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| Chapter VII. Concerning the Fall of Man.
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Chapter VII.—Concerning the Fall of Man.
For the heavenly Logos, a spirit emanating from the
Father and a Logos from the Logos-power, in imitation of the Father who
begat Him made man an image of immortality, so that, as incorruption
is with God, in like manner, man, sharing in a part of God, might have
the immortal principle also. The Logos,440
| 440 [Kaye’s rendering of this passage should be
compared. See his Justin, p. 182.] | too, before the
creation of men, was the Framer of angels. And each of these two orders
of creatures was made free to act as it pleased, not having the nature of
good, which again is with God alone, but is brought to perfection in men
through their freedom of choice, in order that the bad man may be justly
punished, having become depraved through his own fault, but the just man
be deservedly praised for his virtuous deeds, since in the exercise of
his free choice he refrained from transgressing the will of God. Such is
the constitution of things in reference to angels and men. And the power
of the Logos, having in itself a faculty to foresee future events, not as
fated, but as taking place by the choice
of free agents, foretold from time to time the issues of things to come;
it also became a forbidder of wickedness by means of prohibitions,
and the encomiast of those who remained good. And, when men attached
themselves to one who was more subtle than the rest, having regard to
his being the first-born,441
and declared him to be God, though he was resisting the law of God,
then the power of the Logos excluded the beginner of the folly and his
adherents from all fellowship with Himself. And so he who was made in the
likeness of God, since the more powerful spirit is separated from him,
becomes mortal; but that first-begotten one through his transgression
and ignorance becomes a demon; and they who imitated him, that is his
illusions, are become a host of demons, and through their freedom of
choice have been given up to their own infatuation.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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