confusion

Neither shalt thou lie with any beast to defile thyself therewith: neither shall any woman stand before a beast to lie down thereto: it is confusion.

And if a man lie with his daughter in law, both of them shall surely be put to death: they have wrought confusion; their blood shall be upon them.

Then Saul’s anger was kindled against Jonathan, and he said unto him, Thou son of the perverse rebellious woman, do not I know that thou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own confusion, and unto the confusion of thy mother’s nakedness?

Then Saul’s anger was kindled against Jonathan, and he said unto him, Thou son of the perverse rebellious woman, do not I know that thou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own confusion, and unto the confusion of thy mother’s nakedness?

Since the days of our fathers have we been in a great trespass unto this day; and for our iniquities have we, our kings, and our priests, been delivered into the hand of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, and to a spoil, and to confusion of face, as it is this day.

If I be wicked, woe unto me; and if I be righteous, yet will I not lift up my head. I am full of confusion; therefore see thou mine affliction;

Let them be confounded and put to shame that seek after my soul: let them be turned back and brought to confusion that devise my hurt.

Let them be ashamed and brought to confusion together that rejoice at mine hurt: let them be clothed with shame and dishonour that magnify themselves against me.

My confusion is continually before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me,

Let them be ashamed and confounded that seek after my soul: let them be turned backward, and put to confusion, that desire my hurt.

In thee, O LORD, do I put my trust: let me never be put to confusion.

Let mine adversaries be clothed with shame, and let them cover themselves with their own confusion, as with a mantle.

The city of confusion is broken down: every house is shut up, that no man may come in.

Therefore shall the strength of Pharaoh be your shame, and the trust in the shadow of Egypt your confusion.

But the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it; the owl also and the raven shall dwell in it: and he shall stretch out upon it the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness.

Behold, they are all vanity; their works are nothing: their molten images are wind and confusion.

They shall be ashamed, and also confounded, all of them: they shall go to confusion together that are makers of idols.

For your shame ye shall have double; and for confusion they shall rejoice in their portion: therefore in their land they shall possess the double: everlasting joy shall be unto them.

We lie down in our shame, and our confusion covereth us: for we have sinned against the LORD our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even unto this day, and have not obeyed the voice of the LORD our God.

Do they provoke me to anger? saith the LORD: do they not provoke themselves to the confusion of their own faces?

But the LORD is with me as a mighty terrible one: therefore my persecutors shall stumble, and they shall not prevail: they shall be greatly ashamed; for they shall not prosper: their everlasting confusion shall never be forgotten.

O LORD, righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us confusion of faces, as at this day; to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and unto all Israel, that are near, and that are far off, through all the countries whither thou hast driven them, because of their trespass that they have trespassed against thee.

O Lord, to us belongeth confusion of face, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against thee.

And the whole city was filled with confusion: and having caught Gaius and Aristarchus, men of Macedonia, Paul’s companions in travel, they rushed with one accord into the theatre.

For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.

For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.

And ye shall say, To the Lord our God belongeth righteousness, but unto us the confusion of faces, as it is come to pass this day, unto them of Juda, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem,

The land also was moved for the inhabitants thereof, and all the house of Jacob was covered with confusion.

That thou bring them to confusion, and their mother to a spoil, that there may be no offspring of them.

There shall be a confusion also in many places, and the fire shall be oft sent out again, and the wild beasts shall change their places, and menstruous women shall bring forth monsters:

Behold, victuals shall be so good cheap upon earth, that they shall think themselves to be in good case, and even then shall evils grow upon earth, sword, famine, and great confusion.

They stood opposite, and filled the enemies’ army with confusion and cowardice, and bound them with immoveable shackles.

Ye therefore, who laid the foundation of this sedition, submit yourselves to the presbyters, and receive correction so as to repent, bending the knees of your hearts. Learn to be subject, laying aside the proud and arrogant self-confidence of your tongue. For it is better for you that ye should occupy a humble but honourable place in the flock of Christ, than that, being highly exalted, ye should be cast out from the hope of His people. For thus speaketh all-virtuous Wisdom: “Behold, I will bring forth to you the words of my Spirit, and I will teach you my speech. Since I called, and ye did not hear; I held forth my words, and ye regarded not, but set at naught my counsels, and yielded not at my reproofs; therefore I too will laugh at your destruction; yea, I will rejoice when ruin cometh upon you, and when sudden confusion overtakes you, when overturning presents itself like a tempest, or when tribulation and oppression fall upon you. For it shall come to pass, that when ye call upon me, I will not hear you; the wicked shall seek me, and they shall not find me. For they hated wisdom, and did not choose the fear of the Lord; nor would they listen to my counsels, but despised my reproofs. Wherefore they shall eat the fruits of their own way, and they shall be filled with their own ungodliness.”...

Seeing them, therefore, so beaten and so badly used, I was grieved for them, because they were so tormented, and had no rest at all. And I said to the Shepherd who talked with me, “Sir, who is this shepherd, who is so pitiless and severe, and so completely devoid of compassion for these sheep?” “This,” he replied, “is the angel of punishment; and he belongs to the just angels, and is appointed to punish. He accordingly takes those who wander away from God, and who have walked in the desires and deceits of this world, and chastises them as they deserve with terrible and diverse punishments.” “I would know, sir,” I said, “of what nature are these diverse tortures and punishments?” “Hear,” he said, “the various tortures and punishments. The tortures are such as occur during life. For some are punished with losses, others with want, others with sicknesses of various kinds, and others with all kinds of disorder and confusion; others are insulted by unworthy persons, and exposed to suffering in many other ways: for many, becoming unstable in their plans, try many things, and none of them at all succeed, and they say they are not prosperous in their undertakings; and it does not occur to their minds that they have done evil deeds, but they blame the Lord. When, therefore, they have been afflicted with all kinds of affliction, then are they delivered unto me for good training, and they are made strong in the faith of the Lord; and for the rest of the days of their life they are subject to the Lord with pure hearts, and are successful in all their undertakings, obtaining from the Lord everything they ask; and then they glorify the Lord, that they were delivered to me, and no longer suffer any evil.”

When Hell and death and their wicked ministers saw that, they were stricken with fear, they and their cruel officers, at the sight of the brightness of so great light in their own realm, seeing Christ of a sudden in their abode, and they cried out, saying: We are overcome by thee. Who art thou that art sent by the Lord for our confusion? Who art thou that without all damage of corruption, and with the signs of thy majesty unblemished, dost in wrath condemn our power? Who art thou that art so great and so small, both humble and exalted, both soldier and commander, a marvellous warrior in the shape of a bondsman, and a King of glory dead and living, whom the cross bare slain upon it? Thou that didst lie dead in the sepulchre hast come down unto us living: and at thy death all creation quaked and all the stars were shaken: and thou hast become free among the dead and dost rout our legions. Who art thou that settest free the prisoners that are held bound by original sin and restorest them into their former liberty? Who art thou that sheddest thy divine and bright light upon them that were blinded with the darkness of their sins? After the same manner all the legions of devils were stricken with like fear and cried out all together in the terror of their confusion, saying: Whence art thou, Jesus, a man so mighty and bright in majesty, so excellent, without spot and clean from sin? For that world of earth which hath been alway subject unto us until now, and did pay tribute to our profit, hath never sent unto us a dead man like thee, nor ever dispatched such a gift unto Hell. Who then art thou that so fearlessly enterest our borders, and not only fearest not our torments, but besides essayest to bear away all men out of our bonds? Peradventure thou art that Jesus, of whom Satan our prince said that by thy death of the cross thou shouldest receive the dominion of the whole world.

When Hell and death and their wicked ministers saw that, they were stricken with fear, they and their cruel officers, at the sight of the brightness of so great light in their own realm, seeing Christ of a sudden in their abode, and they cried out, saying: We are overcome by thee. Who art thou that art sent by the Lord for our confusion? Who art thou that without all damage of corruption, and with the signs of thy majesty unblemished, dost in wrath condemn our power? Who art thou that art so great and so small, both humble and exalted, both soldier and commander, a marvellous warrior in the shape of a bondsman, and a King of glory dead and living, whom the cross bare slain upon it? Thou that didst lie dead in the sepulchre hast come down unto us living: and at thy death all creation quaked and all the stars were shaken: and thou hast become free among the dead and dost rout our legions. Who art thou that settest free the prisoners that are held bound by original sin and restorest them into their former liberty? Who art thou that sheddest thy divine and bright light upon them that were blinded with the darkness of their sins? After the same manner all the legions of devils were stricken with like fear and cried out all together in the terror of their confusion, saying: Whence art thou, Jesus, a man so mighty and bright in majesty, so excellent, without spot and clean from sin? For that world of earth which hath been alway subject unto us until now, and did pay tribute to our profit, hath never sent unto us a dead man like thee, nor ever dispatched such a gift unto Hell. Who then art thou that so fearlessly enterest our borders, and not only fearest not our torments, but besides essayest to bear away all men out of our bonds? Peradventure thou art that Jesus, of whom Satan our prince said that by thy death of the cross thou shouldest receive the dominion of the whole world.

If thou hear aught against thy brother, give it no credence; slander not, and delight not in hearing slander. For thus it is written: Suffer not thine ear to receive aught against thy brother: but if thou seest aught, correct him, rebuke him, and convert him. And we said unto him: Lord, thou hast in all things taught us and warned us. But, Lord, concerning the believers, even them to whom it belongeth to believe in the preaching of thy name: is it determined that among them also there shall be doubt and division, jealousy, confusion, hatred, and envy? For thou sayest: They shall find fault with one another and respect the person of them that sin, and hate them that rebuke them. And he answered and said unto us: How then shall the judgement come about, that the corn should be gathered into the garner and the chaff thereof cast into the fire?

They that hate such things, and love me and rebuke them that fulfil not my commandments, shall be hated and persecuted and despised and mocked. Men will of purpose speak of them that which is not true, and will band themselves together against them that love me. But these will rebuke them, that they may be saved. But them that will rebuke and chasten and warn them, them will they (the others) hate, and thrust them aside, and despise them, and hold themselves far from them that wish them good. But they that endure such things shall be like unto the martyrs with the Father, because they have striven for righteousness, and have not striven for corruption. And we asked him: Lord, shall such things be among us? And he answered us: Fear not; it shall not be in many, but in a few. We said unto him: Yet tell us, in what manner it shall come to pass. And he said unto us: There shall come forth another doctrine, and a confusion, and because they shall strive after their own advancement, they shall bring forth an unprofitable doctrine. And therein shall be a deadly corruption (of uncleanness), and they shall teach it, and shall turn away them that believe on me from my commandments and cut them off from eternal life. But woe unto them that falsify this my word and commandment, and draw away them that hearken to them from the life of the doctrine and separate themselves from the commandment of life: for together with them they shall come into everlasting judgement.

And again I said: Lord, what will become of the heavens, and the sun, and the moon, along with the stars? And I heard a voice saying to me: Behold, righteous John. And I looked, and saw a Lamb having seven eyes and seven horns. And again I heard a voice saying to me: I will bid the Lamb come before me, and will say, Who will open this book? And all the multitudes of the angels will answer, Give this book to the Lamb to open it. And then will I order the book to be opened. And when He shall open the first seal, the stars of the heaven shall fall, from the one end of it to the other. And when He shall open the second seal, the moon shall be hidden, and there shall be no light in her. And when He shall open the third seal, the light of the sun shall be withheld, and there shall not be light upon the earth. And when He shall open the fourth seal, the heavens shall be dissolved, and the air shall be thrown into utter confusion, as says the prophet: And the heavens are the works of Your hands; they shall perish, but You endure, and they shall all wax old as a garment. And when He shall open the fifth seal, the earth shall be rent, and all the tribunals upon the face of all the earth shall be revealed. And when He shall open the sixth seal, the half of the sea shall disappear. And when He shall open the seventh seal, Hades shall be uncovered.

And the bride answered and said: Verily, father, I am in great love, and I pray my Lord that the love which I have perceived this night may abide with me, and I will ask for that husband of whom I have learned to-day: and therefore I will no more veil myself, because the mirror (veil) of shame is removed from me; and therefore am I no more ashamed or abashed, because the deed of shame and confusion is departed far from me; and that I am not confounded, it is because my astonishment hath not continued with me; and that I am in cheerfulness and joy, it is because the day of my joy hath not been troubled; and that I have set at nought this husband and this marriage that passeth away from before mine eyes, it is because I am joined in another marriage; and that I have had no intercourse with a husband that is temporal, whereof the end is with lasciviousness and bitterness of soul, it is because I am yoked unto a true husband.

And when that serpent had spoken these things in the hearing of all the people, the apostle lifted up his voice on high and said: Cease thou henceforth, O most shameless one, and be put to confusion and die wholly, for the end of thy destruction is come, and dare not to tell of what thou hast done by them that have become subject unto thee. And I charge thee in the name of that Jesus who until now contendeth with you for the men that are his own, that thou suck out thy venom which thou hast put into this man, and draw it forth and take it from him. But the serpent said: Not yet is the end of our time come as thou hast said. Wherefore compellest thou me to take back that which I have put into this man, and to die before my time? for mine own father, when he shall draw forth and suck out that which he hath cast into the creation, then shall his end come. And the apostle said unto him: Show, then, now the nature of thy father. And the serpent came near and set his mouth upon the wound of the young man and sucked forth the gall out of it. And by little and little the colour of the young man which was as purple, became white, but the serpent swelled up. And when the serpent had drawn up all the gall into himself, the young man leapt up and stood, and ran and fell at the apostle's feet: but the serpent being swelled up, burst and died, and his venom and gall were shed forth; and in the place where his venom was shed there came a great gulf, and that serpent was swallowed up therein. And the apostle said unto the king and his brother: Take workmen and fill up that place, and lay foundations and build houses upon them, that it may be a dwelling-place for strangers.

Then Mary stood up before them and spread out her hands toward the heaven and began to speak thus: Elphue Zarethra Charboum Nemioth Melitho Thraboutha Mephnounos Chemiath Aroura Maridon Elison Marmiadon Seption Hesaboutha Ennouna Saktinos Athoor Belelam Opheoth Abo Chrasar, which is in the Greek tongue: O God the exceeding great and all-wise and king of the worlds (ages), that art not to be described, the ineffable, that didst establish the greatness of the heavens and all things by a word, that out of darkness (or the unknown) didst constitute and fasten together the poles of heaven in harmony, didst bring into shape the matter that was in confusion, didst bring into order the things that were without order, didst part the misty darkness from the light, didst establish in one place the foundations of the waters, thou that makest the beings of the air to tremble, and art the fear of them that are on (or under) the earth, that didst settle the earth and not suffer it to perish, and filledst it, which is the nourisher of all things, with showers of blessing: (Son of) the Father, thou whom the seven heavens hardly contained, but who wast well-pleased to be contained without pain in me, thou that art thyself the full word of the Father in whom all things came to be: give glory to thine exceeding great name, and bid me to speak before thy holy apostles.

