Recognitions

Contents

Reading pages: 0.1–1.19 · 1.20–1.44 · 1.45–1.71 · 1.72–2.20 · 2.21–2.44 · 2.45–2.68 · 2.69–3.17 · 3.18–3.41 · 3.42–3.65 · 3.66–4.18 · 4.19–5.11 · 5.12–5.34 · 5.35–7.7 · 7.8–7.36 · 7.37–8.20 · 8.21–8.45 · 8.46–9.7 · 9.8–9.34 · 9.35–10.19 · 10.20–10.46 · 10.47–10.72

1. 0.1Rufinus dedicates his Latin translation of the Recognitions to Gaudentius, explains his method and omissions, and reconciles Clement's succession with the Roman bishops Linus and Cletus.
2. 1.1Clement describes how from boyhood he was tormented by questions about death, the afterlife, and the origin and end of the world.
3. 1.2Clement's restless desire for immortality, he says, was what later led him to the truth.
4. 1.3The endless disputes of the philosophical schools left Clement without any certainty about the soul.
5. 1.4Clement weighs whether to live piously in case there are punishments after death, but cannot be certain of anything.
6. 1.5Clement plans to test the soul's immortality by necromancy in Egypt, but a philosopher friend dissuades him.
7. 1.6Reports reach Rome of a man in Judaea preaching the kingdom of God and working miracles.
8. 1.7Barnabas preaches in Rome that the Son of God has appeared in Judaea, and Clement begins to follow him.
9. 1.8Mocked by philosophers with a question about gnats and elephants, Barnabas refuses to argue and appeals to eyewitnesses.
10. 1.9Clement rebukes the crowd for mocking Barnabas's plain message and warns them of God's judgment.
11. 1.10Clement takes Barnabas into his house for safety and hears him for some days before Barnabas leaves for a festival in Judaea.
12. 1.11Barnabas sails for Judaea, leaving Clement directions to find him.
13. 1.12Clement lands at Caesarea, learns that Peter is to debate Simon the Samaritan, and is brought by Barnabas to Peter.
14. 1.13Peter welcomes Clement warmly and invites him to travel with him and hear the word of truth.
15. 1.14Clement agrees to travel with Peter and asks to be taught about the soul, righteousness, and the world.
16. 1.15Peter teaches that sin fills the world like smoke in a house, hiding God, so that people must call on the one outside to open the door.
17. 1.16Peter teaches that divine truth can be known only from the true Prophet, whose credentials must first be tested and who must then be believed in everything.
18. 1.17Clement writes a book on the true Prophet for James, and Peter tells him to attend his debates without fear for his faith.
19. 1.18Clement assures Peter that his faith in the true Prophet cannot be shaken.
20. 1.19Peter welcomes Clement into his company but has him eat apart until he is baptized.
21. 1.20Zacchaeus reports that Simon has postponed the debate for seven days and proposes the questions to prepare.
22. 1.21Peter tells Clement that the delay is providential, giving time to teach him the faith according to the tradition of the true Prophet.
23. 1.22Peter begins to review his teaching with Clement, starting with the eternal age.
24. 1.23Peter praises Clement's reverent silence about the highest things, and Clement offers to repeat what he has learned.
25. 1.24Clement recites Peter's teaching on the eternal source of all things, the two kingdoms, and the coming judgment.
26. 1.25Clement praises Peter's teaching on the one righteous God and the true Prophet and offers to repeat the history from creation.
27. 1.26Peter warns that the devil steals the word from forgetful hearers and resolves to review the creation account.
28. 1.27Peter recounts the creation: the world as one house divided by the firmament into an upper region for angels and a lower one for men.
29. 1.28Peter continues the creation account: the stars, sun and moon as signs, the living creatures, and paradise.
30. 1.29Peter tells of the righteous men who fell through desire for women, the giants born of them, and the flood from which Noah was saved.
31. 1.30Peter traces history after the flood: the ban on blood, the curse on Noah's middle son, the first altar to demons and the first idol, and Nimrod.
32. 1.31Peter describes the rise of cities, armies, and temples, the seizure of the middle lands by the cursed line, and the first son to die before his father.
33. 1.32Peter tells how Abraham, an astrologer, came to know the Creator from the stars, saved the world from destruction by his friendship with God, and received the promise of the land.
