Jerome and Augustine on the Moral & Ceremonial Law

In 400 AD Jerome and Augustine were debating over whether the ceremonial law was fulfilled by itself or if all Jewish laws were abrogated. Jerome argues for the removal of the entire law, but in this letter, he acknowledges that Augustine did not accept his view which matched the unorthodox Origen. These letters prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that Thomas Aquinas did not "invent" the three categories of the law in the 1200's when Augustine held this view back in 400AD. These letters English translation can be found in a number of places on the internet. Every time I read Jerome I find that there are few in history I disagree with more. But his laying out Augustine's view so clearly in this letter was a great service to the orthodox and actually harms the case of his fellow antinomians whose constant mantra is the threefold division of the law is from Aquinas. By the way, Aquinas did not invent the doctrine of the Trinity either. Augustine wrote a whole book on that doctrine.
 

From Jerome to Augustine (A.D. 404)

This is Jerome's answer to Letters 40, 48, and 71. On receiving these letters, Jerome in three days completes an exhaustive reply to all the questions which Augustine had raised. He explains what is the true title of his book "On Illustrious Men", deals at great length with the dispute between Paul and Peter, expounds his views with regard to the Septuagint, and shows by the story of "the gourd" how close and accurate his translations are. His language throughout is kind but rather patronizing: indeed in this whole correspondence Jerome seldom sufficiently recognizes the greatness of Augustine. The date of the letter is A.D. 404.
 
To Augustine, my lord truly holy, and most blessed father: Jerome sends greetings in Christ.

CHAPTER I

1. I have received by Cyprian, deacon, three letters, or rather three little books, at the same time, from your Excellency, containing what you call sundry questions, but what I feel to be animadversions on opinions which I have published, to answer which, if I were disposed to do it, would require a pretty large volume. Nevertheless I shall attempt to reply without exceeding the limits of a moderately long letter, and without causing delay to our brother, now in haste to depart, who only three days before the time fixed for his journey asked earnestly for a letter to take with him, in consequence of which I am compelled to pour out these sentences, such as they are, almost without premeditation, answering you in a rambling effusion, prepared not in the leisure of deliberate composition, but in the hurry of extemporaneous dictation, which usually produces a discourse that is more the offspring of chance than the parent of instruction; just as unexpected attacks throw into confusion even the bravest soldiers, and they are compelled to take to flight before they can gird on their armor.

 2. But our armor is Christ; it is that which the Apostle Paul prescribes when, writing to the Ephesians, he says, ,'Take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day;" and again, "Stand, therefore, having your loins girded about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked: and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." Armed with these weapons, King David went forth in his day to battle: and taking from the torrent's bed five smooth rounded stones, he proved that, even amidst all the eddying currents of the world, his feelings were free both from roughness and from defilement; drinking of the brook by the way, and therefore lifted up in spirit, he cut off the head of Goliath, using the proud enemy's own sword as the fittest instrument of death? Smiting the profane boaster on the forehead and wounding him in the same place in which Uzziah was smitten with leprosy when he presumed to usurp the priestly office; the same also in which shines the glory that makes the saints rejoice in the Lord, saying, "The light of Thy countenance is sealed upon us, O Lord." Let us therefore also say, "My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed: I will sing and give praise: awake up, my glory; awake, psaltery and harp; I myself will awake early;" that in us may be fulfilled that word, "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it; " and, "The Lord shall give the word with great power to them that publish it." I am well assured that your prayer, as well as mine, is that in our contending the victory may remain with the truth. For you seek Christ's glory, not your own: if you are victorious, I also gain a victory if I discover my error. On the other hand, if I win the day, the gain is yours; for "the children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children." We read, moreover, in Chronicles, that the children of Israel went to battle with their minds set upon peace, seeking even amid swords and bloodshed and the prostrate slain a victory not for themselves, but for peace. Let me, therefore, if it be the will of Christ, give an answer to all that you have written, and attempt in a short dissertation to solve your numerous questions. I pass by the conciliatory phrases in your courteous salutation: I say nothing of the compliments by which you attempt to take the edge off your censure: let me come at once to the matters in debate.

CHAPTER II

3. You say that you received from some brother a book of mine, in which I have given a list of ecclesiastical writers, both Greek and Latin, but which had no title; and that when you asked the brother aforesaid (I quote your own statement) why the title-page had no inscription, or what was the name by which the book was known, he answered that it was called "Epitaphium," i.e. "Obituary Notices:" upon which you display your reasoning powers, by remarking that the name Epitaphium would have been properly given to the book if the reader had found in it an account of the lives and writings of deceased authors, but that inasmuch as mention is made of the works of many who were living when the book was written and are this day still living, you wonder why I should have given the book a title so inappropriate. I think that it must be obvious to your own common sense, that you might have discovered the title of that book from its contents, without any other help. For you have read both Greek and Latin biographies of eminent men, and you know that they do not give to works of this kind the title Epitaphium, but simply "Illustrious Men," e.g. "Illustrious Generals," or "philosophers, orators, historians, poets," etc., as the case may be. An Epitaphium is a work written concerning the dead; such as I remember having composed long ago after the decease of the presbyter Nepotianus, of blessed memory. The book, therefore, of which you speak ought to be entitled, "Concerning Illustrious Men," or properly, "Concerning Ecclesiastical Writers," although it is said that by many who were not qualified to make any correction of the title, it has been called "Concerning Authors."

CHAPTER III

4. You ask, in the second place, my reason for saying, in my commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, that Paul could not have rebuked Peter for that which he himself had done, and could not have censured in another the dissimulation of which he was himself confessedly guilty; and you affirm that that rebuke of the apostle was not a maneuver of pious policy, but real; and you say that I ought not to teach falsehood, but that all things in Scripture are to be received literally as they stand.
To this I answer, in the first place, that your wisdom ought to have suggested the remembrance of the short preface to my commentaries, saying of my own person, "What then? Am I so foolish and bold as to promise that which he could not accomplish? By no means; but have rather, as it seems to me, with more reserve and hesitation, because feeling the deficiency of my strength, followed the commentaries of Origen in this matter. For that illustrious man wrote five volumes on the Epistle of Paul to the Galatians and has occupied the tenth volume of his Stromata with a short treatise upon his explanation of the epistle. He also composed several treatises and fragmentary pieces upon it, which, if they even had stood alone, would have sufficed. I pass over my revered instructor Didymus (blind, it is true, but quick-sighted in the discernment of spiritual things), and the bishop of Laodicea, who has recently left the Church, and the early heretic Alexander, as well as Eusebius of Emesa and Theodorus of Heraclea, who have also left some brief disquisitions upon this subject. From these works, if I were to extract even a few passages, a work which could not be altogether despised would be produced. Let me therefore frankly say that I have read all these; and storing up in my mind very many things which they contain, I have dictated to my amanuensis sometimes what was borrowed from other writers, sometimes what was my own, without distinctly remembering the method, or the words, or the opinions which belonged to each. I look now to the Lord in His mercy to grant that my want of skill and experience may not cause the things which others have well spoken to be lost, or to fail of finding among foreign readers the acceptance with which they have met in the language in which they were first written.  If, therefore, anything in my explanation has seemed to you to demand correction, it would have been seemly for one of your learning to inquire first whether what I had written was found in the Greek writers to whom I have referred; and if they had not advanced the opinion which you censored, you could then with propriety condemn me for what I gave as my own view, especially seeing that I have in the preface openly acknowledged that I had followed the commentaries of Origen, and had dictated sometimes the view of others, sometimes my own, and have written at the end of the chapter with which you find fault: "If anyone be dissatisfied with the interpretation here given, by which it is shown that neither did Peter sin, nor did Paul rebuke presumptuously a greater than himself, he is bound to show how Paul could consistently blame in another what he himself did." By which I have made it manifest that I did not adopt finally and irrevocably that which I had read in these Greek authors, but had propounded what I had read, leaving to the reader's own judgment whether it should be rejected or approved.

