foretold that he would die by crucifixion. For the words “Deliver my soul from the sword, and my only-begotten from the hand of the dog; save me from the mouth of the lion, and my humiliation from the horns of the unicorns” also point to the kind of suffering by which he was to die, that is, crucifixion. I have already explained to you that “the horns of the unicorns” represent the shape of the cross and nothing else.^[405]

3 His asking that his soul be saved from the sword, the mouth of the lion and the hand of the dog was a request that no one should gain power over his soul. He asked this so that we too, when we come to the end of our life, may ask the same thing of God, who is able to turn away every shameless evil angel so that it cannot seize our souls. 4 I showed you that souls continue to exist from the fact that the soul of Samuel was called up by the medium, as Saul demanded. It also appears that the souls of all righteous men and prophets of that kind came under the power of such powers as the very facts show were at work in that medium.^[406] 5 For this reason God teaches us, through his Son as well, to strive by every means to become righteous, and at our departure to ask that our souls not fall under any such power. For when he gave up his spirit on the cross, he said, “Father, into your hands I entrust my spirit.” I learned this too from the memoirs.^[407] [Luke 23:46]

6 It is also written in the memoirs that he urged his disciples to surpass the way of life of the Pharisees, and warned them that otherwise they should know they would not be saved. He said: “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”^[408] [Matthew 5:20]

Chapter 106

Christ's Resurrection is Foretold in the Conclusion of the Psalm.

1 The rest of the Psalm shows several things. He knew that his Father would give him everything he asked and would raise him from the dead. He urged all who fear God to praise God, because through the mystery of this crucified one God had shown mercy to every race of believing people. And he stood in the midst of his brothers, the apostles. After he rose from the dead, they were convinced by him that even before his suffering he had told them he must suffer these things, and that the prophets had announced them beforehand. They then repented of having deserted him when he was crucified. And while he was with them, he sang praise to God, as the memoirs of the apostles also show. 2 The words are these: “I will declare your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing praise to you. You who fear the Lord, praise him; all the seed of Jacob, glorify him; let all the seed of Israel fear him.”^[409]

3 It is also said that he gave one of the apostles the new name Peter, and this is written in his memoirs as having happened. It is also written that he gave two other brothers, the sons of Zebedee, the name Boanerges, which means “sons of thunder.” This was a sign that he is the one through whom the surname Israel was given to Jacob, and through whom Hoshea was given the name Jesus. By that name the people who were left of those who came out of Egypt were brought into the land promised to the patriarchs.^[410] [Mark 3:16-17; Genesis 32:28; Numbers 13:16] 4 Moses also showed that he would rise like a star from the race of Abraham, saying: “A star will rise out of Jacob, and a leader out of Israel.” Another Scripture says: “Behold, a man; his name is Rising.” So when a star rose in heaven at the very time of his birth, as is written in the memoirs of his apostles, the Magi from Arabia recognized the sign from it, came, and worshiped him.^[411] [Numbers 24:17; Zechariah 6:12; Matthew 2:1-2]

Chapter 107

The Same is Taught from the History of Jonah.

1 The memoirs also show that he was to rise on the third day after being crucified. It is written there that some of your own people were arguing with him and said, “Show us a sign.” He answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to them except the sign of Jonah.” When he said this, his meaning was veiled: his hearers were to understand that after he was crucified he would rise on the third day.^[412] [Matthew 12:38-39; Matthew 16:4] 2 He was showing that your generation was more wicked and more adulterous than the city of Nineveh. When Jonah had been thrown up on the third day from the belly of the great fish, he preached to the Ninevites that after three days they would all be destroyed. Then they proclaimed a fast for every living creature, men and animals alike. They put on sackcloth and cried out earnestly, and they truly repented from the heart and renounced injustice. They believed that God is merciful and kind to all who turn from evil. Even the king of that city and his nobles put on sackcloth and kept up the fast and the pleading, and they obtained their request that their city not be overthrown.^[413] [Jonah 2:10]

3 But Jonah was upset that the city was not overthrown on the third day, as he had proclaimed. By God’s arrangement a gourd plant grew up for him out of the ground, and he sat under it and was shaded from the heat. The gourd came up suddenly: Jonah had neither planted nor watered it, but it sprang up at once to give him shade. By a further arrangement it then dried up, and Jonah grieved over it. So God rebuked him for being wrongly discouraged because the city of Nineveh had not been overthrown. He said:^[414] [Jonah 4:1; Jonah 4:6-9] 4 “You took pity on the gourd, though you did not labor over it, nor did you make it grow. It came in a night and perished in a night. And shall I not spare Nineveh, the great city, in which more than a hundred and twenty thousand people live, who do not know their right hand from their left, and many animals as well?”^[415] [Jonah 4:10-11]

Chapter 108

The Resurrection of Christ Did Not Convert the Jews. But Through the Whole World They Have Sent Men to Accuse Christ.

1 All of your people know these things that happened with Jonah. Christ also cried out among you that He would give you the sign of Jonah. He was urging you that, at least after He had risen from the dead, you would repent of the evil things you had done. He wanted you to weep before God as the Ninevites did, so that your nation and your city would not be captured and destroyed, as they have been.^[416] [Matthew 12:39] 2 Yet when you learned that He had risen from the dead, not only did you not repent, but, as I said before, you appointed chosen men and sent them out into the whole world. They announced: “A godless and lawless sect has arisen from a certain Jesus, a Galilean deceiver. We crucified him, but his disciples stole him by night from the tomb where he was laid after he was unnailed from the cross. Now they deceive people by saying that he has risen from the dead and gone up to heaven.” You also accused Him of having taught the godless, lawless and unholy things that you tell every race of people about those who confess Him to be Christ, Teacher, and Son of God.^[417] [Matthew 28:13]

3 On top of this, even though your city has been captured and your land laid waste, you do not repent. You even dare to curse Him and all who believe in Him. We do not hate you, nor those who because of you have formed such opinions about us. Instead we pray that even now all of you will repent and receive mercy from God, the Father of all, who is tenderhearted and rich in mercy.^[418]

Chapter 109

The Conversion of the Gentiles Has Been Predicted by Micah.

1 Now, as for the Gentiles, bear with me while I say a few words from the prophecy of Micah, one of the Twelve. He foretold that they would repent of the evil in which they had lived in error, when they heard the word preached from Jerusalem by His apostles and learned it through them.^[419] 2 These are his words: “And in the last days the mountain of the Lord will be plainly seen, established on the top of the mountains, lifted up above the hills. Peoples will make a river flow to it, and many nations will go and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord and to the house of the God of Jacob. They will give us light about His way, and we will walk in His paths.’ For out of Zion will go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He will judge between many peoples and will rebuke strong nations far away. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, and they will not learn war any more.”^[420] [Micah 4:1-3]

3 And each man will sit under his own vine and under his own fig tree, and there will be no one to frighten him, for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken. For all the peoples will walk in the name of their gods, but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever. And in that day, I will gather her who was afflicted, and I will assemble her who was thrust out, and her whom I had brought low. I will make the afflicted one a remnant, and the crushed one a strong nation. And the Lord will reign over them on Mount Zion from now on and forever.^[421] [Micah 4:4-7]

Chapter 110

A Portion of the Prophecy Already Fulfilled in the Christians: the Rest Shall Be Fulfilled at the Second Advent.

1 When I had finished these quotations, I added: I know, gentlemen, that your teachers admit that all the words of this passage were spoken about the Christ. I also know that they say he has not yet come. Or if they say he has come, they say it is not known who he is, but when he becomes visible and glorious, then, they say, it will be known who he is. 2 And then, they say, what is spoken in this passage will come to pass, as if no fruit at all had yet come from the words of the prophecy. You senseless people! You do not understand what has been shown through all these passages: that two comings of him have been announced. One is the coming in which he was proclaimed as suffering, without glory, without honor, and crucified. The other is the coming in which he will arrive from heaven with glory. That will be when the man of apostasy, who also speaks outrageous things against the Most High, will dare to do lawless things on the earth against us Christians. We have come to know the worship of God from the law and the word that went out from Jerusalem through the apostles of Jesus, and we have fled for refuge to the God of Jacob and the God of Israel.^[422] [Daniel 7:25; 2 Thessalonians 2:3; Micah 4:2]

3 We were filled with war, mutual slaughter, and every kind of wickedness. But every one of us, all over the earth, has changed our weapons of war: our swords into plows, and our spears into farming tools. Now we farm godliness, righteousness, love for humanity, faith, and the hope that comes from the Father himself through the one who was crucified. Each of us sits under his own vine; that is, each of us has relations only with his own lawfully married wife. For you know that the prophetic word says, “And his wife is like a thriving vine.”^[423] [Micah 4:3; Micah 4:4] 4 It is plain that no one can frighten us or make us slaves, we who have believed in Jesus all over the earth. We are beheaded, crucified, thrown to wild beasts, and subjected to chains, fire, and all the other tortures, and it is clear that we do not abandon our confession. On the contrary, the more such things happen, the more other people, in ever greater numbers, become believers and worshippers of God through the name of Jesus. If someone cuts away the parts of a vine that have borne fruit, it sends up other shoots that are healthy and fruitful. The same thing happens with us. For the vine planted by God and by Christ the Savior is his people. [Micah 4:4]

5 The rest of the prophecy will be fulfilled at his second coming. As for “the afflicted and thrust-out one,” that is, thrust out of the world: as far as you and all other people are concerned, every Christian has been driven out not only from his own possessions but from the whole world, since you and they allow no Christian to live.^[424] [Micah 4:6] 6 You say that this has happened to your own people. But if you were driven out after being attacked in war, you have suffered this justly, as all the Scriptures testify. We, however, have done nothing of the kind since coming to know the truth of God. Yet God testifies about us, together with Christ, the most righteous, the only one without stain or sin, that we are being taken away from the earth. For Isaiah cries out: “See how the righteous man has perished, and no one takes it to heart. Righteous men are taken away, and no one pays attention.”^[425] [Isaiah 57:1]

Chapter 111

The Two Advents Were Signified by the Two Goats. Other Figures of the First Advent, in Which the Gentiles are Freed by the Blood of Christ.

