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| Chapter V.—The new covenant, founded on the sufferings of Christ, tends to our salvation, but to the Jews’ destruction.
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Chapter V.—The new covenant, founded
on the sufferings of Christ, tends to our salvation, but to the Jews’
destruction.
For to this end the Lord endured to deliver up His
flesh to corruption, that we might be sanctified through the remission of
sins, which is effected by His blood of sprinkling. For it is written
concerning Him, partly with reference to Israel, and partly to us; and
[the Scripture] saith thus: “He was wounded for our transgressions,
and bruised for our iniquities: with His stripes we are healed. He was
brought as a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb which is dumb before
its shearer.”1481
Therefore we ought to
be deeply grateful to the Lord, because He has both made known to us
things that are past, and hath given us wisdom concerning things present,
and hath not left us without understanding in regard to things which are
to come. Now, the Scripture saith, “Not unjustly are nets spread
out for birds.”1482
| 1482
Prov. i. 17, from the LXX, which has mistaken the
meaning. | This means that the man perishes justly, who, having
a knowledge of the way of righteousness, rushes off into the way of
darkness. And further, my brethren: if the Lord endured to suffer for our
soul, He being Lord of all the world, to whom God said at the foundation
of the world, “Let us make man after our image, and after our
likeness,”1483
understand how it was that
He endured to suffer at the hand of men. The prophets, having obtained
grace from Him, prophesied concerning Him. And He (since it behoved Him
to appear in flesh), that He might abolish death, and reveal the
resurrection from the dead, endured [what and as He did], in order that
He might fulfil the promise made unto the fathers, and by preparing a new
people for Himself, might show, while He dwelt on earth, that He, when He
has raised mankind, will also judge them. Moreover, teaching Israel, and
doing so great miracles and signs, He preached [the truth] to him, and
greatly loved him. But when He chose His own apostles who were to preach
His Gospel, [He did so from among those] who were sinners above all sin,
that He might show He came “not to call the righteous, but sinners
to repentance.”1484
Then He manifested Himself
to be the Son of God. For if He had not come in the flesh, how could men
have been saved by beholding Him?1485
| 1485 The Cod. Sin. reads, “neither would men have been
saved by seeing Him.” | Since looking upon
the sun which is to cease to exist, and is the work of His
hands, their eyes are not able to bear his rays. The Son of God therefore
came in the flesh with this view, that He might bring to a head the sum
of their sins who had persecuted His prophets1486
| 1486 Cod. Sin. has, “their
prophets,” but the corrector has changed it as above. |
to the death. For this purpose,
then, He endured. For God saith, “The stroke of his flesh is from
them;”1487
and1488
“when I shall smite the Shepherd, then the sheep of the
flock shall be scattered.”1489
He
himself willed thus to suffer, for it was necessary that He should suffer
on the tree. For says he who prophesies regarding Him, “Spare my
soul from the sword,1490
| 1490 Cod.
Sin. inserts “and.” | fasten my flesh with nails;
for the assemblies of the wicked have risen up against me.”1491
And again he says,
“Behold, I have given my back to scourges, and my cheeks to
strokes, and I have set my countenance as a firm rock.”1492
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