The Book of the Cave of Treasures 9

1Now Eden is the Holy Church, and the Church is the compassion of God, which He was about to extend to the children of men. For God, according to His foreknowledge, knew what Satan had devised against Adam, and therefore He set Adam beforehand in the bosom of His compassion, even as the blessed David singeth concerning Him in the Psalm (xc), saying, “ Lord, Thou hast been an abiding place for us throughout all generations,’ that is to say, ‘Thou hast made us to have our abiding place in Thy compassion.” And, when entreating God on behalf of the redemption of the children of men, David said, ‘‘ Remember Thy Church, which Thou didst acquire in olden time” (Ps. Ixxiv. 2), that is to say, ‘‘ [Remember] Thy compassion, which Thou art about to spread over our feeble race.”” Eden is the Holy Church, and the Paradise which was in it is the land of rest, and the inheritance of life, which God hath prepared for all the holy children of men. And because Adam was priest, and king, and prophet, God brought him into Paradise that he might minister in Eden, the Holy Church, even as the blessed man Moses testifieth concerning him, saying, “‘ That he might serve God by means of priestly ministration with praise, and that he might keep that commandment which had been entrusted to him by the compassion of God” (Gen. ii. 15, I6 °). And God made Adam and Eve to dwell in Paradise. True is this word, and it proclaimeth the truth: That Tree of Life which was in the midst of Paradise prefigured the Redeeming Cross, which is the veritable Tree of Life, and this it was that was fixed in the middle of the earth.