{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/002/0020257.htm","path":"chr/ecf/002/0020257.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/002/0020257.htm","text":"Since, then, we have shown that all of us are by Scripture called children; and not only so, but that we who have followed Christ are figuratively called babes; and that the Father of all alone is perfect, for the Son is in Him, and the Father is in the Son; it is time for us in due course to say who our Instructor is.\nHe is called Jesus. Sometimes He calls Himself a shepherd, and says, \u201cI am the good Shepherd.\u201d 1141 According to a metaphor drawn from shepherds, who lead the sheep, is hereby understood the Instructor, who leads the children\u2014the Shepherd who tends the babes. For the babes are simple, being figuratively described as sheep. \u201cAnd they shall all,\u201d it is said, \u201cbe one flock, and one shepherd.\u201d 1142 The Word, then, p. 223 who leads the children to salvation, is appropriately called the Instructor 1143 (P\u00e6dagogue).\nWith the greatest clearness, accordingly, the Word has spoken respecting Himself by Hosea: \u201cI am your Instructor.\u201d 1144 Now piety is instruction, being the learning of the service of God, and training in the knowledge of the truth, and right guidance which leads to heaven. And the word \u201cinstruction\u201d 1145 is employed variously. For there is the instruction of him who is led and learns, and that of him who leads and teaches; and there is, thirdly, the guidance itself; and fourthly, what is taught, as the commandments enjoined.\nNow the instruction which is of God is the right direction of truth to the contemplation of God, and the exhibition of holy deeds in everlasting perseverance.\nAs therefore the general directs the phalanx, consulting the safety of his soldiers, and the pilot steers the vessel, desiring to save the passengers; so also the Instructor guides the children to a saving course of conduct, through solicitude for us; and, in general, whatever we ask in accordance with reason from God to be done for us, will happen to those who believe in the Instructor. And just as the helmsman does not always yield to the winds, but sometimes, turning the prow towards them, opposes the whole force of the hurricanes; so the Instructor never yields to the blasts that blow in this world, nor commits the child to them like a vessel to make shipwreck on a wild and licentious course of life; but, wafted on by the favouring breeze of the Spirit of truth, stoutly holds on to the child\u2019s helm,\u2014his ears, I mean,\u2014until He bring him safe to anchor in the haven of heaven.\nWhat is called by men an ancestral custom passes away in a moment, but the divine guidance is a possession which abides for ever.\nThey say that Ph\u0153nix was the instructor of Achilles, and Adrastus of the children of Cr\u0153sus; and Leonides of Alexander, and Nausithous of Philip. But Ph\u0153nix was women-mad, Adrastus was a fugitive. Leonides did not curtail the pride of Alexander, nor Nausithous reform the drunken Pell\u00e6an. No more was the Thracian Zopyrus able to check the fornication of Alcibiades; but Zopyrus was a bought slave, and Sicinnus, the tutor of the children of Themistocles, was a lazy domestic. They say also that he invented the Sicinnian dance. Those have not escaped our attention who are called royal instructors among the Persians; whom, in number four, the kings of the Persians select with the greatest care from all the Persians and set over their sons. But the children only learn the use of the bow, and on reaching maturity have sexual intercourse with sisters, and mothers, and women, wives and courtesans innumerable, practiced in intercourse like the wild boars.\nBut our Instructor is the holy God Jesus, the Word, who is the guide of all humanity. The loving God Himself is our Instructor. Somewhere in song the Holy Spirit says with regard to Him, \u201cHe provided sufficiently for the people in the wilderness. He led him about in the thirst of summer heat in a dry land, and instructed him, and kept him as the apple of His eye, as an eagle protects her nest, and shows her fond solicitude for her young, spreads abroad her wings, takes them, and bears them on her back. The Lord alone led them, and there was no strange god with them.\u201d 1146 Clearly, I trow, has the Scripture exhibited the Instructor in the account it gives of His guidance.\nAgain, when He speaks in His own person, He confesses Himself to be the Instructor: \u201cI am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt.\u201d 1147 Who, then, has the power of leading in and out? Is it not the Instructor? This was He who appeared to Abraham, and said to him, \u201cI am thy God, be accepted before Me;\u201d 1148 and in a way most befitting an instructor, forms him into a faithful child, saying, \u201cAnd be blameless; and I will make My covenant between Me and thee, and thy seed.\u201d There is the communication of the Instructor\u2019s friendship. And He most manifestly appears as Jacob\u2019s instructor. He says accordingly to him, \u201cLo, I am with thee, to keep thee in all the way in which thou shalt go; and I will bring thee back into this land: for I will not leave thee till I do what I have told thee.\u201d 1149 He is said, too, to have wrestled with Him. \u201cAnd Jacob was left alone, and there wrestled with him a man (the Instructor) till the morning.\u201d 1150 This was the man who led, and brought, and wrestled with, and anointed the athlete Jacob against evil. 1151 Now that the Word was at once Jacob\u2019s trainer and the Instructor of humanity [appears from this]\u2014\u201cHe asked,\u201d it is said, \u201cHis name, and said to him, Tell me what is Thy name.\u201d And he said, \u201cWhy is it that thou askest My name?\u201d For He reserved the new name for the new people\u2014the babe; and was as yet unnamed, the Lord God not having yet become man. Yet Jacob called the name of the place, \u201cFace of God.\u201d \u201cFor I have seen,\u201d he says, \u201cGod face to face; and my life is preserved.\u201d 1152 The face of God is the Word by whom God is manifested p. 224 and made known. Then also was he named Israel, because he saw God the Lord. It was God, the Word, the Instructor, who said to him again afterwards, \u201cFear not to go down into Egypt.