{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/003/0030427.htm","path":"chr/ecf/003/0030427.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/003/0030427.htm","text":"Chapter XXVIII.\u2014Examples from the Old Testament, Balaam, Moses, and Hezekiah, to Show How Completely the Instruction and Conduct of Christ 4620 Are in Keeping with the Will and Purpose of the Creator.\nJustly, therefore, was the hypocrisy of the Pharisees displeasing to Him, loving God as they did with their lips, but not with their heart. \u201cBeware,\u201d He says to the disciples, \u201cof the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy,\u201d not the proclamation of the Creator. The Son hates those who refused obedience 4621 to the Father; nor does He wish His disciples to show such a disposition towards Him\u2014not (let it be observed) towards another god, against whom such hypocrisy indeed might have been admissible, as that which He wished to guard His disciples against. It is the example of the Pharisees which He forbids. It was in respect of Him against whom the Pharisees were sinning that (Christ) now forbade His disciples to offend. Since, then, He had censured their hypocrisy, which covered the secrets of the heart, and obscured with superficial offices the mysteries of unbelief, because (while holding the key of knowledge) it would neither enter in itself, nor permit others to enter in, He therefore adds, \u201cThere is nothing covered that shall not be revealed; neither hid, which shall not be known,\u201d 4622 in order that no one should suppose that He was attempting the revelation and the recognition of an hitherto unknown and hidden god. When He remarks also on their murmurs and taunts, in saying of Him, \u201cThis man casteth out devils only through Beelzebub,\u201d He means that all these imputations would come forth to the light of day, and be in the mouths of men in consequence of the promulgation of the Gospel. He then turns to His disciples with these words, \u201cI say unto you, my friends, Be not afraid of them which can only kill the body, and after that have no more power over you.\u201d 4623 They will, however, find Isaiah had already said, \u201cSee how the just man is taken away, and no man layeth it to heart.\u201d 4624 \u201cBut I will show you whom ye shall fear: fear Him who, after p. 396 He hath killed, hath power to cast into hell\u201d (meaning, of course, the Creator); \u201cyea, I say unto you, fear Him.\u201d 4625 Now, it would here be enough for my purpose that He forbids offence being given to Him whom He orders to be feared; and that He orders Him to be respected 4626 whom He forbids to be offended; and that He who gives these commands belongs to that very God for whom He procures this fear, this absence of offence, and this respect. But this conclusion I can draw also from the following words: \u201cFor I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him will I also confess before God.\u201d 4627 Now they who shall confess Christ will have to be slain 4628 before men, but they will have nothing more to suffer after they have been put to death by them. These therefore will be they whom He forewarns above not to be afraid of being only killed; and this forewarning He offers, in order that He might subjoin a clause on the necessity of confessing Him: \u201cEvery one that denieth me before men shall be denied before God\u201d 4629 \u2014by Him, of course, who would have confessed him, if he had only confessed God. Now, He who will confess the confessor is the very same God who will also deny the denier of Himself. Again, if it is the confessor who will have nothing to fear after his violent death, 4630 it is the denier to whom everything will become fearful after his natural death. Since, therefore, that which will have to be feared after death, even the punishment of hell, belongs to the Creator, the denier, too, belongs to the Creator. As with the denier, however, so with the confessor: if he should deny God, he will plainly have to suffer from God, although from men he had nothing more to suffer after they had put him to death. And so Christ is the Creator\u2019s, because He shows that all those who deny Him ought to fear the Creator\u2019s hell. After deterring His disciples from denial of Himself, He adds an admonition to fear blasphemy: \u201cWhosoever shall speak against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him.