For even in sleep malicious jealousy gnaweth, and with wicked spirits disturbeth the soul, and causeth the body to be troubled, and waketh the mind from sleep in confusion; and as a wicked and poisonous spirit, so appeareth it to men.

And wine is a cause both of war and confusion.

Speak truth each one with his neighbour. So shall ye not fall into wrath and confusion; but ye shall be in peace, having the God of peace, so shall no war prevail over you.

The good mind hath not two tongues, of blessing and of cursing, of contumely and of honour, of sorrow and of joy, of quietness and of confusion, of hypocrisy and of truth, of poverty and of wealth; but it hath one disposition, uncorrupt and pure, concerning all men.

Their appearance created such awe and confusion of mind as to make one feel that one had come into the presence of a man who belonged to a different world.

And in the twelfth part confusion from the mingling together of all those things aforesaid.

And when those things which were predicted have come to pass, Then shall confusion fall upon all men, And some of them shall fall in battle, And some of them shall perish in anguish,

They wrought confusion, son with mother and father with daughter;

Elect and faithful, there shall be confusion,

For then in all earth shall confusion be

And driving earth into confusion dost

Confusion. But exceeding terribly

Famines, and pestilences, and confusion

And in confusion many a horse and man

[and tested me in the confusion of my thoughts] "Yet may God reveal Himself to us through Himself!"

At early dawn let the bishop assemble the people, so that the service may be finished before the rising of the sun. When he saith the First Hymn of Praise, of the Dawn, the presbyters and deacons and the rest, the faithful also, [standing] close by, let him say thus: Praise to the Lord. And let the people say: It is meet and right. The bishop: It is meet and right that we should praise and laud and give thanks to Thee, who didst make all, ineffable God. Stretching forth our souls upward, we raise to Thee, O Lord, a hymn of praise for the morning,—to Thee who art all-wise, powerful, great in mercies, O God, the Confirmer and Raiser-up of our souls; we praise Thee, the Word who before the worlds wast begotten of the Father, and restest alone with Thy saints who art praised with the hymns of the archangels——Thee the Maker, who wast not made with hands, and who makest known holy things which are invisible, pure, and spotless——Thee who hast made known to us the hidden mysteries of wisdom, and didst promise to us immortal light; we lift up praise to Thee in pure holiness, we Thy servants, O Lord. And let the people say: We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we give thanks to Thee, O Lord; and we beseech Thee, O our God. Also [let] the bishop say: O God, the Begetter of light, the Principle of life, the Giver of knowledge, the Gift of grace, the Maker of souls, who makest things [that are] beautiful, the Giver of the Holy Ghost, the Treasure of Wisdom, and the Maker of good things, the Lord, the Teacher of holiness, who rulest the worlds by Thy will, the Receiver of pure prayers; we praise Thee, the Only-begotten Son, the First-born and Word of the Father, who didst bestow all Thy grace on us who call upon Thee, the Helper, and upon the Father who begat Thee; who hast an essence that cannot be injured, where neither moth nor worm doth corrupt; who givest to all that with all their heart trust in Thee those things which the angels have desired to behold; who art the Guardian of light eternal and [of] treasures incorruptible; who hast by the will of Thy Father shed light on the darkness which [is] in us; who from the depth hast raised us up to light; who hast given us life out of death, and bestowed upon us freedom out of slavery; who by the cross hast made us of the household of Thy Father, and by Thy gospel hast guided us to the heights of heaven, and hast comforted us by Thy prophets; who in Thine own Person hast made us of the household of God the Father of lights; grant us, O Lord, that we may praise Thee, our God, so that always with unceasing thanksgiving we may speak praises to Thee, we Thy servants, O Lord. The people: We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we give thanks to Thee, we beseech Thee, O our God. Let the bishop also say: We sing to Thee with our mouths this triple hymn of praise as a figure of Thy kingdom, O Son of God, who [art] by eternity; who [art] above all, with the Father; whom all creation praiseth, trembling with fear of Thy Spirit; at whom all nature trembleth in fear and [whom] every soul of the righteous blesseth; with whom all we have taken refuge; who hast made confusion, storms, [and] wind to cease from us; who hast been to us an haven of rest, and a place to flee unto from corruption; in whom we have hope of eternal salvation; who makest the peacefulness of fine weather for those who are buffeted on the seas and with the tempests; who in sicknesses art entreated and healest without price; who art with those that are shut up in prison; who hast loosed us from the bonds of death; [who art] the Comforter of the poor, and of those who mourn, and of those who have laboured and wearied themselves with the cross; who turnest away from us every menace; who for us hast reproved the craft of Satan; who drivest away his menaces, and givest us courage; who thrustest away all error from those that trust in Thee; whom the prophets and apostles praised secretly: we praise Thee, O Lord, we lift up to Thee a doxology, so that, having known Thee, we may rest in the habitations of life, doing Thy will alway. And grant to us, O Lord, to walk according to Thy commandments, and in mercy visit us all, both small and great, the prince and his people, the shepherd and his flock; for Thou, O Lord, art our God, and blessed and praised [is] Thy kingdom—Tthe kingdom] of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, both before the worlds, and now and always, and for the ages, and for ever and ever without end. And let the people say: Amen. Let them sing psalms and four hymns of praise; one by Moses, and of Solomon, and of the other prophets. Thus: little singing-boys; two virgins; three deacons; three presbyters. And so let the hymn of praise be said by the bishop, or by one of the presbyters. Let wt be said thus: The grace of our Lord [be] with you all. And let the people say: And with thy spirit. And let the priest say: Also let us praise our Lord. And let the people say: Meetly and rightly. Let the priest say: Let your hearts be fixed. And let the people say: We have [them fixed] with the Lord. O Lord, the Father, the Giver of light, the Author of all power and of all spirits, the Sealer of eternal light, and the Guide of life, the Maker of felicity and immortality, who hast made us to pass through material darkness, and hast bestowed upon us immaterial light; who hast loosed the bonds of disobedience and crowned us with the faith which is Thine; who dost not keep far off from Thy servants, but art in them always; who dost not neglect those [souls] which with labour and in Thy fear beseech Thee; who knowest all things before they are thought, and searchest out all things before they are considered, and givest what Thou wilt give before we ask Thee; who art well pleased to hear those who with heart undoubting serve Thee, O King of the highest lights and the soldiery of heaven, who hearest the archangels when they praise Thee, and art pleased in them; Answer us, O Lord, we beseech Thee. Grant us with boldness [with] unceasing voice to praise Thee, to laud Thee, to lift up to Thee a doxology; so that being guarded by Thee and guided in light, we Thy servants, O Lord, may constantly praise Thee. The people: We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we give thanks to Thee, O Lord; and we beseech Thee, O our God. The priest: O Lord Jesus, hear us, O Holy One, who wast the Voice of the dumb and the irrational, the Strength of the paralysed, the Giver of light to the blind, the Guide of the lame, the Cleanser of the lepers, the Curer of material fluxes, the Healer of the deaf and dumb, the Reprover of death, the Tormentor of darkness, the Ray of light, and the Lamp that is not quenched, the Sun that is not darkened [and] resteth [not]; but who always givest light unto Thy saints; who hast established all things together for the good likeness of comeliness; who art the well-tempered Reason; who hast plainly given light to all; who art the Saviour of the sons of men, and the Converter of souls; who art the Provider of all things as is right, the Maker of the angels, who adornest all; the Thought of the Father; who didst found the worlds in prudence and wisdom, and didst establish them together; and wast sent from Thy eternal Father unto us; the Intelligence of the Spirit who may not be apprehended or understood, the Maker-known of things invisible; Thou art glorious, and Thy Name is Wonderful. Therefore we also, Thy servants, O Lord, give praise to Thee. The people: We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we give thanks to Thee, O Lord; we beseech Thee, O our Lord. The priest: We sing, O holy Lord, this threefold hymn of praise to Thee, who didst give us a faith in Thee which cannot be loosed, whereby Thou didst make us to conquer the bonds of death; who didst create upright minds in them that trust in Thee, that they might be gods; who by the Spirit didst give unto us to tread under foot all the power of the enemy that we may not profane those things which may not be profaned; who by Thy mediation hast made friendship for us with Thy Father. Answer us Thy servants, O Lord, [Thou] whom without ceasing we entreat, who at our supplication givest [us] power against the adversary; whom alway we ask, as [it were], for the overthrow of the Evil one; Hear us, O King Eternal; comfort the widows, help the orphans; pity and cleanse those who are possessed with unclean spirits, give wisdom to the unwise; convert those who go astray; deliver those who are in prison; guard us all, for Thou, O Lord, art our God; blessed and glorious is Thy kingdom. The people: Amen.

After he is [ordained] let him be constant at the altar, making prayers laboriously without ceasing. But sometimes alone in some house let him take a rest from the things which belong to the house of the Lord; but not ceasing, or diminishing [one] hour, from prayers. Let him fast three days each [week] all the year, [on the] one [hand] that he may be perfected in intelligence; and moreover [let him fast] according to his strength, not wandering about and going hither and thither with every spirit, but doing everything with energy. If it be revealed to a presbyter or bishop to speak, let him speak; but if not, let him not neglect and despise his work, Tf it be revealed to a presbyter to visit his parishes and speak the word, let him go; but if not, let him entreat God with supplication; and if it be revealed to him to speak to them, let him speak to them, always taking the burden and load of Him who was crucified for him, and praying for all the people. Let not a presbyter or bishop be anxious about food or raiment. God taketh thought and careth for His own in the [things] which He knoweth. But if, when he receiveth from any one food or clothing, it be said to him that he should receive also from another, let it suffice him to receive from [the first] alone, and that [only] in so far as is fitting, and as he needeth, and not to excess. In respect of firmness of faith, let a presbyter always be unchangeable; for it is such as these that God desireth; and let him prove the heart of each one; lest evil) kept and buried within, make him a stranger to the grace of God. Let him not allow tares to grow in the good wheat, but let him take them away from it, and cut off, those who bring [them] into it. Let not darkness cover his light. Let him teach all the faithful at all times that they accomplish their course, as it were, in the day; because the children of light walk not in darkness. Let the teaching of the presbyter be fitting, and quiet and moderate, coupled with fear and trembling; and that of the bishop also in like manner. And in teaching let them not speak vain things; but let him say such things as the hearers when they hear may keep [in memory]. Let the presbyter be mindful of all the things that he teacheth. For in the day of the Lord the Word, it will be demanded [of him] that he should testify to the people the things which he spake, so that those who did not hear may be reproved. For he must stand before the glory of God speaking those things which he hath taught. Thus, then, let him teach, that he perish not. Let him pray for those who hear, that the Lord may give them understanding of the Spirit, of knowledge, of truth; and let him not vainly cast pearls before swine; but let him search out [those] who are worthy, those who have heard and have performed; lest if the Word have not brought forth fruit in them, but have perished, he himself should prove the cause of its perishing. Let him not give the holy things to dogs. Let him discern the signs of those who hear the word and bring forth good fruits. But in all things let him, without anxiety, keep [the matter] for the bishop. Let him not neglect nor despise those who do good works through teaching! But let him watch for signs in them; [and] of those [signs appearing] in them let him judge spiritually by [their] sighs, weeping, earnest conversations, silence, sadness, patience, humble bowing of the head. But that which best traineth and causeth suffering is weeping and groaning. But the work [these do] is watching, continence, fasting, quietness, unceasing prayer, meditation, faith, meekness, philanthropy, labour, weariness, love, subjection, goodness, gravity, and every [work of] light. [On the other hand], the signs of those who do not bring forth the fruits of life are [these]:—-sloth, love of pleasure, eyes wandering in all directions, disobedience, complaining, restlessness, a laziness that will not move, wandering about. But the work [these do] is gluttony, debauchery, anger, unbelief, idle and unseasonable laughter, confusion, neglect, error, disturbance, wantonness, love of gains, love of money, envy, contention, drunkenness, high-mindedness, vain talking, love of praise, and every [work of] darkness. Let him recognise products such as these, and let him speak to those who are worthy. But let him not waste time upon those who do not receive [his teaching]. For those who sow on earth without fruits shall reap miseries. Let the presbyter, as is right and fitting, go about to the houses of those who are sick with the deacon, and visit them; let him consider and say to them those things that are fitting and proper, especially to the faithful. Let him exhort that the sick who are poor be helped by the Church, so that they also who do [deeds] of kindness may enter into the joy of their Lord Let him confirm those who have newly become catechumens with prophetical and evangelical utterances, with the word of teaching. Let him not neglect his prayers, for he is the figure of the archangels: but let him know that God did not spare the angels who sinned. Let him fast; and if it is proper, let him receive of the cup. Let wine suffice him, as much as, in his judgment, profiteth and helpeth him, lest that drink which was for [his] healing he receive to [his] loss) In sickness, let him eat herbs and fish, and also that he may have care for his work. In everything let the priest be an example to the faithful of the work of holiness. Let the presbyter praise and give thanks in the same way as the bishop.