34. 1.33The true Prophet appears to Abraham and teaches him; Abraham's two elder sons become the ancestors of other nations, some of whom adopt circumcision.
35. 1.34Peter recounts Isaac's birth, the descent into Egypt, the plagues, and the crossing of the sea under Moses.
36. 1.35Peter recounts the wilderness journey, the giving of the law at Sinai, and the golden calf made after the model of the Egyptian Apis.
37. 1.36Peter teaches that Moses allowed sacrifice to God only as a concession, leaving its abolition to the prophet like Moses.
38. 1.37Peter teaches that the single place of sacrifice pointed forward to the Prophet who would reject both sacrifices and the temple, as its repeated destructions showed.
39. 1.38Peter recounts Moses' death, the conquest, the time of the judges, and the building of the temple by ambitious kings.
40. 1.39Peter teaches that the Prophet instituted baptism in place of sacrifice, and that believers baptized in his name would be spared in the coming war.
41. 1.40The expected Prophet comes with signs, is rejected and slandered by the people, and chooses twelve apostles and seventy-two disciples after the pattern of Moses.
42. 1.41Peter tells how the Prophet, despite his miracles, was crucified, and how creation mourned at his death while his people remained unmoved.
43. 1.42Peter explains the call of the Gentiles, the hostility of evil spirits, and the slanders spread after the resurrection.
44. 1.43The Jerusalem church grows under James, ordained bishop by the Lord, and the priests ask the apostles whether Jesus is the Prophet foretold by Moses.
45. 1.44At Passover the apostles report to James, and Caiaphas challenges them to debate whether Jesus is the Christ; Clement asks what 'Christ' means.
46. 1.45Peter explains that Christ, ruler over men, is so called because the Father anointed him with oil from the tree of life, with which he will anoint the godly in his kingdom.
47. 1.46Peter explains that Aaron's anointing with compounded chrism was an image of Christ's spiritual anointing and conferred kingship, prophecy, and priesthood.
48. 1.47Peter argues that Adam, being a prophet, must have been anointed, and Clement clarifies that he means the eternal ointment made by God.
49. 1.48Peter postpones Clement's question and teaches that Jesus, called Son at his baptism, ended the sacrificial fire and the old anointing by the grace of baptism.
50. 1.49Peter teaches the two comings of Christ, the first in humility and the second in glory, both foretold by the prophets.
51. 1.50Peter argues that prophecy is confirmed because the Gentiles, not the Jews who expected him, received Christ, the 'expectation of the nations'.
52. 1.51Peter teaches that Christ came at the end of the world to invite the righteous to the heavenly Jerusalem, while the wicked will be punished.
53. 1.52Peter explains that Christ was present to the righteous of every generation; some were translated to paradise, and the souls of others await the resurrection in happy regions.
54. 1.53The unbelieving Jews, alarmed by the empty tomb and the growth of the church, press the apostles to debate, and the apostles decide to go up to the temple.
55. 1.54Peter describes the schisms the enemy raised among the Jews before Christ: Sadducees, Samaritans, scribes and Pharisees, and John's disciples.
56. 1.55In the temple debate the high priest praises sacrifice and attacks baptism, and Matthew replies that without the baptism of Jesus no one enters the kingdom.
57. 1.56In the temple debate Andrew answers a Sadducee who denies the resurrection.
58. 1.57James and John, the sons of Zebedee, answer two Samaritans on the resurrection and on whether Jesus is the prophet like Moses.
59. 1.58Philip answers a scribe who calls Jesus a magician by pointing out that the charge would apply equally to Moses.
60. 1.59Bartholomew argues that Jesus is greater than Moses, James son of Alphaeus that Christ authenticates the prophets, and Lebbaeus rebukes the people's ingratitude.
61. 1.60Simon the Canaanite refutes a disciple of John who claims John was the Christ, and Barnabas, called Matthias, urges the people to love Jesus.
62. 1.61Thomas answers Caiaphas's charge that Jesus promised merely earthly rewards.
63. 1.62Peter answers Caiaphas's charge that an unlearned fisherman presumes to teach, arguing that the victory of the unlearned shows divine power.