1 I said earlier that Moses too foretold, in symbols, that there would be two comings of this Christ. I showed this through the symbol of the goats offered at the fast. Again, what Moses and Joshua did announced the same thing in advance, in symbol and in word. Moses stretched out his hands and stayed on the hill until evening, with his hands held up, and this shows a type of nothing other than the cross. The other, who had his name changed to Jesus, led the battle, and Israel won.^[426] [Exodus 17:11-12; Numbers 13:16] 2 It is possible to see that this happened in the case of both of those holy men, prophets of God: one of them was not able to carry both mysteries. I mean the type of the cross and the type of bearing the name. This power belongs to one alone. It was his, it is his, and it will be his. Every ruling power fears his name and is in agony, because they are going to be destroyed through him. So our Christ, who suffered and was crucified, was not cursed by the law. Rather, he showed that he alone would save those who do not fall away from faith in him.^[427] [Deuteronomy 21:23]

3 And when the firstborn of the Egyptians were being destroyed, the blood of the passover rescued those who were saved in Egypt. It had been smeared on both doorposts and on the lintel. For the passover was Christ, who was sacrificed later, as Isaiah also said: “He was led like a sheep to the slaughter.” It is written that you seized him on the day of the passover, and that you likewise crucified him at the passover. Just as the passover blood saved those in Egypt, so the blood of Christ will rescue from death those who have believed.^[428] [Exodus 12:7; 1 Corinthians 5:7; Isaiah 53:7] 4 Would God, then, have been mistaken if this sign had not been put on the doors? I do not say that. I say that God was announcing in advance the salvation that was going to come to the human race through the blood of Christ. The scarlet thread was a symbol in the same way. Joshua son of Nun sent spies to Jericho, and they gave the thread to Rahab the prostitute. They told her to tie it to the window through which she had let them down so that they would escape their enemies. This thread likewise showed the symbol of the blood of Christ. By that blood, people from all the nations who were once sexually immoral and unrighteous are saved. They receive forgiveness of sins and no longer sin.^[429] [Exodus 12:13; Joshua 2:15; Joshua 2:18]

Chapter 112

The Jews Expound These Signs Jejunely and Feebly, and Take Up Their Attention Only with Insignificant Matters.

1 But you explain these things in a lowly way, and so you charge God with great weakness. That is what happens if you hear them in this bare, literal way and do not examine the meaning of what was said. By that reasoning Moses too would be judged a lawbreaker. He commanded that no likeness be made of anything in heaven, on earth or in the sea. Yet he himself then made a bronze serpent, set it up on a standard, and told those who had been bitten to look at it. And they were saved by looking at it.^[430] [Exodus 20:4; Numbers 21:8-9] 2 Are we then to understand that the serpent saved the people at that time? As I said before, God cursed that serpent from the beginning, and he will destroy it with the great sword, as Isaiah cries out. Are we to accept such things as foolishly as your teachers say, and not as symbols? Shall we not rather refer the sign to the image of Jesus who was crucified? After all, Moses with his outstretched hands, together with the one who was called by the name Jesus (Joshua), brought about the victory of your people.^[431] [Genesis 3:14; Isaiah 27:1; Exodus 17:11-12]

3 In this way we will stop being puzzled about what the lawgiver did. He was not abandoning God and persuading the people to put their hope in a beast, the creature through which transgression and disobedience began. This was done and said by the blessed prophet with great insight and mystery. And there is nothing at all in what any of the prophets said or did that anyone can justly blame, if you have the knowledge that is in them. 4 But suppose all your teachers explain to you only why female camels are not mentioned in this passage, or what the so-called female camels are, or why the offerings call for so many measures of fine flour and so many measures of oil. And suppose they explain these things in a lowly and earthbound way, while they never dare to speak of or explain the great matters that deserve inquiry. Or suppose that when we explain them, they order you not to listen at all and not to join in conversation with us. Will they not deserve to hear what our Lord Jesus Christ said to them? “Whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful outside and inside are full of dead men’s bones, paying tithes on mint but swallowing the camel, blind guides!”^[432] [Matthew 23:27; Matthew 23:23-24]

5 So you must despise the teachings of those who exalt themselves and want to be called “Rabbi, Rabbi.” You must come to the words of the prophets with such firm resolve and understanding that you suffer from your own people the same things the prophets themselves suffered. Unless you do this, you can get no benefit at all from the writings of the prophets.^[433] [Matthew 23:7]

Chapter 113

Joshua Was a Figure of Christ.

1 Here is what I mean. As I have said many times, Moses gave the name Jesus (Joshua) to the man called Oshea, who was sent with Caleb to spy out the land of Canaan. You do not ask why he did this. You are not puzzled by it, and you do not care to find out. So Christ has escaped your notice. You read, but you do not understand. Even now, when you hear that Jesus is our Christ, you do not stop to reason that this name was not given to that man idly or by chance.^[434] [Numbers 13:16] 2 But you offer theological explanations of why one alpha was added to Abraham’s first name. In the same way you make grand speeches about why one rho was added to Sarah’s name. Yet you do not ask in the same way why the name Oshea, the son of Nun, which his father had given him, was changed completely to Jesus.^[435] [Genesis 17:5; Genesis 17:15]

3 His name was not the only thing changed. He also became Moses’ successor. Of all the grown men who came out of Egypt, he alone led the people who were left into the holy land. Moses did not do this; he did. And he distributed the land by lot to those who entered with him. In the same way Jesus the Christ will bring back the scattered people and will give the good land to each one. But it will no longer be done in the same way.^[436] 4 For Joshua gave them a temporary inheritance, since he was not the Christ who is God, nor the Son of God. But Jesus Christ will give us an eternal possession after the holy resurrection. Joshua had earlier been renamed Jesus, and he had received strength from His Spirit when he made the sun stand still. For I have shown that it was Jesus who appeared to Moses, to Abraham, and to all the other patriarchs without exception, and who spoke with them, serving the Father’s will. He also came to be born as a man of the virgin Mary, and he exists forever.^[437] [Joshua 10:12-13]

5 For this is the one from whom and through whom the Father will make the heaven and the earth new. This is the one who will shine as an eternal light in Jerusalem. This is the one who is king of Salem after the order of Melchizedek, and who is the eternal priest of the Most High.^[438] [Isaiah 60:19-20; Genesis 14:18] 6 Joshua is said to have circumcised the people a second time with knives of stone. This was a proclamation in advance of the circumcision with which Jesus Christ himself has circumcised us from stones and other idols. He gathered into heaps those from the uncircumcision, that is, from the error of the world, who in every place have been circumcised with knives of stone. These knives are the words of Jesus our Lord. For I have shown that through the prophets Christ was proclaimed in parables as a stone and a rock.^[439] [Joshua 5:2-3] 7 So we will understand the knives of stone to be his words. Through them so many who were wandering in error have been circumcised from their uncircumcision with a circumcision of the heart. From that time on, through Jesus (Joshua), God urged that even those who had the circumcision that began with Abraham should be circumcised in this way. He did so when he said that Jesus (Joshua) had circumcised those who entered that holy land a second time with knives of stone.^[440] [Joshua 5:2]

Chapter 114

Some Rules for Discerning What is Said About Christ. The Circumcision of the Jews is Very Different from that Which Christians Receive.

1 Sometimes the Holy Spirit caused something to be done in plain sight which was a type of what was going to happen. Sometimes he spoke words about things that were still to come, speaking as if they were happening then or had already happened. Readers who do not know this skill will not be able to follow the words of the prophets as they should. So I will give some prophetic words as an example, so that you may follow what I am saying. 2 When he says through Isaiah, “He was led like a sheep to slaughter, and like a lamb before its shearer,” he speaks as though the suffering had already happened. And when he says again, “I spread out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people,” and when he says, “Lord, who has believed our report?”, these words too are spoken as if announcing things already done. For I have shown that Scripture often calls Christ a stone in parable, and in figurative speech calls him Jacob and Israel.^[441] [Isaiah 53:7; Isaiah 65:2; Isaiah 53:1]

3 And again, when he says, “I will see the heavens, the works of your fingers,” I must understand how he uses words, or I will not hear it with understanding. I would hear it the way your teachers claim it should be heard. They suppose that the Father of all, the unbegotten God, has hands, feet, fingers and a soul, like a composite living creature. For this reason they teach that it was the Father himself who appeared to Abraham and to Jacob.^[442] [Psalm 8:3] 4 Blessed are we, then, who have been circumcised a second time with knives of stone. Your first circumcision was and is done with iron, for you remain hard of heart. But our circumcision is the second in order, and it appeared after yours. It comes through sharp stones, that is, through the words of the cornerstone, the stone cut out without hands, spoken through the apostles. It circumcises us from idolatry and, in short, from every kind of wickedness. Our hearts have been so circumcised from evil that we even rejoice to die for the name of the good Rock. That Rock makes living water spring up in the hearts of those who through him have loved the Father of all, and it gives the water of life to drink to all who are willing.^[443] [Joshua 5:2; Isaiah 28:16; Daniel 2:34; Revelation 22:17]

5 But you do not understand me when I say these things. You have not understood what was prophesied that the Christ would do, and you do not believe us when we point you to what has been written. For Jeremiah cries out like this: “Woe to you, because you have forsaken the living fountain and have dug for yourselves broken cisterns, which will not be able to hold water. Is the place where Mount Zion stands to be a desert? For I gave Jerusalem a certificate of divorce in front of you.”^[444] [Jeremiah 2:13; Isaiah 16:1; Jeremiah 3:8]

Chapter 115

Prediction About the Christians in Zechariah. The Malignant Way Which the Jews Have in Disputations.