5. You, however, in order to avoid doing what I had asked, have devised a new argument against the view proposed; maintaining that the Gentiles who had believed in Christ were free from the burden of the ceremonial law, but that the Jewish converts were under the law, and that Paul, as the teacher of the Gentiles, rightly rebuked those who kept the law; whereas Peter, who was the chief of the "circumcision," was justly rebuked for commanding the Gentile converts to do that which the converts from among the Jews were alone under obligation to observe. If this is your opinion, or rather since it is your opinion, that all from among the Jews who believe are debtors to do the whole law, you ought, as being a bishop of great fame in the whole world, to publish your doctrine, and labor to persuade all other bishops to agree with you. As for me in my humble cell, along with the monks my fellow-sinners, I do not presume to dogmatize in regard to things of great moment; I only confess frankly that I read the writings of the Fathers, and, complying with universal usage, put down in my commentaries a variety of explanations, that each may adopt from the number given the one which pleases him. This method, I think, you have found in your reading and have approved in connection with both secular literature and the Divine Scriptures.

6. Moreover, as to this explanation which Origen first advanced, and which all the other commentators after him have adopted, they bring forward, chiefly for the purpose of answering, the blasphemies of Porphyry, who accuses Paul of presumption because he dared to reprove Peter and rebuke him to his face, and by reasoning convict him of having done wrong; that is to say, of being in the very fault which he himself, who blamed another for transgressing, had committed. What shall I say also of John, who has long governed the Church of Constantinople, and holding pontifical rank, who has composed a very large book upon this paragraph, and has followed the opinion of Origen and of the old expositors? If, therefore, you censure me as in the wrong, suffer me, I pray you, to be mistaken in company with such men; and when you perceive that I have so many companions in my error, you will require to produce at least one partisan in defense of your truth. So much on the interpretation of one paragraph of the Epistle to the Galatians.

7. Lest, however, I should seem to rest my answer to your reasoning wholly on the number of witnesses who are on my side, and to use the names of illustrious men as a means of escaping from the truth, not daring to meet you in argument, I shall briefly bring forward some examples from the Scriptures.

In the Acts of the Apostles, a voice was heard by Peter, saying unto him, "Rise, Peter, slay and eat," when all manner of four-footed beasts, and creeping things, and birds of the air, were presented before him; by which saying it is proved that no man is by nature [ceremonially] unclean, but that all men are equally welcome to the gospel of Christ. To which Peter answered, "Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean." And the voice spake unto him again the second time, "What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common." Therefore he went to Caesarea, and having entered the house of Cornelius, "he opened his mouth and said, Of a truth, I perceive that God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation, he that fears Him and works righteousness is accepted with Him." Thereafter "the Holy Spirit fell on all them which heard the word; and they of the circumcision which believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Spirit. Then answered Peter, Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Spirit as well as we? And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord.' .... And the apostles and brethren that were in Judea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God. And when Peter arrived at Jerusalem, they that were of the circumcision contended with him, saying, Thou went in with men; uncircumcised, and didst eat with them." [To] whom he gave a full explanation of the reasons of his conduct, and concluded with these words! "Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as He did unto us who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, what was I, that I could withstand God? When they heard these things, they held their peace, and glorified God, saying, “Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life.” Again, when, long after this, Paul and Barnabas had come to Antioch, and "having gathered the Church together, rehearsed all that God had done with them, and how He had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles, certain men which came down from Judea taught the brethren, and said, Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved. When therefore Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and disputation with them, they determined that Paul and Barnabas, and certain other of them, should go up to Jerusalem unto] the apostles and elders about this question. And when they arrived at Jerusalem, there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying that it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses." And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, with his wonted readiness, "and said, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made a choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe. And God, who knows the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Spirit, even as He did unto us; and put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. Now, therefore, why do you tempt  God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that, through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, we shall be saved, even as they. Then all the multitude kept silence; and to his opinion the Apostle James, and all the elders together, gave consent.

8. These quotations should not be tedious to the reader, but useful both to him and to me, as proving that, even before the Apostle Paul, Peter had come to know that the law was not to be in force after the gospel was given; nay more, that Peter was the prime mover in issuing the decree by which this was affirmed. Moreover, Peter was so great authority that Paul has recorded in his epistle: "Then, after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days." In the following context, again, he adds: "Then, fourteen years after, I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also. And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles;" proving that he had not had confidence in his preaching of the gospel if he had not been confirmed by the consent of Peter and those who were with him. The next words are, "but privately to them that were of reputation, lest by any means I should run, or had run, in vain." Why did he this privately rather than in public? Lest offense should be given to the faith of those who from among the Jews had believed since they thought that the law was still in force and that they ought to join observance of the law with faith in the Lord as their Savior. Therefore also, when at that time Peter had come to Antioch (although the Acts of the Apostles do not mention this, but we must believe Paul's statement), Paul affirms that he "withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For, before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles: but when they arrived, he withdrew, and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled likewise with him; insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation. But when I saw," he says, "that they walked not uprightly, according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Peter before them all, If thou, being a Jew, live after the manner of Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why do you compel the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?" etc. No one can doubt, therefore, that the Apostle Peter was himself the author of that rule with deviation from which he is charged. The cause of that deviation, moreover, is seen to be fear of the Jews. For the Scripture says, that "at first he did eat with the Gentiles, but that when certain had come from James he withdrew, and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision." Now he feared the Jews, to whom he had been appointed apostle, lest by occasion of the Gentiles they should go back from the faith in Christ; imitating the Good Shepherd in his concern lest he should lose the flock committed to him.