Let her hymns of praise be said thus quietly: Holy, holy, without spot, who hast Thy dwelling in the light, God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, God of Enoch and David, of Elijah, of Elisha, of Moses, of Joshua, and of the prophets and of the others who in truth preached Thy Name, God of the Apostles, the God who hast guided all things by Thy reason and hast blest them who lovingly trust in Thee; my soul praiseth Thee with the power of the spirit of my power, my heart praiseth Thee, O Lord, and Thy might, alway. Let all my power praise Thee, O Lord, for if Thou wilt, J am Thine, O God, the God of the poor; for Thou art the Helper of them that lack, and Thou art He that looketh on the meek, and the Assister of the weak; assist me, O Lord, because by Thy grace Thou wast well pleased in me that I should be Thine handmaid, for Thou hast bestowed upon me a great name, that I should be called a Christian. Thou who hast freed me from servitude that I may serve a servitude to God, the Mighty One who [art] for ever, who seest all, that I may praise Thee uncondemned. Yea, O Lord God, confirm my heart in Thee until it is perfected in the Holy Ghost. Rejuvenate us for the edification of Thy holy Church, Son and Word and Thought of the Father, the Christ who camest for the salvation of the race of man, who didst suffer and wast buried, and didst rise, [and] also wast glorified by Him who sent Thee, turn, help, O Lord, set upright our thoughts by the strong faith of the Spirit. Glorify Thy Name in us. For in Thy Father and in Thee and in the Holy Ghost is our hope for ever and ever. With those who are with her let her say: Amen. But let her say the hymn of praise at dawn thus: O Eternal God, Guide of our souls, Maker of light, Treasure of life, who restest in the praises and prayers of the holy ones, Lover of compassion merciful, kind, King of all, and God, our Lord, my spirit praiseth [Thee], sending [up] to Thee the unceasing voices of Thine handmaid, O Lord, who beseecheth Thee that Thou mayest perfect in Thine handmaid the spirit of reason and of piety and of right knowledge. I praise Thee, O Lord, who didst take away from our poverty all disturbance and confusion, wrath and all contention and evil habit, who didst prepare [and] change the feelings of my understanding that I might serve Thee only, O God; who hast adorned Thy holy Church with various ministries, who drivest away from Thine handmaid all doubtfulness, fear, weakness; and holdest the thoughts of those who rightly serve Thee; I praise Thee, O God, who hast enlightened me with the light of Thy knowledge, through Thine Only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom [be] praise and might to Thee for ever and ever. Amen? And with those who are with her let her say: Amen.

On the Saturday let the bishop assemble them who receive the laver, and let him bid them to kneel while the deacon proclaimeth. And when there is silence let him exorcise [them], laying a hand on them, and saying: O God of heaven, God of the lights, God of the archangels who are under Thy power, God of the angels who are under Thy might, King of glories and of dominions, God of saints, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; who hast loosed the souls that were bound by death; who hast enlightened him that was bound in darkness and fixed firm, by the firm-fixing of the suffering of Thy Only-begotten; who hast loosed our cords and hast loosed every weight from [off] us; who hast repelled from us every attack of the Evil One; O Son and Word of God, who hast made us immortal by Thy death; who hast glorified us with Thy glory; who hast loosed all the bands of our sins by Thy passion; who hast borne the curse of our sins by Thy cross, and by Thy resurrection hast taught [mankind] to pass from [being] sons of men to become gods; who hast taken on Thee our humiliation; who hast trodden the way to heaven for us; who hast changed us from corruption to incorruptibility; hear me, O Lord, who cry to Thee in pain and fear,O Lord God, and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, before Him before whom stand the holy hosts of archangels and of cherubim and armies without number, of princes and of seraphim; whose veil [is] the light, and before whose face [is] fire; the throne of whose glory is ineffable; the habitations of whose delights, which Thou hast prepared for Thy saints, are ineffable, the raiments and treasures of which are visible to Thee alone and to Thy holy angels; before whom all things tremble, giving praise; whose glance measureth the mountains, and whose Name, when uttered, cleaveth the depths; whom the heavens which are shut up by Thy hand, hide from view; before whom the earth and the depths together tremble; before whom the sea and the dragons that [are] in it quake; of whom the wild beasts trembling, stand in awe; through whom the mountains and the firmament of the earth melt with fear; at whose power the tempest of the winter quaketh and trembleth, and the raging whirlwind keepeth its limits; because of whom the fire of vengeance doth not overpass that which hath been prescribed to it, but abideth when reproved by Thy commandment; because of whom the whole creation travaileth, groaning with groans, being bidden to tarry till its time; from whom all nature and creation that opposeth itself fleeth; because of whom the whole army of the adversary is subdued, and the Devil is fallen, and the serpent is trodden down, and,the dragon is killed; because of whom the nations which have confessed Thee are enlightened and strengthened in Thee, O Lord; because of whom life is revealed and hope confirmed, and faith strengthened and the Gospel preached; because of whom corruption is brought to naught and incorruptibility waxeth strong; through whom man was fashioned from the earth, but having believed in Thee he is no longer earth; O Lord God Almighty, I exorcise these in the Name of Thee and of Thy beloved Son Jesus Christ. Drive away from the souls of these Thy servants every disease and illness, and every stumbling block and all unbelief, all doubt and all contempt, every unclean spirit that worketh, that is a witch, that killeth, that is under the earth, that is fiery, dark, evil-smelling, given to witchcraft, lascivious, loving gold, uplifted, money loving, wrathful. Yea, O Lord God, overthrow from these Thy servants who have been named in Thee the weapons of the Devil, all magic, witchcraft, fear of idols, divination, astrology, necromancy, observation of the stars, astronomy, pleasure of the passions, love of disgraceful things, sadness, love of money, drunkenness, fornication, adultery, lasciviousness, contumacy, contentiousness, wrath, confusion, wickedness, evil suspicion. Yea, O Lord God, hear me, and breathe on these Thy servants the spirit of tranquillity, that, being guarded by Thee, they may bring forth in Thee fruits of faith, of virtue, of wisdom, of purity, of self-discipline of patience, of hope, of concord, of modesty, of praise. For by Thee they have been called as servants, in the Name of Jesus Christ, being baptized in the Trinity, in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, the angels, glories, dominions, all the heavenly army being witnesses. O Lord, the real-essence of our life and theirs, guard their hearts, O God, for Thou art mighty and glorious for ever and ever. And let all the people, also the priests, say: Amen, So be it, so be it, so be it. If any one be in the endurance of any thing, rise suddenly while the bishop is saying [these words], and weep or cry out, or foam [at the mouth] or gnash with his teeth, or stare or be much uplifted or altogether run away, being quickly carried off, let such an one be put aside by the deacons, so that there be no disturbance while the bishop is speaking, and let such an one be exorcised by the priests until he be cleansed, and so let him be baptized. After the priest exorciseth those who have drawn near, or him who is found unclean, let the priest breathe on them and seal them between their eyes, on the nose, on the heart, on the ears; and so let him raise them up.

Concerning the Order of the Priesthood. Each one of you knows what we have ordained for you, and further ye know that there are some whom we name bishops, and others whom we name presbyters, and others are named deacons. With prayer we laid hand upon them, and we appointed to each an Order according to its different name. And among us there is no one who desires a filling of our hand, nor will he receive from us that which he wishes for of priesthood, as the priests of the oxen of Iyurebe'am, which were made as an abomination to God. Unless there had been a special Order for each according to law, one name would have sufficed for all the world; but having been taught by God a guidance for all functions, we have separated for the bishops the ordination of the priesthood, for the presbyters the priesthood, for the deacons the service.... that the work of the service might be completed withal. It is not seemly for the deacons to offer the Oblation, or to baptise, or to give the Eulogia to small or to great. And the presbyter shall not ordain anyone, because he was not worthy (of anything) beside his Order. For God is not a God of confusion, so that the inferiors may not grasp (at office) with audacity. What work then will be completed by the imperfect } And they make a new law to their own destruction, and do not know that it is a small thing which is in their power (lit. with them); and they kick with their feet in the net And if thus, they do not oppose us, but they oppose the Bishop of all the world, the Son of God, the Chief Priest Jesus Christ our Lord, A chief priest, priests, and levites were ordained by Moses, the lover of God, and we the twelve Apostles were ordained by our Lord and our Saviour Jesus Christ, and we ordained for us Klementos and Ya'ekob and others with them, that we might send ' each one of them, and further, we all of us ordained withal presbyters and deacons. And the first Presbyter, the only true Chief Priest, is our Lord Jesus Christ, who did not grasp for himself the honour, but the Father ordained him. And as he is the Chief Priest for us, so he offered spiritual sacrifice to God the Father before he was crucified, and he commanded us to do likewise. And there were others with us who believe in him, but he does not grant to all who believe in him to be priests, nor to obtain the Order of ordination of priesthood like us. And after his Ascension we offered according to the ordinance of the holy bloodless Oblation. And we ordained bishops and presbyters and deacons in number seven, and amongst them Estifanos, the first martyr, who was not the least of us in his love of God: but he showed his service of God by faith and love of Jesus Christ our Lord, so much that he gave his life up for his sake; and the wicked Jews, the murderers of the Lord, stoned him with stones for his name and killed him. But he was a man of such fervent spirit that he saw our Lord Christ at the right hand of God, and he saw the open gates of the heavens. And it is nowhere found that he did what was not suitable for him as deacon, that he offered sacrifice or laid hand upon anyone, but he kept to his Order of deacon unto the end. For thus it was proper for the martyr of our Lord Christ to fulfil the duties of his Order. And if there are any who blame Filepos the deacon and Hananya the faithful brother because the one baptised the eunuch and the other baptised even me, Pawlos, they are deluded as to what we say; for we say that no one should take by force the ordination of priesthood, but he obtained it from God, as Malkasedek and Ya'ekob; or from the chief priest, as Aron from IS Muse; therefore that Filepos and Hananya themselves took not ordination from themselves, but from our Lord Christ. They believed in the Chief Priest of God, with whom there is none to be compared. PRAYER OF EARLY MORNING And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father of our Lord and our Saviour Jesus Christ, while thanking him because he has kept us throughout the night, and brought us from darkness into light, from corruption into that which is incorruptible, and from ignorance into the knowledge of the truth, that throughout the day also he may cause us to be in all peace and health, and protect his people with the power of his angels, who has authority over all work of blessing, the Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray. O Lord the almighty, do thou cause us to be in all peace and health throughout the day, for thou hast kept us throughout the night Thou, Lord, the almighty, send to us thine angel the good guide. And have mercy upon us according to the greatness of thy mercy, and according to the multitude of thy clemency blot out our wickedness. And none of us is an alien and a backslider, put us not away from thy favour, because of thy name which was named over us. Be forgiving to us and forsake us not. Grant us to obtain favour before thee and before Christ thy Son, through, etc. PRAYER FOR THE SICK And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc. for the sick brethren, that he may remove all sickness and all suffering from them. Having taken away the spirit of disease, may he who has authority for all healing give to them life, the Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for the sick. God the almighty, the Father, etc. we pray thee and we beseech thee for the sick brethren. Grant to them life. Take away the spirit of sickness. Cause to pass away from them all disease and all suffering. Speedily let thy mercy find us, O Lord. The deacon shall say: Let us all say. The people shall say: Have mercy upon us. Physician of the soul and physician of the body, thou art the overseer of all flesh, and of those who are troubled with unclean spirits; deliver every tormented and IS oppressed soul, give health and give rest, drive away all disease from this house, and from those who call upon thy holy and blessed name. Having healed the disease of all of our souls, grant perfect soundness, through, etc. PRAYER FOR THOSE WHO MAKE A JOURNEY And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, JO etc, for those our brethren who make a journey, and also for those who are about to make a journey, whether by sea, or by rivers, or by the deeps, or by road, in whatever journey they may travel, that he may bring all into the safe harbour, the almighty Lord our God. IS The deacon shall say: Pray. Lord our God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee for our brethren who make a journey, and also for those who are about to make a journey abroad; direct (them) as fellow (traveller) though we are many. Speedily let thy mercy find us, O Lord. The deacon shall say: Let us all say. The people shall say: O Lord, have mercy upon us. Bring them into the safe harbour. Restore them to their people with joy and with peace, rejoicing and causing to rejoice, through, etc PRAYER FOR RAINS And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc, for rains, that he may send his rain into the place where it is needed, the almighty Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray. Lord our God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee, send thy rains into the place where they are needed. Make to rejoice the face of the earth, and water its furrows. Bring the sowing and the harvest, and bless the circle of the year with thy goodness. Speedily let thy mercy find us, O Lord. The deacon shall say: Let us all say. The people shall say: O Lord, have mercy upon us. For the poor of thy people, and for all those who hope in thee, work with us according to thy clemency, and nourish our mind with the doctrine of the Godhead, and with understanding which is from thee, through, etc. PRAYER FOR THE FRUIT OF THE EARTH And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father etc. for the fruit of the earth, that he may increase the fruit of the earth, and that he may be pleased to bring the sowing and the harvest. May he grant rich favour, the Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for the fruit of the earth. Lord our God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee, increase the fruit of the earth, and be pleased (and) bring the sowing and the harvest, which is from thy goodness. Speedily let thy mercy find us, O Lord. The deacon shall say: Let us all say. The people shall say: O Lord, have mercy upon us. For the poor of thy people and for all who call upon thy holy and blessed name, through, etc. PRAYER FOR THE WATERS OF THE RIVERS And again we' beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc, for the waters of the rivers, that he may cause (them) to rise up to their (proper) measure. Make to rejoice the face of the earth. May he bring the sowing and the harvest May he grant rich favour, the Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for the waters of the rivers. God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee, cause to rise the waters of the rivers up to their (proper) measure. Make to rejoice the face of the earth, and water its furrows. Multiply food, and bless the circle of the year with thy goodness. Speedily let thy mercy find us, O Lord. The deacon shall say: Let us all say. The people shall say: O Lord, have mercy upon us. For the poor of thy people, and for all who call upon thy holy and blessed name, through, etc. PRAYER FOR THE KING as And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc. for the lover of God, our king, Iyasu, that he should keep his kingdom without trouble, in peace and righteousness, the almighty Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for the king. Lord our God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee for the king of this land, the lover of God, our king, Iyasu, and grant to him what is useful for him. Cause to submit his enemy, the peoples who are against his wall& And speak in his heart for thy holy Church. Speedily let thy mercy find us, O Lord. The deacon shall say: Let us all say. The people shall say: O Lord, have mercy upon him. Grant him without error to keep (his) understanding concerning the faith in the excellence of thy Godhead, through, etc. PRAYER FOR THOSE WHO OFFER AN OFFERING And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, is etc. for those who offer an offering in the holy, one, catholic (lit. which is over all) Church, a sacrifice, first fruits, tithes, a thanksgiving, a memorial, whether much or little, secret and open. And as for those who have nothing and wish to give, (though) they have nothing to to give, accept their desire, and having accepted the longing of every one of them, grant to them the heavenly Spirit And as for those who have somewhat and do not wish to give, soften their heart to do good, thou (lit. he) who hast authority for all work of blessing, the Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for those who offer an offering. God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee for those who offer an offering to the holy, one, catholic Church, to the honour of thy name, an offering and a thanksgiving of first-fruits and of tithes, of much and of little, of secret and of open. And as for those who have nothing (yet) who wish to give, accept their desire as the offering of Abel: and as the Hebrew woman who offered the two mites, and as the sacrifice of the forefathers. And thus accept into the heavenly altar. Repay them with a reward of blessing, heavenly in return for earthly, and much in return for little, and open in return for secret, and life everlasting in Christ in return for food and drink, through, etc PRAYER FOR THE CATECHUMENS And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc. as regards his servants the catechumens, that he may impart to them in due time the washing of regeneration for the forgiveness of sin, the almighty Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for the catechumens, God the Lord almighty, the Father, etc. we pray thee and we beseech thee, have mercy upon thy servants the catechumens. Be kind, (and) remove from them all the remains of the idols. Impose upon their hearts thy law and thy commandment, and thy righteousness and thine ordinance. Speedily let thy mercy find us. The deacon shall say: Let us all say. The people shall say: O Lord, have mercy upon us. In proper time (impart to them) the washing of regeneration for the forgiveness of sin. Make them the shrine of the Holy Spirit, through our Lord and our Saviour Jesus Christ, through whom, etc. PRAYER FOR THOSE WHO HAVE FALLEN ASLEEP And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc. Lord of the living, Life of the dead, and Hope of the desperate, Helper of the afflicted, Cleanser of sinners, who hast abolished death and burst the bonds of Satan (Sayetan). Thou hast granted life to the race of men, thee we pray and beseech, who wilt not die for ever and ever, with whom is the treasure of life, for those who have fallen asleep and rested in the faith; the forefathers, the bishops, (papasat), presbyters and deacons, and readers (anaguenestis), and monks, and virgins, and widows (of the order), infants, widows and orphans (lit. offspring of the dead); and for the soul of thy servant N(egale) and for the soul of all those who are there in that place, whom thou calledst from among thy people in righteousness and in uprightness. Give rest to their soul in the place of pasturage by the water of rest, in the bosom of Abreham, Yeshak, and Ya'ekob, in the garden of joy, among the guides of light, thine angels, having united (them) with thy holy ones. And raise up their body in the day which thou hast appointed, according to thy holy unlying promise of thy heavenly kingdom; for there is no death to thy servants, but rather a passing, and although one has sinned, and the law of man was hidden from them, be indulgent; for thou, God, art good and the lover of man; for there is none pure from uncleanness before thee, even though he lived one hour upon the earth. Do thou grant passings to their soul freely, without hindrance. Send the Spirit of the Comforter, and who gives consolation to their people. Comfort them, cause them to rejoice in Christ, through, etc. PRAYER FOR PEACE And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc, for the peace of the holy, one, catholic Church, that he may grant much peace upon all rulers (lit. shepherds) and peoples and upon all flocks, he who has authority for all peace, the Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for peace. Lord our God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee for the peace of the holy, one, catholic Church. King of peace, give to us peace, because thou gavest to IS us everything. Possess us, God, and reward us, for beside thee there is no other whom we know. And thy holy name we name and we invoke. Do thou impart thy heavenly peace upon us all. Preserve (our) life (lit. soul) and our condition of this world peacefully. Give peace to the king of this land, and through thy holy name give counsel to the rulers of the neighbouring peoples. Guard our coming in and our going out in peace, that living in a quiet and tranquil life we may be found in all piety, in the fear of God and virtue in Christ, through, etc. PRAYER FOR THE CONGREGATION And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc. for the congregation, this as well as all our congregations, that he may grant that it may be according to his holy will, the almighty Lord our God. The deacon shall say: Pray for our congregation. God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee for this our congregation as well as all our congregations. Grant that it may be according to thy holy will, where we do this service of our congregation and other congregations also. And make it a house of prayer and a house of blessing. Vouchsafe to bestow upon us, and upon those who (come) after us, the everlasting salvation. Rise up, O Lord, and let all thine enemies be scattered, and let all flee away from before thy face who hate thy holy and blessed name, and make thy people ten thousand of ten thousands and ten thousand times ten thousand, through, etc PRAYER FOR THE PAPAS And again we beseech the almighty God, the Father, etc. for the blessed and holy Papas, Aba N(egale), that thou wilt in keeping keep him for us during many years and during times of peace, while he fulfils the priesthood which has been entrusted to him by thee. May the Lord our God grant rich favour. The deacon shall say: Pray for Papas N. Lord our God the almighty, we pray thee and we beseech thee for the blessed Papas N. In keeping keep him for us during many years, during times of peace, while he fulfils the priesthood which was entrusted to him by thee, together with all the bishops, presbyters, and deacons, and with all the fulness of the holy, one, catholic Church. And the prayer which they make for us and for all thy people hear (it), and accept them; and open to them the treasury of thy clemency; and further, pour down upon him abundantly thy grace of thy Holy Spirit, thy heavenly blessing, that he may bless thy people; and moreover, cause to submit every enemy, visible or invisible, and bruise (them) under his feet; and himself indeed keep for thy Church in glory, through thine only Son, through whom to thee with him and with the Holy Spirit (be) glory and might, now and ever and for ever and ever. Amen.

