OT § 24

The words "be blameless" are addressed to Abraham, to whom had been given the spirit of wisdom, holy, marvelously agile, unpolluted. The soul of the just man, therefore, must be in training night and day, ever on the lookout, never indulging in sleep but on perpetual watch, intent on God, so as to understand the things that are and to comprehend the causes of each. But wisdom is also the interpreter of future things: "She knows the things of old and infers the things to come. She understands turns of speech and the solutions of riddles. She has foreknowledge of signs and wonders and of the outcome of seasons and times." One who has obtained her, therefore, cannot but be good and perfect, because he possesses every virtue and is the very image of goodness. Even the sophists of this world drew from this text a definition of such a wise man: The wise man is (by definition) a good man and an accomplished communicator.

After he had turned ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, "I am the Almighty God; walk before me and be perfect. I will establish my covenant between me and you, and I will greatly multiply you exceedingly." Hence, the name of Abraham is amplified at the age of one hundred years, the covenant of circumcision is given, and the promise of the birth of Isaac is made, so that in a great mystery, a one-hundred-year-old receives the son of promise already circumcised. He walks before the Lord to be able to be perfect, who every moment remembers himself to be standing in the sight of the Divinity and as if placed in his service; as Elias, who said, "The Lord lives, in whose sight I stand" (1 Kings 17:1); he always indicated that he kept himself prepared for divine service, having the presence of his Creator in mind; and because the first step of perfection is humility, it is rightly added:

After the tenth year he took Ishmael, his child by the maidservant, and considered that the promises had been fulfilled for him in the child. The patriarch was, you remember, the text tells us, eighty-six years old when Ishmael was born. The loving God, however, exercised the virtue of the just man for a still further period of thirteen years. When God saw that he had been purified like gold in a furnace for a long period of time and had rendered the just man's virtue more conspicuous and resplendent, Scripture says, "When Abram was ninety-nine years old, God appeared to him again." Why did God delay so long? Not simply that we should get to know the just man's endurance and his great virtue, but for us to see as well the extraordinary degree of his power. You see, when nature lost its potency and was now useless for childbearing, his body being wasted and chilled with old age, God put into effect the promise to demonstrate his peculiar power.

Since in many places of the divine Scriptures we read that God speaks to human beings, and because of this the Jews indeed, but also some of our own people, have thought that God is to be understood as though a man—that is, as marked out with human limbs and bodily form—while the philosophers, on the other hand, look down upon these things as fabulous and shaped after the likeness of poetic fictions; it seems to me that I must first speak a few words about these matters, and then come to the things that have been read out. First, then, let my discourse be addressed to those who, set outside, arrogantly clamor around us, saying that it does not befit that lofty and invisible and incorporeal God to make use of human affections. For if you grant Him, they say, the practice of speaking, without doubt you will also grant Him a mouth and a tongue and the other members by which the function of speaking is fulfilled. And if this be so, then there has been a departure from the invisible and incorporeal God; and stringing together many things similar to these, they weary our people. To these things, then, if we are helped by your prayers, we shall briefly reply, in the measure the Lord shall grant.