1 But you ought to believe Zechariah, who shows the mystery of the Christ in a parable and proclaims it in a hidden way. These are his words: “Rejoice and be glad, daughter of Zion, for look, I am coming, and I will dwell in the midst of you, says the Lord. Many nations will be joined to the Lord on that day, and they will be my people. I will dwell in the midst of you, and they will know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you.”^[445] [Zechariah 2:10-11] 2 “The Lord will take possession of Judah and his portion in the holy land, and he will again choose Jerusalem. Let all flesh be in awe before the face of the Lord, for he has been roused from his holy clouds. And he showed me Jesus, the high priest, standing before the angel of the Lord. The devil stood at his right hand to oppose him. And the Lord said to the devil, ‘May the Lord, who chose Jerusalem, rebuke you. Look, is this not a brand plucked out of the fire?’”^[446] [Zechariah 2:12-13; Zechariah 3:1-2]

3 Trypho was about to answer and argue with me, so I said: “First wait and hear what I have to say. I am not going to give the explanation you expect, as though there had been no priest named Jesus in the land of Babylon, where your people were captives. Even if I were to argue that way, I would show that there was indeed a priest named Jesus among your people. But the prophet did not see the man himself in his revelation. In the same way, he did not see the devil and the angel of the Lord with his own eyes while in his ordinary state. He saw them in a trance, when a revelation was given to him.”^[447] 4 “But now I say this. It was said that the son of Nun, through the name Jesus, did certain mighty deeds and acts that announced in advance what our Lord would do. In the same way, I now come to show that the revelation given among your people concerning Jesus the priest in Babylon was an announcement in advance of what our Priest would do. He is God and Christ, the Son of the Father of all.”^[448]

5 “Indeed, I was already wondering,” I said, “why you stayed silent a little while ago when I was speaking, and why you did not catch me out when I said that the son of Nun was the only one of his own age group who came out of Egypt and entered the holy land, along with those listed as underage in that generation. For you rush to sores and settle on them like flies.”^[449] 6 “For even if someone says ten thousand things well, if there is one small thing that does not please you, or that you do not understand, or that is not exact, you pay no attention to the many good things. You seize on the little remark and work hard to make it out to be impiety and wrong. So when God judges you by the same standard, you will have to give an account all the more for your own great acts of daring. These may be evil deeds or worthless interpretations, which you twist the text to produce. For it is just that you should be judged by the judgment with which you judge.”^[450] [Matthew 7:2]

Chapter 116

It is Shown How This Prophecy Suits the Christians.

1 But to give you the account of the revelation of the holy Jesus Christ, I take up my argument again. I say that this revelation too was given for us, who believe in Christ, this crucified One, as our High Priest. We were living in fornication and, simply put, in every kind of filthy practice. But through the grace that comes from our Jesus, according to the will of his Father, we have stripped off all the filthy evils we were clothed in. The devil stands over us continually as our opponent, wanting to drag everyone to himself. But the angel of God, that is, the power of God sent to us through Jesus Christ, rebukes him, and he withdraws from us.^[451] [Zechariah 3:1-4] 2 And we are like people snatched out of a fire. We have been cleansed from our former sins, and rescued from the affliction and the fiery trial that the devil and all his servants bring on us. Jesus the Son of God snatches us out of these yet again. He has promised to clothe us in the garments prepared for us, if we keep his commandments, and he has promised to provide an eternal kingdom.^[452] [Zechariah 3:2]

3 That Jesus, whom the prophet calls a priest, appeared wearing filthy clothes, because he is said to have taken a prostitute as a wife. He was called a brand snatched from the fire because he had received forgiveness of sins, and the devil who opposed him was rebuked. In the same way, we have believed in God, the maker of all things, through the name of Jesus, as one man. Through the name of his firstborn Son we have taken off the filthy clothes, that is, our sins. We were set on fire by the word of his calling, and we are the true high-priestly race of God. God himself bears witness to this when he says that in every place among the Gentiles people offer him pure sacrifices that please him. God accepts sacrifices from no one except through his priests.^[453] [Zechariah 3:1-4; Malachi 1:11]

Chapter 117

Malachi's Prophecy Concerning the Sacrifices of the Christians. It Cannot Be Taken as Referring to the Prayers of Jews of the Dispersion.

1 So God, speaking beforehand, testifies that all the sacrifices made through this name are pleasing to him. These are the sacrifices Jesus the Christ handed down for us to perform, that is, at the thanksgiving of the bread and the cup, which Christians offer in every place on earth. But he rejects the sacrifices made by you and by those priests of yours. He says: “I will not accept your sacrifices from your hands. For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name has been glorified among the Gentiles, he says, but you profane it.”^[454] [Malachi 1:10-12] 2 Yet even now, in your love of quarreling, you say this. You say that God does not accept the sacrifices offered in Jerusalem by the people who lived there at that time and were called Israelites. But you say that he said he accepts the prayers of the people of that race who were then scattered abroad, and that he calls their prayers sacrifices. Now I myself also say that prayers and thanksgivings, when offered by worthy people, are the only perfect sacrifices that please God.

3 These are the only sacrifices that Christians too have been taught to offer. They offer them at the memorial of their food, both dry and liquid, in which they also recall the suffering the Son of God endured for them. The chief priests and teachers of your people have caused his name to be profaned and blasphemed over all the earth. You have put filthy clothes on all who have become Christians through the name of Jesus. But God will show that these clothes are taken off us when he raises everyone. He will set some, incorruptible, immortal and free from grief, in an eternal kingdom that will never be dissolved, and he will send others away to the eternal punishment of fire.^[455] [Matthew 25:46] 4 You and your teachers deceive yourselves when you explain that the word spoke about people of your race in the dispersion, and that it meant their prayers and sacrifices, offered in every place, were pure and pleasing. Understand that you are lying and trying in every way to deceive yourselves. First of all, even now your race does not extend from the rising of the sun to its setting. There are nations among whom not one of your race has ever lived. [Malachi 1:11]

5 For there is no race of people at all among whom prayers and thanksgivings are not offered to the Father and Maker of all through the name of the crucified Jesus. This is true whether they are barbarians or Greeks or are called by any other name at all, whether they are wagon-dwellers, or people called homeless, or herdsmen living in tents. Next, when the prophet Malachi said this, your dispersion over the whole earth, as widely as you are now scattered, had not yet happened. The Scriptures themselves show this.

Chapter 118

He Exhorts to Repentance Before Christ Comes; In Whom Christians, Since They Believe, are Far More Religious Than Jews.

1 So stop your love of quarreling, and repent before the great day of judgment comes. On that day all those from your tribes who pierced this Christ will mourn, as I showed from Scripture that it was foretold. I have also explained that the Lord swore “after the order of Melchizedek,” and what that statement means. I said earlier that Isaiah’s prophecy, “His burial has been taken away from the midst,” was about the Christ who was going to be buried and to rise again. And I have said in many places that this same Christ is the judge of all the living and the dead.^[456] [Zechariah 12:10; Isaiah 57:2; Acts 10:42] 2 Nathan likewise spoke of him to David and said: “I will be a father to him, and he will be a son to me. I will not take my mercy away from him, as I did from those before him. I will establish him in my house and in his kingdom forever.” The prince in the house, of whom Ezekiel speaks, is none other than this same one. For the Christ, as Son of God, is the chosen priest and eternal king. Do not think that Isaiah or the other prophets say that at his second coming sacrifices of blood or drink offerings will be brought to the altar. They speak of true and spiritual praises and thanksgivings.^[457]

3 It is not for nothing that we have believed in him, and we were not led astray by those who taught us this. It happened by God’s wonderful providence. Through the calling of the new and eternal covenant, that is, of Christ, we were to be found wiser and more devout than you. You are thought to be lovers of God and people of understanding, but you are not.^[458] 4 Isaiah marveled at this and said: “Kings will shut their mouths. For those who were told nothing about him will see, and those who have not heard will understand. Lord, who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” I went on, “Trypho, in saying these things I am trying, as far as is possible, to say the same things again for the sake of those who have come with you today. But I am doing it briefly and in shortened form.”^[459] [Isaiah 52:15; Isaiah 53:1]

5 He replied, “You do well. Even if you say the same things again at greater length, know that I and those with me are glad to listen.”

Chapter 119

Christians are the Holy People Promised to Abraham. They Have Been Called Like Abraham.

1 Then I said again, “Gentlemen, do you think we could ever have understood these things in the Scriptures, if we had not received, by the will of the One who willed it, the grace to understand them? So that what was said by Moses might also come true: 2 ‘They provoked me with strange gods; with their abominations they embittered me. They sacrificed to demons whom they did not know. New and recent gods have come, whom their fathers did not know. You abandoned God who begot you, and forgot God who nourishes you. And the Lord saw, and was jealous, and was provoked to anger by the wrath of his sons and daughters. He said, “I will turn my face away from them, and I will show what will happen to them at the last. For they are a perverse generation, sons in whom there is no faith. They made me jealous with what is not God; they provoked me to anger with their idols. And I will make them jealous with what is not a nation; with a senseless nation I will provoke them to anger. For a fire has been kindled by my anger, and it will burn down to Hades. It will devour the earth and its produce, and set the foundations of the mountains ablaze. I will heap evils upon them.”’^[460]

3 After that righteous one was put to death, we sprang up again as another people. We shot up as new and flourishing ears of grain, as the prophets said: “And many nations will take refuge with the Lord on that day, to be his people, and they will settle in the middle of the whole earth.” We are not only a people but a holy people, as we have already shown: “And they will call it a holy people, redeemed by the Lord.”^[461] [Zechariah 2:11; Isaiah 62:12] 4 So we are not a contemptible people, or a barbarian tribe, or a nation like the Carians or the Phrygians. God has chosen us too, and he made himself plain to those who did not ask after him. “Behold, I am God,” he says, “to a nation, to those who did not call on my name.” For this is the nation that God promised long ago to Abraham, when he announced that he would make him the father of many nations. He did not mean the Arabians, the Egyptians or the Idumeans, since Ishmael also became the father of a great nation, and so did Esau, and there is now a great multitude of Ammonites. Noah, moreover, was the father of Abraham himself and, put simply, of the whole human race, and different men were the forefathers of different peoples.^[462] [Isaiah 65:1; Genesis 17:5]

5 What more, then, does Christ grant to Abraham here? This: he called him by his voice with a calling like ours, telling him to go out from the land in which he lived. By that same voice he has called all of us. We have already come out from the way of life in which we lived, spending our days in evil like the other inhabitants of the earth. With Abraham we shall inherit the holy land, and we shall receive the inheritance for endless ages, because we are children of Abraham through the same faith.^[463] [Genesis 12:1; Galatians 3:7] 6 Abraham believed the voice of God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. In the same way we have believed the voice of God, spoken again through the apostles of Christ and proclaimed to us through the prophets. We have renounced everything in the world, even to the point of death. So God promises Abraham a nation of like faith, God-fearing and righteous, one that gladdens the Father. He does not promise it to you, “in whom is no faith.”^[464] [Genesis 15:6; Deuteronomy 32:20]

Chapter 120

Christians Were Promised to Isaac, Jacob, and Judah.

