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| The Son of God Became Incarnate in Order that We Being Cleansed by Faith May Be Raised to the Unchangeable Truth.
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Chapter 18.—The Son of God
Became Incarnate in Order that We Being Cleansed by Faith May Be
Raised to the Unchangeable Truth.
24. Since, then, we were not fit to
take hold of things eternal, and since the foulness of sins weighed
us down, which we had contracted by the love of temporal things,
and which were implanted in us as it were naturally, from the root
of mortality, it was needful that we should be cleansed. But
cleansed we could not be, so as to be tempered together with things
eternal, except it were through things temporal, wherewith we were
already tempered together and held fast. For health is at the
opposite extreme from disease; but the intermediate process of
healing does not lead us to perfect health, unless it has some
congruity with the disease. Things temporal that are useless merely
deceive the sick; things temporal that are useful take up those
that need healing, and pass them on healed, to things eternal. And
the rational mind, as when cleansed it owes contemplation to things
eternal; so, when needing cleansing, owes faith to things temporal.
One even of those who were formerly esteemed wise men among the
Greeks has said, The truth stands to faith in the same relation in
which eternity stands to that which has a beginning. And he is no
doubt right in saying so. For what we call temporal, he describes
as having had a beginning. And we also ourselves come under this
kind, not only in respect to the body, but also in respect to the
changeableness of the soul. For that is not properly called eternal
which undergoes any degree of change. Therefore, in so far as we
are changeable, in so far we stand apart from eternity. But life
eternal is promised to us through the truth, from the clear
knowledge of which, again, our faith stands as far apart as
mortality does from eternity. We then now put faith in things done
in time on our account, and by that faith itself we are cleansed;
in order that when we have come to sight, as truth follows faith,
so eternity may follow upon mortality. And therefore, since our
faith will become truth, when we have attained to that which is
promised to us who believe: and that which is promised us is
eternal life; and the Truth (not that which shall come to be
according as our faith shall be, but that truth which is always,
because in it is eternity,—the Truth then) has said, “And this
is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only
true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent:”528
when our
faith by seeing shall come to be truth, then eternity shall possess
our now changed mortality. And until this shall take place, and in
order that it may take place,—because we adapt the faith of
belief to things which have a beginning, as in things eternal we
hope for the truth of contemplation, lest the faith of mortal life
should be at discord with the truth of eternal life,—the Truth
itself, co-eternal with the Father, took a beginning from earth,529
when the Son
of God so came as to become the Son of man, and to take to Himself
our faith, that He might thereby lead us on to His own truth, who
so undertook our mortality, as not to lose His own eternity. For
truth stands to faith in the relation in which eternity stands to
that which has a beginning. Therefore, we must needs so be
cleansed, that we may come to have such a beginning as remains
eternal, that we may not have one beginning in faith, and another
in truth. Neither could we pass to things eternal from the
condition of having a beginning, unless we were transferred, by
union of the eternal to ourselves through our own beginning, to His
own eternity. Therefore our faith has, in some measure, now
followed thither, whither He in whom we have believed has ascended;
born,530
dead, risen
again, taken up. Of these four things, we knew the first two in
ourselves. For we know that men both have a beginning and die. But
the remaining two, that is, to be raised, and to be taken up, we
rightly hope will be in us, because we have believed them done in
Him. Since, therefore, in Him that, too, which had a beginning has
passed over to eternity, in ourselves also it will so pass over,
when faith shall have arrived at truth. For to those who thus
believe, in order that they might remain in the word of faith, and
being thence led on to the truth, and through that to eternity,
might be freed from death, He speaks thus: “If ye continue in my
word, then are ye my disciples indeed.” And as though they would
ask, With what fruit? He proceeds to say, “And ye shall know the
truth.” And again, as though they would say, Of what good is
truth to mortal men? “And the truth,” He says, “shall make
you free.”531
From what,
except from death, from corruptions, from changeableness? Since
truth remains immortal, incorrupt, unchangeable. But true
immortality, true incorruptibility, true unchangeableness, is
eternity itself.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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