9. As I have shown, therefore, that Peter was thoroughly aware of the abrogation of the law of Moses, but was compelled by fear to pretend to observe it, let us now see whether Paul, who accuses another, ever did anything of the same kind himself. We read in the same book: "Paul passed through Syria and Cilicia, confirming the churches. Then came he to Derbe and Lystra: and, behold, a certain disciple was there, named Timothy, the son of a certain woman which was a Jewess, and believed; but his father was a Greek: which was well reported of by the brethren that were at Lystra and Iconium. Him would Paul have to go forth with him; and he took and circumcised him, because of the Jews which were in those quarters: for they knew all that his father was a Greek." O blessed Apostle Paul, who rebuked Peter for dissimulation, because he withdrew himself from the Gentiles through fear of the Jews who' came from James, why art thou, notwithstanding thine own doctrine, compelled to circumcise Timothy, the son of a Gentile, nay more, a Gentile himself (for he was not a Jew, having not been circumcised)? Thou wilt answer, "Because of the Jews which are in these quarters?" If, then, you forgive yourself the circumcision of a disciple coming from the Gentiles, forgive Peter also, who has precedence above thee, his doing some things of the same kind through fear of the believing Jews. Again, it is written: "Paul after this tarried there yet a good while, and then took his leave of the brethren, and sailed thence into Syria, and with him Priscilla and Aquila; having shorn his head in Cenchrea, for he had a vow." Be it granted that he was compelled through fear of the Jews in the other case to do what he was unwilling to do; wherefore did he let his hair grow in accordance with a vow of his own making, and afterwards, when in Cenchrea, shave his head according to the law, as the Nazarites, who had given themselves by vow to God, were wont to do, according to the law of Moses?
 
10. But these things are small when compared with what follows. The sacred historian Luke further relates: "And when we arrived at Jerusalem, the brethren received us gladly;" and the day following, James, and all the elders who were with him, having expressed their approbation of his gospel, said to Paul: "Thou seest, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are which believe; and they are all zealous of the law: and they are informed of thee, that you teach all the Jews which are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their children, neither to walk after the customs. What is it, therefore? The multitude must need come together: for they will hear that thou art come. Do therefore this that we say to thee: We have four men which have a vow on them; them take, and purify thyself with them, and be at charges with them, that they may shave their heads: and all may know that those things, whereof they were informed concerning thee, are nothing; but that thou thyself also walk orderly, and keep the law. Then Paul took the men, and the next day purifying himself with them, entered into the temple, to signify the accomplishment of the days of purification, until an offering should be offered for every one of them." Paul, here again, let me question thee: Why didst thou shave thy head, why didst thou walk barefoot according to I Jewish ceremonial law, why didst thou offer sacrifices, why were victims slain for thee according to the law? Thou wilt answer, doubtless, "To avoid giving offense to those of the Jews who had believed." To gain the Jews, thou didst pretend to be a Jew; and James and all the other elders taught thee this dissimulation. But thou didst not succeed in escaping, after all. For when thou wast on the point of being killed in a tumult which had arisen, thou wast rescued by the chief captain of the band, and was sent by him to Caesarea, guarded by a careful escort of soldiers, lest the Jews should kill thee as a dissembler, and a destroyer of the law; and from Caesarea coming to Rome, thou didst, in thine own hired house, preach Christ to both Jews and Gentiles, and thy testimony was sealed under Nero's sword.

11. We have learned, therefore, that through fear of the Jews both Peter and Paul alike pretended that they observed the precepts of the law. How could Paul have the assurance and effrontery to reprove in another what he had done himself? I at least, or, I should rather say, others before me, have given such explanation of the matter as they deemed best, not defending the use of falsehood in the interest of religion, as you charge them with doing, but teaching the honorable exercise of a wise discretion; seeking both to show the wisdom of the apostles, and to restrain the shameless blasphemies of Porphyry, who says that Peter and Paul quarreled with each other in childish rivalry, and affirms that Paul had been inflamed with envy on account of the excellencies of Peter, and had written boastfully of things which he either had not done, or, if he did them, had done with inexcusable presumption, reproving in another that which he himself had done. They, in answering him, gave the best interpretation of the passage which they could find; what interpretation have you to propound? Surely you must intend to say something better than they have said since you have rejected the opinion of the ancient commentators.

CHAPTER IV

12. You say in your letter: "You do not require me to teach you in what sense the apostle says, To the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews;'" and other such things in the same passage, which are to be ascribed to the compassion of pitying love, not to the artifices of intentional deceit. For he that ministers to the sick becomes as if he were sick himself, not indeed falsely pretending to be under the fever, but considering with the mind of one truly sympathizing what he would wish done for himself if he were in the sick man's place. Paul was indeed a Jew; and when he had become a Christian, he had not abandoned those Jewish sacraments which that people had received in the right way, and for a certain appointed time. Therefore, even when he was an apostle of Christ, he took part in observing these, but with this view, that he might show that they were in no wise hurtful to those who, even after they had believed in Christ, desired to retain the ceremonies which by the law they had learned from their fathers; provided only that they did not build on these their hope of salvation, since the salvation which was foreshadowed in these has now been brought in by the Lord Jesus." The sum of your whole argument, which you have expanded into a most prolix dissertation, is this, that Peter did not err in supposing that the law was binding on those who from among the Jews had believed, but departed from the right course in this, that he compelled the Gentile converts to conform to Jewish observances. Now, if he compelled them, it was not by use of authority as a teacher, but by the example of his own practice. And Paul, according to your view, did not protest against what Peter had done personally but asked wherefore Peter would compel those who were from among the Gentiles to conform to Jewish observances.

13. The matter in debate, therefore, or I should rather say your opinion regarding it, is summed up in this: that since the preaching of the gospel of Christ, the believing Jews do well in observing the precepts of the law, i.e. in offering sacrifices as Paul did, in circumcising their children, as Paul did in the case of Timothy, and keeping the Jewish Sabbath, as all the Jews have been accustomed to do. If this be true, we fall into the heresy of Cerinthus and Ebion, who, though believing in Christ, were anathematized by the fathers for this one error, that they mixed up the ceremonies of the law with the gospel of Christ, and professed their faith in that which was new, without letting go what was old. Why do I speak of the Ebionites, who make pretensions to the name of Christian? In our own day there exists a sect among the Jews throughout all the synagogues of the East, which is called the sect of the Minei, and is even now condemned by the Pharisees. [The adherents to ] this sect are known commonly as Nazarenes; they believe in Christ the Son of God, born of , the Virgin Mary; and they say that He who suffered under Pontius Pilate and rose again, is the same as the one in whom we believe. But while they desire to be both Jews and Christians, they are neither the one nor the other. I, therefore, beseech you, who think that you are called upon to heal my slight wound, which is no more, so to speak, than a prick or scratch from a needle, to devote your skill in the healing art to this grievous wound, which has been opened by a spear driven home with the impetus of a javelin. For there is surely no proportion between the culpability of him who exhibits the various opinions held by the fathers in a commentary on Scripture and the guilt of him who reintroduces within the Church a most pestilential heresy. If, however, there is for us no alternative but to receive the Jews into the Church, along with the usages prescribed by their law; if in short, it shall be declared lawful for them to continue in the Churches of Christ what they have been accustomed to practice in the synagogues of Satan, I will tell you my opinion of the matter: they will not become Christians, but they will make us Jews.
 