1 Notice, though, that God promises the same things to Isaac and to Jacob. For he says to Isaac, “And in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.” To Jacob he says, “And in you all the tribes of the earth shall be blessed, and in your seed.” He does not say this to Esau, or to Reuben, or to anyone else. He says it only to those from whom Christ was to come, according to the plan carried out through the virgin Mary.^[465] [Genesis 26:4; Genesis 28:14] 2 If you will also study the blessing of Judah, you will see what I mean. The seed is divided from Jacob and comes down through Judah, Phares, Jesse and David. This was a symbol that some of your race would be found to be children of Abraham and would be found in the portion of Christ. Others would be children of Abraham, but only like the sand on the seashore. That sand is barren and fruitless. There is a great deal of it, too much to count, yet it bears no fruit at all and only drinks the water of the sea. The great multitude in your race is shown to be like this. They drink down teachings of bitterness and godlessness, and they spit out the word of God.^[466] [Genesis 22:17]

3 In the blessing of Judah it says: “A ruler shall not fail from Judah, nor a leader from his thighs, until he comes for whom it is laid up, and he shall be the expectation of the nations.” It is clear that this was said not about Judah but about Christ. For all of us from all the nations do not look for Judah. We look for Jesus, who also led your fathers out of Egypt. For the prophecy was looking ahead to the coming of Christ when it said: “Until he comes for whom it is laid up, and he shall be the expectation of the nations.”^[467] [Genesis 49:10] 4 So he has come, as we have shown at length, and Jesus is expected to appear again above the clouds. You profane his name, and you work hard to have it profaned over all the earth. I could have argued with you, gentlemen, I said, about the wording that you explain as “Until the things laid up for him come.” The Seventy did not translate it that way. They wrote, “Until he comes for whom it is laid up.”^[468] [Daniel 7:13; Genesis 49:10]

5 But the words that follow show that this was said about Christ. For it reads: “And he will be the expectation of the nations.” So I am not coming to argue with you over a small point of wording. In the same way, I have not tried to prove my case about Christ from the Scriptures you do not accept, which I quoted earlier, from the words of the prophet Jeremiah, of Ezra, and of David. I have argued from the Scriptures you still accept to this day. If your teachers had understood those, be well assured they would have made them disappear. They did this with the account of the death of Isaiah, whom you sawed in two with a wooden saw. That too was a mystery pointing to Christ. He is going to cut your people in two. He will count the worthy, together with the holy patriarchs and prophets, fit for the eternal kingdom. As he has already said, he will send the others, together with similar disobedient and unrepentant people from all the nations, to the condemnation of the unquenchable fire.^[469] [Genesis 49:10]

6 “For they will come,” he said, “from the west and the east, and will recline at table with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of the heavens. But the sons of the kingdom will be thrown out into the outer darkness.” I say this, I said, because I care about nothing except speaking the truth. I will not hold back out of regard for anyone, even if I must be torn limb from limb by you right now. I did not hold back even out of concern for anyone of my own people, I mean the Samaritans. When I addressed Caesar in writing, I said they were being led astray by trusting the magician Simon, who came from their own people. They say he is God above every rule, authority and power.^[470] [Matthew 8:11-12; Ephesians 1:21]

Chapter 121

From the Fact that the Gentiles Believe in Jesus, It is Evident that He is Christ.

1 While they stayed silent, I went on: My friends, when the Scripture speaks about this Christ through David, it no longer says that the nations will be blessed in his seed, but in him. It reads this way: “His name is for ever; it will rise above the sun; and in him all the nations will be blessed.” But if all the nations are blessed in Christ, and we from all the nations believe in him, then he is the Christ, and we are the ones blessed through him.^[471] 2 God had earlier given the sun to be worshipped, as it is written. Yet no one has ever been seen to endure death out of faith in the sun. But for the name of Jesus you can see people of every race who have endured, and still endure, every kind of suffering rather than deny him. For the word of truth and wisdom is more fiery than the sun, and brighter than the sun’s powers, and it goes down into the depths of the heart and mind. So the word of Scripture said, “Above the sun his name will rise.” And again Zechariah says, “His name is the Rising.” And speaking about the same person he said, “Tribe by tribe they will mourn.”^[472] [Deuteronomy 4:19; Zechariah 6:12; Zechariah 12:12]

3 Now at his first coming he was without honor, without beauty, and despised. Yet he shone and prevailed so much that he is unknown in no race. People from every race have repented of the old evil way of life of their own people. Even demons are subject to his name, and all rulers and kingdoms fear his name more than they fear all the dead. So at his glorious coming, will he not by every means destroy all who hated him and unjustly turned away from him? And will he not give rest to his own people, giving them everything they hope for?^[473] [Isaiah 53:2-3; Luke 10:17] 4 To us, then, it has been given to hear and understand, to be saved through this Christ, and to know all the things of the Father. This is why he said to him: “It is a great thing for you to be called my servant, to set up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the scattered people of Israel. I have made you a light for the nations, so that you may be their salvation to the end of the earth.”^[474] [Isaiah 49:6]

Chapter 122

The Jews Understand This of the Proselytes Without Reason.

1 You think these words were spoken about the “stranger” and the proselytes. In fact they were spoken about us, who have been enlightened through Jesus. Otherwise Christ would have borne witness to those people too. But as it is, “you become twice as much sons of Gehenna,” as he himself said. So what was said through the prophets was not said to them but to us. Of us the word says: “I will lead the blind by a way they did not know, and they will walk paths they never knew. And I am a witness, says the Lord God, and so is my servant whom I have chosen.”^[475] [Matthew 23:15; Isaiah 42:16; Isaiah 43:10] 2 Who, then, does Christ bear witness to? Clearly, to those who have believed. But the proselytes not only do not believe; they blaspheme his name twice as much as you do. They also want to kill and torture us who believe in him, for in every way they are eager to become like you.^[476]

3 And again in other passages he cries out: “I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness, and I will take hold of your hand and strengthen you, and I will appoint you as a covenant for a race, as a light for the nations, to open the eyes of the blind, to bring out of their chains those who are bound.” Gentlemen, these words too were spoken to Christ and about the enlightened Gentiles. Or will you say again, “He is speaking of the law and the proselytes”?^[477] [Isaiah 42:6-7] 4 And some of those who had come on the second day cried out, as if they were in a theatre, “Well, what? Does he not speak of the law and of those who are enlightened by it? And these are the proselytes.” 5 “No,” I said, looking at Trypho. “If the law had the power to enlighten the nations and those who hold it, what need would there be of a new covenant? But God announced beforehand that he would send a new covenant, an everlasting law and a commandment. So we will not understand these words of the old law and its proselytes, but of Christ and his proselytes, that is, of us Gentiles, whom he has enlightened. As he says somewhere: ‘Thus says the Lord: In an acceptable time I heard you, and in a day of salvation I helped you, and I gave you as a covenant of nations, to establish the earth and to inherit desolate places as an inheritance.’”^[478] [Isaiah 49:8; Jeremiah 31:31]

6 “What, then, is Christ’s inheritance? Is it not the nations? What is God’s covenant? Is it not Christ? As he says elsewhere: ‘You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, and the ends of the earth as your possession.’”^[479]

Chapter 123

Ridiculous Interpretations of the Jews. Christians are the True Israel.

1 “Just as all these words were spoken to Christ and about the Gentiles, so you should suppose the earlier ones were too. For the proselytes have no need of a covenant, since one and the same law is laid down for all who are circumcised. About them the Scripture speaks like this: ‘And the stranger will also be added to them, and will be added to the house of Jacob.’ The proselyte who is circumcised, so as to join the people, is like a native-born Israelite. But we, though thought worthy to be called a people, are still Gentiles, because we are uncircumcised.”^[480] [Isaiah 14:1] 2 “It is also ridiculous for you to think that the eyes of the proselytes have been opened but not yours, and that you are the ones called blind and deaf while they are the enlightened ones. It will become still more ridiculous if you claim that the law was given to the Gentiles, when you yourselves have not understood that law.”

3 “For if you had known it, you would have feared God’s anger, and you would not be lawless, wandering sons. You would be ashamed to hear him say, time after time: ‘Sons, in whom there is no faith’; and, ‘Who is blind, but my servants, and who is deaf, but those who rule over them? And the servants of God have been made blind. You have often seen, and you did not take heed; your ears are open, and you did not hear.’”^[481] [Deuteronomy 32:20; Isaiah 42:19-20] 4 “Is this God’s praise of you a fine one? Is this the kind of testimony God gives that suits servants? You are not ashamed, though you hear the same things again and again, and you do not shudder when God threatens you. You are a foolish and hard-hearted people. ‘Therefore, behold, I will go on to remove this people,’ says the Lord, ‘and I will remove them, and I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and hide the understanding of the prudent.’ And rightly so. For you are neither wise nor prudent, but shrewd and crafty. You are wise only in doing evil, but unable to know the hidden counsel of God, or the faithful covenant of the Lord, or to find the everlasting paths.”^[482] [Isaiah 29:14; Jeremiah 4:22]

5 “That is why he says, ‘I will raise up for Israel and for Judah the seed of men and the seed of beasts.’ And through Isaiah he speaks like this about another Israel: ‘On that day there will be a third Israel among the Assyrians and the Egyptians, blessed in the land which the Lord of hosts blessed, saying: Blessed will be my people who are in Egypt and in Assyria, and Israel my inheritance.’”^[483] [Jeremiah 31:27; Isaiah 19:24-25] 6 So God blesses this people, calls them Israel, and declares aloud that they are his inheritance. Why, then, do you not repent of deceiving yourselves, as if you alone were Israel, and of cursing the people whom God has blessed? For when he was speaking to Jerusalem and the lands around it, he went on to say: “And I will bring forth men upon you, my people Israel, and they will inherit you, and you will be their possession, and you will never again be bereaved of them.”^[484] [Ezekiel 36:12]

7 “What then?” said Trypho. “Are you Israel? Is he saying these things about you?” I said to him: “If we had not already spent a long time on this subject, I might have doubted whether you were asking out of ignorance. But we have brought this question to a conclusion too, with proof and with your agreement. So I do not think you are ignorant of what was said earlier, or that you want to quarrel again. I think you are calling on me to give the same proof to these men as well.” 8 He signaled his agreement with his eyes, and I went on: “Again, in Isaiah, if you have ears to hear it, God speaks about the Christ in a figure and calls him Jacob and Israel. He says: ‘Jacob is my servant; I will uphold him. Israel is my chosen one; I will put my Spirit upon him, and he will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not quarrel or cry out, and no one will hear his voice in the streets. A crushed reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not put out. But he will bring it forth to truth. He will take up justice, and he will not be broken, until he has set justice on the earth. And in his name the nations will hope.’”^[485] [Isaiah 42:1-4]

9 “Just as your whole race was called Jacob and Israel after that one man Jacob, who was also named Israel, so we too take our names from Christ, who gave us birth to God. Like him, we are called Jacob and Israel and Judah and Joseph and David. We are called true children of God, and that is what we are, we who keep the commandments of Christ.”^[486] [1 John 3:1]

Chapter 124

Christians are the Sons of God.