64. 1.63Peter summarizes the apostles' testimony and urges the people to be reconciled to God through baptism with the threefold invocation and the Eucharist.
65. 1.64Peter warns that because sacrifices continue after their time has ended, the temple will be destroyed and the gospel preached to the Gentiles.
66. 1.65Gamaliel, secretly a believer, calms the priests' fury and promises to debate the apostles the next day.
67. 1.66After a night of prayer, James the bishop leads the church to the temple, and Gamaliel opens the second day's debate.
68. 1.67Gamaliel invites the apostles to speak freely and swears to protect them.
69. 1.68Caiaphas asks that the debate be held from the Scriptures, and James secures agreement that the law and the prophets will be the basis.
70. 1.69James proves from the law that Jesus is the Christ, teaches the necessity of baptism in the threefold name, and persuades the people and the high priest to seek baptism.
71. 1.70As the people are about to be baptized, a hostile man stirs up a riot in the temple and throws James down the steps.
72. 1.71The believers flee to Jericho, and Gamaliel warns them that the hostile man has letters from Caiaphas to persecute them at Damascus.
73. 1.72James sends Peter to Caesarea to refute Simon the Samaritan magician, who claims to be the 'Standing One', the supreme power above the creator.
74. 1.73Zacchaeus welcomes Peter at Caesarea and hears the account of James's preaching and injury.
75. 1.74Peter ends his account: Simon has challenged him to debate, and Peter promises to teach Clement day by day until they reach Rome.
76. 2.1On the morning of the debate Peter wakes his twelve companions and tells them how his habit of recalling the Lord's words has made him wake at midnight.
77. 2.2Clement agrees, citing how he grew used to the sea, and welcomes giving up some sleep for Peter's teaching.
78. 2.3Peter asks his companions to tell him about Simon's character before the debate, so as not to cast pearls before swine.
79. 2.4Peter explains that how much he reveals to Simon depends on his moral character, though he must answer him for the hearers' sake.
80. 2.5Niceta, a former disciple of Simon, warns Peter that Simon is a skilled orator and magician.
81. 2.6Aquila, also a former disciple of Simon, offers to tell Peter how Simon performs his wonders.
82. 2.7Aquila describes Simon's origins and his claim to be the Standing One, a power above the creator.
83. 2.8Aquila tells how Simon joined the sect of Dositheus, with its thirty disciples and the woman Luna.
84. 2.9Aquila recounts Simon's love for Luna and his boasts of the magical wonders he could perform.
85. 2.10Aquila admits that he and Niceta helped Simon deceive others even though they saw through his false claims.
86. 2.11Aquila tells how Simon displaced Dositheus as head of the sect.
87. 2.12Aquila describes Simon's teaching that Luna is Wisdom come down from the higher heavens, and a marvel he saw.
88. 2.13Aquila tells how Simon claimed to work his magic through the soul of a murdered boy, and how Niceta challenged him with the coming judgment.
89. 2.14Confronted, Simon claims to be a god born of a virgin, and Aquila and Niceta pretend to believe him.
90. 2.15Simon boasts that he once made a boy out of air, which his hearers understand to refer to the murdered boy whose soul he uses.
91. 2.16Peter laments that Simon, though convinced by his own sorcery that souls are immortal and judged, still defies God's judgment.
92. 2.17Peter explains that the devil seeks to turn men's natural love for God toward himself, which God permits for a just reason.
93. 2.18Peter teaches that God permits the devil's deceptions to test whether men remain loyal to their true Father and Creator.
94. 2.19Peter prays with the baptized (Clement, not yet baptized, withdraws) and goes out to debate Simon before a great crowd.
95. 2.20Peter opens the debate by urging his hearers to seek first God's righteousness and kingdom, since judgment concerns deeds, not questions.
96. 2.21Peter teaches that this life is the time for works, that God is known from creation, and that hidden things will be revealed to the righteous by the Holy Spirit.
97. 2.22Peter describes life as a journey whose gate is the true Prophet and whose goal is the kingdom of the Father, and invites discussion in peace.
98. 2.23Simon rejects Peter's call for peace and demands open combat.
99. 2.24Peter answers with a parable of two generals and explains that he seeks not agreement with error but an orderly search for truth.
100. 2.25Peter sets out the rules for a patient, peaceful disputation aimed at truth rather than victory.
