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Reply to Faustus the Manichaean

16.

At present I would call attention to the fact, that when the Manichaeans, although they disguise their blasphemous absurdities under the name of Christianity, bring such objections against the Christian Scriptures, we have to defend the authority of the divine record in both Testaments against the Manichaeans as much as against the Pagans. A Pagan might find fault with passages in the New Testament in the same way as Faustus does with what he calls unworthy representations of God in the Old Testament; and the Pagan might be answered by the quotation of similar passages from his own authors, as in Paul's speech at Athens. ¹ Even in Pagan writings we might find the doctrine that God created and constructed the world, and that He is the giver of light, which does not imply that before light was made He abode in darkness; and that when His work was finished He was elated with joy, which is more than saying that He saw that it was good; and that He made a law with rewards for obedience, and punishments for disobedience, by which they do not mean to say that God was ignorant of the future, because He gave a law to those by whom it was to be broken. Nor could they make asking questions a proof of a want of foresight even in a human being; for in their books many questions are asked only for the purpose of using the answers for the conviction of the persons addressed: for the questioner knows not only what answer he desires, but what will actually be given. Again, if the Pagan tried to make out God to be envious of any one, because He will not give happiness to the wicked, he would find many passages in the writings of his own authors in support of this principle of the divine government.

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Contra Faustum Manichaeum libri triginta tres

16. Nunc illud admoneo, ut cum insanas et sacrilegas fabulas suas christiani nominis pallio velare contendant, videant tamen, quando ista contra scripturas christianas disputant, non a nobis contra paganos tantum, sed etiam contra Manichaeos veritatem codicum divinorum testamenti utriusque defendi. Et ista quidem, quae modo Faustus velut indigna deo de nostris veteribus litteris in sermone suo posuit, contra paganum et in evangelico vel apostolico sermone talia reprehendentem ita fortasse defenderem, p. 604,8 ut paria de auctoribus eorum, sicut Paulus noster apud Athenienses fecit, commemorarem. Invenirem enim fortasse et in litteris eorum deum mundi creatorem ac fabricatorem et lucis huius institutorem, qui tamen antequam eam conderet, non iacebat in tenebris, et ex opere suo perfecto elatum esse gaudio – quod certe amplius est quam: Vidit quia bonum est* –, et legis latorem, quam si homo sequeretur, suo bono faceret, si autem sperneret, suo malo, quem non ideo dicerent ignarum futuri, quia et futuris contemptoribus legem dedit. Iam vero ideo improvidum, quod aliquid interroget, nec hominem dicerent, in quorum libris multa non ob aliud interrogantur, nisi ut suis quisque responsionibus convincatur, cum ille, qui interrogat, non solum sciat, quod sibi vult ab altero responderi, sed etiam illum hoc responsurum. p. 604,23 Invidentem autem cuiquam deum, quod malos beatos fieri non sineret, si vellet dicere, plenos inveniret suorum libros de hac re ad divinam providentiam pertinente [s ?].