1 When I saw that they were disturbed because I said that we too are children of God, I spoke before they could ask a question. I said: “Listen, gentlemen, to what the Holy Spirit says about this people: that they are all sons of the Most High, and that this very Christ will be present in their assembly, carrying out judgment on every race of people.” [Psalm 82:1; Psalm 82:6] 2 “These words were spoken through David, and as you translate them, they run like this: ‘God stands in the assembly of gods; in their midst he judges the gods. How long will you judge unjustly and show favor to sinners? Give judgment for the orphan and the poor; do justice to the lowly and the needy. Rescue the needy, and deliver the poor from the hand of the sinner. They did not know and did not understand; they walk about in darkness. All the foundations of the earth will be shaken. I said, “You are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most High. But you die like a man, and you fall like one of the rulers.” Rise up, O God, judge the earth, for you will take all the nations as your inheritance.’”^[487]

3 “But in the Septuagint version it is written: ‘Behold, you die like men, and fall like one of the rulers.’ This is to show the disobedience of human beings, I mean Adam and Eve, and the fall of one of the rulers, that is, the one called the serpent, who fell with a great fall because he led Eve astray.”^[488] 4 “But my argument now is not aimed at that point. I want to show you that the Holy Spirit rebukes human beings. They were made like God, free from suffering and death, if they kept his commands, and he counted them worthy to be called his sons. Yet they become like Adam and Eve and bring death on themselves. So take the interpretation of the psalm however you wish. Even so, it has been shown that they were counted worthy to become gods, and that all of them were counted worthy to be able to become sons of the Most High. It is also shown that they will be judged and condemned through their own fault, as Adam and Eve were. And that he also calls the Christ God has been shown in many places.”^[489] [Psalm 82:6]

Chapter 125

He Explains What Force the Word Israel Has, and How It Suits Christ.

1 “I wanted, gentlemen,” I said, “to learn from you what the name Israel means.” They stayed silent, so I went on: “I will tell you what I know. I do not think it right to keep quiet when I know something. Nor do I think it right to keep worrying about you, even if I suspect that you do know and are deceiving yourselves out of envy or out of inexperience. Rather, I should say everything plainly and without guile, as my Lord said: ‘The sower went out to sow the seed. Some fell on the road, some among the thorns, some on rocky ground, and some on good ground.’”^[490] [Luke 8:5-8; Matthew 13:3-8] 2 So I must speak in the hope that there is good ground somewhere. That Lord of mine is strong and powerful, and he will come and demand what is his from everyone. He will not condemn his steward if he recognizes him as faithful. Such a steward knows that his lord is powerful and will come to demand what is his. So he gives it out at every banker’s table and has not buried it for any reason at all.”^[491] [Luke 19:23]

3 “Now the name Israel means this: a man who overcomes power. For ‘isra’ means ‘a man overcoming,’ and ‘el’ means ‘power.’ This was foretold through the mystery of the wrestling match in which Jacob wrestled with the one who appeared. He appeared because he served the Father’s will, but he was God because he is the firstborn child of all created things. In this way it was prophesied that Christ, once he became man, would also struggle.”^[492] [Genesis 32:24; Colossians 1:15] 4 “For when he became man, as I said before, the devil came to him. I mean that power which is also called the serpent and Satan. He tempted him and tried to bring him down by demanding that he worship him. But Christ broke him and threw him down. He proved the devil wicked, since, contrary to the Scripture, he demanded to be worshipped as God, having become a rebel against God’s purpose. For Christ answered him, ‘It is written: You shall worship the Lord your God and serve him alone.’ Then the devil, defeated and exposed, withdrew.”^[493] [Matthew 4:10; Luke 4:8; Deuteronomy 6:13]

5 “But our Christ was also going to be ‘numbed,’ that is, to be in pain and to feel his suffering, when he was about to be crucified. He announced this in advance too, by touching Jacob’s thigh and making it go numb. Israel, however, had been his name from of old. He gave this name to the blessed Jacob, blessing him with his own name. By this he also proclaimed that all who take refuge in the Father through him are the blessed Israel. But you have understood none of this and are not preparing to understand it. Because you are children of Jacob by physical descent, you expect to be saved no matter what. But I have shown in many places that you deceive yourselves in this too.”^[494] [Genesis 32:25; Genesis 32:28]

Chapter 126

The Various Names of Christ According to Both Natures. It is Shown that He is God, and Appeared to the Patriarchs.

1 “But who is this one? If you knew, Trypho,” I said, “you would not blaspheme him, now that he has come, been born, suffered and ascended into heaven. He is called at one time the Angel of great counsel, and a Man through Ezekiel, and like a Son of Man through Daniel, and a Child through Isaiah. Through David he is called Christ and God to be worshipped. Through many he is called Christ and Stone, through Solomon Wisdom, and through Moses Joseph, Judah and a Star. Through Zechariah he is called the Rising, and through Isaiah again the Suffering One, Jacob and Israel. He has also been called a Rod, a Flower, a Cornerstone and the Son of God. He will be present again, and then your twelve tribes will mourn.”^[495] [Isaiah 9:6; Daniel 7:13; Isaiah 11:1; Matthew 24:30] 2 “If you had understood what the prophets said, you would not have denied that he is God, the Son of the only, unbegotten and unutterable God. For it is said somewhere through Moses in Exodus: ‘The Lord spoke to Moses and said to him, I am the Lord. I appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as their God, and I did not make my name known to them, and I established my covenant with them.’” [Exodus 6:2-4]

3 “And again he speaks this way: ‘A man wrestled with Jacob.’ And he says that this was God, for he says that Jacob said, ‘I saw God face to face, and my soul was saved.’ He also recorded that Jacob named the place where the man wrestled with him, appeared to him and blessed him, ‘Form of God.’”^[496] [Genesis 32:24; Genesis 32:30] 4 Moses also says that God appeared to Abraham in the same way, by the oak of Mamre, while Abraham was sitting at the door of his tent at midday. After saying this he continues: “And lifting up his eyes he saw, and behold, three men were standing over him. And when he saw them, he ran to meet them.” A little later one of them promises Abraham a son: “Why did Sarah laugh, saying, ‘Shall I really bear a child? I am old.’ Is any word impossible with God? At this time I will return, at the appointed season, and Sarah shall have a son.” And they depart from Abraham.^[497] [Genesis 18:1-2; Genesis 18:13-14]

5 Again he speaks of them in this way: “And the men rose up from there and looked down toward Sodom.” Then again the one who was and is speaks to Abraham in this way: “I will not hide from my servant Abraham what I am about to do.” I repeated what follows in the writings of Moses, as I had explained it before. By these passages, I said, it has been shown that this one who appeared to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and the other patriarchs, and who is recorded as God, is placed under the Father and Lord and serves his will.^[498] [Genesis 18:16-17] 6 I added something I had not said earlier: “So also, when the people longed to eat meat, Moses did not believe the one who in that passage too is called an angel, who promised that God would give them enough to be filled. And it is shown that he himself, being both God and an angel sent by the Father, said and did these things. For this is how the Scripture goes on: ‘And the Lord said to Moses, “Will the Lord’s hand not be enough? Now you will know whether my word will overtake you or not.”’ And again, in other words, it says: ‘But the Lord said to me, “You will not cross this Jordan. The Lord your God, who goes before your face, he will destroy the nations.”’”^[499] [Numbers 11:23; Deuteronomy 31:2-3]

Chapter 127

These Passages of Scripture Do Not Apply to the Father, But to the Word.

1 Many other things of this kind are said by the lawgiver and the prophets. I think I have said enough to show this: when my God says, “God went up from Abraham,” or “The Lord spoke to Moses,” or “The Lord came down to see the tower which the sons of men had built,” or when “God shut Noah in the ark from outside,” you must not suppose that the unbegotten God himself came down or went up from anywhere.^[500] [Genesis 17:22; Genesis 11:5; Genesis 7:16] 2 For the ineffable Father and Lord of all neither has arrived anywhere, nor walks, nor sleeps, nor rises. He remains in his own place, wherever it is, sharp in sight and sharp in hearing, not with eyes or ears but by an indescribable power. He oversees all things and knows all things, and none of us escapes his notice. He is not moved, for he cannot be contained by any place or by the whole world, since he existed even before the world came to be.