Just as we profess that God is incorporeal and almighty and invisible, so also we confess by a sure and unshakable doctrine that He cares for mortal things and that nothing is carried out apart from His providence, neither in heaven nor on earth. Remember that we said nothing is carried out without His providence, not: without His will. For many things are carried out without His will, nothing without His providence. For providence is that by which He looks after and manages and provides for the things that are done, whereas will is that by which He wills something or does not will it. But of these things elsewhere; for that treatment is longer and more diffuse. According, then, to this, that we profess God to be the provider and manager of all things, it follows that He should indicate what He wills or what is expedient for human beings. For if He does not indicate it, He will neither be the provider of man nor be believed to care for mortal things. When therefore God indicates to human beings what He wills them to do, by what affection above all is He to be said to indicate it? Is it not by that which is in the use and knowledge of human beings? For if, for the sake of argument, we should say that God is silent—which is believed to befit His nature—how will anything be thought to have been indicated by Him through silence? But now He is said to have spoken for this reason, that human beings, knowing that by this ministry the will of one is made known to another, may recognize that those things which are conveyed to them through the prophets are indications of the will of God. In which things assuredly the will of God is not understood to be contained unless He is said to have spoken them, because it is neither perceived nor understood that among human beings the will can ever be indicated through silence. But again these things we say, not according to the error of the Jews, or even of some of our own who err along with them, so far as to suppose—because human frailty cannot hear otherwise about God than as the things themselves and their names are known to it, and therefore we should suppose that God acts with these members like our own and with a human form. This is foreign to the faith of the Church. But this very thing, that He either breathes into the heart of each of the saints or causes the sound of a voice to reach his ears, is what is meant when God is said to have spoken to a man. So also, when He indicates that the things which each one either speaks or does are known to Him, He is said to have heard; and when He indicates that something unjust is being done by us, He is said to be angry; when He convicts us of being ungrateful for His benefits, He is said to repent, indicating these things indeed by those affections which are in use among human beings, yet not administering them by those members which belong to a corporeal nature. For that substance is simple and composed neither of any members nor of joints and affections, but whatever is carried out by the divine powers, this—that human beings may be able to understand it—is either set forth under the name of human members or is expressed by common and known affections. And in this way God is said either to be angry or to hear or to speak. For if the human voice is defined as struck air, that is, air beaten back by the tongue, God's voice too can be called air struck either by divine force or by divine will. And hence it is that, if at any time a voice is divinely given, it glides not to the ears of all, but to those whose hearing it concerns, so that you may recognize the sound to be rendered not by the beating of a tongue—otherwise the hearing would be common to all—but governed by the direction of the heavenly command. Although it is reported that often to the prophets and patriarchs and the rest of the saints the word of God came even without the sound of a voice, as we are abundantly taught from all the sacred volumes. In which, to speak briefly, the mind, illumined through the Spirit of God, is formed into words. And therefore whether in this way or in that, which we have spoken of above, God is said to have spoken when He indicates His will. According, then, to this understanding, let us now discuss some of the things which have been read.

Abram fell face down. We read that in the earlier places of sacred history, holy men invoked the Lord, offered him sacrifices of praise, and lived innocently in his sight, but none had fallen face down before the Lord before Abram. However, the more superior gifts he received compared to the previous ones, the greater thanks he gave to the Giver of gifts by humbling himself; and because in falling to the ground he humbly recalled his fragility, he immediately deserved to sublimely recognize the eminence of divine power. For it follows:

And God said to him: I am, and my covenant is with you. For what is it for the Lord to say: I am, if not to clearly declare the state of his eternity, in which he is always the same? About which the Psalm also says: But you are the same (Psalm 102:28). This place harmonizes with the Gospel where the Lord said to the Jews: Before Abraham was, I am (John 8:58). For appearing in the flesh, he taught that he himself was the one who had once appeared to Abraham in spirit, when he repeated to the Jews the same testimony of his essence that he had given to Abraham; but the Jews were troubled because they had heard: Before Abraham was, I am; yet Abraham rejoiced when he heard: I am, and did not doubt that God existed before he did; hence, because he faithfully heard the word of divine eternity, he received in the increase of reward that he would be called and be the father of many nations. Moreover, the Jews, because they could not grasp the mysteries of divinity they'd heard, were cast out from the lineage of Abraham, and were counted among the offspring of vipers: Finally, they took up stones to throw at him; but he hid himself from them, and went out of the temple (John 8:59), so that, evidently hidden from their stony hearts, and going out, he would come to reveal to the Gentiles the knowledge of his majesty. For even then having gone out of the temple, he restored sight to the man born blind. Evidently as a figure of grace, with which he was to enlighten the hearts of the Gentiles. It follows:

The promise of a bodily posterity was made to Abraham, for it is written: "So shall your posterity be." The promise of a spiritual posterity was also made to him, for through faith he was to be the father of a multitude. The flesh of Abraham gave forth offspring and was thus multiplied. All the more so would his spiritual begetting be fruitful: for he begot spiritually through his fruitful mind. Now, the great number of thoughts arising out of faith transcend in clarity the light of the stars.

Conjugal chastity accords with the written law by reason of the divine promise: because the Lord promised to Abraham, Genesis 17: You shall be the father of many nations; and I will make you increase most exceedingly, and I will establish you among nations, and kings shall come forth from you. Since therefore the Lord as a benefit promised that He would give offspring to Abraham through the way of marriage, it is evident that conjugal chastity accords with the written law.

(Chapter 17—Verse 3 and following) And the Lord spoke to him, saying: Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. It should be noted that wherever we read Testament in Greek, in the Hebrew language it is the word covenant or pact, that is, Berith ().

For a name is changed, with a letter added, so that he would be called Abraham instead of Abram, which means 'father of a multitude', as the Latin interpretation has it, or 'sublime father', 'chosen father'; or so that he would become a father and the father of a son. He was vain when he did not know God; he became chosen after he knew God. He was a father when he had offspring by a slave woman; but he was not the father of a son, because he did not have a son who was conceived in lawful marriage. Sarah gave birth, and he became the father of a son.