\u201d 1153 See how the Instructor follows the righteous man, and how He anoints the athlete, teaching him to trip up his antagonist.\nIt is He also who teaches Moses to act as instructor. For the Lord says, \u201cIf any one sin before Me, him will I blot out of My book; but now, go and lead this people into the place which I told thee.\u201d 1154 Here He is the teacher of the art of instruction. For it was really the Lord that was the instructor of the ancient people by Moses; but He is the instructor of the new people by Himself, face to face. \u201cFor behold,\u201d He says to Moses, \u201cMy angel shall go before thee,\u201d representing the evangelical and commanding power of the Word, but guarding the Lord\u2019s prerogative. \u201cIn the day on which I will visit them,\u201d 1155 He says, \u201cI will bring their sins on them; that is, on the day on which I will sit as judge I will render the recompense of their sins.\u201d For the same who is Instructor is judge, and judges those who disobey Him; and the loving Word will not pass over their transgression in silence. He reproves, that they may repent. For \u201cthe Lord willeth the repentance of the sinner rather than his death.\u201d 1156 And let us as babes, hearing of the sins of others, keep from similar transgressions, through dread of the threatening, that we may not have to undergo like sufferings. What, then, was the sin which they committed? \u201cFor in their wrath they slew men, and in their impetuosity they hamstrung bulls. Cursed be their anger.\u201d 1157 Who, then, would train us more lovingly than He? Formerly the older people had an old covenant, and the law disciplined the people with fear, and the Word was an angel; but to the fresh and new people has also been given a new covenant, and the Word has appeared, and fear is turned to love, and that mystic angel is born\u2014Jesus. For this same Instructor said then, \u201cThou shalt fear the Lord God;\u201d 1158 but to us He has addressed the exhortation, \u201cThou shalt love the Lord thy God.\u201d 1159 Wherefore also this is enjoined on us: \u201cCease from your own works, from your old sins;\u201d \u201cLearn to do well;\u201d \u201cDepart from evil, and do good;\u201d \u201cThou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity.\u201d This is my new covenant written in the old letter. The newness of the word must not, then, be made ground of reproach. But the Lord hath also said in Jeremiah: \u201cSay not that I am a youth: before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee, and before I brought thee out of the womb I sanctified thee.\u201d 1160 Such allusions prophecy can make to us, destined in the eye of God to faith before the foundation of the world; but now babes, through the recent fulfilment of the will of God, according to which we are born now to calling and salvation. Wherefore also He adds, \u201cI have set thee for a prophet to the nations,\u201d 1161 saying that he must prophesy, so that the appellation of \u201cyouth\u201d should not become a reproach to those who are called babes.\nNow the law is ancient grace given through Moses by the Word. Wherefore also the Scripture says, \u201cThe law was given through Moses,\u201d 1162 not by Moses, but by the Word, and through Moses His servant. Wherefore it was only temporary; but eternal grace and truth were by Jesus Christ. Mark the expressions of Scripture: of the law only is it said \u201cwas given;\u201d but truth being the grace of the Father, is the eternal work of the Word; and it is not said to be given, but to be by Jesus, without whom nothing was. 1163 Presently, therefore, Moses prophetically, giving place to the perfect Instructor the Word, predicts both the name and the office of Instructor, and committing to the people the commands of obedience, sets before them the Instructor. \u201cA prophet,\u201d says he, \u201clike Me shall God raise up to you of your brethren,\u201d pointing out Jesus the Son of God, by an allusion to Jesus the son of Nun; for the name of Jesus predicted in the law was a shadow of Christ. He adds, therefore, consulting the advantage of the people, \u201cHim shall ye hear;\u201d 1164 and, \u201cThe man who will not hear that Prophet,\u201d 1165 him He threatens. Such a name, then, he predicts as that of the Instructor, who is the author of salvation. Wherefore prophecy invests Him with a rod, a rod of discipline, of rule, of authority; that those whom the persuasive word heals not, the threatening may heal; and whom the threatening heals not, the rod may heal; and whom the rod heals not, the fire may devour. \u201cThere shall come forth,\u201d it is said, \u201ca rod out of the root of Jesse.\u201d 1166\nSee the care, and wisdom, and power of the Instructor: \u201cHe shall not judge according to opinion, nor according to report; but He shall dispense judgment to the humble, and reprove the sinners of the earth.\u201d And by David: \u201cThe Lord instructing, hath instructed me, and not given me over to death.\u201d 1167 For to be chastised of the Lord, and instructed, is deliverance from death. And by the same prophet He says: p. 225 \u201cThou shalt rule them with a rod of iron.\u201d 1168 Thus also the apostle, in the Epistle to the Corinthians, being moved, says, \u201cWhat will ye? Shall I come unto you with a rod, or in love, in the spirit of meekness?\u201d 1169 Also, \u201cThe Lord shall send the rod of strength out of Sion,\u201d 1170 He says by another prophet. And this same rod of instruction, \u201cThy rod and staff have comforted me,\u201d 1171 said some one else. Such is the power of the Instructor\u2014sacred, soothing, saving.\n\u03c0\u03b1\u03b9\u03b4\u03b5\u03c5\u03c4\u03ae\u03c2; Hos. v. 2.\n223:1145 223:1146 223:1147 223:1148 223:1149 223:1150 223:1151 223:1152 224:1153 224:1154 224:1155 224:1156 224:1157 224:1158 224:1159 224:1160 224:1161 224:1162 224:1163 224:1164 224:1165 224:1166 224:1167 225:1168 225:1169 225:1170 225:1171","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol II: CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA: Chapter VII.\u2014Who the Instructor Is, and Respecting His Instruction.","type":"page"}