But he who does not consider these things, will, contrary to justice, spare him who deserves punishment; as Saul spared Agag, and Eli his sons, who knew not the Lord. Such a one profanes his own dignity, and that Church of God which is in his parish. Such a one is esteemed unjust before God and holy men, as affording occasion of scandal to many of the newly baptized, and to the catechumens; as also to the youth of both sexes, to whom a woe belongs, add a mill-stone about his neck, and drowning, on account of his guilt. For, observing what a person their governor is, through his wickedness and neglect of justice they will grow sceptical, and, indulging the same disease, will be compelled to perish with him; as was the case of the people joining with Jeroboam, and those which were in the conspiracy with Corah. But if the offender sees that the bishop and deacons are innocent and unblameable, and the flock pure, he will either not venture to despise their authority, and to enter into the Church of God at all, as one smitten by his own conscience: or if he values nothing, and ventures to enter in, either he will be convicted immediately, as Uzza at the ark, when he touched it to support it; and as Achan, when he stole the accursed thing; and as Gehazi, when he coveted the money of Naaman, and so will be immediately punished: or else he will be admonished by the pastor, and drawn to repentance. For when he looks round the whole Church one by one, and can spy no blemish, neither in the bishop nor in the people who are under his care, he will be put to confusion, and pricked at the heart, and in a peaceable manner will go his way with shame and many tears, and the flock will remain pure. He will apply himself to God with tears, and will repent of his sins, and have hope. Nay, the whole flock, at the sight of his tears, will be instructed, because a sinner avoids destruction by repentance.

Now, when you pray, be not as the hypocrites; but as the Lord has appointed us in the Gospel, so pray: Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be Your name; Your kingdom come; Your will be done, as in heaven, so on earth; give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil; for Yours is the kingdom forever. Amen. Pray thus thrice in a day, preparing yourselves beforehand, that you may be worthy of the adoption of the Father; lest, when you call Him Father unworthily, you be reproached by Him, as Israel once His first-born son was told: If I be a Father, where is my glory? And if I be a Lord, where is my fear? For the glory of fathers is the holiness of their children, and the honour of masters is the fear of their servants, as the contrary is dishonour and confusion. For says He: Through you my name is blasphemed among the Gentiles.

I the same make a constitution in regard to remainders. Those eulogies which remain at the mysteries, let the deacons distribute them among the clergy, according to the mind of the bishop or the presbyters: to a bishop; four parts; to a presbyter, three parts; to a deacon, two parts; and to the rest of the sub-deacons, or readers, or singers, or deaconesses, one part. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God, that every one be honoured according to his dignity; for the Church is the school, not of confusion, but of good order.

Now this we all in common do charge you, that every one remain in that rank which is appointed him, and do not transgress his proper bounds; for they are not ours, but God's. For says the Lord: He that hears you, hears me; and he that hears me, hears Him that sent me. And, He that despises you, despises me; and he that despises me, despises Him that sent me. For if those things that are without life do observe good order, as the night, the day, the sun, the moon, the stars, the elements, the seasons, the months, the weeks, the days, and the hours, and are subservient to the uses appointed them, according to that which is said, You have set them a bound which they shall not pass; and again, concerning the sea, I have set bounds thereto, and have encompassed it with bars and gates; and I said to it, Hitherto shall you come, and you shall go no farther; how much more ought you not to venture to remove those things which we, according to God's will, have determined for you! But because many think this a small matter, and venture to confound the orders, and to remove the ordination which belongs to them severally, snatching to themselves dignities which were never given them, and allowing themselves to bestow that authority in a tyrannical manner which they have not themselves, and thereby provoke God to anger (as did the followers of Corah and King Uzziah, who, having no authority, usurped the high-priesthood without commission from God; and the former were burnt with fire, and the latter was struck with a leprosy in his forehead); and provoke Christ Jesus to anger, who has made this constitution; and also grieve the Holy Spirit, and make void His testimony: therefore, foreknowing the danger that hangs over those who do such things, and the neglect about the sacrifices and eucharistical offices which will arise from their being impiously offered by those who ought not to offer them; who think the honour of the high-priesthood, which is an imitation of the great High Priest Jesus Christ our King, to be a matter of sport; we have found it necessary to give you warning in this matter also. For some are already turned aside after their own vanity. We say that Moses the servant of God (to whom God spoke face to face, as if a man spoke to his friend; to whom He said, I know you above all men; to whom He spoke directly, and not by obscure methods, or dreams, or angels, or riddles) — this person, when he made constitutions and divine laws, distinguished what things were to be performed by the high priests, what by the priests, and what by the Levites; distributing to every one his proper and suitable office in the divine service. And those things which are allotted for the high priests to do, those might not be meddled with by the priests; and what things were allotted to the priests, the Levites might not meddle with; but every one observed those ministrations which were written down and appointed for them. And if any would meddle beyond the tradition, death was his punishment. And Saul's example does show this most plainly, who, thinking he might offer sacrifice without the prophet and high priest Samuel, drew upon himself a sin and a curse without remedy. Nor did even his having anointed him king discourage the prophet. But God showed the same by a more visible effect in the case of Uzziah, when He without delay exacted the punishment due to this transgression, and he that madly coveted after the high-priesthood was rejected from his kingdom also. As to those things that have happened among us, you yourselves are not ignorant of them. For you know undoubtedly that those that are by us named bishops, and presbyters, and deacons, were made by prayer, and by the laying on of hands; and that by the difference of their names is showed the difference of their employments. For not every one that will is ordained, as the case was in that spurious and counterfeit priesthood of the calves under Jeroboam; but he only who is called of God. For if there were no rule or distinction of orders, it would suffice to perform all the offices under one name. But being taught by the Lord the series of things, we distributed the functions of the high-priesthood to the bishops, those of the priesthood to the presbyters, and the ministration under them both to the deacons; that the divine worship might be performed in purity. For it is not lawful for a deacon to offer the sacrifice, or to baptize, or to give either the greater or the lesser blessing. Nor may a presbyter perform ordination; for it is not agreeable to holiness to have this order perverted. For God is not the God of confusion, that the subordinate persons should tyrannically assume to themselves the functions belonging to their superiors, forming a new scheme of laws to their own mischief, not knowing that it is hard for them to kick against the pricks; for such as these do not fight against us, or against the bishops, but against the universal Bishop and the High Priest of the Father, Jesus Christ our Lord. High priests, priests, and Levites were ordained by Moses, the most beloved of God. By our Saviour were we apostles, thirteen in number, ordained; and by the apostles I James, and I Clement, and others with us, were ordained, that we may not make the catalogue of all those bishops over again. And in common, presbyters, and deacons, and sub-deacons, and readers, were ordained by all of us. The great High Priest therefore, who is so by nature, is Christ the only begotten; not having snatched that honour to Himself, but having been appointed such by the Father; who being made man for our sake, and offering the spiritual sacrifice to His God and Father, before His suffering gave it us alone in charge to do this, although there were others with us who had believed in Him. But he that believes is not presently appointed a priest, or obtains the dignity of the high-priesthood. But after His ascension we offered, according to His constitution, the pure and unbloody sacrifice; and ordained bishops, and presbyters, and deacons, seven in number: one of which was Stephen, that blessed martyr, who was not inferior to us as to his pious disposition of mind towards God; who showed so great piety towards God, by his faith and love towards our Lord Jesus Christ, as to give his life for Him, and was stoned to death by the Jews, the murderers of the Lord. Yet still this so great and good a man, who was fervent in spirit, who saw Christ on the right hand of God, and the gates of heaven opened, does nowhere appear to have exercised functions which did not appertain to his office of a deacon, nor to have offered the sacrifices, nor to have laid hands upon any, but kept his order of a deacon unto the end. For so it became him, who was a martyr for Christ, to preserve good order. But if some do blame Philip our deacon, and Ananias our faithful brother, that the one did baptize the eunuch, and the other me Paul, these men do not understand what we say. For we have affirmed only that no one snatches the sacerdotal dignity to himself, but either receives it from God, as Melchisedec and Job, or from the high priest, as Aaron from Moses. Wherefore Philip and Ananias did not constitute themselves, but were appointed by Christ, the High Priest of that God to whom no being is to be compared.

And the angel of the Lord smote the whole land of the Philistines on that night, and there was a great confusion on that night and on the following morning.

And in the morning Abimelech rose with terror and confusion and with a great dread, and he sent and had his servants called in, and he related his dream to them, and the people were greatly afraid.

And they assembled near Jashub's camp, seeing his confusion, and Judah drew his sword and smote forty-two men of the camp of Jashub, and the whole of Jashub's camp fled before Judah, and no man stood against him, and they left Jashub and fled from him, and Jashub was still prostrate upon the ground.

And the Lord hearkened to the voice of the sons of Jacob, and the Lord caused great terror and confusion to seize the people of Bethchorin, and they fought amongst themselves the one with the other in the darkness of night, and smote each other in great numbers.

And the Lord saw the ambition of Joseph and his trouble, and the Lord brought down upon those men darkness and confusion, and the hand of every one that smote him became withered.

And it came to pass when the sons of Esau had fled from before the sons of Jacob, the sons of Jacob pursued them unto the borders of Seir, but they did not slay a single man from amongst them when they pursued them, for Esau's body which they carried with them excited their confusion, so they fled and the sons of Jacob turned back from them and came up to the place where their brethren were in Hebron, and they remained there on that day, and on the next day until they rested from the battle.