14. For what Christian will submit to hear what is said in your letter? "Paul was indeed a Jew; and when he had become a Christian, he had not abandoned those Jewish sacraments which that people had received in the right way, and for a certain appointed time. Therefore, even when he was an apostle of Christ, he took part in observing these; but with this view, that he might show that they were in no wise hurtful to those who, even after they had believed in Christ, desired to retain the ceremonies which by the law they had learned from their fathers." Now I implore you to hear patiently my complaint. Paul, even when he was an apostle of Christ, observed Jewish ceremonies; and you affirm that they are in no wise hurtful to those who wish to retain them as they had received them from their fathers by the law. I, on the contrary, shall maintain, and, though the world were to protest against my view, I may boldly declare that the Jewish ceremonies are to Christians both hurtful and fatal; and that whoever observes them, whether he be Jew or Gentile originally, is cast into the pit of perdition. "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believes," that is, to both Jew and Gentile; for if the Jew is excepted, He is not the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believes. Moreover, we read in the Gospel, "The law and the prophets were until John the Baptist." Also, in another place: "Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill Him, because He had not only broken the Sabbath, but said also that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God." Again: "Of His fullness have all we received, and grace for grace; for the law was given Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus: Christ." Instead of the grace of the law which has passed away, we have received the grace of the gospel which is abiding; and instead of the shadows and types of the old dispensation, the truth has come by Jesus Christ. Jeremiah also prophesied thus in God's name: "Behold, the days come, says the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah; not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand, to bring them out of the land of Egypt." Observe what the prophet says, not to Gentiles, who had not been partakers in any former covenant, but to the Jewish nation. He who has given them the law by Moses, promises in place of it the new covenant of the gospel, that they might no longer live in the oldness of the letter, but in the newness of the spirit. Paul himself, moreover, in connection with whom the discussion of this question has arisen, delivers such sentiments as these frequently, of which I subjoin only a few, as I desire to be brief: "Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing." Again: "Christ is of no benefit to you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace." Again: "If ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law." From which it is evident that he has not the Holy Spirit who submits to the law, not, as our fathers affirmed the apostles to have done, feignedly, under the promptings of a wise discretion, but, as you suppose to have been the case, sincerely. As to the quality of these legal precepts, let us learn from God's own teaching: "I gave them," He says, "statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live." I say these things, not that I may, like Manichaeus and Marcion, destroy the law, which I know on the testimony of the apostle to be both holy and spiritual; but because when "faith came," and the fulness of times, "God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons," and might live no longer under the law as our schoolmaster, but under the Heir, who has now attained to full age, and is Lord.

15. It is further said in your letter: "The thing, therefore, which he rebuked in Peter was not his observing the customs handed down from his fathers, which Peter, if he wished, might do without being chargeable with deceit or inconsistency." Again I say: Since you are a bishop, a teacher in the Churches of Christ, if you would prove what you assert, receive any Jew who, after having become a Christian, circumcises any son that may be born to him, observes the Jewish Sabbath, abstains from meats which God has created to be used with thanksgiving, and on the evening of the fourteenth day of the first month slays a paschal lamb; and when you have done this, or rather, have refused to do it (for I know that you are a Christian, and will not be guilty of a profane action), you will be constrained, whether willingly or unwillingly, to renounce your opinion; and then you will know that it is a more difficult work to reject the opinion of others than to establish your own. Moreover, lest perhaps we should not believe your statement, or, I should rather say, understand it (for it is often the case that a discourse unduly extended is not intelligible, and is less censured by the unskilled in discussion because its weakness is not so easily perceived), you inculcate your opinion by reiterating the statement in these words: "Paul had forsaken everything peculiar to the Jews that was evil, especially this, that 'being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, they had not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God.'
 
16. In this, moreover, he differed from them, that after the passion and resurrection of Christ, in whom had been given and made manifest the mystery of grace, according to the order of Melchizedek, they still considered it binding on them to celebrate, not out of mere reverence for old customs, but as necessary to salvation, the sacraments of the old dispensation; which were indeed at one time necessary, else had it been unprofitable and vain for the Maccabees’ to suffer martyrdom as they did for their adherence to them. Lastly, in this also Paul differed from the Jews, that they persecuted the Christian preachers of grace as enemies of the law. These, and all similar errors and sins, he declares that he counted but loss and dung, that he might win Christ." We have learned from you what evil things peculiar to the Jews Paul had abandoned; let us now learn from your teaching what good things which were Jewish he retained. You will reply: "The ceremonial observances in which they continued to follow the practice of their fathers, in the way in which these were complied, with by Paul himself, without believing them to be at all necessary to salvation." I do not fully understand what you mean by the words, "without believing them to be at all necessary to salvation." For if they do not contribute to salvation, why are they observed? And if they must be observed, they by all means, contribute to salvation; especially seeing that, because of observing them, some have been made martyrs: for they would not be observed unless they contributed to salvation. For they are not things indifferent -- neither good nor bad, as philosophers say. Self-control is good, self-indulgence is bad: between these, and indifferent, as having no moral quality, are such things as walking, blowing one's nose, expectorating phlegm, etc. Such an action is neither good nor bad; for whether you do it or leave it undone, it does not affect your standing as righteous or unrighteous. But the observance of legal ceremonies is not a thing indifferent; it is either good or bad. You say it is good. I affirm it to be bad, and bad not only when done by Gentile converts, but also when done by Jews who have believed. In this passage, you fall, if I am not mistaken, into one error while avoiding another. For while you guard yourself against the blasphemies of Porphyry, you become entangled in the snares of Ebion; pronouncing that the law is binding on those who from among the Jews have believed. Perceiving, again, that what you have said is a dangerous doctrine, you attempt to qualify it by words which are only superfluous: viz., "The law must be observed not from any belief, such as prompted the Jews to keep it, that this is necessary to salvation, and not in any misleading dissimulation such as Paul reproved in Peter."

