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Contra Faustum Manichaeum libri triginta tres

40.

Quod ergo ecclesia cuius uxor sit occultatur alienigenis, cuius autem soror non tacetur, haec interim causa facile occurrit, quia occultum et difficile ad intellegendum est, quomodo anima humana verbo dei copuletur sive misceatur sive quid melius et aptius dici potest, cum sit illud deus, ista creatura; p. 633,18 secundum hoc enim sponsus et sponsa vel vir et uxor Christus et ecclesia dicuntur. Qua vero cognatione sint fratres Christus et omnes sancti gratia divina, non consanguinitate terrena, hoc est de patre, non de matre, et effabilius dicitur et capacius auditur. Nam et inter se omnes sancti per eandem gratiam fratres sunt, sponsus autem ceterorum societati nullus illorum est. Proinde Christum quamvis excellentissimae iustitiae atque sapientiae, tamen hominem multo facilius et proclivius alienigenae crediderunt, non quidem falso, quod homo esset, sed quomodo etiam deus esset, ignoraverunt. Hinc et Hieremias: Et homo, inquit, est, et qui agnoscit eum? Et homo est, quia proditur, quod frater est. Et quis agnoscit eum? quia occultatur, quod sponsus est. p. 634,2 Haec de patre Abraham adversum impudentissimam et imperitissimam et calumniosissimam Fausti vocem satis dicta sunt.

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Reply to Faustus the Manichaean

40.

As for the reason why, though it is concealed among strangers whose wife the Church is, it is not hidden whose sister she is, it is plainly because it is obscure and hard to understand how the human soul and the Word of God are united or mingled, or whatever word may be used to express this connection between God and the creature. It is from this connection that Christ and the Church are called bridegroom and bride, or husband and wife. The other relationship, in which Christ and all the saints are brethren by divine grace and not by earthly consanguinity, or by the father and not by the mother, is more easily expressed in words, and more easily understood. For the same grace makes all the saints to be also brethren of one another; while in their society no one is the bridegroom of all the rest. So also, notwithstanding the surpassing justice and wisdom of Christ, His manhood was much more plainly and readily recognized by strangers, who, indeed, were not wrong in believing Him to be man, but they did not understand His being God as well as man. Hence Jeremiah says: "He is both a man, and who shall know Him?" ¹ He is a man, for it is made manifest that He is a brother. And who shall know Him? for it is concealed that He is a husband. This must suffice as a defense of our father Abraham against Faustus' impudence and ignorance and malice.