However, a question arises here which should not be passed over and which may perhaps also, quite independently, be bothering some of you. What does it mean, that when the name of Abraham, this man Jacob's grandfather, was changed (he was previously called Abram, you see, and God changed his name and said, you shall not be called Abram, but Abraham)? From that time on he was never called Abram. Search in the Scriptures, and you will see that earlier on, before he received another name, he was only called Abram. After he had received the new one, he was only called Abraham. This man Jacob, however, heard the same words when he received another name: You shall not be called Jacob, but you shall be called Israel. Now search the Scriptures, and see how he was always called either name, both Jacob and Israel. When Abram got another name, he was never called anything but Abraham; when Jacob got another name, he was called Jacob and Israel. The name Abraham was to receive its explanation in this world, because it was here that he became the father of many nations, from which his name is derived. The name Israel, on the other hand, belongs to the next world, where we will see God. So the people of God, the Christian people, is in this world and this time both Jacob and Israel; Jacob in our actual situation, Israel in our hopeful expectation.

And you will be the father of many nations, and your name will no longer be called Abram, but you will be called Abraham, because I have made you the father of many nations. Because blessed Abraham left his kin and his father's house at the command of the Lord, he received deservedly also in this gift of reward to exist as the father of many nations; indeed of so many, that not only those who came from his seed according to the flesh, but also those who deriving their origin of flesh elsewhere, would follow the footsteps of his faith and obedience, as the Apostle writes to the Romans with full exposition. It should be known that Abram means Exalted Father, but Abraham means Father of Many, so it is understood, of many nations.

(Chapter 17, Verse 5) And your name shall no longer be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of many nations. The Hebrews say that God, from his name, which is the Tetragrammaton among them, added the letter He to Abraham and Sarah: for he was first called Abram (), which means lofty father, and later he was called Abraham (), which means father of many: for what follows nations is not part of the name, but is understood. It is not surprising, therefore, that when it seems that the letter Α has been added among the Greeks and us: we have called it the Hebrew letter He added; for the language of that tongue is to write with He (ה‎), but to read with A (א‎): just as, on the contrary, the letter A is often pronounced as He.

Verse 7. "And the overseer of the eunuchs imposed names upon them, calling Daniel Belteshazzar (Balthasar), and Hananiah Shadrach, and Mishael Meshach, and Azariah Abednego." It was not only the overseer or master of the eunuchs (as others have rendered it, the "chief-eunuch") who changed the names of saints, but also Pharaoh called Joseph in Egypt Somtonphanec (Genesis 41:45), for neither of them wished them to have Jewish names in the land of captivity. Wherefore the prophet says in the Psalm: "How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?" (Psalm 137:4). Furthermore the Lord Himself changes names benignly, and on the basis of events imposes names of special significance, so as to call Abram Abraham (Genesis 17:5), and Sarai Sarah (Genesis 17:15). Also in the Gospel, the former Simon received the name of Peter (Mark 3:16), and the sons of Zebedee are called "sons of thunder" (Mark 3:17) - which is not boanerges, as most people suppose, but is more correctly read benereem.