\u201d 4631 Now, if both the remission and the retention of sin savour of a judicial God, the Holy Ghost, who is not to be blasphemed, will belong to Him, who will not forgive the blasphemy; just as He who, in the preceding passage, was not to be denied, belonged to, Him who would, after He had killed, also cast into hell. Now, since it is Christ who averts blasphemy from the Creator, I am at a loss to know in what manner His adversary 4632 could have come. Else, if by these sayings He throws a black cloud of censure 4633 over the severity of Him who will not forgive blasphemy and will kill even to hell, it follows that the very spirit of that rival god may be blasphemed with impunity, and his Christ denied; and that there is no difference, in fact, between worshipping and despising him; but that, as there is no punishment for the contempt, so there is no reward for the worship, which men need expect. When \u201cbrought before magistrates,\u201d and examined, He forbids them \u201cto take thought how they shall answer;\u201d \u201cfor,\u201d says He, \u201cthe Holy Ghost shall teach you in that very hour what ye ought to say.\u201d 4634 If such an injunction 4635 as this comes from the Creator, the precept will only be His by whom an example was previously given. The prophet Balaam, in Numbers, when sent forth by king Balak to curse Israel, with whom he was commencing war, was at the same moment 4636 filled with the Spirit. Instead of the curse which he was come to pronounce, he uttered the blessing which the Spirit at that very hour inspired him with; having previously declared to the king\u2019s messengers, and then to the king himself, that he could only speak forth that which God should put into his mouth. 4637 The novel doctrines of the new Christ are such as the Creator\u2019s servants initiated long before! But see how clear a difference there is between the example of Moses and of Christ. 4638 Moses voluntarily interferes with brothers 4639 who were quarrelling, and chides the offender: \u201cWherefore smitest thou thy fellow?\u201d He is, however, rejected by him: \u201cWho made thee a prince or a judge over us?\u201d 4640 Christ, on the contrary, when requested by a certain man to compose a strife between him and his brother about dividing an inheritance, refused His assistance, although in so honest a cause. Well, then, my Moses is better than your Christ, aiming as he did at the peace of brethren, and obviating their wrong. But of course the case must be different with Christ, for he is the Christ of the simply good and non-judicial god. \u201cWho,\u201d says he, \u201cmade me a judge over you?\u201d 4641 No other word of excuse was he able to find, p. 397 without using 4642 that with which the wicked, man and impious brother had rejected 4643 the defender of probity and piety! In short, he approved of the excuse, although a bad one, by his use of it; and of the act, although a bad one, by his refusal to make peace between brothers. Or rather, would He not show His resentment 4644 at the rejection of Moses with such a word? And therefore did He not wish in a similar case of contentious brothers, to confound them with the recollection of so harsh a word? Clearly so. For He had Himself been present in Moses, who heard such a rejection\u2014even He, the Spirit of the Creator. 4645 I think that we have already, in another passage, 4646 sufficiently shown that the glory of riches is condemned by our God, \u201cwho putteth down the mighty from their throne, and exalts the poor from the dunghill.\u201d 4647 From Him, therefore, will proceed the parable of the rich man, who flattered himself about the increase of his fields, and to Whom God said: \u201cThou fool, this night shall they require thy soul of thee; then whose shall those things be which thou hast provided?\u201d 4648 It was just in the like manner that the king Hezekiah heard from Isaiah the sad doom of his kingdom, when he gloried, before the envoys of Babylon, 4649 in his treasures and the deposits of his precious things. 4650\nAs narrated by St. Luke xii. 1-21.\n395:4621 395:4622 395:4623 395:4624 396:4625 396:4626 396:4627 396:4628 396:4629 396:4630 396:4631 396:4632\nSo full of blasphemy, as he is, against the Creator.\n396:4633 396:4634\nLuke 12:11, 12.\n396:4635 396:4636 396:4637 396:4638 396:4639\n\u201cTwo men of the Hebrews.\u201d\u2014A.V.\n396:4640\nExod. 2:13, 14.\n396:4641\nLuke 12:13, 14.\n397:4642 397:4643\nExcusserat. Oehler interprets the word by temptaverat.\n397:4644 397:4645\nThis is an instance of the title \u201cSpirit\u201d being applied to the divine nature of the Son. See Bp. Bull\u2019s Def. Nic. Fid. (by the translator). [See note 13, p. 375, supra.]\n397:4646\nAbove, chap. xv. of this book, p. 369, supra.\n397:4647\nComp. 1 Sam. 2:8, Ps. 113:7, Luke 1:52.\n397:4648 397:4649 397:4650","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol III: Tertullian: Part II: Exampl...","type":"page"}