3 How then could he speak to anyone, or be seen by anyone, or appear in the smallest corner of the earth? The people at Sinai were not even able to look at the glory of the one he sent. Moses himself could not enter the tent he had made when it was filled with the glory from God. And the priest could not bear to stand before the temple when Solomon brought the ark into the house in Jerusalem which Solomon himself had built.^[501] [Exodus 40:35] 4 So neither Abraham, nor Isaac, nor Jacob, nor any other human being saw the Father, the ineffable Lord of absolutely all things, and of Christ himself. They saw the one who, by the Father’s will, is God, his Son, and is an angel because he serves the Father’s purpose. He is the one whom the Father also willed to be born a man through the virgin, and who once became fire when he spoke with Moses from the bush. [Exodus 3:2]

5 If we do not understand the Scriptures in this way, it will follow that the Father and Lord of all was not in heaven when it was said through Moses: “And the Lord rained on Sodom fire and sulfur from the Lord out of heaven.” The same would follow when it was said through David: “Lift up your gates, you rulers, and be lifted up, you everlasting gates, and the King of glory will come in,” and again when he says: “The Lord says to my Lord, ‘Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.’”^[502] [Genesis 19:24; Psalm 24:7; Psalm 110:1]

Chapter 128

The Word is Sent Not as an Inanimate Power, But as a Person Begotten of the Father's Substance.

1 Christ is Lord, and God, the Son of God. He appeared in power at an earlier time as a man and an angel, and in the glory of fire as at the bush. He also appeared at the judgment carried out on Sodom. All this has been demonstrated in much of what has been said. Then I went back over everything I had set out earlier from Exodus, about the vision at the bush and the naming of Jesus (Joshua), and I went on:^[503] 2 Gentlemen, do not suppose that I say these things so often out of mere wordiness. I know that some want to head off my argument. They say that the power from the Father of all which appeared to Moses, or to Abraham, or to Jacob is called an angel as it goes forth to men, because through it the Father’s messages are announced to men. They say it is called glory because it sometimes appears in a vision too great to be contained. They say it is sometimes called a man or a human being because it appears shaped in whatever forms the Father wishes. And they call it the Word because it carries the Father’s words to men.

3 They insist, however, that this power cannot be cut off or separated from the Father. They compare it to the light of the sun on earth, which they say cannot be cut off or separated from the sun in heaven. When the sun sets, the light goes away with it. In the same way, they say, the Father makes his power spring forth when he wishes, and when he wishes draws it back into himself. They teach that this is also how he makes the angels.^[504] 4 But it has been shown that there are angels, and that they remain always and are not dissolved back into that from which they came. This power is called God by the prophetic word, as has likewise been shown from many passages, and it is also called Angel. I examined briefly, in what I said earlier, how it is not distinct in name only, like the sun’s light, but is something different in number as well. I said that this power has been begotten from the Father by his power and will, but not by being cut off, as if the Father’s essence were divided. Everything else that is divided and cut is not the same afterward as it was before. By way of example, I had taken up the case of fires kindled from a fire. We see that they are other fires, yet the fire from which many can be kindled is not made any less, but stays the same.

Chapter 129

That is Confirmed from Other Passages of Scripture.

1 Now I will repeat once more the words I used to prove this. When it says, “The Lord rained fire from the Lord out of heaven,” the prophetic word shows that there are two in number. One is on earth, and it says he came down to see the outcry of Sodom. The other is in heaven. He is also the Lord of the Lord on earth, as his Father and God. He is the cause of his being powerful, and Lord, and God.^[505] [Genesis 19:24; Genesis 18:21] 2 Again, the word says that God said in the beginning, “Behold, Adam has become as one of us.” These words, “as one of us,” also point to number. They do not allow a figurative meaning, though the sophists try to explain them that way. They can neither state the truth nor understand it.^[506] [Genesis 3:22] 3 And it is said in Wisdom: “If I announce to you what happens day by day, I will remember to recount what has been from eternity. The Lord created me as the beginning of his ways, for his works. Before the age he founded me, in the beginning, before he made the earth, and before he made the depths, and before the springs of water came forth, before the mountains were settled. Before all the hills he begets me.”^[507] [Proverbs 8:22-25]

4 When I had said this, I added: Understand, my hearers, if you really give your minds to it. The word made clear that this offspring was begotten by the Father before absolutely all created things. And anyone at all would agree that what is begotten is different in number from the one who begets.

Chapter 130

He Returns to the Conversion of the Gentiles, and Shows that It Was Foretold.

1 When they all agreed, I said: I could now give some passages that I did not mention before. They were spoken in a veiled way by the faithful servant Moses. They read: “Rejoice, O heavens, together with him, and let all the angels of God worship him.” And I went on with the rest of the passage: “Rejoice, O nations, with his people, and let all the angels of God be strong in him. For he avenges the blood of his sons, and will avenge, and will repay vengeance to his enemies, and will repay those who hate him, and the Lord will cleanse the land of his people.”^[508] [Deuteronomy 32:43] 2 Having said this, he says that we, the nations, rejoice with his people. By his people I mean Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the prophets, and in short all those of that people who are pleasing to God, as we agreed earlier. But we will not take it to mean everyone of your race. For we know from Isaiah that the limbs of those who have transgressed will be devoured by worm and unquenchable fire, yet remain undying, so that they become a sight for all flesh.^[509] [Isaiah 66:24]

3 “I want to add to these, gentlemen,” I said, “some other words, taken from Moses’ own words. From them you can understand that from the beginning God scattered all people, with their nations and languages. Out of all the nations he took your nation for himself, a useless, disobedient and faithless nation. And he showed that those from every nation who choose to obey his purpose through Christ, whom he also calls Jacob and names Israel, must be Jacob and Israel, as I said earlier in many places.^[510] 4 For when he says, ‘Rejoice, you nations, with his people,’ he assigns them the same inheritance and gives them the same name. But by speaking of them as ‘nations’ who rejoice with his people, he speaks to the shame of your nation. You provoked him to anger by worshiping idols. In the same way he has deemed these people, who were idolaters, worthy to know his purpose and to inherit the inheritance that is with him.^[511] [Deuteronomy 32:43]

Chapter 131

How Much More Faithful to God the Gentiles are Who are Converted to Christ Than the Jews.

1 “I will also give the words that show God divided all the nations. They are these: ‘Ask your father, and he will tell you, your elders, and they will tell you. When the Most High divided the nations, as he scattered the sons of Adam, he set the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the sons of Israel. And the Lord’s portion became his people Jacob, and Israel the measured share of his inheritance.’” After saying this, I added that the Seventy translated it, “He set the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the angels of God.” But my argument loses nothing from this either, so I gave your interpretation.^[512] [Deuteronomy 32:7-9] 2 “And you yourselves, if you are willing to confess the truth, must admit that we are more faithful to God. God called us through the despised mystery of the cross, which is full of shame. Because of our confession, our obedience and our reverence, punishments even to the point of death have been inflicted on us by the demons and the devil’s army, with the help you have given them. We endure everything rather than deny Christ even in word, the Christ through whom we were called to the salvation that the Father prepared beforehand. We are more faithful—

3 than you, who were redeemed from Egypt with an upraised arm and a visitation of great glory. The sea was divided for you and became a dry road. On it God killed those who pursued you with a very great force and splendid chariots, by flooding over them the sea that had been made into a road for your sake. A pillar of light shone for you, so that, unlike every other people in the world, you might have your own light, which never failed and never set. He rained down bread for you to eat, the manna, through heavenly angels, so that you would not even need to make bread or go looking for it. And the water at Marah was made sweet.^[513] [Exodus 13:21; Exodus 16:4; Exodus 15:23-25] 4 A sign of the one who was going to be crucified also came about with the serpents that bit you, as I said before. God was giving you all these mysteries ahead of their proper times, yet you are always proved to have been ungrateful to him. It came about also through the type of Moses’ outstretched hands, when he and the man who was given the name Jesus were fighting Amalek. God said that the event should be written down. He said the name of Jesus was to be placed in your ears, saying, “This is the one who will wipe out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.”^[514] [Numbers 21:8-9; Exodus 17:11-12; Exodus 17:14]

5 It is plain that the memory of Amalek remained even after the son of Nun. But through Jesus who was crucified, God makes it plain that the demons are going to be destroyed and to fear his name. All rulers and kingdoms will likewise be wary of him. And those from every race of people who believe in him will be shown to be God-fearing and peaceable. Those symbols were advance announcements of everything concerning him. The things I related earlier, Trypho, point to the same thing.^[515] [Exodus 17:14] 6 So many quails were given to you when you craved meat that they could not be counted. For you, water also burst out of the rock. A cloud followed you to give shade from the heat and protection from the cold. It declared the pattern of another, new heaven and announced it in advance. The straps of your sandals did not break, your sandals did not wear out, and your clothes did not wear away. Even the clothes of the younger ones grew along with them.^[516] [Numbers 11:31-32; Exodus 17:6; Deuteronomy 29:5]

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Notes

[379] Compare Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34. In Justin’s Greek, the cry from the cross reads “O God, O God,” without “my.”

[380] Compare Matthew 26:36–44 and Mark 14:32–39 (Gethsemane, on the Mount of Olives, with Peter, James, and John).

[381] See Genesis 3:9 and 4:9.

[382] Judah’s blessing is Jacob’s in Genesis 49:8–12. Joseph’s blessing is probably Moses’ blessing in Deuteronomy 33:13–17, which Justin discussed earlier in the Dialogue. Both blessings are treated earlier in the work.

[383] “Firstborn ... before all created things” echoes Colossians 1:15–17. “Without beauty” echoes the description of the Servant in Isaiah 53:2–3.

[384] The older translation makes Adam the father “both of Himself and of those” listed. The Greek more naturally says “Adam himself was the father of these.” The argument still works: Adam is the ancestor of Mary’s forefathers, and so, by the principle in the next sentence, of her child.

[385] “East” translates the Greek anatolē, meaning the “rising” of the sun and so “the East.” In the Greek Old Testament it stands for the Hebrew word “Branch” in Zechariah 3:8 and 6:12, and elsewhere in the Dialogue (e.g. ch. 106) Justin applies Zechariah 6:12 to Christ. Here he lists the titles without citing particular verses.

[386] Luke 1:35, 38. Luke has “the Holy Spirit will come upon you”; Justin writes “the Spirit of the Lord.”

[387] Psalm 22:4–6 (21:5–7 in the Greek Old Testament).

[388] The Greek reads literally “he is a reproach to us, the men who believe in him.”

[389] Psalm 22:7–8. The mockery in the Gospels is at Matthew 27:39–43 (compare Mark 15:29–32). The words “and walk about” are not found in our Gospels.