Many responses are given by God to Abraham, but they are not all conveyed to one and the same person. For certain of them are to Abram, certain to Abraham, that is, some after the change of name and others while he was still reckoned by his native appellation. And first indeed there is conveyed by God to Abram, before the change of name, that oracle which says: "Go out from your land, and from your kindred, and from your father's house," and the rest. But in this nothing is enjoined concerning the covenant of God, nothing concerning circumcision. For he could not, while he was still Abram and bore the name of his carnal birth, receive the covenant of God and the mark of circumcision. But when "he went out from his land and from his kindred," then more sacred responses are now conveyed to him, and first it is said to him: "You shall no longer be called Abram, but Abraham shall be your name." Then at last he both received the covenant of God and accepted circumcision, the seal of faith, which he could not receive while he was in his father's house and in carnal kinship and while he was still called Abram. But neither was he himself and his wife called "presbyter" as long as he was in his father's house and dwelt with flesh and blood; but after he had set out from there, he merited both to be called "Abraham" and to be called "presbyter": "for they were both," it says, "presbyters," that is, old, namely Abraham and his admirable wife, "and advanced in their days." How many before them led their life over longer spans of years—for nine hundred years and more, and some, not much less, lived until the flood—and none of these were called presbyters. For by this name in Abraham not the old age of the body, but the maturity of the heart, was named. So also the Lord says to Moses: "Choose for yourself presbyters, whom you yourself know to be presbyters." Let us look more diligently at the Lord's word—what that addition may mean, by which He says: "whom you yourself know to be presbyters." Surely he who bore the senile age of the body was not manifest to the eyes of all as being a presbyter, that is, an old man? Why then is this special inspection enjoined upon Moses alone, so great and so notable a prophet, that those be chosen not whom other men know, not whom the untrained crowd recognizes, but whom the prophet full of God shall have chosen? For the judgment concerning them is not about the body, not about age, but about the mind. Such, then, were these blessed presbyters Abraham and Sarah. And first of all their native names, which carnal birth had given them, are changed. "For when Abraham was ninety-nine years old, God appeared to him and said: I am God, be well-pleasing before me, and be blameless, and I will set my covenant between me and you. And Abraham fell upon his face and adored God, and God spoke to him, saying: I am, behold my covenant is with you, and you shall be father of a multitude of nations, and in you all the nations shall be blessed, and your name shall no longer be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham." And when He had given this name, He immediately adds: "and I will set my covenant between me and you, and your seed after you. And this is the covenant which you shall keep between me and you, and between your seed after you." And after these things He adds: "every male among you shall be circumcised, and you shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin."

For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect: Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no transgression. Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all, (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were. [Genesis 17:5] Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations; according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be. And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara's womb: He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

Hence, the Stoic philosophers drew their doctrine as if from a source, saying that all things belong to the wise. For the East and the West, the North and the South are parts of the universe. The whole world is enclosed in them. When God promised Abraham that He would give him these things, what else does He declare but that He will provide everything to the wise and faithful, leaving nothing lacking? Thus, Solomon also says in Proverbs: the whole world of riches belongs to the faithful. How much greater is Solomon than Zeno, the master and founder of the Stoic sect! How much greater than Plato, the father of philosophy, or Pythagoras, the inventor of his name! But who is faithful, if not wise? For the fool is like the moon, always changing, but the wise person remains steadfast in their faith.

And I will establish my covenant between me and you, and between your seed after you in their generations with an everlasting covenant; that I may be your God and the God of your seed after you. The old translation has: And I will establish my testament. It should be noted, however, that wherever we read "testament" in Greek, in the Hebrew language it is "covenant" or "pact," that is, "berith." It is not surprising, then, that the testament or covenant of God is with Abraham and his seed in an everlasting covenant, that He may be their God: because indeed this covenant will be preserved throughout the entire duration of this life without any interruption in the generations of the chosen following in succession, and will be celebrated without any end in the future age. What follows, however, is:

And I will give to you and to your seed after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession. It requires a more laborious exposition on how it should be understood as fulfilled or still expected to be fulfilled, since any earthly possession cannot be eternal for any nation. But it should be known that "eternal" is interpreted by our people as what the Greeks call "Aeonion," which is derived from "age." For in Greek "Aeon" is called an age. But the Latins did not dare to say "age-long," lest they send the meaning far off into something else. For many things are called "age-long" that are done in this age in such a way as to pass away in a short time. However, what is called "Aeonion" either has no end or extends to the end of this age. And therefore, as we said above, the land of Canaan is given as an everlasting possession to the seed of Abraham, because in it Christians, up to the end of this age, whether from the Jews or from the Gentiles, that is, the seed of Abraham, are believed never to be lacking.

God said again to Abraham: And you shall therefore keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations; this is my covenant which you shall keep between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised; and you shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. The Lord, in His kind provision, first established the covenant of His grace with the blessed Abraham and his offspring; and then He requires of them the covenant of obedience: so that the labor of striving might be less terrifying when the reward of perpetual remuneration is heard first. Therefore, the foreskin of the flesh is commanded to be circumcised, as a sign of the covenant between God and men, so that by this sign the faithful of that time might be reminded to cleanse themselves from all pollution of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God; but also by a higher mystery, that carnal circumcision was done as a sign of the covenant between God and Abraham's offspring, because it was given as a sign of that covenant of which it was said above to Abraham: In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed; which no faithful person doubts pertains to the grace of the new testament. Therefore, in the sign of this covenant, no faithful person doubts that Abraham and his offspring were circumcised in the flesh of their foreskin, so that it might be typologically prefigured that one would be born from his seed who would cleanse his chosen ones from all stain of sins, and grant them perpetual blessing; to the sacrament of which cleansing aptly corresponds what follows: