[4518] Ps. civ. 4.
[4519] Luke ii. 10, 11.
[4520] Origen, however, appears also to have read eudokias: "among men of good will."
14. The Old Testament, Typified by John, is the Beginning of the Gospel.
In addition to what we have said, there is also this to be considered about the Gospel, that in the first instance it is that of Christ Jesus, the head of the whole body of the saved; as Mark says, [4521] "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ." Then also it is the Gospel of the Apostles; whence Paul [4522] says, "According to my Gospel." But the beginning of the Gospel--for in respect of its extent it has a beginning, a continuation, a middle, and an end--is nothing but the whole Old Testament. John is, in this respect, a type of the Old Testament, or, if we regard the connection of the New Testament with the Old, John represents the termination of the Old. For the same Mark says: [4523] "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet, Behold I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight." And here I must wonder how the dissentients [4524] can connect the two Testaments with two different Gods. These words, were there no others, are enough to convict them of their error. For how can John be the beginning of the Gospel if they suppose he belongs to a different God, if he belongs to the demiurge, and, as they hold, is not acquainted with the new deity? And the angels are not entrusted with but one evangelical ministry, and that a short one, not only with that addressed to the shepherds. For at the end an exalted and flying angel, having the Gospel, will preach it to every nation, for the good Father has not entirely deserted those who have fallen away from Him. John, son of Zebedee, says in his Apocalypse: [4525] "And I saw an angel flying in the midst of heaven, having the Eternal Gospel, to preach it to those who dwell upon the earth, and to every nation, and tribe, and tongue, and people, saying, with a loud voice, Fear God and give Him glory, for the hour of His judgment hath come, and worship Him that made the heaven, and the earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters."
[4521] Mark i. 1.
[4522] Rom. ii. 16.
[4523] i. 2, 3.
[4524] heterodoxoi.
[4525] Apoc. xiv. 6, 7.
15. The Gospel is in the Old Testament, and Indeed in the Whole Universe. Prayer for Aid to Understand the Mystical Sense of the Work in Hand.
As, then, we have shown that the beginning of the Gospel, according to one interpretation, is the whole Old Testament, and is signified by the person of John, we shall add, lest this should be called a mere unsupported assertion, what is said in the Acts [4526] about the eunuch of the queen of the Ethiopians and Philip. Philip, it is said, began at the passage of Isaiah: "He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a lamb before his shearer is dumb," and so preached to him the Lord Jesus. How can he begin with the prophet and preach Jesus, if Isaiah was not a part of the beginning of the Gospel? From this we may derive a proof of the assertion made at the outset, that every divine Scripture is Gospel. If he who preaches the Gospel preaches good things, and all those who spoke before the sojourn of Jesus in the flesh preach Christ, who is as we saw good things, then the words spoken by all of them alike are in a sense a part of the Gospel. And when the Gospel is said to be declared throughout the whole world, we infer that it is actually preached in the whole world, not, that is to say, in this earthly district only, but in the whole system of heaven and earth, or from heaven and earth. And why should we discuss any further what the Gospel is? What we have said is enough. Besides the passages we have adduced, passages by no means inept or unsuited for our purpose,--much to the same effect might be collected from the Scriptures, so that it is clearly seen what is the glory of the good things in Jesus Christ shed forth by the Gospel, the Gospel ministered by men and angels, and, I believe, also by authorities and powers, [4527] and thrones and dominions, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in the world to come, and indeed even by Christ Himself. Here, then, let us bring to a close what has to be said before proceeding to read the work itself. And now let us ask God to assist us through Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit, so that we may be able to unfold the mystical sense which is treasured up in the words before us.
[4526] Acts viii. 26, sqq.
[4527] Ephes. i. 21.
