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| Chapter X.—Proofs of the foregoing, drawn from the Gospels of Mark and Luke.
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Chapter X.—Proofs of the foregoing,
drawn from the Gospels of Mark and Luke.
1. Luke
also, the follower and disciple of the apostles, referring to Zacharias
and Elisabeth, from whom, according to promise, John was born, says:
“And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the
commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.”3394
And again, speaking of Zacharias: “And it
came to pass, that while he executed the priest’s office before God
in the order of his course, according to the custom of the priest’s
office, his lot was to burn incense;”3395
| 3395 Literally, “that he should place the
incense.” The next clause is most likely an interpolation for the
sake of explanation. | and he came to sacrifice,
“entering into the temple of the Lord.”3396
Whose angel Gabriel, also, who stands prominently in the presence
of the Lord, simply, absolutely, and decidedly confessed in his own
person as God and Lord, Him who had chosen Jerusalem, and had instituted
the sacerdotal office. For he knew of none other above Him; since, if he
had been in possession of the knowledge of any other more perfect God and
Lord besides Him, he surely would never—as I have already shown
—have confessed Him, whom he knew to be the fruit of a defect, as
absolutely and altogether God and Lord. And then, speaking of John, he
thus says: “For he shall be great in the sight of the Lord, and
many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And
he shall go before Him in the spirit and power of Elias, to make ready a
people prepared for the Lord.”3397
For
whom, then, did he prepare the people, and in the sight of what Lord was
he made great? Truly of Him who said that John had something even
“more than a prophet,”3398
and
that “among those born of women none is greater than John the
Baptist;” who did also make the people ready for the Lord’s
advent, warning his fellow-servants, and preaching to them repentance,
that
they might receive remission from the Lord when He
should be present, having been converted to Him, from whom they had been
alienated because of sins and transgressions. As also David says,
“The alienated are sinners from the womb: they go astray as soon as
they are born.”3399
And it was on account of
this that he, turning them to their Lord, prepared, in the spirit and
power of Elias, a perfect people for the Lord.
2. And again, speaking in reference to the angel, he
says: “But at that time the angel Gabriel was sent from God, who
did also say to the virgin, Fear not, Mary; for thou hast found favour
with God.”3400
And he says concerning
the Lord: “He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the
Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of His father
David: and He shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of His
kingdom there shall be no end.”3401
For who
else is there who can reign uninterruptedly over the house of Jacob for
ever, except Jesus Christ our Lord, the Son of the Most High God, who
promised by the law and the prophets that He would make His salvation
visible to all flesh; so that He would become the Son of man for this
purpose, that man also might become the son of God? And Mary, exulting
because of this, cried out, prophesying on behalf of the Church,
“My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God
my Saviour. For He hath taken up His child Israel, in remembrance of His
mercy, as He spake to our fathers, Abraham, and his seed for
ever.”3402
By these and such like
[passages] the Gospel points out that it was God who spake to the
fathers; that it was He who, by Moses, instituted the legal dispensation,
by which giving of the law we know that He spake to the fathers. This
same God, after His great goodness, poured His compassion upon us,
through which compassion “the Day-spring from on high hath looked
upon us, and appeared to those who sat in darkness and the shadow of
death, and has guided our feet into the way of peace;”3403
as Zacharias also, recovering from the state
of dumbness which he had suffered on account of unbelief, having been
filled with a new spirit, did bless God in a new manner. For all things
had entered upon a new phase, the Word arranging after a new manner the
advent in the flesh, that He might win back3404
| 3404 “Ascriberet Deo”—make
the property of God. | to God that human nature
(hominem) which had departed from God; and therefore men were
taught to worship God after a new fashion, but not another god, because
in truth there is but “one God, who justifieth the circumcision by