101. 2.26Simon interrupts and charges Peter with contradicting Jesus, who said he came to bring not peace but a sword.
102. 2.27Peter cites the beatitude on peacemakers, and Simon retorts that Jesus then commanded others what he did not do himself.
103. 2.28Peter begins to show that Jesus' saying about the sword is consistent with his teaching of peace, starting from the beatitudes.
104. 2.29Peter explains that Jesus commanded peace among believers but declared a war of words against those who opposed his teaching.
105. 2.30Peter cites Jesus' war against the scribes and Pharisees and his instructions to offer peace to every house.
106. 2.31Peter explains that the apostles offer peace first and turn to the war of words only against those who reject it.
107. 2.32Simon argues that Jesus contradicted himself by condemning division yet causing it.
108. 2.33Peter explains that as an apostle he must teach only what his master commanded, and invites Simon first to test whether Jesus is a prophet.
109. 2.34Peter argues that the question whether Jesus is a prophet must come before the question of apparent inconsistencies in his sayings.
110. 2.35Peter explains that Jesus divides the kingdom of error by the word of truth, so that error falls and truth reigns.
111. 2.36Peter states his faith: one God, creator of the world and just judge.
112. 2.37Simon claims that no one accepts Peter's belief in one creator God, and hesitates to state his own view for fear of the crowd.
113. 2.38Peter challenges Simon to state his position plainly.
114. 2.39Simon argues from the plural passages of the law that there are many gods, above whom is an unknown supreme God not known even to the Jews.
115. 2.40Peter undertakes to prove that the God of the Jews, creator of heaven and earth, is above all.
116. 2.41Peter shows from Scripture that other so-called gods are subject to the God of the Jews, and that the title 'god' is given loosely to Moses, judges, and idols.
117. 2.42Peter explains that angels of the nations and holy men are called gods only in a derived sense, while Christ is God of the princes and the Creator alone is true God.
118. 2.43Peter quotes Deuteronomy to show that there is no God besides the Creator, the God of the Jews.
119. 2.44Peter cites further Scriptures for the worship of one God and links polytheism with the serpent, who first spoke of 'gods'.
120. 2.45Peter warns that being deceived is no excuse before God, and that even a wonder-working prophet must not be believed if he preaches other gods.
121. 2.46Peter argues that Jesus preached the God of the Jews, since he blamed the scribes and Pharisees for small faults but never for not knowing God.
122. 2.47Simon cites Jesus' saying that no one knows the Father except the Son as proof of an unknown God above the creator.
123. 2.48Peter answers that the Son, always with the Father, revealed him to Moses and the prophets, but not to Simon, who rejects the Son.
124. 2.49Simon mocks the idea that God has a Son and announces an ineffable power of light unknown even to the creator, Moses, and Jesus.
125. 2.50Peter ridicules Simon's uncertain 'I think' and challenges him to read his hearers' thoughts if he knows what is beyond the heavens.
126. 2.51Peter argues that a new God would require a new sense, and that Simon lacks even the prophetic sense of foreknowledge.
127. 2.52Peter and the crowd laugh at Simon's claim to have learned from the law what the law does not know.
128. 2.53Simon argues from the story of paradise that the creator is weak and not good, and therefore that a perfect God must exist above him.
129. 2.54Simon concludes from the creator's imperfection and from the evil in the world that a higher God exists.
130. 2.55Peter turns Simon's argument against him: the same charges apply to Simon's higher power, which moreover gives no evidence of existing.
131. 2.56Peter argues that Simon's unknown God has no name or attribute not borrowed from the Creator, who alone chastises his sons justly.
132. 2.57Simon claims that souls come from the good God and were taken captive by the creator; Peter shows that this contradicts Simon's earlier claims.
133. 2.58Simon says his good God saves those who know him, not those who keep the law; Peter answers that such a God would save the wicked and neglect the good.
134. 2.59Peter argues that loyalty to the Creator, our own Father, is more pious than deserting him for a richer stranger.
135. 2.60Peter argues that Simon's God would be weaker than the creator who took his souls captive, and again demands a new sense to know him.
136. 2.61Simon invites Peter to imagine an immense incorporeal light beyond the world.
