Chapter 12

§ 1.

For the tradition of those elders, which they pretended to observe according to the Law, was contrary to the Law given by Moses.¹ Wherefore also Esaias saith, Thy vintners mingle wine with water: signifying that the Elders mingled with the strict commandment of God a diluted tradition: contriving, that is, a law spurious, and contrary to The Law: as also the Lord made manifest, saying unto them,² Why do ye transgress the commandment of God, because of your own tradition? Yea, not only did they by perversion make void the Law of God, mingling water with wine; but they even set up in opposition their own law, which even to this day is called Pharisaical. Wherein they take away some things, some they add, others they expound at their own will: and of these their teachers make special use. And being minded to maintain these traditions, they have no mind to submit themselves to God’s Law, training them up for the coming of Christ: but they called the Lord Himself to account for healing on the Sabbath, which however, as we said before, was not forbidden by the Law. (For themselves too in a manner used to do a work of healing, in that they would circumcise a man on the sabbath.) But with themselves they found no fault, when by their tradition and Pharisaical Law (of which I spake before) they were transgressing the Commandment of God, and not having that which the Law commands, i.e., Love towards God.

§ 2.

But that this is the first and greatest commandment, and the next that towards our neighbour, the Lord taught,³ when He said that the whole Law and Prophets hang on these commandments.⁴ Nor did even He bring down any other commandment greater than this: but this same one He renewed to His Disciples,⁵ bidding them love God with all their heart, and all others as themselves. But had He come down from another Father, never would He have adopted His first and chief commandment from the Law: rather surely he would have tried at any rate to bring it down as somewhat greater from the perfect Father, instead of using that which had been given by the God of the Law.

And Paul too saith, Love is the fulfilling of the Law:⁶ and that when all other things are done away, there abideth faith,⁷ hope, charity, and that the greatest of these is charity: and that neither knowledge without love towards God avails anything:⁸ nor understanding of mysteries, nor faith, nor prophecy, but that all things are void and in vain without love: and that it is love which completes the perfect man, and that he who loves God is perfect, both in this world and in the future. For we never come to an end in our loving of God, but the more we shall have looked upon Him, so much the more we love Him.

§ 3.

Wherefore, since in the Law and in the Gospel the first and greatest precept is,⁹ to love the Lord our God with all our heart, and next one like unto it, to love his neighbour as himself: one and the same is shewn to be the Founder of the Law and of the Gospel. That is, the precepts of perfect life being the same in both Testaments, shewed their God to be the same: Who while He laid down His precepts of detail as suited each of the two, did in both recommend the very same, as the higher and chiefest, without which is no salvation.

§ 4.

And whom would not the Lord put to silence, declaring that the Law is from no other God, where He saith to those whom He was teaching, to the multitude and His disciples,¹⁰ The Scribes and Pharisees have sate down on Moses’ seat. All things therefore whatsoever they say unto you, observe and do; but do ye not after their works, for they say and do not. For they bind heavy burthens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but themselves are unwilling to move them even with a finger.¹¹ He was not then blaming that Law which was given by Moses, which as long as Jerusalem yet stood He recommended to be practised; but He was blaming those men, because, while they uttered the words of the Law, they were destitute of Love, and so were unrighteous towards God and their neighbours.¹² As Esaias also saith, This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. But in vain do they worship Me, teaching doctrines and precepts of men. He doth not apply the term, Precepts of men, to the Law given by Moses, but to the traditions of their Elders, which they had devised, by maintaining whereof they made void the Law of God,¹³ and therefore neither did they submit themselves to His Word.

For this is what Paul also saith concerning them: For being ignorant of God’s righteousness,¹⁴ and wanting to establish their own righteousness, they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the Law, for righteousness to every one that believeth.¹⁵ And how is Christ the end of the Law, if He were not also its beginning? For He Who brought in the end, the same also wrought the beginning: and He it is Who saith to Moses,¹⁶ I have surely seen the affliction of My people which is in Egypt and I am come down to deliver them: He Who is the Word of God, accustomed from the beginning to go up and come down, for the health of those who are diseased.

§ 5.

Further: that the Law taught before, that mankind ought to follow Christ, Himself makes evident, thus answering the person who asked Him what he should do to inherit eternal life,¹⁷ If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.¹⁸ And when he asked, Which, the Lord in reply,¹⁹ Thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness, honour thy father and thy mother, and thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: setting forth the precepts of the Law as a sort of steps of the entrance into life, for all who were fain to follow Him. And in saying it then to that one person, He said it unto all. But when the other had said, I have done all (and perhaps he had not done it, else surely it would not be said to him, Keep the commandments); the Lord to reprove his covetousness, said to him,²⁰ If thou wilt be perfect, go, sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and come, follow Me; promising the portion of Apostles to such as did so. And no other God the Father did He announce to those who followed Him, besides Him Who from the beginning was announced by the Law: nor any other Son, nor as a Mother, the Idea of that Æon who was in suffering and in decay, nor any Pleroma of thirty Æons, which has been shewn to be void and incongruous; nor the tale which has been feigned by the other heretics; but He taught men to do the things which God commanded from the beginning, and to destroy their old covetousness by good works, and to follow Christ. As to the fact, that distributing men’s possessions to the poor doth make away with their past covetousness, Zacchæus made it evident, saying,²¹ Behold, I give half my goods to the poor, and if I have defrauded any man of aught, I restore fourfold.