17. Peter, therefore pretended to keep the law; but this censor of Peter boldly observed the things prescribed by the law. The next words of your letter are these: "For if Paul observed these sacraments in order, by pretending to be a Jew, to gain the Jews, why did he not also take part with the Gentiles in heathen sacrifices, when to them that were without law he became as without law, that he might gain them also? The explanation is found in this, that he took part in the Jewish rites as being himself a Jew; and that when he said all this which I have quoted, he meant not that he pretended to be what he was not, but that he felt with true compassion that he must bring such help to them as would be needful for himself if he were involved in their error’s. Herein he exercised not the subtlety of a deceiver, but the sympathy of a compassionate deliverer." A triumphant vindication of Paul! You prove that he did not pretend to share the error of the Jews, but was actually involved in it; and that he refused to imitate Peter in a course of deception, dissembling through fear of the Jews what he really was, but without reserve freely avowed himself to be a Jew. Oh, unheard of compassion of the apostle! In seeking to make the Jews Christians, he himself became a Jew! For he could not have persuaded the luxurious to become temperate if he had not himself become luxurious like them; and could not have brought help, in his compassion, as you say, to the wretched, otherwise than by experiencing in his own person their wretchedness! Truly wretched, and worthy of most compassionate lamentation, are those who, carried away by the vehemence of disputation, and by love for the law which has been abolished, have made Christ's apostle to be a Jew. Nor is there, after all, a great difference between my opinion and yours: for I say that both Peter and Paul, through fear of the believing Jews, practiced, or rather pretended to practice, the precepts of the Jewish law; whereas you maintain that they did this out of pity, "not with the subtlety of a deceiver, but with the sympathy of a compassionate deliverer." But by both this is equally admitted, that (whether from fear or from pity) they pretended to be what they were not. As to your argument against our view, that he ought to have become to the Gentiles a Gentile, if to the Jews he became a Jew, this favors our opinion rather than yours: for as he did not actually become a Jew, so he did not actually become a heathen; and as he did not actually become a heathen, so he did not actually become a Jew. His conformity to the Gentiles consisted in this, that he received as Christians the uncircumcised who believed in Christ, and left them free to use without scruple meats which the Jewish law prohibited; but not, as you suppose, in taking part in their worship of idols. For "in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision avails anything, nor uncircumcision, but the keeping of the commandments of God."

18. I ask you, therefore, and with all urgency press the request, that you forgive me this humble attempt at a discussion of the matter; and wherein I have transgressed, lay the blame upon yourself who compelled me to write in reply, and who made me out to be as blind as Stesichorus. And do not bring the reproach of teaching the practice of lying upon me, who am a follower of Christ, who said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." It is impossible for me, who am a worshipper of the Truth, to bow under the yoke of falsehood. Moreover, refrain from stirring up against me the unlearned crowd who esteem you as their bishop, and regard with the respect due the priestly office the orations which you deliver in the church, but who esteem lightly an old decrepit man like me, courting the retirement of a monastery far from the busy haunts of men; and seek others who may be more fully instructed or corrected by you. For the sound of your voice can scarcely reach me, who am so far separated from you by sea and land. And if you happen to write me a letter, Italy and Rome are sure to be acquainted with its contents long before it is brought to me, to whom alone it ought to be sent.

CHAPTER V

19. In another letter, you ask why a former translation which I made of some of the canonical books was carefully marked with asterisks and obelisks, whereas I, afterward, published a translation without these. You must pardon my saying that you seem to me not to understand the matter: for the former translation is from the Septuagint; and wherever obelisks are placed, they are designed to indicate that the [LXX] Seventy have said more than is found in the Hebrew text. But the asterisks indicate what has been added by Origen from the version of Theodotion. In that version I was translating from the Greek: but in the later version, translating from the Hebrew itself, I have expressed what I understood it to mean, being careful to preserve rather the exact sense than the order of the words. I am surprised that you do not read the books of the Seventy translators in the genuine form in which they were originally given to the world, but as they have been corrected, or rather corrupted, by Origen, with his obelisks and asterisks; and that you refuse to follow the translation, however feeble, which has been given by a Christian man, especially seeing that Origen borrowed the things which he has added from the edition of a man who, after the passion of Christ, was a Jew and a blasphemer. Do you wish to be a true admirer and partisan of the Seventy translators? Then do not read what you find under the asterisks; rather erase them from the volumes, that you may approve yourself indeed a follower of the ancients. If, however, you do this, you will be compelled to find fault with all the libraries of the Churches; for you will scarcely find more than one manuscript here and there which has not these interpolations.

CHAPTER VI

20. A few words now as to your remark that I ought not to have given a translation after this had been already done by the ancients; and the novel syllogism which you use: "The passages of which the Seventy have given an interpretation were either obscure or plain. If they were obscure, it is believed that you are as likely to have been mistaken as the others if they were plain, it is not believed that the Seventy could have been mistaken."

All the commentators who have been our predecessors in the Lord in the work of expounding the Scriptures have expounded either what was obscure or what was plain. If some passages were obscure, how could you, after them, presume to discuss that which they were not able to explain? If the passages were plain, it was a waste of time for you to have undertaken to treat of that which could not possibly have escaped them. This syllogism applies with peculiar force to the book of Psalms, in the interpretation of which Greek commentators have written many volumes: viz. 1st, Origen: 2d, Eusebius of Caesarea; 3d, Theodorus of Heraclea; 4th, Asterius of Scythopolis; 5th, Apollinaris of Laodicea; and, 6th, Didymus of Alexandria. There are said to be minor works on selections from the Psalms, but I speak at present of the whole book. Moreover, among Latin writers the bishops Hilary of Poitiers, and Eusebius of Verceil, have translated Origen and Eusebius of Caesarea, the former of whom has in some things been followed by our own Ambrose. Now, I put it to your wisdom to answer why you, after all the labors of so many and so competent interpreters, differ from them in your exposition of some passages?

If the Psalms are obscure, it must be believed that you are as likely to be mistaken as others; if they are plain, it is incredible that these others could have fallen into a mistake. In either case, your exposition has been, by your own showing, an unnecessary labor and on the same principle, no one would ever venture to speak on any subject after others have pronounced their opinion, and no one would be at liberty to write anything regarding that which another has once handled, however, important the matter might be.

It is, however, more in keeping with your enlightened judgment, to grant to all others the liberty which you tolerate in yourself for in my attempt to translate into Latin, for the benefit of those who speak the same language with myself, the corrected Greek version of the Scriptures, I have labored not to supersede what has been long esteemed, but only to bring prominently forward those things which have been either omitted or tampered with by the Jews, in order that Latin readers might know what is found in the original Hebrew text. If anyone is averse to reading it, none compels him against his will. Let him drink with satisfaction the old wine, and despise my new wine, i.e. the sentences which I have published in explanation of former writers, with the design of making more obvious by my remarks what in them seemed to me to be obscure.

As to the principles which ought to be followed in the interpretation of the Sacred Scriptures, they are stated in the book which I have written,' and in all the introductions to the divine books which I have in my edition prefixed to each; and to these I think it sufficient to refer the prudent reader. And since you approve of my labors in revising the translation of the New Testament, as you say -- giving me at the same time this as your reason, that very many are acquainted with the Greek language, and are therefore competent judges of my work -- it would have been but fair to have given me credit for the same fidelity in the Old Testament; for I have not followed my own imagination, but have rendered the divine words as I found them. understood by those who speak the Hebrew language. If you have any doubt of this in any passage, ask the Jews what is the meaning of the original.