137. 2.62Peter recalls how, while fishing at Capernaum, he was so absorbed in imagining Jerusalem and Caesarea that he did not notice a fish on his hook.
138. 2.63Andrew rouses Peter from his reverie and responds with a word of warning.
139. 2.64Andrew warns that such fantasies are the beginnings of demonic possession or come from a disorder of soul or body.
140. 2.65Peter argues that imagination only recombines what has been seen, and again challenges Simon to read the thoughts of those present.
141. 2.66Simon claims that whatever can be thought must exist, and Peter shows the absurdity of the claim.
142. 2.67Peter offers to show from the law and nature the truth about immensity, but only after discussing the bounded heavens.
143. 2.68Peter teaches that above the visible firmament is an eternal higher heaven, which will appear to the saints when the visible one passes away.
144. 2.69Peter teaches that the truths of faith must be grounded in reason, which makes faith firm.
145. 2.70The first day's debate ends; Simon leaves with a third of the crowd, Peter heals the sick, and Clement eats apart from the baptized.
146. 2.71Peter explains that he does not eat with the unbaptized because former idolaters harbor unclean spirits that baptism drives out.
147. 2.72Peter explains that Simon is wilfully possessed, and that the unbaptized can end their separation from the common table by seeking baptism.
148. 3.1Before the second day's debate Peter explains why he avoids revealing the highest truths about God to a mixed crowd, then teaches his companions about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
149. 3.2Aquila asks Peter to explain the first principle and in what sense Christ is called the Son of God.
150. 3.3In the bracketed passage, Peter teaches that God alone is the principle without beginning and unbegotten, and rejects calling him 'self-father' or 'self-begotten'.
151. 3.4In the bracketed passage, Peter rejects calling God self-made and argues from Jesus' words that the soul is immortal and unaffected by bodily change.
152. 3.5In the bracketed passage, Peter argues from Jesus' teaching on adultery and desire that the commandment is addressed to the free, immortal soul rather than to the body.
153. 3.6In the bracketed passage, Peter cites Isaiah to show that God is first, without beginning and unbegotten.
154. 3.7In the bracketed passage, Peter warns against inquiring what the Unbegotten is, teaching only that he is, and that he is best honored by silence.
155. 3.8In the bracketed passage, Peter teaches that the unbegotten God begot the Only-begotten without change or division, and calls the Son begotten, made, and created.
156. 3.9In the bracketed passage, Peter teaches that God begot the Only-begotten without change to himself, and warns against thinking of God as male and female.
157. 3.10In the bracketed passage, Peter argues that the Son, born of the unborn, is truly distinct from the Father, as the Father's command 'Sit at my right hand' shows.
158. 3.11In the bracketed passage, Peter teaches that the Son is the image of the unbegotten power, like the sun shown in a mirror, and that the Holy Spirit was made through the Son and is numbered after Father and Son.
159. 3.12On the second day Simon complains that the people love Peter rather than himself and suggests that Peter is the real magician.
160. 3.13Peter explains that Simon's former followers turned against him when they saw that he did not teach the truth he professed.
161. 3.14Simon demands that Peter prove from the law what he promised about the eternal light and the two heavens, and Peter agrees, citing the parable of the sower.
162. 3.15Simon drops the question of the light and asks where evil comes from; Peter insists that he first say whether he asks as a learner or as an opponent.
163. 3.16Peter shows that Simon's question was badly put and denies that everyone agrees evil exists.
164. 3.17Peter lists the questions that must be settled about evil before asking where it comes from.
165. 3.18Peter insists that Simon cannot both contradict and judge, and proposes that each state his view and the hearers judge.
166. 3.19Peter defends the people as fit judges, united by their love of truth.
167. 3.20Peter proposes, following Jesus, to begin with God's righteousness and human freedom to do what will be judged.
168. 3.21Peter presses Simon on whether anything is in human power, and Simon retreats into uncertainty.
169. 3.22Simon appeals to fate, and Peter shows that denying free choice would overturn judgment, law, virtue, and God himself.
170. 3.23Peter defines free choice, and Simon asks whether everything God wills exists and everything he does not will does not.
171. 3.24Peter distinguishes things moved by necessity, like the heavens, from beings with free will, who are rewarded or punished.