[390] Psalm 22:9–15. Justin’s quotation passes over the words “Do not be far from me, for trouble is near” (verse 11) before “for there is no one to help me.”

[391] “Arabia” is Justin’s usual description of the Magi’s home. Matthew 2:1 says only “from the east.” For the flight to Egypt, see Matthew 2:13–14.

[392] The Greek phrase rendered “at the very beginning” can also mean “at all.”

[393] The older translation has “destruction of the tower.” The Greek word usually means “laying down” or “foundation,” so “building” is used here.

[394] The quotations are Psalm 22:15 and Isaiah 50:4.

[395] The quotation is from Psalm 22:10–11. The calf refers to Exodus 32.

[396] The Greek of this sentence is compressed; the phrase rendered “sinless as he is” literally reads “with respect to being sinless.”

[397] The meaning of the rare Greek word translated “doomed to an early end” is uncertain. The older translation has “prematurely destructive.”

[398] The quotation is Psalm 22:13. Matthew 2:1 says only that the Magi came “from the east”; Justin is the earliest known writer to say they came from Arabia.

[399] The quotation is Hosea 10:6 in the Greek version. In Hosea the words describe the calf idol of Samaria being carried off to Assyria. Justin applies them to Jesus being sent to Herod.

[400] Justin’s explanation of the word is not accurate. In Hebrew, “satan” means “adversary,” and the usual Hebrew word for serpent is “nachash.”

[401] The words at the Jordan match Psalm 2:7. They also match the reading of Luke 3:22 in a few ancient manuscripts. Most manuscripts have “You are my beloved Son; in you I am well pleased.” The temptation is in Matthew 4:1–11 and Luke 4:1–13, and Jesus’ answer quotes Deuteronomy 6:13.

[402] The Greek says only “like clots” or “thick drops” (thromboi). The older translation adds “of blood,” as in Luke 22:44. Luke 22:43–44 is missing from some early manuscripts, and Justin’s words here are an early witness to the passage.

[403] The quotation is Psalm 22:15–18 (Psalm 21 in the Greek numbering), quoted from the Greek version. “Dug into” translates the Greek verb ōryxan, which literally means “they dug.” The older translation and most English Bibles have “pierced.” The Hebrew wording of this line is disputed, and many Hebrew manuscripts read “like a lion.”

[404] “Memoirs” is Justin’s usual name for the Gospels.

[405] Justin’s earlier explanation is in chapter 91. There he says the horns of the unicorn in Deuteronomy 33:17 can stand only for the cross.

[406] The idea that righteous souls before Christ fell under the power of evil spirits is Justin’s own inference from this story. Scripture does not state it.

[407] The words on the cross are from Luke 23:46, which quotes Psalm 31:5.

[408] The saying is Matthew 5:20.

[409] Psalm 22:22–23 (Psalm 21:23–24 in the Greek Old Testament). “Congregation” translates “ekklēsia,” the same Greek word used for “church.”

[410] For the new names Peter and Boanerges, see Mark 3:16–17. “His memoirs” may mean Peter’s memoirs rather than Jesus’ memoirs. Some scholars take this as a reference to Mark’s Gospel, which early tradition linked with Peter and which alone records “Boanerges.” The Greek is ambiguous.

[411] For the star and the Magi, see Matthew 2:1–11. Matthew says only that the Magi came “from the east.” “From Arabia” is Justin’s own detail.

[412] The “memoirs” are the Gospels. Justin says elsewhere (First Apology 66) that these memoirs are called Gospels. Compare Matthew 12:38–40.

[413] “Wicked and adulterous generation” echoes Jesus’ words in Matthew 12:39. Justin’s “three days” follows the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint) at Jonah 3:4. The Hebrew text, followed by most English Bibles, has “forty days.” That is why the older translation adds “(in other versions, forty).”

[414] See Jonah 4:1–9.

[415] Jonah 4:10–11.

[416] For “the sign of Jonah,” see Matthew 12:39–41, 16:4, and Luke 11:29–30.

[417] Justin made the same charge earlier, in chapter 17. The story that the disciples stole the body also appears in Matthew 28:11–15.

[418] The older English has “long-suffering” for the Greek “polyeleos,” which means “of much mercy.”

[419] “The Twelve” are the twelve shorter prophetic books, the Minor Prophets, counted as one.

[420] Micah 4:1–3, which is nearly the same as Isaiah 2:2–4. Justin’s Greek says literally that peoples “will set a river” toward the mountain, a very literal rendering of the Hebrew verb for “flow,” which shares its root with the word for “river.” The usual Septuagint of Micah reads “peoples will hasten to it.”

[421] Micah 4:4–7.

[422] The older English has “the true worship of God”; the Greek has only “the worship of God” (θεοσέβεια).

[423] The swords, plows and vine come from Micah 4:3–4, quoted in chapter 109. Justin reads the “vine” as a man’s own wife, supporting this with Psalm 128:3 (127:3 in the Greek Old Testament), which reads “your wife,” not “his wife.”

[424] Justin is quoting Micah 4:6, part of the prophecy given in chapter 109; in the Greek, “the afflicted and thrust-out one” is feminine, as in Micah.

[425] The quotation is Isaiah 57:1.

[426] “Jesus” and “Joshua” are the same name in Greek (Ἰησοῦς). Moses renamed Hoshea “Joshua” (Numbers 13:16), and Justin relies on this.

[427] On the law’s curse, compare Deuteronomy 21:23 and Galatians 3:13; Justin discusses this curse at length in chapters 89–96.

[428] The quotation is Isaiah 53:7. Compare 1 Corinthians 5:7: “Christ, our passover lamb, has been sacrificed.”

[429] See Joshua 2:1, 15–21.

[430] See Exodus 20:4 and Numbers 21:8–9. The word for the “standard” or pole is σημεῖον, which also means “sign.” It is the word used in the Greek of Numbers 21:8, and Justin builds on it in the next section.

[431] For Moses’ outstretched hands and Joshua’s victory over Amalek, see Exodus 17:8–13.

[432] Justin combines phrases from Matthew 23:23–24, 27.

[433] Compare Matthew 23:7–8. Many manuscripts of Matthew 23:7 have the doubled “Rabbi, Rabbi.”

[434] Greek “Jesus” and Hebrew “Joshua” are the same name. Justin uses “Jesus” for both men, which is how the Greek Old Testament reads. “Oshea” here is Justin’s Αὐσῆς, i.e. Hoshea (Numbers 13:16).

[435] Justin’s Greek names the letters alpha (Abram to Abraham) and rho (Sarai to Sarah, which the Greek Old Testament spells Σάρα and then Σάρρα). See Genesis 17:5, 15.

[436] Justin says Joshua “alone” of the adults who left Egypt entered the land. Numbers 14:30 names Caleb as well.

[437] Joshua’s stopping of the sun is told in Joshua 10:12–14. “His Spirit” probably means the Spirit of Christ, though the Greek pronoun is ambiguous.

[438] The eternal light in Jerusalem recalls Isaiah 60:19–20. Melchizedek appears as king of Salem and priest of the Most High God in Genesis 14:18, and as a priest “forever after the order of Melchizedek” in Psalm 110:4 (compare Hebrews 7). Justin applies both titles to Christ.

[439] The second circumcision with stone knives is in Joshua 5:2–3. Justin’s word for “heaps” (thēmōnia, a stack, as of sheaves) is not the word the Greek Old Testament uses for the “hill of foreskins” in Joshua 5:3 (bounos). Still, he seems to have that scene in mind.

[440] The Greek perfect infinitive means Joshua “had circumcised” them, a completed past act (Joshua 5:2–3), so the older English rendering “would circumcise” does not match.

[441] The quotations are Isaiah 53:7, Isaiah 65:2 and Isaiah 53:1. Elsewhere in the Dialogue Justin argues that Christ is figuratively called Jacob and Israel.

[442] The quotation is Psalm 8:3 (8:4 in the Greek and Hebrew numbering).

[443] “Sharp stones” echoes the Greek of Joshua 5:2, where the stone knives are made from sharp rock. The “cornerstone” recalls Isaiah 28:16 and Psalm 118:22, and the “stone cut out without hands” recalls Daniel 2:34. Justin reads these as Christ, whose words come through the apostles’ preaching. The water of life for all who are willing echoes Revelation 22:17.

[444] Only the words about the fountain and the broken cisterns come from Jeremiah 2:13. The rest of the quotation is not found in that passage. It seems to combine wording like Isaiah 16:1 (Mount Zion as a desert) with the certificate of divorce in Jeremiah 3:8 or Isaiah 50:1.

[445] Justin quotes Zechariah 2:10–11 (2:14–15 in the Greek Old Testament), continuing in the next section to Zechariah 3:2.

[446] Where Hebrew-based Bibles read “his holy dwelling,” the Greek Old Testament that Justin uses reads “his holy clouds.”

[447] Justin does not deny that a priest named Joshua (Jesus) lived among the exiles. His point is that Zechariah saw him in a vision, not in person.

[448] In the Greek Old Testament, Joshua son of Nun is called “Jesus son of Nave.” This is why Justin links his name to Christ.

[449] Numbers 14:29–31 says that Caleb as well as Joshua would enter the land, along with those under twenty. Justin’s earlier claim that Joshua alone entered left out Caleb, a slip Trypho could have seized on.

[450] The last sentence echoes Jesus’ words in Matthew 7:2.

[451] Justin is applying the vision of Joshua the high priest in Zechariah 3. There Satan stands to oppose him, and Joshua’s filthy clothes are taken off.

[452] The older translation says Jesus “has promised again to deliver us.” The Greek says he does rescue us again now. The promise concerns the garments and the kingdom.

[453] God’s words about pure sacrifices offered in every place among the Gentiles come from Malachi 1:11.

[454] The quotation is from Malachi 1:10–12; “thanksgiving” translates eucharistia, the word from which “Eucharist” comes.

[455] The “filthy clothes” recall Zechariah 3:3–5, where the filthy garments of Joshua the high priest are taken off him. Justin discussed that passage in the chapters just before this one.

