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Contra Faustum Manichaeum libri triginta tres

17.

Sicut enim mos est divinorum in scripturis sanctis mysteriorum, ut idem homo alias aliam atque aliam pro re aliqua significanda personam gerat, tunc Moyses populi Iudaeorum sub lege positi personam gerebat eumque in prophetica praenuntiatione figurabat. Sicut ergo Moyses petram virga percutiens de dei virtute dubitavit, ita ille populus, qui sub lege per Moysen data tenebatur, Christum ligno crucis affigens eum virtutem dei esse non credidit. Sed sicut percussa petra manavit aquam sitientibus, sic plaga dominicae passionis effecta est vita credentibus. p. 459,9 Habemus enim de hac re praeclarissimam et fidelissimam vocem apostoli, cum inde loqueretur, dicentis: Petra autem erat Christus. Hanc ergo carnalem de Christi divinitate desperationem in ipsius Christi altitudine deus mori iubet, cum mortem carnis Moysi in monte imperat fieri. Sicut enim petra Christus, ita et mons Christus: petra humilis fortitudo, mons eminens magnitudo, quia sicut apostolus ait: Petra erat Christus, ita ipse dominus: non potest civitas abscondi super montem constituta, se scilicet montem, fideles autem suos in sui nominis gloria fundatos asserens civitatem. Prudentia carnis vivit, cum tamquam petra percussa Christi humilitas in cruce contemnitur; Christus enim crucifixus Iudaeis scandalum est, gentibus autem stultitia, et prudentia carnis moritur, cum tamquam montis eminentia Christus excelsus agnoscitur; p. 459,23 ipsis enim vocatis Iudaeis et Graecis Christus dei virtus et dei sapientia est. Ascendit itaque Moyses in montem, ut carne mortua vivo spiritu reciperetur: quo Faustus non ascenderat, ut carnales calumnias mente mortua loqueretur. Nonne ipsam petram Petrus per prudentiam carnis percuti exhorruit, cum domino passionem suam praenuntianti ait: Absit, domine, non fiet istud; propitius tibi esto? Neque enim pepercit huic peccato dominus, cum ei retulerit: Redi retro, satanas, scandalum mihi es; non enim sapis, quae dei sunt, sed quae sunt hominum. p. 459,6 Aut ubi mortua est ista carnalis diffidentia nisi in Christi glorificatione tamquam in montis altitudine? Nam utique vivebat, cum eum timide negaret, et utique mortua erat, cum eum libere praedicaret. Haec vivebat in Saulo, cum scandalum crucis detestans vuastabat christianam fidem; et ubi nisi in illo monte mortua erat, cum iam Paulus diceret: Vivo autem iam non ego, vivit vero in me Christus?

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Reply to Faustus the Manichaean

17.

We often find in the symbolical passages of Scripture, that the same person appears in different characters on different occasions. So, on this occasion, Moses represents and prefigures the Jewish people as placed under the law. As, then, Moses, when he struck the rock with his rod, doubted the power of God, so the people who were under the law given by Moses, when they nailed Christ to the cross, did not believe Him to be the power of God. And as water flowed from the smitten rock for those that were athirst, so life comes to believers from the stroke of the Lord's passion. The testimony of the apostle is clear and decisive on this point, when he says, "This rock was Christ." ¹ In the command of God, that the death of the flesh of Moses should take place on the mountain, we see the divine appointment that the carnal doubt of the divinity of Christ should die on Christ's exaltation. As the rock is Christ, so is the mountain. The rock is the fortitude of His humiliation; the mountain the height of His exaltation. For as the apostle says, "This rock was Christ," so Christ Himself says, "A city set upon an hill cannot be hid," ² showing that He is the hill, and believers the city built upon the glory of His name. The carnal mind lives when, like the smitten rock, the humiliation of Christ on the cross is despised. For Christ crucified is to the Jews a stumbling-block, and to the Greeks foolishness. And the carnal mind dies when, like the mountain-top, Christ is seen in His exaltation. "For to them that are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God, and the wisdom of God." ³ Moses therefore ascended the mount, that in the death of the flesh he might be received by the living spirit. If Faustus had ascended, he would not have uttered carnal objections from a dead mind. It was the carnal mind that made Peter dread the smiting of the rock, when, on the occasion of the Lord's foretelling His passion, he said, "Be it far from Thee, Lord; spare Thyself." And this sin too was severely rebuked, when the Lord replied, "Get thee behind me, Satan; thou art an offense unto me: for thou savorest not the things which be of God, but those which be of men." ⁴ And where did this carnal distrust die but in the glorification of Christ, as on a mountain height? If it was alive when Peter timidly denied Christ, it was dead when he fearlessly preached Him. It was alive in Saul, when, in his aversion to the offense of the cross, he made havoc of the Christian faith, and where but on this mountain had it died, when Paul was able to say, "I live no longer, but Christ liveth in me?" ⁵