172. 3.25Peter shows that Simon's dilemma fails because God has willed some beings to act freely and be judged by their choices.
173. 3.26Peter argues that goodness requires freedom, and describes the end of the world, the resurrection, and the judgment foretold by the true Prophet.
174. 3.27Peter explains that the visible heaven was made to veil God's dwelling during the time of contest; Simon objects that a good God would not destroy a good world.
175. 3.28Peter compares the visible heaven to an eggshell that must break so that the heavenly kingdom may appear.
176. 3.29Peter teaches that God's will, not any law, determines whether his creatures endure; Simon objects that seeing God contradicts Exodus.
177. 3.30Peter explains that God is seen by the spirit, as men will see him when made like angels at the resurrection; Simon leaves, demanding a proof of the soul's immortality.
178. 3.31Peter encourages his companions to form the habit of waking early and to fill their minds with the remembrance of God.
179. 3.32Peter resolves to review each day's debate with his companions at night, setting out in order what could not be fully stated against Simon.
180. 3.33On the third day Peter complains of those who come to learn but then contradict as if they were teachers.
181. 3.34Peter teaches that learning requires a fixed order, and that the ignorant must follow a guide who knows it.
182. 3.35Peter argues that all are equally capable of truth by nature but differ in education, so teachers must first learn.
183. 3.36Peter teaches that those who hear the truth in order recognize it, but whether they accept it depends on their free choice.
184. 3.37Peter teaches that men will be judged on doing the good within their power, and must know God as both good and just.
185. 3.38Peter explains that God is good in giving sun and rain to all now, and just in separating the righteous from the wicked at the judgment.
186. 3.39Simon demands proof of the soul's immortality, and Peter proposes first to establish that God is just.
187. 3.40Peter argues that the prosperity of the wicked and the suffering of the righteous in this life require the soul's immortality if God is just.
188. 3.41Peter argues that the injustice of this life proves a coming judgment; Simon accuses him of evading the question of the soul's immortality.
189. 3.42Peter denounces Simon as armed with the serpent's cunning and describes the moral chaos that denying the soul's immortality would bring.
190. 3.43Peter promises to prove the soul's immortality in a single sentence, and Simon stays to hear it.
191. 3.44Peter reveals that Simon keeps in his house the image of the murdered boy whose soul he claims to summon, which itself proves the soul's survival.
192. 3.45Exposed, Simon asks to repent, but Peter predicts his relapse and explains that he learned Simon's secret from his former associates, not by prophecy.
193. 3.46Simon claims his repentance was a ruse and threatens to show Peter the power of his divinity.
194. 3.47Simon boasts that he is the first power and the eternal Son of God, born of Rachel, and mocks the crucified Jesus as a magician.
195. 3.48Peter challenges Simon to let the crowd search his house; Simon tries to raise a riot.
196. 3.49The people drive Simon out, and Peter urges patience with the wicked and laments that Simon has become a chosen vessel of the evil one.
197. 3.50The crowd kneels in repentance, and Peter prays over them with tears.
198. 3.51Peter invites his companions to voice their doubts openly so that they can be healed.
199. 3.52Niceta asks how Simon can work real wonders, and Peter begins by explaining that God gave free choice and allowed two kingdoms, of good and of evil.
200. 3.53Peter teaches that God hid the kingdom of heaven like a treasure, revealing it to those who seek it from him and love it above all things.
201. 3.54Peter teaches that the kingdom must be loved above everything, since all earthly things pass while God alone remains.
202. 3.55Peter compares the testing of this age to the contest between Moses and Pharaoh's magicians, whose signs seemed equal but were not.
203. 3.56Peter likens Simon's opposition to that of Pharaoh's magicians against Moses.
204. 3.57Niceta asks why it is a sin to believe Simon's wonders, if believing Jesus because of his signs is not.
205. 3.58Peter teaches that God veiled the truth with his love, so that only those who knock at the door of divine love can reach it.
206. 3.59Peter explains the 'pairs' of evil and good that appear in turn, and how both simple and prudent people can judge between their signs.
207. 3.60Peter explains that the evil one's signs are useless, while those of the good heal and save, though at the end of the world the evil one will imitate good signs.
208. 3.61Peter lists the ten pairs of evil and good figures from Cain and Abel to Antichrist and Christ.