faith, and the uncircumcision through faith.”3405
But Zacharias prophesying, exclaimed, “Blessed be the Lord
God of Israel; for He hath visited and redeemed His people, and hath
raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David;
as He spake by the mouth of His holy prophets, which have been since the
world begun; salvation from our enemies, and from the hand of all that
hate us; to perform the mercy [promised] to our fathers, and to remember
His holy covenant, the oath which He swore to our father Abraham, that He
would grant unto us, that we, being delivered out of the hand of our
enemies, might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness
before Him, all our days.”3406
Then
he says to John: “And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of
the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare His
ways; to give knowledge of salvation to His people, for the remission of
their sins.”3407
For this is the knowledge of
salvation which was wanting to them, that of the Son of God, which John
made known, saying, “Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the
sin of the world. This is He of whom I said, After me cometh a man who
was made before me;3408
| 3408
Harvey observes that the Syriac, agreeing with the Latin here, expresses
priority in point of time; but our translation, without reason, makes it
the precedence of honour, viz., was preferred before me. The Greek
is, πρῶτός μου. |
because He was prior to me: and of His fulness have all we
received.”3409
This, therefore, was the knowledge of salvation; but [it did not
consist in] another God, nor another Father, nor Bythus, nor the Pleroma
of thirty Æons, nor the Mother of the (lower) Ogdoad: but the knowledge
of salvation was the knowledge of the Son of God, who is both called and
actually is, salvation, and Saviour, and salutary. Salvation, indeed, as
follows: “I have waited for Thy salvation, O Lord.”3410
And then again, Saviour: “Behold my God,
my Saviour, I will put my trust in Him.”3411
But as bringing salvation, thus: “God hath made known His
salvation (salutare) in the sight of the heathen.”3412
For He is indeed Saviour, as being the Son and
Word of God; but salutary, since [He is] Spirit; for he says: “The
Spirit of our countenance, Christ the Lord.”3413
But salvation, as being flesh: for “the Word was
made flesh, and dwelt among us.”3414
This
knowledge of salvation, therefore, John did impart to those repenting,
and believing in the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the
world.
3. And the angel of the Lord, he says,
appeared to the shepherds, proclaiming joy to them:
“For3415
there is born in the
house of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. Then [appeared] a
multitude of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying, Glory in the
highest to God, and on earth peace, to men of good will.”3416
| 3416 Thus found also in the
Vulgate. Harvey supposes that the original of Irenæus read according to
our textus receptus, and that the Vulgate rendering was adopted in
this passage by the transcribers of the Latin version of our author. [No
doubt a just remark.] There can be no doubt, however, that the reading
εὐδοκίας is supported
by many and weighty ancient authorities. [But on this point see the facts
as given by Burgon, in his refutation of the rendering adopted by late
revisers, Revision Revised, p. 41. London, Murray, 1883.]
| The falsely-called Gnostics say that these angels came from the
Ogdoad, and made manifest the descent of the superior Christ. But they
are again in error, when saying that the Christ and Saviour from above
was not born, but that also, after the baptism of the dispensational
Jesus, he, [the Christ of the Pleroma,] descended upon him as a dove.
Therefore, according to these men, the angels of the Ogdoad lied, when
they said, “For unto you is born this day a Saviour, who is Christ
the Lord, in the city of David.” For neither was Christ nor the
Saviour born at that time, by their account; but it was he, the
dispensational Jesus, who is of the framer of the world, the [Demiurge],
and upon whom, after his baptism, that is, after [the lapse of] thirty
years, they maintain the Saviour from above descended. But why did [the
angels] add, “in the city of David,” if they did not proclaim
the glad tidings of the fulfilment of God’s promise made to David,
that from the fruit of his body there should be an eternal King? For the
Framer [Demiurge] of the entire universe made promise to David, as David
himself declares: “My help is from God, who made heaven and
earth;”3417
and again: “In His
hand are the ends of the earth, and the heights of the mountains are His.
