22. If, therefore, even they
who are united in marriage only for the purpose of begetting, for
which purpose marriage was instituted, are not compared with the
Fathers, seeking their very sons in a way far other than do these;
forasmuch as Abraham, being bidden to slay his son, fearless and
devoted, spared not his only son, whom from out of great despair he
had received1997
save that
he laid down his
hand, when He forbade him, at Whose command he had
lifted it up; it remains that we consider, whether at least
continent persons among us are to be compared to those Fathers who
were
married; unless haply now these are to be preferred to them,
to whom we have not yet found persons to compare. For there was a
greater good in their
marriage, than is the proper good of
marriage: to which without doubt the good of Continence is to be
preferred: because they sought not sons from
marriage by such
duty
as these are led by, from a certain sense of
mortal nature
requiring succession against
decease. And, whoso denies this to be
good he knows not
God, the Creator of all things
good, from things heavenly even unto things earthly, from things
immortal even unto things
mortal. But neither are
beasts altogether
without this sense of begetting, and chiefly
birds, whose care of
building nests meets us at once, and a certain likeness to
marriages, in order to
beget and
nurture together. But those men,
with
mind far holier,
surpassed this affection of
mortal nature,
the chastity whereof in its own
kind, there being added thereto the
worship of
God, as some have understood, is set forth as bearing
first thirty-fold; who sought sons of their
marriage for the sake
of
Christ; in order to distinguish His race after the
flesh from
all
nations: even as
God was pleased to order, that this above the
rest should avail to prophesy of Him, in that it was foretold of
what race also, and of what
nation, He should hereafter come in the
flesh. Therefore it was a
far greater good than the
chaste
marriages of
believers among us, which
father Abraham knew in his
own thigh, under which he bade his
servant to put his
hand, that he
might take an
oath concerning the
wife, whom his son was to marry.
For putting his
hand under the thigh of a man, and swearing by the
God of
Heaven,
1998
what else
did he signify, than that in that
Flesh, which derived its origin
from that thigh, the
God of
Heaven would come? Therefore
marriage
is a good, wherein
married persons are so much the better, in
proportion as they fear God with greater chastity and faithfulness,
specially if the sons, whom they desire after the flesh, they also
bring up after the spirit.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