209. 3.62Peter teaches that only one who renounces worldly affairs and loves God can persevere in learning about him.
210. 3.63A former follower of Simon reports that Simon has thrown his magical apparatus into the sea and left for Rome, and asks Peter to receive him.
211. 3.64Peter presents Simon's former follower to the crowd, who hear of Simon's crimes.
212. 3.65Peter announces that he will ordain Zacchaeus as their shepherd, stay three months, and then follow Simon to the Gentiles.
213. 3.66Peter ordains Zacchaeus bishop of Caesarea with twelve presbyters and four deacons, and gives the church its instructions.
214. 3.67Peter invites the people to enroll for baptism after three months of instruction and fasting, describing baptism in running water with anointing.
215. 3.68Peter decides to stay three months at Caesarea and to send twelve companions ahead after Simon, naming four replacements.
216. 3.69Peter instructs the twelve to go ahead and report on Simon, and they place themselves at his command.
217. 3.70The twelve set out, and the people of Caesarea weep at the prospect of Peter's departure.
218. 3.71Peter consoles the people and explains that he must follow God's will by going after Simon to defend the Gentiles.
219. 3.72Peter permits those without binding duties to follow him, teaches for three months, and more than ten thousand are baptized at the festival.
220. 3.73A letter reports that Simon is slandering Peter from city to city and is staying at Tripolis.
221. 3.74Peter commends the Caesarean church to its clergy and prepares to leave for Tripolis; Clement records his teaching for James.
222. 3.75Clement lists the contents of the ten books he sent to James from Caesarea and sets out with Peter.
223. 4.1Peter travels from Caesarea through the coastal cities to Tripolis, followed by many believers, and is received there.
224. 4.2At Maro's house Peter refuses to eat until he knows all his companions are lodged, and learns that the citizens have received them eagerly.
225. 4.3Peter learns that Simon has fled toward Syria and that the crowds are already gathering eagerly at his door.
226. 4.4Peter sees in the eager crowds the fulfillment of Christ's sayings about the harvest and about many coming from east and west, and calls the desire to hear God's word a gift from God.
227. 4.5Peter teaches that God gives the Hebrews to believe Moses and the nations to love Jesus, but each must by his own will also accept the other and do God's will.
228. 4.6Maro offers his hall and garden for the discourse, and the crowd rushes in after Peter.
229. 4.7Peter, standing on a pedestal in Maro's garden, expels demons and heals the sick before beginning his discourse.
230. 4.8Peter opens by announcing that he will show God's Providence to be blameless and demon possession to be just, ignorance being the mother of evils.
231. 4.9In the beginning humanity, made in God's image and taught by the true Prophet, worshiped God with a pure mind, and creation kept covenant with them so that they lived a thousand years without decay.
232. 4.10Ease led the first humans to take God's gifts as their natural due, and so to deny Providence and the worth of virtue.
233. 4.11God sent toil and affliction as a remedy, so that hardship restored the worship of God that prosperity had destroyed.
234. 4.12God translated Enoch for his gratitude and saved righteous Noah through the flood, which purified the world of the ungrateful.
235. 4.13After the flood men again fell into impiety, and drunken festivals gave rise to idolatry and to demonic frenzy taken for divine inspiration.
236. 4.14Peter offers the ancestral worship of God as freedom from demons and warns that those who reject it face eternal punishment, since God is just as well as good.
237. 4.15Demons who enter people through sin come to control them, and souls that obey them will share their eternal fire.
238. 4.16Demons enter only those who, through excess and impiety, break the measure set by God.
239. 4.17Faith and purity drive demons out, and Gentiles must turn to God and pray, since demons flee in proportion to growing faith.
240. 4.18Incomplete faith leaves room for demons, who disguise their suggestions as bodily humors, so moderation in food and drink is necessary.
241. 4.19Demons make people believe their sufferings come from the gods so that they will sacrifice to them, but each person is free to choose life or destruction.
242. 4.20Peter argues that idols, mere metal, cannot be divine, and that neither divination nor healing proves divinity.
243. 4.21Demons know more than men because they are spirits, but God has given a test: the true God's prophecies are always true, while the demons' sometimes fail.
244. 4.22God lets demons sometimes tell the truth so that their mixed oracles reveal them as demons and make our struggle known.