For the sea is His, and He did Himself make it; and His hands founded the
dry land. Come ye, let us worship and fall down before Him, and weep in
the presence of the Lord who made us; for He is the Lord our
God.”3418
The Holy Spirit evidently
thus declares by David to those hearing him, that there shall be those
who despise Him who formed us, and who is God alone. Wherefore he also
uttered the foregoing words, meaning to say: See that ye do not err;
besides or above Him there is no other God, to whom ye should rather
stretch out [your hands], thus rendering us pious and grateful towards
Him who made, established, and [still] nourishes us. What, then, shall
happen to those who have been the authors of so much blasphemy against
their Creator? This identical truth was also what the angels
[proclaimed]. For when they exclaim, “Glory to God in the highest,
and in earth peace,” they have glorified with these words Him who
is the Creator of the highest, that is, of super-celestial things, and
the Founder of everything on earth: who has sent to His own handiwork,
that is, to men, the blessing of His salvation from heaven. Wherefore he
adds: “The shepherds returned, glorifying God for all which they
had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.”3419
For the Israelitish shepherds did not glorify another god, but
Him who had been announced by the law and the prophets, the Maker of all
things, whom also the angels glorified. But if the angels who were from
the Ogdoad were accustomed to glorify any other, different from Him whom
the shepherds [adored], these angels from the Ogdoad brought to them
error and not truth.
4. And still further does Luke say in reference to the
Lord: “When the days of purification were accomplished, they
brought Him up to Jerusalem, to present Him before the Lord, as it is
written in the law of the Lord, That every male opening the womb shall be
called holy to the Lord; and that they should offer a sacrifice, as it is
said in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtle-doves, or two young
pigeons:”3420
in his own person most
clearly calling Him Lord, who appointed the legal dispensation. But
“Simeon,” he also says, “blessed God, and said, Lord,
now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace; for mine eyes have seen Thy
salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all people; a
light for the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people
Israel.”3421
And
“Anna”3422
also, “the
prophetess,” he says, in like manner glorified God when she saw
Christ, “and spake of Him to all them who were looking for the
redemption of Jerusalem.”3423
| 3423 The text seems to be corrupt in the old Latin
translation. The rendering here follows Harvey’s conjectural
restoration of the original Greek of the passage. | Now by all
these one God is shown forth, revealing to men the new dispensation of
liberty, the covenant, through the new advent of His Son.
5. Wherefore also Mark, the interpreter and follower of
Peter, does thus commence his Gospel narrative: “The beginning of
the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God; as it is written in the
prophets, Behold, I send My messenger before Thy face, which shall
prepare Thy way.3424
| 3424 The
Greek of this passage in St. Mark i. 2 reads,
τὰς τρίβους αὐτοῦ, i.e., His
paths, which varies from the Hebrew original, to which the text of
Irenæus seems to revert, unless indeed his copy of the Gospels contained
the reading of the Codex Bezæ. [See book iii. cap. xii. 3, 14, below;
also, xiv. 2 and xxiii. 3. On this Codex, see Burgon, Revision
Revised, p. 12, etc., and references.] | The voice of one
crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make the paths
straight before our God.” Plainly does the
commencement of the Gospel quote the words of the holy prophets, and
point out Him at once, whom they confessed as God and Lord; Him, the
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who had also made promise to Him, that
He would send His messenger before His face, who was John, crying in the
wilderness, in “the spirit and power of Elias,”3425
“Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make
straight paths before our God.” For the prophets did not announce
one and another God, but one and the same; under various aspects,
however, and many titles. For varied and rich in attribute is the Father,
as I have already shown in the book preceding3426
this; and I
shall show [the same truth] from the prophets themselves in the further
course of this work. Also, towards the conclusion of his Gospel, Mark
says: “So then, after the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was
received up into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of
God;”3427
confirming what had been
spoken by the prophet: “The Lord said to my Lord, Sit Thou on
My right hand, until I make Thy foes Thy footstool.”3428
Thus God and the Father are truly one and the
same; He who was announced by the prophets, and handed down by the true
Gospel; whom we Christians worship and love with the whole heart, as the
Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things therein.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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