Chapter CXL.--In Christ all are free. The Jews hope for salvation in vain because they are sons of Abraham.
"Hence also Jacob, as I remarked before, being himself a type of Christ, had married the two handmaids of his two free wives, and of them begat sons, for the purpose of indicating beforehand that Christ would receive even all those who amongst Japheth's race are descendants of Canaan, equally with the free, and would have the children fellow-heirs. And we are such; but you cannot comprehend this, because you cannot drink of the living fountain of God, but of broken cisterns which can hold no water, as the Scripture says. [2482] But they are cisterns broken, and holding no water, which your own teachers have digged, as the Scripture also expressly asserts, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.' [2483] And besides, they beguile themselves and you, supposing that the everlasting kingdom will be assuredly given to those of the dispersion who are of Abraham, after the flesh, although they be sinners, and faithless, and disobedient towards God, which the Scriptures have proved is not the case. For if so, Isaiah would never have said this: And unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we would have been like Sodom and Gomorrah.' [2484] And Ezekiel: Even if Noah, and Jacob, and Daniel were to pray for sons or daughters, their request should not be granted.' [2485] But neither shall the father perish for the son, nor the son for the father; but every one for his own sin, and each shall be saved for his own righteousness.' [2486] And again Isaiah says: They shall look on the carcases [2487] of them that have transgressed: their worm shall not cease, and their fire shall not be quenched; and they shall be a spectacle to all flesh.' [2488] And our Lord, according to the will of Him that sent Him, who is the Father and Lord of all, would not have said, They shall come from the east, and from the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness.' [2489] Furthermore, I have proved in what has preceded, [2490] that those who were foreknown to be unrighteous, whether men or angels, are not made wicked by God's fault, but each man by his own fault is what he will appear to be.
[2482] Jer. ii. 13.
[2483] Isa. xxix. 13.
[2484] Isa. i. 9.
[2485] Ezek. xiv. 18, 20.
[2486] Ezek. xviii. 20.
[2487] Literally, "limbs."
[2488] Isa. lxvi. 24.
[2489] Matt. viii. 11 f.
[2490] Chap. lxxxviii, cii.
Chapter CXLI.--Free-will in men and angels.
"But that you may not have a pretext for saying that Christ must have been crucified, and that those who transgressed must have been among your nation, and that the matter could not have been otherwise, I said briefly by anticipation, that God, wishing men and angels to follow His will, resolved to create them free to do righteousness; possessing reason, that they may know by whom they are created, and through whom they, not existing formerly, do now exist; and with a law that they should be judged by Him, if they do anything contrary to right reason: and of ourselves we, men and angels, shall be convicted of having acted sinfully, unless we repent beforehand. But if the word of God foretells that some angels and men shall be certainly punished, it did so because it foreknew that they would be unchangeably [wicked], but not because God had created them so. So that if they repent, all who wish for it can obtain mercy from God: and the Scripture foretells that they shall be blessed, saying, Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not sin;' [2491] that is, having repented of his sins, that he may receive remission of them from God; and not as you deceive yourselves, and some others who resemble you in this, who say, that even though they be sinners, but know God, the Lord will not impute sin to them. We have as proof of this the one fall of David, which happened through his boasting, which was forgiven then when he so mourned and wept, as it is written. But if even to such a man no remission was granted before repentance, and only when this great king, and anointed one, and prophet, mourned and conducted himself so, how can the impure and utterly abandoned, if they weep not, and mourn not, and repent not, entertain the hope that the Lord will not impute to them sin? And this one fall of David, in the matter of Uriah's wife, proves, sirs," I said, "that the patriarchs had many wives, not to commit fornication, but that a certain dispensation and all mysteries might be accomplished by them; since, if it were allowable to take any wife, or as many wives as one chooses, and how he chooses, which the men of your nation do over all the earth, wherever they sojourn, or wherever they have been sent, taking women under the name of marriage, much more would David have been permitted to do this."
When I had said this, dearest Marcus Pompeius, I came to an end.
[2491] Ps. xxxii. 2.