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| Chapter XV.—Proofs of the resurrection from Isaiah and Ezekiel; the same God who created us will also raise us up.
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Chapter XV.—Proofs of the
resurrection from Isaiah and Ezekiel; the same God who created us will also
raise us up.
1. Now, that He who at the
beginning created man, did promise him a second birth after his
dissolution into earth, Esaias thus declares: “The dead shall rise
again, and they who are in the tombs shall arise, and they who are in the
earth shall rejoice. For the dew which is from Thee is health to
them.”4575
And again: “I will
comfort you, and ye shall be comforted in Jerusalem: and ye shall see,
and your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall flourish as the grass;
and the hand of the Lord shall be known to those who worship
Him.”4576
And Ezekiel speaks as
follows: “And the hand of the Lord came upon me, and the Lord led me forth in the Spirit,
and set me down in the midst of the plain, and this place was full of
bones. And He caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there
were many upon the surface of the plain very dry. And He said unto me,
Son of man, can these bones live? And I said, Lord, Thou who hast made
them dost know. And He said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and thou
shalt say to them, Ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord to these bones, Behold, I
will cause the spirit of life to come upon you, and I will lay sinews
upon you, and bring up flesh again upon you, and I will stretch skin upon
you, and will put my Spirit into you, and ye shall live; and ye shall
know that I am the Lord.
And I prophesied as the Lord had commanded me. And it came to pass, when
I was prophesying, that, behold, an earthquake, and the bones were drawn
together, each one to its own articulation: and I beheld, and, lo, the
sinews and flesh were produced upon them, and the skins rose upon them
round about, but there was no breath in them. And He said unto me,
Prophesy to the breath, son of man, and say to the breath, These things
saith the Lord, Come from
the four winds (spiritibus), and breathe upon these dead, that
they may live. So I prophesied as the Lord had commanded me, and the
breath entered into them; and they did live, and stood upon their feet,
an exceeding great gathering.”4577
And again he says, “Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will set your
graves open, and cause you to come out of your graves, and bring you into
the land of Israel; and ye shall know that I am the Lord,
when I shall
open your sepulchres, that I may bring my people again out of the
sepulchres: and I will put my Spirit into you, and ye shall live; and I
will place you in your land, and ye shall know that I am the Lord. I have said, and I will do,
saith the Lord.”4578
As we at once perceive that the Creator
(Demiurgo) is in this passage represented as vivifying our dead
bodies, and promising resurrection to them, and resuscitation from their
sepulchres and tombs, conferring upon them immortality also (He says,
“For as the tree of life, so shall their days be”4579
), He is shown to be the only God who
accomplishes these things, and as Himself the good Father, benevolently
conferring life upon those who have not life from themselves.
2. And for this reason did the Lord most plainly
manifest Himself and the Father to His disciples, lest, forsooth, they
might seek after another God besides Him who formed man, and who gave him
the breath of life; and that men might not rise to such a pitch of
madness as to feign another Father above the Creator. And thus also He
healed by a word all the others who were in a weakly condition because of
sin; to whom also He said, “Behold, thou art made whole, sin no
more, lest a worse thing come upon thee:”4580
pointing out by this, that, because of the sin of disobedience,
infirmities have come upon men. To that man, however, who had been blind
from his birth, He gave sight, not by means of a word, but by an outward
action; doing this not without a purpose, or because it so happened, but
that He might show forth the hand of God, that which at the beginning had
moulded man. And therefore, when His disciples asked Him for what cause
the man had been born blind, whether for his own or his parents’
fault, He replied, “Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents,
but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.”4581
Now the work of God is the fashioning of man.
For, as the Scripture says, He made [man] by a kind of process:
“And the Lord took clay from the earth, and formed man.”4582
Wherefore also the Lord spat on the ground and
made clay, and smeared it upon the eyes, pointing out the original
fashioning [of man], how it was effected, and manifesting the hand of God
to those who can understand by what [hand] man was formed out of the
dust. For that which the artificer, the Word, had omitted to form in the
womb, [viz., the blind man’s eyes], He then supplied in public,
that the works of God might be manifested in him, in order that we might
not be seeking out another hand by which man was fashioned, nor another
Father; knowing that this hand of God which formed us at the beginning,
and which does form us in the womb, has in the last times sought us out
who were lost, winning back His own, and taking up the lost sheep upon
His shoulders, and with joy restoring it to the fold of life.
3. Now, that the Word of God forms us in the womb, He
says to Jeremiah, “Before I formed thee in the womb, I knew thee;
and before thou wentest forth from the belly, I sanctified thee, and
appointed thee a prophet among the nations.”4583
And Paul, too, says in like manner, “But when it pleased
God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, that I might declare
Him among the nations.”4584
As,
therefore, we are by the Word formed in the womb, this very same Word
formed the visual power in him who had been blind from his birth; showing
openly who it is that fashions us in secret, since the Word Himself had
been made manifest to men: and declaring the original formation of Adam,
and the manner in which he was created, and by what hand he was
fashioned, indicating the whole from a part. For the Lord who formed the
visual powers is He who made the whole man, carrying out the will of the
Father. And inasmuch as man, with respect to that formation which, was
after Adam, having fallen into transgression, needed the laver of
regeneration, [the Lord] said to him [upon whom He had conferred sight],
after He had smeared his eyes with the clay, “Go to Siloam, and
wash;”4585
thus restoring to him both
[his perfect] confirmation, and that regeneration which takes place by
means of the laver. And for this reason when he was washed he came
seeing, that he might both know Him who had fashioned him, and that man
might learn [to know] Him who has conferred upon him life.
4. All the followers of Valentinus, therefore, lose
their case, when they say that man was not fashioned out of this earth,
but from a fluid and diffused substance. For, from the earth out of which
the Lord formed eyes for that man, from the same earth it is evident that
man was also fashioned at the beginning. For it were incompatible that
the eyes should indeed be formed from one source and the rest of the body
from another; as neither would it be compatible that one [being]
fashioned the body, and another the eyes. But He, the very same who
formed Adam at the beginning, with whom also the Father spake, [saying],
“Let Us make man after Our image and likeness,”4586
revealing Himself in these last times to men,
formed visual organs (visionem) for him who had been blind [in
that body which he had derived] from Adam. Wherefore also the
Scripture, pointing out what should come to pass, says, that when Adam
had hid himself because of his disobedience, the Lord came to him at
eventide, called him forth, and said, “Where art thou?”4587
That means that in the last times the very same
Word of God came to call man, reminding him of his doings, living in
which he had been hidden from the Lord. For just as at that time God
spake to Adam at eventide, searching him out; so in the last times, by
means of the same voice, searching out his posterity, He has visited
them.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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