21. Perhaps you will say, "What if the Jews decline to answer, or choose to impose upon us?" Is it conceivable that the whole multitude of Jews will agree together to be silent if asked about my translation, and that none shall be found that has any knowledge of the Hebrew language? Or will they all imitate those Jews whom you mention as having, in some little town, conspired to injure my reputation? For in your letter you put together the following story:

A certain bishop, one of our brethren, having introduced in the Church over which he presides the reading of your version, came upon a word in the book of the prophet Jonah, of which you have given a very different rendering from that which had been of old familiar to the senses and memory of all the worshippers, and had been chanted for so many generations in the Church. Thereupon arose such a tumult in the congregation, especially among the Greeks, correcting what had been read, and denouncing the translation as false, that the bishop was compelled to ask the testimony of the Jewish residents (it was in the town of Oea). These, whether from ignorance or from spite, answered that the words in the Hebrew manuscripts were correctly rendered in the Greek version, and in the Latin one taken from it. What further need I say? The man was compelled to correct your version in that passage as if it had been falsely translated, as he desired not to be left without a congregation -- a calamity which he narrowly escaped. From this case, we also are led to think that you may be occasionally mistaken.

CHAPTER VII

22. You tell me that I have given a wrong translation of some word in Jonah and that a worthy bishop narrowly escaped losing his charge through the clamorous tumult of his people, which was caused by the different rendering of this one word. At the same time, you withhold from me what the word was which I have mistranslated; thus taking away the possibility of my saying anything in my own vindication, lest my reply should be fatal to your objection. Perhaps it is the old dispute about the gourd which has been revived, after slumbering for many long years since the illustrious man, who in that day combined in his own person the ancestral honors of the Cornelii and of Asinius Pollio, brought against me the charge of giving in my translation the word "ivy" instead of "gourd" I have already given a sufficient answer to this in my commentary on Jonah. At present, I deem it enough to say that in that passage, where the Septuagint has "gourd," and Aquila and the others have rendered the word "ivy" (kissos), the Hebrew MS. has "ciceion," which is in the Syriac tongue, as now spoken, "ciceia." It is a kind of shrub having large leaves like a vine, and when planted it quickly springs up to the size of a small tree, standing upright by its own stem, without requiring any support of canes or poles, as both gourds and ivy do. If, therefore, in translating word for word, I had put the word "ciceia," no one would know what it meant; if I had used the word "gourd," I would have said what is not found in the Hebrew text. I, therefore, put down "ivy," that I might not differ from all other translators. But if your Jews said, either through malice or ignorance, as you yourself suggest, that the word is in the Hebrew text which is found in the Greek and Latin versions, it is evident that they were either unacquainted with Hebrew, or have been pleased to say what was not true, in order to make sport of the gourd-planters.

In closing this letter, I beseech you to have some consideration for a soldier who is now old and has long retired from active service, and not to force him to take the field and again expose his life to the chances of war. Do you, who are young, and who have been appointed to the conspicuous seat of pontifical dignity, give yourself to teaching the people, and enrich Rome with new stores from fertile Africa.' I am contented to make but little noise in an obscure corner of a monastery, with one to hear me or read to me.

(I have stood by Jerome's statue in Bethlehem. There are no pictures of any disrespect to this anti-Semitic confused old boy's bronze replica. There is definitely nothing on film. Definetly not.)

Radical Depravity Seen in Biblical Texts

THE BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE ON SIN^’S EFFECT ON MAN

Man's condition after the fall (dead, blind, deaf, powerless, etc.)

Main passages:

Rom. 3:9-18            Eph. 2:1-3               Jer. 13:23; 17:9               Psa. 51:5; 53:1-5          1 Tim. 5:6               Isa. 53:6

Scriptural theme:

Gen. 2:17

 “ ”   3:7

 “ ”   6:5

 “ ”   8:21

Num. 15:39

Deut. 5:9

1 Kin. 8:46

2 Chr. 6:36

Job  14:4

 “ ”  15:14, 16

 “ ”  22:5

 “ ”  42:7

Psa. 4:2, 6

“ ”   5:9, 10

“ ”   14:1-4

“ ”    22:6

“ ”    36:1

“ ”    51:5

“ ”    52:3

“ ”    53:1-5

“ ”    58:3

“ ”    106:6

“ ”    116:11

“ ”    130:3

“ ”    143:2

Prov. 20:9

 “ ”    26:11

 “ ”    30:12

Eccl. 7:20, 29

 “ ”    9:3

Isa. 26:10, 14

“ ”  29:15, 16

“ ”  32:6

“ ” 41:28, 29

“ ” 42:18

“ ” 48:8

“ ” 53:6

“ ” 64:6

“ ” 66:3, 4              

Jer. 4:22

“ ” 7:24

“ ” 9:3

“ ” 13:23

“ ” 17:9

“ ” 18:12

Mat. 7:16-18

“ ” 11:25

“ ” 12:33

“ ” 15:14

Mark 7:21-23

John 2:24, 25

 “ ”   3:3, 5-7

 “ ”   3:19

John  5:21, 40

 “ ”    6:53

 “ ”    8:19, 34

 “ ”    8:37, 44

 “ ”    14:17

Acts 13:41

 “ ”   26:18

Rom. 1:28

 “ ”    3:23

 “ ”    5:6, 12-14

 “ ”    6:23

 “ ”    7:15-24

 “ ”    8:7-8

 “ ”    11:8-12

 “ ”    11:35, 36

1 Cor. 1:18

 “ ”     2:14

2 Cor. 1:9

 “ ”     3:5

 “ ”     4:3,  4

 “ ”     5:17

Gal. 3:11, 12

 “ ”  4:8

 “ ”  5:17

 Eph. 2:1-3, 12

 “ ”    4:17-19

 “ ”    5:6, 8, 14

 Phil. 2:15

 Col. 2:13

 1 Tim. 5:6

 “ ”       6:5

 2 Tim. 2:25, 26

 “ ”       3:7, 8

Titus 1:15

 “ ”    3:3

 Jam. 3:2-8

 2 Pet. 2:3, 8-22

 I Jhn. 1:8, 10

 “ ”     3:10

 “ ”     5:19

Jude 4

Rev. 3:10

“ ”    6:4

“ ”    16:9, 11, 21

 “ ”   18:9

God's view of the wicked’s prayer and/or sacrifice:

Prov.  21:27; 15:8, 29

Rom.  14:23

1 Cor. 10:31

 “ ”     16:22

Col.  3:17

The Impeccability of Christ

There is a debate among Evangelicals over Jesus’ life on earth during His humiliation in regards to temptations. Those who believe Jesus could have sinned if He would have succumbed to the so-called temptations to sin hold the “peccability” position. Those who believe that the God-Man was incapable of sinning hold to the “impeccability” view. Why do I hold to the “impeccability” view in this debate? For me this issue is rather simple. After Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary He had two natures. He was 100% God and 100% man. He was not born with a sin nature like Adam obtained at the fall (when he failed the covenantal test for himself and his descendants). The miracle of the virgin conception kept Jesus from being born with legal guilt and a disposition to sin like we have. We have both a sinful nature and a sinful environment. We sin by nature and by choice because we are slaves of sin from our natural birth. Once these sins become habits, they become even stronger masters. So it is impossible for us to fully grasp even what it was like to not ever have a strong drive towards sin.