[456] The mourning of those who pierced him alludes to Zechariah 12:10–12 (compare Revelation 1:7). “After the order of Melchizedek” is from Psalm 110:4. “His burial has been taken away from the midst” is the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint) of Isaiah 57:2, which Justin has quoted earlier in the Dialogue.

[457] The older translation puts a quotation in Ezekiel’s mouth (“There shall be no other prince in the house but He”). The Greek has only Justin’s paraphrase: Ezekiel’s “prince in the house” is none other than Christ. The “prince” (or “leader”) appears in Ezekiel’s vision of the new temple (for example Ezekiel 44:3).

[458] “Providence” translates pronoia, God’s forethought and care.

[459] The quotation is Isaiah 52:15–53:1 in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), which has “Lord” at the start of 53:1. Paul quotes these verses in Romans 15:21 and 10:16, and John quotes Isaiah 53:1 in John 12:38.

[460] Deuteronomy 32:16–23, from the Song of Moses, quoted from the Greek Old Testament. Paul quotes verse 21 (“I will make them jealous with what is not a nation”) in Romans 10:19.

[461] The first quotation is close to Zechariah 2:11, though there the nations dwell “in your midst” rather than “in the middle of the whole earth.” The second is from Isaiah 62:12.

[462] “He made himself plain to those who did not ask after him” and the words that follow come from Isaiah 65:1, which Paul also quotes in Romans 10:20. Our texts of Isaiah read “Here I am” rather than “I am God.” The promise to make Abraham “the father of many nations” is Genesis 17:4–5.

[463] The call to leave his land is Genesis 12:1. For believers as children of Abraham through faith, compare Galatians 3:7.

[464] “Renounced” translates a Greek verb that means to say farewell to something or to bid it goodbye.

[465] The promises are Genesis 26:4 (to Isaac) and Genesis 28:14 (to Jacob).

[466] The blessing of Judah is Genesis 49:8–12. Phares is Perez, son of Judah (Genesis 38:29; Ruth 4:18–22). “Like the sand on the seashore” echoes the promise to Abraham in Genesis 22:17.

[467] Justin believes that Christ, before he was born as a man, was the one who led Israel out of Egypt. In chapter 75 he links this to Exodus 23:20–21, where God says of the angel sent before Israel, “my name is in him.” In Greek, “Jesus” and “Joshua” are the same name.

[468] The “Seventy” are the translators of the Greek Old Testament (the Septuagint). Justin says they wrote “for whom it is laid up.” However, the wording he attributes to the Jews, “the things laid up for him,” is also widely found in surviving Septuagint manuscripts of Genesis 49:10. The difference is a matter of variant readings.

[469] The Old Testament does not record how Isaiah died. The story that he was sawn in two comes from later Jewish tradition, and Hebrews 11:37 likely alludes to it (“they were sawn in two”).

[470] Justin was born in Flavia Neapolis (modern Nablus) in Samaria. His family was probably Gentile, but he still calls the Samaritans his people. His written address to the emperor is his First Apology, which speaks of Simon in chapters 26 and 56. For Simon, compare Acts 8:9–10.

[471] Justin is quoting Psalm 72:17 (Psalm 71 in the Greek numbering) freely. The Septuagint reads “his name will endure before the sun.” “In his seed” refers to God’s promise to Abraham (Genesis 22:18).

[472] “Rising” (anatolē) can mean the rising of the sun, the east, or the dawn. In Zechariah 6:12 the Greek Old Testament uses it for the Hebrew word meaning “Branch.” “Tribe by tribe they will mourn” comes from Zechariah 12:12.

[473] The words “without honor, without beauty, and despised” echo Isaiah 53:2–3.

[474] The quotation is Isaiah 49:6 from the Greek Old Testament, slightly abridged. The Greek word “pais” can mean “servant” or “child.” Here it translates the Hebrew word for “servant.”

[475] “Twice as much sons of Gehenna” echoes Jesus’ words to the scribes and Pharisees about their converts in Matthew 23:15. The prophetic quotations are Isaiah 42:16 and Isaiah 43:10.

[476] “Proselytes” are Gentiles who had converted to Judaism.

[477] The quotation is Isaiah 42:6–7. The older translation has “covenant of the people”; the Greek here says “covenant of a race” (genous).

[478] The quotation is Isaiah 49:8 (Greek Septuagint), where the Greek has “covenant of nations” (diathēkēn ethnōn).

[479] The quotation is Psalm 2:7–8.

[480] The quotation is Isaiah 14:1. The point seems to be that a circumcised proselyte joins Israel under the one law and needs no new covenant, while Gentile Christians remain “nations” yet are called God’s people, so the prophecies of a covenant for the nations refer to them.

[481] The quotations are Deuteronomy 32:20 and Isaiah 42:19–20.

[482] The quotation is Isaiah 29:14, and “wise only in doing evil” echoes Jeremiah 4:22.

[483] “Lord of hosts” translates “Lord of Sabaoth,” a Hebrew title meaning “Lord of hosts” (or armies).

[484] The quotation is Ezekiel 36:12, from the Greek Old Testament (the Septuagint).

[485] The Greek manuscript of Justin reads “he will take up justice.” The Septuagint reads “he will bring forth justice in truth; he will shine out and not be broken,” and the older translation follows that. Here Justin’s text is translated as it stands.

[486] The Greek here is compressed. The older translation renders it “like Jacob, and Israel, and Judah, and Joseph, and David.” Justin seems to mean that Christians bear these names because Christ bears them in the prophets (he has just shown Christ called “Jacob” and “Israel”). The wording “are called… and are” may echo 1 John 3:1.

[487] “As you translate them” contrasts the Jews’ own rendering with the Septuagint wording that Justin gives next. It is not certain which Jewish version Justin had in mind.

[488] The “Seventy” are the translators of the Greek Old Testament, the Septuagint. Their wording adds “Behold” and has “men” (plural) where the version in 124.2 has “a man.”

[489] “Free from suffering” renders the Greek apatheis, “not subject to suffering.”

[490] The Greek of the phrase about envy and inexperience is difficult; apeiria normally means “inexperience.”

[491] In the Greek, “if he recognizes him” could also mean “if the steward acknowledges him.” I have followed the more natural reading, in which the lord is still the subject.

[492] This is Justin’s explanation of the name. Modern scholars usually explain “Israel” differently, as something like “God strives” or “he struggles with God.”

[493] The temptation is told in Matthew 4:1–11 and Luke 4:1–13. Jesus’ reply quotes Deuteronomy 6:13 in the form found in Matthew 4:10 and Luke 4:8.

[494] The Greek word translated “from of old” (anōthen) can mean either “from the beginning” or “from above.”

[495] “The Rising” is the Greek word anatolē, which means the rising of the sun, or the east. In the Greek Old Testament it is used in Zechariah for the “Branch.”

[496] “Form of God” (Greek Eidos theou) is how the Greek Old Testament renders the place name Peniel in Genesis 32:30; in Hebrew the name means “Face of God.”

[497] Justin is quoting excerpts from Genesis 18:1–2 and 18:13–14 in the Greek Old Testament.

[498] The quotations are from Genesis 18:16–17; Justin had already gone through this passage earlier in the Dialogue (chapter 56).

[499] The two quotations are from Numbers 11:23 and Deuteronomy 31:2–3.

[500] The quotations are from Genesis 17:22, the frequent phrase “The Lord spoke to Moses,” Genesis 11:5, and Genesis 7:16.

[501] See Exodus 40:35 (Moses could not enter the tent of meeting) and 1 Kings 8:10–11 (the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud and the glory).

[502] The quotations are Genesis 19:24, Psalm 24:7 and Psalm 110:1. In Psalm 24:7 Justin follows the Greek Old Testament, which reads “Lift up your gates, you rulers,” where the Hebrew has “Lift up your heads, O gates.”

[503] In Greek, “Jesus” and “Joshua” are the same name. Earlier in the Dialogue (ch. 75), Justin argued from Exodus 23:20–21 (“my name is in him”) that the angel sent before Israel bore this name, the name Moses gave to Hoshea (Numbers 13:16).

[504] This is the view of Justin’s opponents, not his own. In the next section (128.4) he rejects it, arguing that this power is distinct in number from the Father and not like the sun’s light, and that angels exist permanently.

[505] The last phrase in the Greek can also be read as “the cause of his existence, and of his being powerful, Lord and God.”

[506] The quotation is Genesis 3:22.

[507] “Wisdom” here means the book of Proverbs, quoted from the Greek Old Testament (Proverbs 8:21a–25). The first sentence appears in the Greek version but not in the Hebrew text.

[508] This is from the Song of Moses (Deuteronomy 32:43), in the Greek form Justin used, which differs from the Hebrew text.

[509] The reference to the worm and fire is Isaiah 66:24.

[510] The scattering of the nations refers to Deuteronomy 32:8, part of the passage (Deuteronomy 32:7–9) that Justin goes on to quote.

[511] Justin is alluding to Deuteronomy 32:21, where God says Israel provoked him with idols and he will provoke them with “a people that is no people.”

[512] The quotation is Deuteronomy 32:7–9. “The Seventy” are the translators traditionally credited with the Greek Old Testament (the Septuagint). In verse 8 most Septuagint manuscripts read “angels of God,” while the standard Hebrew text reads “sons of Israel.” A Hebrew copy found among the Dead Sea Scrolls reads “sons of God.” Justin treats “sons of Israel” as the Jewish reading and “angels” as the Seventy’s.

[513] The Greek says the manna was given “through heavenly angels”; compare Psalm 78:25, where the manna is called “bread of angels.”

[514] The serpents are in Numbers 21:6–9, and Moses’ outstretched hands in Exodus 17:8–13. In Exodus 17:14 God tells Moses to write the event down and recite it in Joshua’s ears, and God says, “I will blot out the memory of Amalek.” Justin reads this as placing the name of Jesus in Israel’s ears, and as saying that Jesus himself will blot out Amalek.

[515] “Son of Nun” is Joshua. The Greek has “Naue,” the Septuagint spelling of Nun, which the older translation gives as “Nave.”

[516] Deuteronomy 8:4 says Israel’s clothes did not wear out in the wilderness, and 29:5 says their clothes and sandals did not wear out. The idea that the children’s clothes grew with them is not in the Bible; it seems to reflect a Jewish tradition.