Nay, indeed, while Antipater was in Judea, and before he was upon his journey to Rome, he gave money to have the like letters against them sent from Rome, and then came to his father, who as yet had no suspicion of him, and apologized for his brethren, and alleged on their behalf that some of the things contained in those letters were false, and others of them were only youthful errors. Yet at the same time that he expended a great deal of his money, by making presents to such as wrote against his brethren, did he aim to bring his accounts into confusion, by buying costly garments, and carpets of various contextures, with silver and gold cups, and a great many more curious things, that so, among the view great expenses laid out upon such furniture, he might conceal the money he had used in hiring men [to write the letters]; for he brought in an account of his expenses, amounting to two hundred talents, his main pretense for which was file law-suit he had been in with Sylleus. So while all his rogueries, even those of a lesser sort also, were covered by his greater villainy, while all the examinations by torture proclaimed his attempt to murder his father, and the letters proclaimed his second attempt to murder his brethren; yet did no one of those that came to Rome inform him of his misfortunes in Judea, although seven months had intervened between his conviction and his return, so great was the hatred which they all bore to him. And perhaps they were the ghosts of those brethren of his that had been murdered that stopped the mouths of those that intended to have told him. He then wrote from Rome, and informed his [friends] that he would soon come to them, and how he was dismissed with honor by Caesar.

Now the king, being desirous to get this plotter against him into his hands, and being also afraid lest he should some way come to the knowledge how his affairs stood, and be upon his guard, he dissembled his anger in his epistle to him, as in other points he wrote kindly to him, and desired him to make haste, because if he came quickly, he would then lay aside the complaints he had against his mother; for Antipater was not ignorant that his mother had been expelled out of the palace. However, he had before received a letter, which contained an account of the death of Pheroras, at Tarentum, and made great lamentations at it; for which some commended him, as being for his own uncle; though probably this confusion arose on account of his having thereby failed in his plot [on his father's life]; and his tears were more for the loss of him that was to have been subservient therein, than for [an uncle] Pheroras: moreover, a sort of fear came upon him as to his designs, lest the poison should have been discovered. However, when he was in Cilicia, he received the forementioned epistle from his father, and made great haste accordingly. But when he had sailed to Celenderis, a suspicion came into his mind relating to his mother's misfortunes; as if his soul foreboded some mischief to itself. Those therefore of his friends which were the most considerate advised him not rashly to go to his father, till he had learned what were the occasions why his mother had been ejected, because they were afraid that he might be involved in the calumnies that had been cast upon his mother: but those that were less considerate, and had more regard to their own desires of seeing their native country, than to Antipater's safety, persuaded him to make haste home, and not, by delaying his journey, afford his father ground for an ill suspicion, and give a handle to those that raised stories against him; for that in case any thing had been moved to his disadvantage, it was owing to his absence, which durst not have been done had he been present. And they said it was absurd to deprive himself of certain happiness, for the sake of an uncertain suspicion, and not rather to return to his father, and take the royal authority upon him, which was in a state of fluctuation on his account only. Antipater complied with this last advice, for Providence hurried him on [to his destruction]. So he passed over the sea, and landed at Sebastus, the haven of Cesarea.

Upon Herod's saying this, he was interrupted by the confusion he was in; but ordered Nicolaus, one of his friends, to produce the evidence against Antipater. But in the mean time Antipater lifted up his head, [for he lay on the ground before his father's feet,] and cried out aloud, "Thou, O father, hast made my apology for me; for how can I be a parricide, whom thou thyself confessest to have always had for thy guardian? Thou callest my filial affection prodigious lies and hypocrisy! how then could it be that I, who was so subtle in other matters, should here be so mad as not to understand that it was not easy that he who committed so horrid a crime should be concealed from men, but impossible that he should be concealed from the Judge of heaven, who sees all things, and is present every where? or did not I know what end my brethren came to, on whom God inflicted so great a punishment for their evil designs against thee? And indeed what was there that could possibly provoke me against thee? Could the hope of being king do it? I was a king already. Could I suspect hatred from thee? No. Was not I beloved by thee? And what other fear could I have? Nay, by preserving thee safe, I was a terror to others. Did I want money? No; for who was able to expend so much as myself? Indeed, father, had I been the most execrable of all mankind, and had I had the soul of the most cruel wild beast, must I not have been overcome with the benefits thou hadst bestowed upon me? whom, as thou thyself sayest, thou broughtest [into the palace]; whom thou didst prefer before so many of thy sons; whom thou madest a king in thine own lifetime, and, by the vast magnitude of the other advantages thou bestowedst on me, thou madest me an object of envy. O miserable man! that thou shouldst undergo this bitter absence, and thereby afford a great opportunity for envy to arise against thee, and a long space for such as were laying designs against thee! Yet was I absent, father, on thy affairs, that Sylleus might not treat thee with contempt in thine old age. Rome is a witness to my filial affection, and so is Caesar, the ruler of the habitable earth, who oftentimes called me Philopater. Take here the letters he hath sent thee, they are more to be believed than the calumnies raised here; these letters are my only apology; these I use as the demonstration of that natural affection I have to thee. Remember that it was against my own choice that I sailed [to Rome], as knowing the latent hatred that was in the kingdom against me. It was thou, O father, however unwillingly, who hast been my ruin, by forcing me to allow time for calumnies against me, and envy at me. However, I am come hither, and am ready to hear the evidence there is against me. If I be a parricide, I have passed by land and by sea, without suffering any misfortune on either of them: but this method of trial is no advantage to me; for it seems, O father, that I am already condemned, both before God and before thee; and as I am already condemned, I beg that thou wilt not believe the others that have been tortured, but let fire be brought to torment me; let the racks march through my bowels; have no regard to any lamentations that this polluted body can make; for if I be a parricide, I ought not to die without torture." Thus did Antipater cry out with lamentation and weeping, and moved all the rest, and Varus in particular, to commiserate his case. Herod was the only person whose passion was too strong to permit him to weep, as knowing that the testimonies against him were true.

Moreover, as to the citizens of Jerusalem, although they took this matter very ill, yet did they restrain their passion; but Florus acted herein as if he had been hired, and blew up the war into a flame, and sent some to take seventeen talents out of the sacred treasure, and pretended that Caesar wanted them. At this the people were in confusion immediately, and ran together to the temple, with prodigious clamors, and called upon Caesar by name, and besought him to free them from the tyranny of Florus. Some also of the seditious cried out upon Florus, and cast the greatest reproaches upon him, and carried a basket about, and begged some spills of money for him, as for one that was destitute of possessions, and in a miserable condition. Yet was not he made ashamed hereby of his love of money, but was more enraged, and provoked to get still more; and instead of coming to Cesarea, as he ought to have done, and quenching the flame of war, which was beginning thence, and so taking away the occasion of any disturbances, on which account it was that he had received a reward [of eight talents], he marched hastily with an army of horsemen and footmen against Jerusalem, that he might gain his will by the arms of the Romans, and might, by his terror, and by his threatenings, bring the city into subjection.

But the people were desirous of making Florus ashamed of his attempt, and met his soldiers with acclamations, and put themselves in order to receive him very submissively. But he sent Capito, a centurion, beforehand, with fifty soldiers, to bid them go back, and not now make a show of receiving him in an obliging manner, whom they had so foully reproached before; and said that it was incumbent on them, in case they had generous souls, and were free speakers, to jest upon him to his face, and appear to be lovers of liberty, not only in words, but with their weapons also. With this message was the multitude amazed; and upon the coming of Capito's horsemen into the midst of them, they were dispersed before they could salute Florus, or manifest their submissive behavior to him. Accordingly, they retired to their own houses, and spent that night in fear and confusion of face.

"Had I perceived that you were all zealously disposed to go to war with the Romans, and that the purer and more sincere part of the people did not propose to live in peace, I had not come out to you, nor been so bold as to give you counsel; for all discourses that tend to persuade men to do what they ought to do are superfluous, when the hearers are agreed to do the contrary. But because some are earnest to go to war because they are young, and without experience of the miseries it brings, and because some are for it out of an unreasonable expectation of regaining their liberty, and because others hope to get by it, and are therefore earnestly bent upon it, that in the confusion of your affairs they may gain what belongs to those that are too weak to resist them, I have thought proper to get you all together, and to say to you what I think to be for your advantage; that so the former may grow wiser, and change their minds, and that the best men may come to no harm by the ill conduct of some others. And let not any one be tumultuous against me, in case what they hear me say do not please them; for as to those that admit of no cure, but are resolved upon a revolt, it will still be in their power to retain the same sentiments after my exhortation is over; but still my discourse will fall to the ground, even with a relation to those that have a mind to hear me, unless you will all keep silence. I am well aware that many make a tragical exclamation concerning the injuries that have been offered you by your procurators, and concerning the glorious advantages of liberty; but before I begin the inquiry, who you are that must go to war, and who they are against whom you must fight, I shall first separate those pretenses that are by some connected together; for if you aim at avenging yourselves on those that have done you injury, why do you pretend this to be a war for recovering your liberty? but if you think all servitude intolerable, to what purpose serve your complaint against your particular governors? for if they treated you with moderation, it would still be equally an unworthy thing to be in servitude. Consider now the several cases that may be supposed, how little occasion there is for your going to war. Your first occasion is the accusations you have to make against your procurators; now here you ought to be submissive to those in authority, and not give them any provocation; but when you reproach men greatly for small offenses, you excite those whom you reproach to be your adversaries; for this will only make them leave off hurting you privately, and with some degree of modesty, and to lay what you have waste openly. Now nothing so much damps the force of strokes as bearing them with patience; and the quietness of those who are injured diverts the injurious persons from afflicting. But let us take it for granted that the Roman ministers are injurious to you, and are incurably severe; yet are they not all the Romans who thus injure you; nor hath Caesar, against whom you are going to make war, injured you: it is not by their command that any wicked governor is sent to you; for they who are in the west cannot see those that are in the east; nor indeed is it easy for them there even to hear what is done in these parts. Now it is absurd to make war with a great many for the sake of one, to do so with such mighty people for a small cause; and this when these people are not able to know of what you complain: nay, such crimes as we complain of may soon be corrected, for the same procurator will not continue for ever; and probable it is that the successors will come with more moderate inclinations. But as for war, if it be once begun, it is not easily laid down again, nor borne without calamities coming therewith. However, as to the desire of recovering your liberty, it is unseasonable to indulge it so late; whereas you ought to have labored earnestly in old time that you might never have lost it; for the first experience of slavery was hard to be endured, and the struggle that you might never have been subject to it would have been just; but that slave who hath been once brought into subjection, and then runs away, is rather a refractory slave than a lover of liberty; for it was then the proper time for doing all that was possible, that you might never have admitted the Romans [into your city], when Pompey came first into the country. But so it was, that our ancestors and their kings, who were in much better circumstances than we are, both as to money, and strong bodies, and [valiant] souls, did not bear the onset of a small body of the Roman army. And yet you, who have now accustomed yourselves to obedience from one generation to another, and who are so much inferior to those who first submitted, in your circumstances will venture to oppose the entire empire of the Romans. While those Athenians, who, in order to preserve the liberty of Greece, did once set fire to their own city; who pursued Xerxes, that proud prince, when he sailed upon the land, and walked upon the sea, and could not be contained by the seas, but conducted such an army as was too broad for Europe; and made him run away like a fugitive in a single ship, and brake so great a part of Asia at the Lesser Salamis; are yet at this time servants to the Romans; and those injunctions which are sent from Italy become laws to the principal governing city of Greece. Those Lacedemonians also who got the great victories at Thermopylae and Platea, and had Agesilaus [for their king], and searched every corner of Asia, are contented to admit the same lords. Those Macedonians also, who still fancy what great men their Philip and Alexander were, and see that the latter had promised them the empire over the world, these bear so great a change, and pay their obedience to those whom fortune hath advanced in their stead. Moreover, ten thousand ether nations there are who had greater reason than we to claim their entire liberty, and yet do submit. You are the only people who think it a disgrace to be servants to those to whom all the world hath submitted. What sort of an army do you rely on? What are the arms you depend on? Where is your fleet, that may seize upon the Roman seas? and where are those treasures which may be sufficient for your undertakings? Do you suppose, I pray you, that you are to make war with the Egyptians, and with the Arabians? Will you not carefully reflect upon the Roman empire? Will you not estimate your own weakness? Hath not your army been often beaten even by your neighboring nations, while the power of the Romans is invincible in all parts of the habitable earth? nay, rather they seek for somewhat still beyond that; for all Euphrates is not a sufficient boundary for them on the east side, nor the Danube on the north; and for their southern limit, Libya hath been searched over by them, as far as countries uninhabited, as is Cadiz their limit on the west; nay, indeed, they have sought for another habitable earth beyond the ocean, and have carried their arms as far as such British islands as were never known before. What therefore do you pretend to? Are you richer than the Gauls, stronger than the Germans, wiser than the Greeks, more numerous than all men upon the habitable earth? What confidence is it that elevates you to oppose the Romans? Perhaps it will be said, It is hard to endure slavery. Yes; but how much harder is this to the Greeks, who were esteemed the noblest of all people under the sun! These, though they inhabit in a large country, are in subjection to six bundles of Roman rods. It is the same case with the Macedonians, who have juster reason to claim their liberty than you have. What is the case of five hundred cities of Asia? Do they not submit to a single governor, and to the consular bundle of rods? What need I speak of the Henlochi, and Colchi and the nation of Tauri, those that inhabit the Bosphorus, and the nations about Pontus, and Meotis, who formerly knew not so much as a lord of their own, but are now subject to three thousand armed men, and where forty long ships keep the sea in peace, which before was not navigable, and very tempestuous? How strong a plea may Bithynia, and Cappadocia, and the people of Pamphylia, the Lycians, and Cilicians, put in for liberty! But they are made tributary without an army. What are the circumstances of the Thracians, whose country extends in breadth five days' journey, and in length seven, and is of a much more harsh constitution, and much more defensible, than yours, and by the rigor of its cold sufficient to keep off armies from attacking them? do not they submit to two thousand men of the Roman garrisons? Are not the Illyrlans, who inhabit the country adjoining, as far as Dalmatia and the Danube, governed by barely two legions? by which also they put a stop to the incursions of the Daeians. And for the Dalmatians, who have made such frequent insurrections in order to regain their liberty, and who could never before be so thoroughly subdued, but that they always gathered their forces together again, revolted, yet are they now very quiet under one Roman legion. Moreover, great advantages might provoke any people to revolt, the Gauls might do it best of all, as being so thoroughly walled round by nature; on the east side by the Alps, on the north by the river Rhine, on the south by the Pyrenean mountains, and on the west by the ocean. Now although these Gauls have such obstacles before them to prevent any attack upon them, and have no fewer than three hundred and five nations among them, nay have, as one may say, the fountains of domestic happiness within themselves, and send out plentiful streams of happiness over almost the whole world, these bear to be tributary to the Romans, and derive their prosperous condition from them; and they undergo this, not because they are of effeminate minds, or because they are of an ignoble stock, as having borne a war of eighty years in order to preserve their liberty; but by reason of the great regard they have to the power of the Romans, and their good fortune, which is of greater efficacy than their arms. These Gauls, therefore, are kept in servitude by twelve hundred soldiers, which are hardly so many as are their cities; nor hath the gold dug out of the mines of Spain been sufficient for the support of a war to preserve their liberty, nor could their vast distance from the Romans by land and by sea do it; nor could the martial tribes of the Lusitanians and Spaniards escape; no more could the ocean, with its tide, which yet was terrible to the ancient inhabitants. Nay, the Romans have extended their arms beyond the pillars of Hercules, and have walked among the clouds, upon the Pyrenean mountains, and have subdued these nations. And one legion is a sufficient guard for these people, although they were so hard to be conquered, and at a distance so remote from Rome. Who is there among you that hath not heard of the great number of the Germans? You have, to be sure, yourselves seen them to be strong and tall, and that frequently, since the Romans have them among their captives every where; yet these Germans, who dwell in an immense country, who have minds greater than their bodies, and a soul that despises death, and who are in rage more fierce than wild beasts, have the Rhine for the boundary of their enterprises, and are tamed by eight Roman legions. Such of them as were taken captive became their servants; and the rest of the entire nation were obliged to save themselves by flight. Do you also, who depend on the walls of Jerusalem, consider what a wall the Britons had; for the Romans sailed away to them, an subdued them while they were encompassed by the ocean, and inhabited an island that is not less than the [continent of this] habitable earth; and four legions are a sufficient guard to so large an island And why should I speak much more about this matter, while the Parthians, that most warlike body of men, and lords of so many nations, and encompassed with such mighty forces, send hostages to the Romans? whereby you may see, if you please, even in Italy, the noblest nation of the East, under the notion of peace, submitting to serve them. Now when almost all people under the sun submit to the Roman arms, will you be the only people that make war against them? and this without regarding the fate of the Carthaginians, who, in the midst of their brags of the great Hannibal, and the nobility of their Phoenician original, fell by the hand of Scipio. Nor indeed have the Cyrenians, derived from the Lacedemonians, nor the Marmaridite, a nation extended as far as the regions uninhabitable for want of water, nor have the Syrtes, a place terrible to such as barely hear it described, the Nasamons and Moors, and the immense multitude of the Numidians, been able to put a stop to the Roman valor. And as for the third part of the habitable earth, [Africa,] whose nations are so many that it is not easy to number them, and which is bounded by the Atlantic Sea and the pillars of Hercules, and feeds an innumerable multitude of Ethiopians, as far as the Red Sea, these have the Romans subdued entirely. And besides the annual fruits of the earth, which maintain the multitude of the Romans for eight months in the year, this, over and above, pays all sorts of tribute, and affords revenues suitable to the necessities of the government. Nor do they, like you, esteem such injunctions a disgrace to them, although they have but one Roman legion that abides among them. And indeed what occasion is there for showing you the power of the Romans over remote countries, when it is so easy to learn it from Egypt, in your neighborhood? This country is extended as far as the Ethiopians, and Arabia the Happy, and borders upon India; it hath seven millions five hundred thousand men, besides the inhabitants of Alexandria, as may be learned from the revenue of the poll tax; yet it is not ashamed to submit to the Roman government, although it hath Alexandria as a grand temptation to a revolt, by reason it is so full of people and of riches, and is besides exceeding large, its length being thirty furlongs, and its breadth no less than ten; and it pays more tribute to the Romans in one month than you do in a year; nay, besides what it pays in money, it sends corn to Rome that supports it for four months [in the year]: it is also walled round on all sides, either by almost impassable deserts, or seas that have no havens, or by rivers, or by lakes; yet have none of these things been found too strong for the Roman good fortune; however, two legions that lie in that city are a bridle both for the remoter parts of Egypt, and for the parts inhabited by the more noble Macedonians. Where then are those people whom you are to have for your auxiliaries? Must they come from the parts of the world that are uninhabited? for all that are in the habitable earth are [under the] Romans. Unless any of you extend his hopes as far as beyond the Euphrates, and suppose that those of your own nation that dwell in Adiabene will come to your assistance; but certainly these will not embarrass themselves with an unjustifiable war, nor, if they should follow such ill advice, will the Parthians permit them so to do; for it is their concern to maintain the truce that is between them and the Romans, and they will be supposed to break the covenants between them, if any under their government march against the Romans. What remains, therefore, is this, that you have recourse to Divine assistance; but this is already on the side of the Romans; for it is impossible that so vast an empire should be settled without God's providence. Reflect upon it, how impossible it is for your zealous observations of your religious customs to be here preserved, which are hard to be observed even when you fight with those whom you are able to conquer; and how can you then most of all hope for God's assistance, when, by being forced to transgress his law, you will make him turn his face from you? and if you do observe the custom of the sabbath days, and will not be revealed on to do any thing thereon, you will easily be taken, as were your forefathers by Pompey, who was the busiest in his siege on those days on which the besieged rested. But if in time of war you transgress the law of your country, I cannot tell on whose account you will afterward go to war; for your concern is but one, that you do nothing against any of your forefathers; and how will you call upon God to assist you, when you are voluntarily transgressing against his religion? Now all men that go to war do it either as depending on Divine or on human assistance; but since your going to war will cut off both those assistances, those that are for going to war choose evident destruction. What hinders you from slaying your children and wives with your own hands, and burning this most excellent native city of yours? for by this mad prank you will, however, escape the reproach of being beaten. But it were best, O my friends, it were best, while the vessel is still in the haven, to foresee the impending storm, and not to set sail out of the port into the middle of the hurricanes; for we justly pity those who fall into great misfortunes without fore-seeing them; but for him who rushes into manifest ruin, he gains reproaches [instead of commiseration]. But certainly no one can imagine that you can enter into a war as by agreement, or that when the Romans have got you under their power, they will use you with moderation, or will not rather, for an example to other nations, burn your holy city, and utterly destroy your whole nation; for those of you who shall survive the war will not be able to find a place whither to flee, since all men have the Romans for their lords already, or are afraid they shall have hereafter. Nay, indeed, the danger concerns not those Jews that dwell here only, but those of them which dwell in other cities also; for there is no people upon the habitable earth which have not some portion of you among them, whom your enemies will slay, in case you go to war, and on that account also; and so every city which hath Jews in it will be filled with slaughter for the sake of a few men, and they who slay them will be pardoned; but if that slaughter be not made by them, consider how wicked a thing it is to take arms against those that are so kind to you. Have pity, therefore, if not on your children and wives, yet upon this your metropolis, and its sacred walls; spare the temple, and preserve the holy house, with its holy furniture, for yourselves; for if the Romans get you under their power, they will no longer abstain from them, when their former abstinence shall have been so ungratefully requited. I call to witness your sanctuary, and the holy angels of God, and this country common to us all, that I have not kept back any thing that is for your preservation; and if you will follow that advice which you ought to do, you will have that peace which will be common to you and to me; but if you indulge four passions, you will run those hazards which I shall be free from."

After these men's performances, Josephus, and the rest of the multitude with him, took a great deal of fire, and burnt both the machines and their coverings, with the works belonging to the fifth and to the tenth legion, which they put to flight; when others followed them immediately, and buried those instruments and all their materials under ground. However, about the evening, the Romans erected the battering ram again, against that part of the wall which had suffered before; where a certain Jew that defended the city from the Romans hit Vespasian with a dart in his foot, and wounded him a little, the distance being so great, that no mighty impression could be made by the dart thrown so far off. However, this caused the greatest disorder among the Romans; for when those who stood near him saw his blood, they were disturbed at it, and a report went abroad, through the whole army, that the general was wounded, while the greatest part left the siege, and came running together with surprise and fear to the general; and before them all came Titus, out of the concern he had for his father, insomuch that the multitude were in great confusion, and this out of the regard they had for their general, and by reason of the agony that the son was in. Yet did the father soon put an end to the son's fear, and to the disorder the army was under, for being superior to his pains, and endeavoring soon to be seen by all that had been in a fright about him, he excited them to fight the Jews more briskly; for now every body was willing to expose himself to danger immediately, in order to avenge their general; and then they encouraged one another with loud voices, and ran hastily to the walls.

Now upon John's entry into Jerusalem, the whole body of the people were in an uproar, and ten thousand of them crowded about every one of the fugitives that were come to them, and inquired of them what miseries had happened abroad, when their breath was so short, and hot, and quick, that of itself it declared the great distress they were in; yet did they talk big under their misfortunes, and pretended to say that they had not fled away from the Romans, but came thither in order to fight them with less hazard; for that it would be an unreasonable and a fruitless thing for them to expose themselves to desperate hazards about Gischala, and such weak cities, whereas they ought to lay up their weapons and their zeal, and reserve it for their metropolis. But when they related to them the taking of Gischala, and their decent departure, as they pretended, from that place, many of the people understood it to be no better than a flight; and especially when the people were told of those that were made captives, they were in great confusion, and guessed those things to be plain indications that they should be taken also. But for John, he was very little concerned for those whom he had left behind him, but went about among all the people, and persuaded them to go to war, by the hopes he gave them. He affirmed that the affairs of the Romans were in a weak condition, and extolled his own power. He also jested upon the ignorance of the unskillful, as if those Romans, although they should take to themselves wings, could never fly over the wall of Jerusalem, who found such great difficulties in taking the villages of Galilee, and had broken their engines of war against their walls.

These harangues of John's corrupted a great part of the young men, and puffed them up for the war; but as to the more prudent part, and those in years, there was not a man of them but foresaw what was coming, and made lamentation on that account, as if the city was already undone; and in this confusion were the people. But then it must be observed, that the multitude that came out of the country were at discord before the Jerusalem sedition began; for Titus went from Gischala to Cesates, and Vespasian from Cesarea to Jamnia and Azotus, and took them both; and when he had put garrisons into them, he came back with a great number of the people, who were come over to him, upon his giving them his right hand for their preservation. There were besides disorders and civil wars in every city; and all those that were at quiet from the Romans turned their hands one against another. There was also a bitter contest between those that were fond of war, and those that were desirous for peace. At the first this quarrelsome temper caught hold of private families, who could not agree among themselves; after which those people that were the dearest to one another brake through all restraints with regard to each other, and every one associated with those of his own opinion, and began already to stand in opposition one to another; so that seditions arose every where, while those that were for innovations, and were desirous of war, by their youth and boldness, were too hard for the aged and prudent men. And, in the first place, all the people of every place betook themselves to rapine; after which they got together in bodies, in order to rob the people of the country, insomuch that for barbarity and iniquity those of the same nation did no way differ from the Romans; nay, it seemed to be a much lighter thing to be ruined by the Romans than by themselves.

By these motives Ananus encouraged the multitude to go against the zealots, although he knew how difficult it would be to disperse them, because of their multitude, and their youth, and the courage of their souls; but chiefly because of their consciousness of what they had done, since they would not yield, as not so much as hoping for pardon at the last for those their enormities. However, Ananus resolved to undergo whatever sufferings might come upon him, rather than overlook things, now they were in such great confusion. So the multitude cried out to him, to lead them on against those whom he had described in his exhortation to them, and every one of them was most readily disposed to run any hazard whatsoever on that account.

And now these zealots and Idumeans were quite weary of barely killing men, so they had the impudence of setting up fictitious tribunals and judicatures for that purpose; and as they intended to have Zacharias the son of Baruch, one of the most eminent of the citizens, slain, so what provoked them against him was, that hatred of wickedness and love of liberty which were so eminent in him: he was also a rich man, so that by taking him off, they did not only hope to seize his effects, but also to get rid of a mall that had great power to destroy them. So they called together, by a public proclamation, seventy of the principal men of the populace, for a show, as if they were real judges, while they had no proper authority. Before these was Zacharias accused of a design to betray their polity to the Romans, and having traitorously sent to Vespasian for that purpose. Now there appeared no proof or sign of what he was accused; but they affirmed themselves that they were well persuaded that so it was, and desired that such their affirmation might be taken for sufficient evidence. Now when Zacharias clearly saw that there was no way remaining for his escape from them, as having been treacherously called before them, and then put in prison, but not with any intention of a legal trial, he took great liberty of speech in that despair of his life he was under. Accordingly he stood up, and laughed at their pretended accusation, and in a few words confuted the crimes laid to his charge; after which he turned his speech to his accusers, and went over distinctly all their transgressions of the law, and made heavy lamentation upon the confusion they had brought public affairs to: in the mean time, the zealots grew tumultuous, and had much ado to abstain from drawing their swords, although they designed to preserve the appearance and show of judicature to the end. They were also desirous, on other accounts, to try the judges, whether they would be mindful of what was just at their own peril. Now the seventy judges brought in their verdict that the person accused was not guilty, as choosing rather to die themselves with him, than to have his death laid at their doors; hereupon there arose a great clamor of the zealots upon his acquittal, and they all had indignation at the judges for not understanding that the authority that was given them was but in jest. So two of the boldest of them fell upon Zacharias in the middle of the temple, and slew him; and as he fell down dead, they bantered him, and said, "Thou hast also our verdict, and this will prove a more sure acquittal to thee than the other." They also threw him down from the temple immediately into the valley beneath it. Moreover, they struck the judges with the backs of their swords, by way of abuse, and thrust them out of the court of the temple, and spared their lives with no other design than that, when they were dispersed among the people in the city, they might become their messengers, to let them know they were no better than slaves.