Adam was also created innocent and without sin. It was not until he chose for himself and the human race as the covenant representative to rebel against God that he became a sinner. We are sons of Adam and daughters of Eve. Thus, we sin because we are already sinners.

However, on the issue of the nature of the God-Man Jesus there is a very different story. Jesus’ human nature was innocent, perfect, and without any disposition towards sin. He was born outside of Adam’s line by the Holy Spirit enacted virgin conception. Jesus' divine nature has always been incapable of sin or being tempted by sin (Jam 1:13). God despises sin and it is completely contrary to His nature. This applies equally to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Jesus is God. God cannot sin. Jesus was formally tested by the devil as the second Adam, the covenant representative of all who would surrender to Him, repenting, and believing. These tests were directed towards Jesus’ perfect, innocent and sinless human nature. But that nature was and is also connected to the divine nature in the God-Man Jesus the Messiah (the Greek term is translated as Christ).

Is Jesus God? Yes. Can God sin? No. Can the God-Man sin? No!

Why were these tests recorded in the Bible then? Jesus was modeling how to choose the right path when tested, tried, or tempted by relying on the Holy Spirit. This was recorded to teach us (sinners) lessons about fighting temptation. It was not so we would have such a high view of man that we would lower our view of God the Son who is LORD of all. Our salvation was purchased by His death on the cross. His entire life of living a holy life in our place is reckoned to replace the believer’s sin record in heaven. Jesus perfectly fulfilled all the requirements of the law of God in our place.

Some Bible students forget when they are talking about the God-Man Jesus that He is not like us in many, many ways. Sin for a perfect being is so disgusting and so revolting that it has to be masked with deception to become an enticement. Remember the Garden of Eden? When that perfect being is also fully God, this is not an option. No being can deceive the omniscient Son of God.

Pelagius denied original sin (legal guilt) and his view exalted men to the point that they could choose to never sin and enter heaven by works. Some modern day individuals have followed his beliefs and have embraced some forms of free-will-theism. They also exalt fallen man and thus lower their views of the God-Man, Jesus. They are more concerned about what is "fair" according to the humanistic world view rather than what is "just" in God's eyes. These views work like a see-saw. If you have a high view of man, you will always have a low view of Jesus and His divine nature. If you have a high view of Jesus you will always distrust man's ability to do good by his fallen and depraved nature. Like with a see-saw, when one side is down, the other side is up.

For the death of Jesus to pay in full for the sins of billions of sinners it had to be the death of a perfect man who was and is also God the Son. Only an infinite person's suffering, punishment, and death could pay in full for the wickedness of so many sinners. The emphasis in the New Testament is on Jesus' deity and crucifixion, not on his so-called “temptations.”

The Greek word used in the passages that some English versions translate as “temptation” also means "trial" or "difficulty." For instance, the word in Heb 2:18 most often translated as “tempt” is the Greek term peiradzo which has the primary meaning: “to try to learn the nature or character of someone or something by submitting such to thorough and extensive testing - 'to test, to examine, to put to the test, examination, testing'”  (Louw-Nida Lexicon). Thus, the translators have to decide from the context which meaning of peiradzo is most appropriate. The term could be translated "trial" or "testing" every time it is used in a text that is discussing Jesus. Some theologians argue that it should be only translated as “trial” or testing” each time it is used in reference to the God-Man.  A test or a trial is different from a temptation. A temptation requires a weakness in the person being enticed in order for it to be successful. A perfect person can be tested without any weakness.

Consider this illustration about testing. If a straight "A" student is given an easy test, does anyone assume she will fail it? Is it not a real test because everyone believes she can answer what is 10 + 12? Yet, it is a real test if given by her instructor and it is passed if the right answer is given, no matter how easy the test is. There is no universal law that all tests must be hard for every individual. Those that get all worked up about the trials or so-called “temptations” being "real" are not thinking very deeply or carefully. When Jesus wept outside of Lazarus’s tomb he was enduring a trial that we will also face. He fully understands our emotions. But Jesus was never tempted to tell a second lie to cover up a former lie that He had told, because He never told a lie in the first place.

Here is another but not so pretty illustration. You buy two bottles of great water at Starbucks. You drink one on the way home. You have the other bottle in your hand. When you get home, your dog runs into the bathroom and starts drinking out of the toilet. Why are you not also tempted to join the dog in drinking from the toilet? This is because you are not thirsty, you have great water in your hand, and you know the consequences of the dog’s action—sickness. So it is not a temptation to you because you have greater knowledge and a superior nature to the dog. Likewise, sin so utterly repulsed the perfect Son of God—even in His perfect, holy, wise and sinless human nature so that it could never entice Him.

Most peccability adherents also deny that mankind is radically and pervasively (totally) depraved. They do not believe that when Adam fell into sin, it affected every faculty and atom of the man. So when they start with a conditional depravity view—that man's reason and/or will are not fallen, other wrong views will follow. They will next deny the texts that teach the inability of every person to move towards God without God first giving new life and they end up exalting man way above what is biblical ( John 3:3, 5, 8; Rom 8:7; 1 Cor 2:14; Eph 2:1-5; 1 John 5:1). What follows is that they also end up with too low a view on God the Son. When this is mixed with humanistic reasoning on “fairness” and “equality,” it sinks even deeper into confusion and bad doctrine.

Wayne Grudem writes: “(1) If Jesus’ human nature had existed by itself, independent of his divine nature, then it would have been a human nature just like that which God gave Adam and Eve. It would have been free from sin but nonetheless able to sin. Therefore, if Jesus’ human nature had existed by itself, there was the abstract or theoretical possibility that Jesus could have sinned, just as Adam and Eve’s human natures were able to sin. (2) But Jesus’ human nature never existed apart from union with his divine nature.  From the moment of his conception, he existed as truly God and truly man as well. Both his human nature and his divine nature existed united in one person. (3) Although there were some things (such as being hungry or thirsty or weak) that Jesus experienced in his human nature alone and were not experienced by his divine nature (see below), nonetheless, an act of sin would have been a moral act that would apparently have involved the whole person of Christ. Therefore, if he had sinned, it would have involved both his human and divine natures. (4) But if Jesus as a person had sinned, involving both his human and divine natures in sin, then God himself would have sinned, and he would have ceased to be God. Yet that is clearly impossible because of the infinite holiness of God’s nature. (5) Therefore, if we are asking if it was actually possible for Jesus to have sinned, it seems that we must conclude that it was not possible. The union of his human and divine natures in one person prevented it” (Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, 538-39).

Therefore, because of my high view of the holy triune Godhead and that this holiness (transcendence and purity) applies to each person equally: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, just as do as all of the other divine attributes (sovereignty, immutability, omniscience, etc.); I am forced to take the impeccability side in this debate. I don’t believe anybody at the bema seat of Christ will be rebuked for having too high a view of God. But I do fear that many will be admonished for having too low a view of God. I don’t want to be member of the low view group on that day.