16. Meaning of "Beginning." (1) in Space.
"In the beginning was the Word." [4528] It is not only the Greeks who consider the word "beginning" to have many meanings. Let any one collect the Scripture passages in which the word occurs, and with a view to an accurate interpretation of it note what it stands for in each passage, and he will find that the word has many meanings in sacred discourse also. We speak of a beginning in reference to a transition. Here it has to do with a road and with length. This appears in the saying: [4529] "The beginning of a good way is to do justice." For since the good way is long, there have first to be considered in reference to it the question connected with action, and this side is presented in the words "to do justice;" the contemplative side comes up for consideration afterwards. In the latter the end of it comes to rest at last in the so-called restoration of all things, since no enemy is left them to fight against, if that be true which is said: [4530] "For He must reign until He have placed His enemies under His feet. But the last enemy to be destroyed is death." For then but one activity will be left for those who have come to God on account of His word which is with Him, that, namely, of knowing God, so that, being found by the knowledge of the Father, they may all be His Son, as now no one but the Son knows the Father. For should any one enquire carefully at what time those are to know the Father to whom He who knows the Father reveals Him, and should he consider how a man now sees only through a glass and in a riddle, never having learned to know as he ought to know, he would be justified in saying that no one, no apostle even, and no prophet had known the Father, but when he became one with Him as a son and a father are one. And if any one says that it is a digression which has led us to this point, our consideration of that one meaning of the word beginning, we must show that the digression is necessary and useful for the end we have in view. For if we speak of a beginning in the case of a transition, and of a way and its length, and if we are told that the beginning of a good way is to do justice, then it concerns us to know in what manner every good way has for its beginning to do justice, and how after such beginning it arrives at contemplation, and in what manner it thus arrives at contemplation.
[4528] John i. 1.
[4529] Prov. xvi. 5.
[4530] 1 Cor. xv. 25, 26.
17. (2) in Time. The Beginning of Creation.
Again, there is a beginning in a matter of origin, as might appear in the saying: [4531] "In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth." This meaning, however, appears more plainly in the Book of Job in the passage: [4532] "This is the beginning of God's creation, made for His angels to mock at." One would suppose that the heavens and the earth were made first, of all that was made at the creation of the world. But the second passage suggests a better view, namely, that as many beings were framed with a body, the first made of these was the creature called dragon, but called in another passage [4533] the great whale (leviathan) which the Lord tamed. We must ask about this; whether, when the saints were living a blessed life apart from matter and from any body, the dragon, falling from the pure life, became fit to be bound in matter and in a body, so that the Lord could say, speaking through storm and clouds, "This is the beginning of the creation of God, made for His angels to mock at." It is possible, however, that the dragon is not positively the beginning of the creation of the Lord, but that there were many creatures made with a body for the angels to mock at, and that the dragon was the first of these, while others could subsist in a body without such reproach. But it is not so. For the soul of the sun is placed in a body, and the whole creation, of which the Apostle says: [4534] "The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now," and perhaps the following is about the same: "The creation was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but on account of Him who subjected it for hope;" so that bodies might be in vanity, and doing the things of the body, as he who is in the body must. [4535] ...One who is in the body does the things of the body, though unwillingly. Wherefore the creation was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but he who does unwillingly the things of the body does what he does for the sake of hope, as if we should say that Paul desired to remain in the flesh, not willingly, but on account of hope. For though he thought it better [4536] to be dissolved and to be with Christ, it was not unreasonable that he should wish to remain in the flesh for the sake of the benefit to others and of advancement in the things hoped for, not only by him, but also by those benefited by him. This meaning of the term "beginning," as of origin, will serve us also in the passage in which Wisdom speaks in the Proverbs. [4537] "God," we read, "created me the beginning of His ways, for His works." Here the term could be interpreted as in the first application we spoke of, that of a way: "The Lord," it says, "created me the beginning of His ways." One might assert, and with reason, that God Himself is the beginning of all things, and might go on to say, as is plain, that the Father is the beginning of the Son; and the demiurge the beginning of the works of the demiurge, and that God in a word is the beginning of all that exists. This view is supported by our: "In the beginning was the Word." In the Word one may see the Son, and because He is in the Father He may be said to be in the beginning.
[4531] Gen. i. 1.
[4532] Job xl. 19.
[4533] Job iii. 8.
[4534] Rom. viii. 22, 20.
[4535] The text is defective here.
[4536] Phil. i. 23.
[4537] viii. 22.
18. (3) of Substance.
In the third place a beginning may be that out of which a thing comes, the underlying matter from which things are formed. This, however, is the view of those who hold matter itself to be uncreated, a view which we believers cannot share, since we believe God to have made the things that are out of the things which are not, as the mother of the seven martyrs in the Maccabees teaches, [4538] and as the angel of repentance in the Shepherd inculcated. [4539]
[4538] 2 Macc. vii. 28.
[4539] Herm. Sim. viii.
19. (4) of Type and Copy.
In addition to these meanings there is that in which we speak of an arche, [4540] according to form; thus if the first-born of every creature [4541] is the image of the invisible God, then the Father is his arche. In the same way Christ is the arche of those who are made according to the image of God. For if men are according to the image, but the image according to the Father; in the first case the Father is the arche of Christ, and in the other Christ is the arche of men, and men are made, not according to that of which he is the image, but according to the image. With this example our passage will agree: "In the arche was the Word."