Translation Hide
Reply to Faustus the Manichaean

2.

Augustin replied: You are always answering arguments which no one uses, instead of our real arguments, which you cannot answer. No one says that Christ could not die if He had not been born; for Adam died though he had not been born. What we say is, Christ was born, because this is said not by this or that heretic, but in the holy Gospel; and He died, for this too is written, not in some heretical production, but in the holy Gospel. You set aside argument on the question of the true account to be given of Jesus, and refer to what He says of Himself, and what His apostles say of Him; and yet, when I begin to quote the Gospel of His apostle Matthew, where we have the whole narrative of Christ's birth, you forthwith deny that Matthew wrote the narrative, though this is affirmed by the continuous testimony of the whole Church, from the days of apostolic presidency to the bishops of our own time. What authority will you quote against this? Perhaps some book of Manichaeus, where it is denied that Jesus was born of a virgin. As, then, I believe your book to be the production of Manichaeus, since it has been kept and handed down among the disciples of Manichaeus, from the time when he lived to the present time, by a regular succession of your presidents, so I ask you to believe the book which I quote to have been written by Matthew, since it has been handed down from the days of Matthew in the Church, without any break in the connection between that time and the present. The question then is, whether we are to believe the statements of an apostle who was in the company of Christ while He was on earth, or of a man away in Persia, born long after Christ. But perhaps you will quote some other book bearing the name of an apostle known to have been chosen by Christ; and you will find there that Christ was not born of Mary. Since, then, one of the books must be false, the question in this case is, whether we are to yield our belief to a book acknowledged and approved as handed down from the beginning in the Church founded by Christ Himself, and maintained through the apostles and their successors in an unbroken connection all over the world to the present day; or to a book which this Church condemns as unknown, and which, moreover, is brought forward by men who prove their veracity by praising Christ for falsehood.

Edition Hide
Contra Faustum Manichaeum libri triginta tres

2.

Augustinus respondit: Iterum ac saepe tibi proponis, quod non audis ab eis, a quibus confutaris. Nemo tibi dicit: Non poterat mori, nisi natus esset, quia mortuus est Adam, quamvis natus non fuisset; sed dicitur tibi: natus est, quia hoc sanctum evangelium, non nescio quis haereticus loquitur; mortuus est, quia hoc in sancto evangelio, non in libro alicuius haeretici legitur. Sed tu, qui prohibes argumentari, cum de rebus agitur, quae pertinent ad Iesum, et quaerendum censes, quid ipse de se quidve apostoli sui de eodem praedicarint, cum coepero Matthaei evangelium recitare, apostoli eius, ubi narratio nativitatis eius tota contexitur, continuo dices illam narrationem non esse Matthaei, quam Matthaei esse dicit universa ecclesia, ab apostolicis sedibus usque ad praesentes episcopos certa successione perducta‹m›. Tu mihi quid contra lecturus es? p. 739,21 Aliquem forte librum Manichaei, ubi Iesus negatur esse natus ex uirgine? Sicut ergo ego credo illum librum esse Manichaei, quoniam ex ipso tempore, quo Manichaeus vivebat in carne, per discipulos eius certa successione praepositorum vestrorum ad vestra usque tempora custoditus atque perductus est, sic et istum librum credite esse Matthaei, quem ex illo tempore, quo Matthaeus ipse in carne vixit, non interrupta serie temporum ecclesia certa conexionis successione usque ad tempora ista perduxit. Et dic mihi, cui libro potius credere debeamus, eiusne apostoli, qui Christo, cum adhuc in terra esset, adhaeserat, an nescio cuius Persae, qui tanto post natus est? p. 740,4 Sed alium forte proferes librum, qui nomen habeat alicuius apostoli, quem a Christo constat electum, et ibi Christum natum ex Maria non esse lecturus es. Cum ergo necesse sit alterum horum librorum esse mendacem, cui nos potius censes fidem accommodare debere? Eine, quem illa ecclesia ab ipso Christo inchoata per apostolos provecta certa successionum serie usque ad haec tempora toto terrarum orbe dilatata ab initio traditum et conservatum agnoscit atque approbat, an ei, quem eadem ecclesia incognitum reprobat, cum etiam proferatur ab hominibus ita veracibus, ut Christum laudent esse mentitum?