Now when hitherto the several parties in the city had been dashing one against another perpetually, this foreign war, now suddenly come upon them after a violent manner, put the first stop to their contentions one against another; and as the seditious now saw with astonishment the Romans pitching three several camps, they began to think of an awkward sort of concord, and said one to another, "What do we here, and what do we mean, when we suffer three fortified walls to be built to coop us in, that we shall not be able to breathe freely? while the enemy is securely building a kind of city in opposition to us, and while we sit still within our own walls, and become spectators only of what they are doing, with our hands idle, and our armor laid by, as if they were about somewhat that was for our good and advantage. We are, it seems, [so did they cry out,] only courageous against ourselves, while the Romans are likely to gain the city without bloodshed by our sedition." Thus did they encourage one another when they were gotten together, and took their armor immediately, and ran out upon the tenth legion, and fell upon the Romans with great eagerness, and with a prodigious shout, as they were fortifying their camp. These Romans were caught in different parties, and this in order to perform their several works, and on that account had in great measure laid aside their arms; for they thought the Jews would not have ventured to make a sally upon them; and had they been disposed so to do, they supposed their sedition would have distracted them. So they were put into disorder unexpectedly; when some of them left their works they were about, and immediately marched off, while many ran to their arms, but were smitten and slain before they could turn back upon the enemy. The Jews became still more and more in number, as encouraged by the good success of those that first made the attack; and while they had such good fortune, they seemed both to themselves and to the enemy to be many more than they really were. The disorderly way of their fighting at first put the Romans also to a stand, who had been constantly used to fight skillfully in good order, and with keeping their ranks, and obeying the orders that were given them; for which reason the Romans were caught unexpectedly, and were obliged to give way to the assaults that were made upon them. Now when these Romans were overtaken, and turned back upon the Jews, they put a stop to their career; yet when they did not take care enough of themselves through the vehemency of their pursuit, they were wounded by them; but as still more and more Jews sallied out of the city, the Romans were at length brought into confusion, and put to flight, and ran away from their camp. Nay, things looked as though the entire legion would have been in danger, unless Titus had been informed of the case they were in, and had sent them succors immediately. So he reproached them for their cowardice, and brought those back that were running away, and fell himself upon the Jews on their flank, with those select troops that were with him, and slew a considerable number, and wounded more of them, and put them all to flight, and made them run away hastily down the valley. Now as these Jews suffered greatly in the declivity of the valley, so when they were gotten over it, they turned about, and stood over against the Romans, having the valley between them, and there fought with them. Thus did they continue the fight till noon; but when it was already a little after noon, Titus set those that came to the assistance of the Romans with him, and those that belonged to the cohorts, to prevent the Jews from making any more sallies, and then sent the rest of the legion to the upper part of the mountain, to fortify their camp.

Reader, remember me in your prayers, that we too may deserve to be made emulators of the spirit. The two former books on The Principles I translated not only at your instance, but even under pressure from you during the days of Lent; but as you, my devout brother Macarius, were not only living near me during that time, but had more leisure at your command than now, so I also worked the harder; whereas I have been longer in explaining these two latter books, seeing you came less frequently from a distant extremity of the city to urge on my labour. Now if you remember what I warned you of in my former preface,—that certain persons would be indignant, if they did not hear that we spoke some evil of Origen,—that, I imagine, you have forthwith experienced, has come to pass. But if those demons who excite the tongues of men to slander were so infuriated by that work, in which he had not as yet fully unveiled their secret proceedings, what, think you, will be the case in this, in which he will expose all those dark and hidden ways, by which they creep into the hearts of men, and deceive weak and unstable souls? You will immediately see all things thrown into confusion, seditions stirred up, clamours raised throughout the whole city, and that individual summoned to receive sentence of condemnation who endeavoured to dispel the diabolical darkness of ignorance by means of the light of the gospel lamp. Let such things, however, be lightly esteemed by him who is desirous of being trained in divine learning, while retaining in its integrity the rule of the Catholic faith. I think it necessary, however, to remind you that the principle observed in the former books has been observed also in these, viz. not to translate what appeared contrary to Origen’s other opinions, and to our own belief, but to pass by such passages as being interpolated and forged by others. But if he has appeared to give expression to any novelties regarding rational creatures (on which subject the essence of our faith does not depend), for the sake of discussion and of adding to our knowledge, when perhaps it was necessary for us to answer in such an order some heretical opinions, I have not omitted to mention these either in the present or preceding books, unless when he wished to repeat in the following books what he had already stated in the previous ones, when I have thought it convenient, for the sake of brevity, to curtail some of these repetitions. Should any one, however, peruse these passages from a desire to enlarge his knowledge, and not to raise captious objections, he will do better to have them expounded by persons of skill. For it is an absurdity to have the fictions of poetry and the ridiculous plays of comedy interpreted by grammarians, and to suppose that without a master and an interpreter any one is able to learn those things which are spoken either of God or of the heavenly virtues, and of the whole universe of things, in which some deplorable error either of pagan philosophers or of heretics is confuted; and the result of which is, that men would rather rashly and ignorantly condemn things that are difficult and obscure, than ascertain their meaning by diligence and study.

Celsus, however, accepting or granting that Jesus foreknew what would befall Him, might think to make light of the admission, as he did in the case of the miracles, when he alleged that they were wrought by means of sorcery; for he might say that many persons by means of divination, either by auspices, or auguries, or sacrifices, or nativities, have come to the knowledge of what was to happen. But this concession he would not make, as being too great a one; and although he somehow granted that Jesus worked miracles, he thought to weaken the force of this by the charge of sorcery. Now Phlegon, in the thirteenth or fourteenth book, I think, of his Chronicles, not only ascribed to Jesus a knowledge of future events (although falling into confusion about some things which refer to Peter, as if they referred to Jesus), but also testified that the result corresponded to His predictions. So that he also, by these very admissions regarding foreknowledge, as if against his will, expressed his opinion that the doctrines taught by the fathers of our system were not devoid of divine power.

But I do not understand how he can imagine the overturning of the tower [of Babel] to have happened with a similar object to that of the deluge, which effected a purification of the earth, according to the accounts both of Jews and Christians. For, in order that the narrative contained in Genesis respecting the tower may be held to convey no secret meaning, but, as Celsus supposes, may be taken as true to the letter, the event does not on such a view appear to have taken place for the purpose of purifying the earth; unless, indeed, he imagines that the so-called confusion of tongues is such a purificatory process. But on this point, he who has the opportunity will treat more seasonably when his object is to show not only what is the meaning of the narrative in its historical connection, but what metaphorical meaning may be deduced from it. Seeing that he imagines, however, that Moses, who wrote the account of the tower, and the confusion of tongues, has perverted the story of the sons of Aloeus, and referred it to the tower, we must remark that I do not think any one prior to the time of Homer has mentioned the sons of Aloeus, while I am persuaded that what is related about the tower has been recorded by Moses as being much older not only than Homer, but even than the invention of letters among the Greeks. Who, then, are the perverters of each other’s narratives? Whether do they who relate the story of the Aloadæ pervert the history of the time, or he who wrote the account of the tower and the confusion of tongues the story of the Aloadæ? Now to impartial hearers Moses appears to be more ancient than Homer. The destruction by fire, moreover, of Sodom and Gomorrha on account of their sins, related by Moses in Genesis, is compared by Celsus to the story of Phaethon,—all these statements of his resulting from one blunder, viz. his not attending to the [greater] antiquity of Moses. For they who relate the story of Phaethon seem to be younger even than Homer, who, again, is much younger than Moses. We do not deny, then, that the purificatory fire and the destruction of the world took place in order that evil might be swept away, and all things be renewed; for we assert that we have learned these things from the sacred books of the prophets. But since, as we have said in the preceding pages, the prophets, in uttering many predictions regarding future events, show that they have spoken the truth concerning many things that are past, and thus give evidence of the indwelling of the Divine Spirit, it is manifest that, with respect to things still future, we should repose faith in them, or rather in the Divine Spirit that is in them.

But I do not understand how he can imagine the overturning of the tower [of Babel] to have happened with a similar object to that of the deluge, which effected a purification of the earth, according to the accounts both of Jews and Christians. For, in order that the narrative contained in Genesis respecting the tower may be held to convey no secret meaning, but, as Celsus supposes, may be taken as true to the letter, the event does not on such a view appear to have taken place for the purpose of purifying the earth; unless, indeed, he imagines that the so-called confusion of tongues is such a purificatory process. But on this point, he who has the opportunity will treat more seasonably when his object is to show not only what is the meaning of the narrative in its historical connection, but what metaphorical meaning may be deduced from it. Seeing that he imagines, however, that Moses, who wrote the account of the tower, and the confusion of tongues, has perverted the story of the sons of Aloeus, and referred it to the tower, we must remark that I do not think any one prior to the time of Homer has mentioned the sons of Aloeus, while I am persuaded that what is related about the tower has been recorded by Moses as being much older not only than Homer, but even than the invention of letters among the Greeks. Who, then, are the perverters of each other’s narratives? Whether do they who relate the story of the Aloadæ pervert the history of the time, or he who wrote the account of the tower and the confusion of tongues the story of the Aloadæ? Now to impartial hearers Moses appears to be more ancient than Homer. The destruction by fire, moreover, of Sodom and Gomorrha on account of their sins, related by Moses in Genesis, is compared by Celsus to the story of Phaethon,—all these statements of his resulting from one blunder, viz. his not attending to the [greater] antiquity of Moses. For they who relate the story of Phaethon seem to be younger even than Homer, who, again, is much younger than Moses. We do not deny, then, that the purificatory fire and the destruction of the world took place in order that evil might be swept away, and all things be renewed; for we assert that we have learned these things from the sacred books of the prophets. But since, as we have said in the preceding pages, the prophets, in uttering many predictions regarding future events, show that they have spoken the truth concerning many things that are past, and thus give evidence of the indwelling of the Divine Spirit, it is manifest that, with respect to things still future, we should repose faith in them, or rather in the Divine Spirit that is in them.

But I do not understand how he can imagine the overturning of the tower [of Babel] to have happened with a similar object to that of the deluge, which effected a purification of the earth, according to the accounts both of Jews and Christians. For, in order that the narrative contained in Genesis respecting the tower may be held to convey no secret meaning, but, as Celsus supposes, may be taken as true to the letter, the event does not on such a view appear to have taken place for the purpose of purifying the earth; unless, indeed, he imagines that the so-called confusion of tongues is such a purificatory process. But on this point, he who has the opportunity will treat more seasonably when his object is to show not only what is the meaning of the narrative in its historical connection, but what metaphorical meaning may be deduced from it. Seeing that he imagines, however, that Moses, who wrote the account of the tower, and the confusion of tongues, has perverted the story of the sons of Aloeus, and referred it to the tower, we must remark that I do not think any one prior to the time of Homer has mentioned the sons of Aloeus, while I am persuaded that what is related about the tower has been recorded by Moses as being much older not only than Homer, but even than the invention of letters among the Greeks. Who, then, are the perverters of each other’s narratives? Whether do they who relate the story of the Aloadæ pervert the history of the time, or he who wrote the account of the tower and the confusion of tongues the story of the Aloadæ? Now to impartial hearers Moses appears to be more ancient than Homer. The destruction by fire, moreover, of Sodom and Gomorrha on account of their sins, related by Moses in Genesis, is compared by Celsus to the story of Phaethon,—all these statements of his resulting from one blunder, viz. his not attending to the [greater] antiquity of Moses. For they who relate the story of Phaethon seem to be younger even than Homer, who, again, is much younger than Moses. We do not deny, then, that the purificatory fire and the destruction of the world took place in order that evil might be swept away, and all things be renewed; for we assert that we have learned these things from the sacred books of the prophets. But since, as we have said in the preceding pages, the prophets, in uttering many predictions regarding future events, show that they have spoken the truth concerning many things that are past, and thus give evidence of the indwelling of the Divine Spirit, it is manifest that, with respect to things still future, we should repose faith in them, or rather in the Divine Spirit that is in them.

He next proceeds to make the following statement about the Jews:—“The first point relating to the Jews which is fitted to excite wonder, is that they should worship the heaven and the angels who dwell therein, and yet pass by and neglect its most venerable and powerful parts, as the sun, and moon, and the other heavenly bodies, both fixed stars and planets, as if it were possible that ‘the whole’ could be God, and yet its parts not divine; or [as if it were reasonable] to treat with the greatest respect those who are said to appear to such as are in darkness somewhere, blinded by some crooked sorcery, or dreaming dreams through the influence of shadowy spectres, while those who prophesy so clearly and strikingly to all men, by means of whom rain, and heat, and clouds, and thunder (to which they offer worship), and lightnings, and fruits, and all kinds of productiveness, are brought about,—by means of whom God is revealed to them,—the most prominent heralds among those beings that are above,—those that are truly heavenly angels,—are to be regarded as of no account!” In making these statements, Celsus appears to have fallen into confusion, and to have penned them from false ideas of things which he did not understand; for it is patent to all who investigate the practices of the Jews, and compare them with those of the Christians, that the Jews who follow the law, which, speaking in the person of God, says, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me: thou shalt not make unto thee an image, nor a likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters under the earth; thou shalt not bow down to them, nor serve them,” worship nothing else than the Supreme God, who made the heavens, and all things besides. Now it is evident that those who live according to the law, and worship the Maker of heaven, will not worship the heaven at the same time with God. Moreover, no one who obeys the law of Moses will bow down to the angels who are in heaven; and, in like manner, as they do not bow down to sun, moon, and stars, the host of heaven, they refrain also from doing obeisance to heaven and its angels, obeying the law which declares: “Lest thou lift up thine eyes to heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldst be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the Lord thy God hath divided unto all nations.”

As we allege, however, that he has fallen into confusion in consequence of false notions which he has imbibed, come and let us point them out to the best of our ability, and show that although Celsus considers it to be a Jewish custom to bow down to the heaven and the angels in it, such a practice is not at all Jewish, but is in violation of Judaism, as it also is to do obeisance to sun, moon, and stars, as well as images. You will find at least in the book of Jeremiah the words of God censuring by the mouth of the prophet the Jewish people for doing obeisance to such objects, and for sacrificing to the queen of heaven, and to all the host of heaven. The writings of the Christians, moreover, show, in censuring the sins committed among the Jews, that when God abandoned that people on account of certain sins, these sins [of idol-worship] also were committed by them. For it is related in the Acts of the Apostles regarding the Jews, that “God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven; as it is written in the book of the prophets, O ye house of Israel, have ye offered to me slain beasts and sacrifices by the space of forty years in the wilderness? Yea, ye took up the tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of your god Remphan, figures which you made to worship them.” And in the writings of Paul, who was carefully trained in Jewish customs, and converted afterwards to Christianity by a miraculous appearance of Jesus, the following words may be read in the Epistle to the Colossians: “Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind; and not holding the head, from which all the body by joint and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God.” But Celsus, having neither read these verses, nor having learned their contents from any other source, has represented, I know not how, the Jews as not transgressing their law in bowing down to the heavens, and to the angels therein.

