Works Theodotus Excerpta e Theodoto Excerpts of Theodotus

XIX.

Advancing from faith and fear to knowledge, man knows how to say Lord, Lord; but not as His slave, he has learned to say, Our Father. 1 Having set free the spirit of bondage, which produces fear, and advanced by love to adoption, he now reverences from love Him whom he feared before. For he no longer abstains from what he ought to abstain from out of fear, but out of love clings to the commandments. "The Spirit itself," it is said, "beareth witness when we cry, Abba, 2 Father." 3

  1. [A happy reference to the Lord's Prayer as connected with St. Paul's reference to the Abba; and it is worth while to compare the use of this word with the prayer as used in the synagogue. Vol. v. Elucid. III. p. 559, this series.] ↩

  2. [A happy reference to the Lord's Prayer as connected with St. Paul's reference to the Abba; and it is worth while to compare the use of this word with the prayer as used in the synagogue. Vol. v. Elucid. III. p. 559, this series.] ↩

  3. Rom. viii. 15; Gal. iv. 6. ↩

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