Equipping the Saints

Paul writes in Ephesians that the role of the four support offices in the church is “for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ” (Eph 4:12 NKJV). The one office that we are concerned with here is that of the ‘pastor/teacher.’ These teaching shepherds in the church have “equipping” responsibility as one of their specific job descriptions. The work of the ministry belongs to the entire body.  Every saved church member is a minister of the local church.  The shepherds (elders, pastors), however, have an additional task of equipping everyone to do the ministry they have been given to do by Christ Himself.  This is the way that the HEAD, King Jesus, has set up His church to operate.  He gives gifted men to the church. They are the in-house trainers (equippers) of God’s people.  Every Christian has the task of being a minister of the Church in their area of giftedness and interests.  When we follow the orders from headquarters it is clear what every person’s role in the local church should be. Pastors are to equip Christians to do their ministries.  Members are to do the ministry.

But what is equipping?  This term was used for restoring something to its original condition or making something fit or complete. If a camper is equipped for a camping trip, they will have been given the necessary resources to survive in the wilderness.  They would be given bug spray, matches, lights, tents, sleeping bags, and other necessary equipment to do well on their trip. When a Christian is equipped, they are trained in the necessary character qualities, integrity, information, and skills they need to worship Jesus, edify other believers, and share Jesus with those around them who are not yet in submission to the King. The reason the teaching shepherds never work themselves out of a job is that the need of being equipped is a life long process.  The leaders are to seek out those who are feeding themselves spiritually and who are growing in their relationship with both Jesus and His church. These are to be given special and extra training to do their tasks. They are to be instructed on how to share with others what they are learning. Paul put it like this in his command to the young pastor, Timothy: “And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Timothy 2:2 NKJV).

When we do God’s work according to the blueprint, then our ministries multiply rather than add. One man alone can only burn himself out and get run out of town.  But if each teaching shepherd equips five new men each year and they equip five other men, then the multiplication goes on and on. These equipped and edified men evangelize, equip and edify their wives and children. They also reach out to other men. Their wives reach out to other women and their children to other children.  Proper edification and equipping produces excited people who share Jesus with others (evangelism). 

Therefore, the shepherds must protect their equipping time and not let the urgent steal it all away.  They do have to give an answer to the Chief Shepherd of how they cared for his flock according to the apostle Peter. “To the elders among you, I appeal as a fellow elder, a witness of Christ's sufferings and one who also will share in the glory to be revealed. {2} Shepherd the flock of God which is among you, serving as overseers, not by compulsion but willingly, not for dishonest gain but eagerly; {3} not greedy for money, but eager to serve; not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. {4} And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away.” (1 Peter 5:1-4)

The church stands or falls with leadership. A group of godly men who will make equipping, edifying and evangelizing their intentional focus and vision of a biblically-driven church will bring about reformation and revival. These are the vital commitments that let us know who we are and what we do. Every true church should have edification, equipping, and encouraging believers, evangelizing the lost, exalting Christ, and establishing and expanding the church as part of their vision of what God’s purposes are for them as local body of believers. Let’s follow our Head, the Lord Christ. Let’s follow His Word and His ways.

Established in the Faith

^“14These things I write to you, though I hope to come to you shortly; ¹⁵but if I am delayed, I write so that you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth” (I Tim. 3:14-15). According to Paul, the Church is God’s House. As an apostle of Christ sent to the Gentiles, Paul was commissioned to reveal the “house-order” for God’s house with each new group of believers he met (Eph. 3:8-10).  It is in fulfilling this personal mission given to Paul by God that we see the apostle establishing the churches in the faith (Acts 15:36 - 16:5).

The original term for "church" eklesia simply means an "assembly of people" rather than popular abuse of the parts of the Greek term. The use of this term in both the Septuagint and secular literature makes this clear. Look it up in a solid Greek Lexicon. In English, 'butterfly" is not a regular fly that sits in butter. However, a New Testament Church has certain characteristics that make it a unique assembly that is the Bride of Christ.

Likewise, we need to consider another important term found in Acts 14. What does the word ‘establish’ or ‘strengthen’ mean in the New Testament?  It means to prop something up. To give something weak new strength. A tomato stake has the job of strengthening the vine so that it can safely produce fruit. “ ²¹And when they [Paul and Barnabas] had preached the gospel to that city and made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch, ²²strengthening the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith, and saying, ‘We must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.’ ²³So when they had appointed elders in every church, and prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord in whom they had believed ” (Acts 14:21-23).   

1 Timothy 3 teaches that the Church is God’s house. Christ has a house-order He wants implemented in His house. A church is a family of saved families. Timothy, in his office of evangelist (church planter) was sent to the new work at Thessalonica. The Bible says: “Therefore, when we could no longer endure it, we thought it good to be left in Athens alone, {2} and sent Timothy, our brother and minister of God, and our fellow laborer in the gospel of Christ, to establish you and encourage you concerning your faith, {3} that no one should be shaken by these afflictions; for you yourselves know that we are appointed to this” (1 Thess 3:1-3).  

 An evangelist (a modern day church planter) takes a group of disciples and strengthens them in the faith by setting in place the marks of a church. The group of disciples is not ready for a pastor-teacher until it has been established. Thus, the evangelist (church planter) sets things in order by establishing or strengthening two households: (1) God’s  household and (2) individual family households. The church planter’s work with these households involves teaching the role and responsibilities for each member of both households by the biblical house-order. He can’t just make it up. He must follow the blueprint from God.  

Who are the members of God’s household? These are teaching shepherds, ruling shepherds, deacons, older men, younger men, older women, younger women, and widows. Who are the members of an individual family household? These are: husbands and/or fathers, wives and/or mothers, children, and slaves (today they would be in-house employees). According to the Bible, a group has not been established into a church until God’s house and the saved families in that house are functioning by the house-order explained in the Bible. All positions must be filled and each function should operate just as is taught in Scripture. This means that everyone should know and be fulfilling their role and responsibilities in the assembly, which is a family of saved families.  

The book of Titus, Ephesians 5:22 - 6:9, Colossians 3:18 - 4:1, and 1 and 2 Timothy were written to teach us what these roles and responsibilities are in both God’s household and the individual family households. We sing, “I am so glad to be part of the family of God,” and indeed we should be. Let us also strive to have our family and our family of saved families, the church, also follow the orders from the Head of the church on how these two households should be ordered. We then will become re-established in the faith. Let the church be the church right where King Jesus has placed her!  

 A group that settles for anything less than having all the marks of the church in place has become a simple society and not a church. However, a church has the Word of God (the Bible) preached correctly, the two ordinances administered properly, practices church discipline, has the government functions that are listed in the New Testament operating by biblical standards, has biblically qualified leaders, believes the essentials of orthodox doctrine, and is actively fulfilling the great commission.