The following, then, are his words: “It is folly on their part to suppose that when God, as if He were a cook, introduces the fire [which is to consume the world], all the rest of the human race will be burnt up, while they alone will remain, not only such of them as are then alive, but also those who are long since dead, which latter will arise from the earth clothed with the self-same flesh [as during life]; for such a hope is simply one which might be cherished by worms. For what sort of human soul is that which would still long for a body that had been subject to corruption? Whence, also, this opinion of yours is not shared by some of the Christians, and they pronounce it to be exceedingly vile, and loathsome, and impossible; for what kind of body is that which, after being completely corrupted, can return to its original nature, and to that self-same first condition out of which it fell into dissolution? Being unable to return any answer, they betake themselves to a most absurd refuge, viz. that all things are possible to God. And yet God cannot do things that are disgraceful, nor does He wish to do things that are contrary to His nature; nor, if (in accordance with the wickedness of your own heart) you desired anything that was evil, would God accomplish it; nor must you believe at once that it will be done. For God does not rule the world in order to satisfy inordinate desires, or to allow disorder and confusion, but to govern a nature that is upright and just. For the soul, indeed, He might be able to provide an everlasting life; while dead bodies, on the contrary, are, as Heraclitus observes, more worthless than dung. God, however, neither can nor will declare, contrary to all reason, that the flesh, which is full of those things which it is not even honourable to mention, is to exist for ever. For He is the reason of all things that exist, and therefore can do nothing either contrary to reason or contrary to Himself.”

It is probable, however, that to such remarks as the above, the answer returned would be, that he was pious who kept the laws of his own country, and not at all chargeable with impiety for the non-observance of those of other lands; and that, again, he who was deemed guilty of impiety among certain nations was not really so, when he worshipped his own gods, agreeably to his country’s laws, although he made war against, and even feasted on, those who were regarded as divinities among those nations which possessed laws of an opposite kind. Now, observe here whether these statements do not exhibit the greatest confusion of mind regarding the nature of what is just, and holy, and religious; since there is no accurate definition laid down of these things, nor are they described as having a peculiar character of their own, and stamping as religious those who act according to their injunctions. If, then, religion, and piety, and righteousness belong to those things which are so only by comparison, so that the same act may be both pious and impious, according to different relations and different laws, see whether it will not follow that temperance also is a thing of comparison, and courage as well, and prudence, and the other virtues, than which nothing could be more absurd! What we have said, however, is sufficient for the more general and simple class of answers to the allegations of Celsus. But as we think it likely that some of those who are accustomed to deeper investigation will fall in with this treatise, let us venture to lay down some considerations of a profounder kind, conveying a mystical and secret view respecting the original distribution of the various quarters of the earth among different superintending spirits; and let us prove to the best of our ability, that our doctrine is free from the absurd consequences enumerated above.

It appears to me, indeed, that Celsus has misunderstood some of the deeper reasons relating to the arrangement of terrestrial affairs, some of which are touched upon even in Grecian history, when certain of those who are considered to be gods are introduced as having contended with each other about the possession of Attica; while in the writings of the Greek poets also, some who are called gods are represented as acknowledging that certain places here are preferred by them before others. The history of barbarian nations, moreover, and especially that of Egypt, contains some such allusions to the division of the so-called Egyptian nomes, when it states that Athena, who obtained Saïs by lot, is the same who also has possession of Attica. And the learned among the Egyptians can enumerate innumerable instances of this kind, although I do not know whether they include the Jews and their country in this division. And now, so far as testimonies outside the word of God bearing on this point are concerned, enough have been adduced for the present. We say, moreover, that our prophet of God and His genuine servant Moses, in his song in the book of Deuteronomy, makes a statement regarding the portioning out of the earth in the following terms: “When the Most High divided the nations, when He dispersed the sons of Adam, He set the bounds of the people according to the number of the angels of God; and the Lord’s portion was His people Jacob, and Israel the cord of His inheritance.” And regarding the distribution of the nations, the same Moses, in his work entitled Genesis, thus expresses himself in the style of a historical narrative: “And the whole earth was of one language and of one speech; and it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there.” A little further on he continues: “And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men had built. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they have begun to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. And the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city and the tower. Therefore is the name of it called Confusion; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.” In the treatise of Solomon, moreover, on “Wisdom,” and on the events at the time of the confusion of languages, when the division of the earth took place, we find the following regarding Wisdom: “Moreover, the nations. in their wicked conspiracy being confounded, she found out the righteous, and preserved him blameless unto God, and kept him strong in his tender compassion towards his son.” But on these subjects much, and that of a mystical kind, might be said; in keeping with which is the following: “It is good to keep close the secret of a king,”—in order that the doctrine of the entrance of souls into bodies (not, however, that of the transmigration from one body into another) may not be thrown before the common understanding, nor what is holy given to the dogs, nor pearls be cast before swine. For such a procedure would be impious, being equivalent to a betrayal of the mysterious declarations of God’s wisdom, of which it has been well said: “Into a malicious soul wisdom shall not enter, nor dwell in a body subject to sin.” It is sufficient, however, to represent in the style of a historic narrative what is intended to convey a secret meaning in the garb of history, that those who have the capacity may work out for themselves all that relates to the subject.

It appears to me, indeed, that Celsus has misunderstood some of the deeper reasons relating to the arrangement of terrestrial affairs, some of which are touched upon even in Grecian history, when certain of those who are considered to be gods are introduced as having contended with each other about the possession of Attica; while in the writings of the Greek poets also, some who are called gods are represented as acknowledging that certain places here are preferred by them before others. The history of barbarian nations, moreover, and especially that of Egypt, contains some such allusions to the division of the so-called Egyptian nomes, when it states that Athena, who obtained Saïs by lot, is the same who also has possession of Attica. And the learned among the Egyptians can enumerate innumerable instances of this kind, although I do not know whether they include the Jews and their country in this division. And now, so far as testimonies outside the word of God bearing on this point are concerned, enough have been adduced for the present. We say, moreover, that our prophet of God and His genuine servant Moses, in his song in the book of Deuteronomy, makes a statement regarding the portioning out of the earth in the following terms: “When the Most High divided the nations, when He dispersed the sons of Adam, He set the bounds of the people according to the number of the angels of God; and the Lord’s portion was His people Jacob, and Israel the cord of His inheritance.” And regarding the distribution of the nations, the same Moses, in his work entitled Genesis, thus expresses himself in the style of a historical narrative: “And the whole earth was of one language and of one speech; and it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there.” A little further on he continues: “And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men had built. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they have begun to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. And the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city and the tower. Therefore is the name of it called Confusion; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.” In the treatise of Solomon, moreover, on “Wisdom,” and on the events at the time of the confusion of languages, when the division of the earth took place, we find the following regarding Wisdom: “Moreover, the nations. in their wicked conspiracy being confounded, she found out the righteous, and preserved him blameless unto God, and kept him strong in his tender compassion towards his son.” But on these subjects much, and that of a mystical kind, might be said; in keeping with which is the following: “It is good to keep close the secret of a king,”—in order that the doctrine of the entrance of souls into bodies (not, however, that of the transmigration from one body into another) may not be thrown before the common understanding, nor what is holy given to the dogs, nor pearls be cast before swine. For such a procedure would be impious, being equivalent to a betrayal of the mysterious declarations of God’s wisdom, of which it has been well said: “Into a malicious soul wisdom shall not enter, nor dwell in a body subject to sin.” It is sufficient, however, to represent in the style of a historic narrative what is intended to convey a secret meaning in the garb of history, that those who have the capacity may work out for themselves all that relates to the subject.

The supposed great learning of Celsus, which is composed, however, rather of curious trifles and silly talk than anything else, has made us touch upon these topics, from a wish to show to every one who peruses his treatise and our reply, that we have no lack of information on those subjects, from which he takes occasion to calumniate the Christians, who neither are acquainted with, nor concern themselves about, such matters. For we, too, desired both to learn and set forth these things, in order that sorcerers might not, under pretext of knowing more than we, delude those who are easily carried away by the glitter of names. And I could have given many more illustrations to show that we are acquainted with the opinions of these deluders, and that we disown them, as being alien to ours, and impious, and not in harmony with the doctrines of true Christians, of which we are ready to make confession even to the death. It must be noticed, too, that those who have drawn up this array of fictions, have, from neither understanding magic, nor discriminating the meaning of Holy Scripture, thrown everything into confusion; seeing that they have borrowed from magic the names of Ialdabaoth, and Astaphæus, and Horæus, and from the Hebrew Scriptures him who is termed in Hebrew Iao or Jah, and Sabaoth, and Adonæus, and Eloæus. Now the names taken from the Scriptures are names of one and the same God; which, not being understood by the enemies of God, as even themselves acknowledge, led to their imagining that Iao was a different God, and Sabaoth another, and Adonæus, whom the Scriptures term Adonai, a third besides, and that Eloæus, whom the prophets name in Hebrew Eloi, was also different.

If I must now explain how the just man “slays his enemies,” and prevails everywhere, it is to be observed that, when he says, “Every morning will I destroy the wicked of the land, that I may cut off all workers of iniquity from the city of Jehovah,” by “the land” he means the flesh whose lusts are at enmity with God; and by “the city of Jehovah” he designates his own soul, in which was the temple of God, containing the true idea and conception of God, which makes it to be admired by all who look upon it. As soon, then, as the rays of the Sun of righteousness shine into his soul, feeling strengthened and invigorated by their influence, he sets himself to destroy all the lusts of the flesh, which are called “the wicked of the land,” and drives out of that city of the Lord which is in his soul all thoughts which work iniquity, and all suggestions which are opposed to the truth. And in this way also the just give up to destruction all their enemies, which are their vices, so that they do not spare even the children, that is, the early beginnings and promptings of evil. In this sense also we understand the language of the 137th Psalm: “O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us: happy shall he be that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.” For “the little ones” of Babylon (which signifies confusion) are those troublesome sinful thoughts which arise in the soul; and he who subdues them by striking, as it were, their heads against the firm and solid strength of reason and truth, is the man who “dasheth the little ones against the stones;” and he is therefore truly blessed. God may therefore have commanded men to destroy all their vices utterly, even at their birth, without having enjoined anything contrary to the teaching of Christ; and He may Himself have destroyed before the eyes of those who were “Jews inwardly” all the offspring of evil as His enemies. And, in like manner, those who disobey the law and word of God may well be compared to His enemies led astray by sin; and they may well be said to suffer the same fate as they deserve who have proved traitors to the truth of God.

The remaining part of the extract given by Celsus seems to have been taken from some other form of heresy, and the whole jumbled together in strange confusion: “How is it, that while so many go about the well, no one goes down into it? Why dost thou shrink with fear when thou hast gone so far on the way? Answer: Thou art mistaken, for I lack neither courage nor weapons.” We who belong to the church which takes its name from Christ, assert that none of these statements are true. For he seems to have made them simply that they might harmonize with what he had said before; but they have no reference to us. For it is a principle with us, not to worship any god whom we merely “suppose” to exist, but Him alone who is the Creator of this universe, and of all things besides which are unseen by the eye of sense. These remarks of Celsus may apply to those who go on another road and tread other paths from us,—men who deny the Creator, and make to themselves another god under a new form, having nothing but the name of God, whom they esteem higher than the Creator; and with these may be joined any that there may be who say that the Son is greater than the God who rules all things. In reference to the precept that we ought not to serve two masters, we have already shown what appears to us the principle contained in it, when we proved that no sedition or disloyalty could be charged against the followers of Jesus their Lord, who confess that they reject every other lord, and serve Him alone who is the Son and Word of God.

After having said so much of the demons, and of their fondness for blood and the odour of sacrifices, Celsus adds, as though wishing to retract the charge he had made: “The more just opinion is, that demons desire nothing and need nothing, but that they take pleasure in those who discharge towards them offices of piety.” If Celsus believed this to be true, he should have said so, instead of making his previous statements. But, indeed, human nature is never utterly forsaken by God and His only-begotten Son, the truth. Wherefore even Celsus spoke the truth when he made the demons take pleasure in the blood and smoke of victims; although, by the force of his own evil nature, he falls back into his errors, and compares demons with men who rigorously discharge every duty, even to those who show no gratitude; while to those who are grateful they abound in acts of kindness. Here Celsus appears to me to get into confusion. At one time his judgment is darkened by the influence of demons, and at another he recovers from their deluding power, and gets some glimpses of the truth. For again he adds: “We must never in any way lose our hold of God, whether by day or by night, whether in public or in secret, whether in word or in deed, but in whatever we do, or abstain from doing.” That is, as I understand it, whatever we do in public, in all our actions, in all our words, “let the soul be constantly fixed upon God.” And yet again, as though, after struggling in argument against the insane inspirations of demons, he were completely overcome by them, he adds: “If this is the case, what harm is there in gaining the favour of the rulers of the earth, whether of a nature different from ours, or human princes and kings? For these have gained their dignity through the instrumentality of demons.” In a former part, Celsus did his utmost to debase our souls to the worship of demons; and now he wishes us to seek the favour of kings and princes, of whom, as the world and all history are full of them, I do not consider it necessary to quote examples.

Then Celsus, following the example of those who are under the influence of demons—at one time recovering, at another relapsing, as though he were again becoming sensible—says: “If, however, any worshipper of God should be ordered to do anything impious, or to say anything base, such a command should in no wise be regarded; but we must encounter all kinds of torment, or submit to any kind of death, rather than say or even think anything unworthy of God.” Again, however, from ignorance of our principles, and in entire confusion of thought, he says: “But if any one commands you to celebrate the sun, or to sing a joyful triumphal song in praise of Minerva, you will by celebrating their praises seem to render the higher praise to God; for piety, in extending to all things, becomes more perfect.” To this our answer is, that we do not wait for any command to celebrate the praises of the sun; for we have been taught to speak well not only of those creatures that are obedient to the will of God, but even of our enemies. We therefore praise the sun as the glorious workmanship of God, which obeys His laws and hearkens to the call, “Praise the Lord, sun and moon,” and with all your powers show forth the praises of the Father and Creator of all. Minerva, however, whom Celsus classes with the sun, is the subject of various Grecian myths, whether these contain any hidden meaning or not. They say that Minerva sprang fully armed from the brain of Jupiter; that when she was pursued by Vulcan, she fled from him to preserve her honour; and that from the seed which fell to the ground in the heat of Vulcan’s passion, there grew a child whom Minerva brought up and called Erichthonius,