Edition Masquer
Scorpiace

III.

[1] Nec putem disceptandum, an digne deus prohibeat nomen et honorem suum mendacio addici, an digne quos ab errore superstitionis auulserit rursus in Aegyptum regredi nolit, an digne a se non patiatur absistere quos sibi adlegit. Ita nec illud expectabitur retractari a nobis, an obseruari uoluerit disciplinam quam uoluit instituere et an merito ulciscatur desertam quam uoluit obseruatam, quando frustra instituisset, si obseruari eam noluisset, et frustra obseruari uoluisset, si uindicare noluisset. [2] Sequitur enim, ut has definitiones dei aduersus superstitiones tam euictas quam etiam uindicatas probem, quoniam ex his tota martyriorum ratio constabit. Aberat apud deum in monte Moyses, cum populus tam necessariam absentiam eius impatiens deos sibi producere quaerit, quo se potius ipse perdiderit. [3] Vrgetur Aaron, et iubet inaures feminarum suarum in ignem conferri. Amissuri enim erant in iudicium sibi uera ornamenta aurium, dei uoces. Sapiens ignis effigiem uituli defundit illis suggillans illic cor habentes ubi et thesaurum, apud Aegyptum scilicet, inter cetera animalia bouis etiam cuiusdam consecratricem. [4] Itaque tria milia hominum a parentibus proximis caesa, quia tam proximum parentem deum offenderant, transgressionis et primordia et merita dedicauerunt. In Arithmis cum diuertisset Israel apud Sethim, abeunt libidinatum ad filias Moab, inuitantur ad idola, ut et spiritu fornicarentur, edunt denique de pollutis eorum, dehinc et adorant deos gentis et Beelphegor initiantur. [5] Ob hanc quoque idololatrian moechiae sororem uiginti tria milia domesticis obtruncata gladiis diuinae irae litauerunt. Defuncto Iesu Naue derelincunt deum patrum suorum et seruiunt idolis Baalim et Astartis, et iratus dominus tradidit eos in manibus diripientium, et diripiebantur ab illis et uenumdabantur inimicis, nec poterant omnino subsistere a facie inimicorum suorum. [6] Quocumque processerant, manus erat super illos in mala, et conpressati sunt ualde. Post quae instituit super illos deus Critas, quos Censores intellegimus. Sed nec istis obaudire perseuerauerunt. Vt quis critarum obierat, illi ad delinquendum supra quam patres eorum, abeundo post deos aliorum et seruiendo et adorando eos. [7] Itaque dominus iratus, quoniam quidem, ait, transgressi sunt gens ista pactum meum, quod disposui patribus eorum, et non audierunt uocem meam, et ego non aduertam ad auferendum uirum a facie eorum ex nationibus, quas reliquit decedens Iesus. Atque ita per omnes paene annales critarum et deinceps regum reseruatis gentium circumcolarum uiribus bello et captiuitate et iugo allophylorum iram dei pensauit Israel, quotienscumque ab illo maxime in idololatrian exorbitauerunt.

Traduction Masquer
Scorpiace

Chapter III.

Nor should I think it needful to discuss whether God pursues a worthy course in forbidding His own name and honour to be given over to a lie, or does so in not consenting that such as He has plucked from the maze of false religion should return again to Egypt, or does so in not suffering to depart from Him them whom He has chosen for Himself. Thus that, too, will not require to be treated by us, whether He has wished to be kept the rule which He has chosen to appoint, and whether He justly avenges the abandonment of the rule which He has wished to be kept; since He would have appointed it to no purpose if He had not wished it kept, and would have to no purpose wished it kept if He had been unwilling to uphold it. My next step, indeed, is to put to the test these appointments of God in opposition to false religions, the completely vanquished as well as also the punished, since on these will depend the entire argument for martyrdoms. Moses was apart with God on the mountain, when the people, not brooking his absence, which was so needful, seek to make gods for themselves, which, for his own part, he will prefer to destroy. ¹ Aaron is importuned, and commands that the earrings of their women be brought together, that they may be thrown into the fire. For the people were about to lose, as a judgment upon themselves, the true ornaments for the ears, the words of God. The wise fire makes for them the molten likeness of a calf, reproaching them with having the heart where they have their treasure also,--in Egypt, to wit, which clothed with sacredness, among the other animals, a certain ox likewise. Therefore the slaughter of three thousand by their nearest relatives, because they had displeased their so very near relative God, solemnly marked both the commencement and the deserts of the trespass. Israel having, as we are told in Numbers, ² turned aside at Sethim, the people go to the daughters of Moab to gratify their lust: they are allured to the idols, so that they committed whoredom with the spirit also: finally, they eat of their defiled sacrifices; then they both worship the gods of the nation, and are admitted to the rites of Beelphegor. For this lapse, too, into idolatry, sister to adultery, it took the slaughter of twenty-three thousand by the swords of their countrymen to appease the divine anger. After the death of Joshua the son of Nave they forsake the God of their fathers, and serve idols, Baalim and Ashtaroth; ³ and the Lord in anger delivered them up to the hands of spoilers, and they continued to be spoiled by them, and to be sold to their adversaries, and could not at all stand before their enemies. Whithersoever they went forth, His hand was upon them for evil, and they were greatly distressed. And after this God sets judges (critas), the same as our censors, over them. But not even these did they continue steadfastly to obey. So soon as one of the judges died, they proceeded to transgress more than their fathers had done by going after the gods of others, and serving and worshipping them. Therefore the Lord was angry. "Since, indeed," He says, "this nation have transgressed my covenant which I established with their fathers, and have not hearkened to my voice, I also will give no heed to remove from before them a man of the nations which Joshua left at his death." ⁴ And thus, throughout almost all the annals of the judges and of the kings who succeeded them, while the strength of the surrounding nations was preserved, He meted wrath out to Israel by war and captivity and a foreign yoke, as often as they turned aside from Him, especially to idolatry.