245. 4.23Peter answers the question why God made evil beings by asserting that nothing is evil by substance.
246. 4.24God created even those he foresaw would sin, since to refrain out of fear of their future wickedness would show weakness in the Creator.
247. 4.25God foresaw that free creatures would fall and assigned them ranks, so that fallen beings serve as ministers of punishment and as adversaries whose defeat wins the faithful their reward.
248. 4.26Idolatry began when fallen angels served human lust and taught men magic, filling the world with impiety.
249. 4.27After the flood Ham handed magic to his son Mesraim, called Zoroaster, who sought divine honors through star-magic until a demon burned him up.
250. 4.28The people honored the dead Zoroaster as a living star carried to heaven by lightning, the origin of honoring those killed by lightning.
251. 4.29Nimrod, called Ninus, became the first king through magic, the magi spread astral cults, and Zoroaster's ashes were carried to the Persians and worshiped as heavenly fire.
252. 4.30Men everywhere deified those they admired and added drunken feasts through which demons entered them, until the sober religion of God almost vanished.
253. 4.31Worship of lifeless idols removed the fear of an all-seeing God and unleashed war, plunder, and insatiable greed.
254. 4.32Peter calls the people to repentance and baptism in spring, river, or sea under the threefold name, which drives out demons and empowers believers to free others.
255. 4.33Believers are no different in nature but command demons by God's power, as an officer commands stronger soldiers through fear of Caesar.
256. 4.34The devil tempted Christ with the world's glory and, rebuffed, sent false prophets, apostles, and teachers who speak in Christ's name.
257. 4.35Peter warns the people to accept no teacher without the testimony of James in Jerusalem, and calls baptism the wedding garment to be kept unstained.
258. 4.36Peter lists what stains the baptismal garment—false teaching about God, sins of deed, and eating food offered to demons—and speaks of three steps of thirty, sixty, and a hundred commandments.
259. 4.37Peter dismisses the crowds until the next day, eats with his companions in the garden, and rests.
260. 5.1Peter lets his companions sleep, then goes out at dawn and begins his second discourse to the gathered crowd.
261. 5.2Man, made in God's image with dominion over creation, became subject to suffering through sin, but through piety and faith can be freed and heal others.
262. 5.3Suffering comes from unbelief, which ignores the coming judgment, while faith keeps from sin and gives power over demons.
263. 5.4Ignorance is the mother of all evils, and worst of all is the ignorance that thinks itself knowledge.
264. 5.5Ignorance has no substance and vanishes when the truth is known, and the true Prophet alone gives that knowledge, the gate of life.
265. 5.6Hearers of the true Prophet are free to accept or reject his teaching, which shows that human beings have free will.
266. 5.7The ignorant are not judged for their ignorance, but those who reject the truth once heard are, while those who accept it devote themselves to good works in hope of seeing God.
267. 5.8Peter urges his hearers to receive God's word like good seed, since those who reject it are responsible for their own ruin.
268. 5.9God established two kingdoms and no one can serve both, as the true Prophet taught about God and mammon.
269. 5.10The true Prophet who appeared in Judea is proved by his miracles, his knowledge of hearts, and the fulfillment of the law's prophecies and types in him.
270. 5.11The prophecy that the nations would await the Messiah is all the more remarkable because the Jews, who expected him, failed through envy to recognize him when he came.
271. 5.12By God's providence the nations, who never heard of the Messiah, now seek him, fulfilling prophecy, while those who knew of him did not recognize him.
272. 5.13Peter calls his hearers to serve the one God, imitate his mercy, and so recover the image and likeness in which they were made.
273. 5.14Idols cannot even serve as slaves, yet their makers have made them masters, wasting useful material, while true worship means imitating God.
274. 5.15No idolater would want to be like his idols, which depend on human laws, dogs, and locks for protection and so cannot be gods.
275. 5.16Idols are lower than the dead, since they never lived; even sun and stars are not to be worshiped, for only the uncreated God is God.
276. 5.17The ancient serpent, condemned to eat earth, insinuates belief in many gods to draw people from faith in the one God.
277. 5.18The serpent persuades people that ignorance excuses them, but willful ignorance is itself guilt and destroys the soul.
278. 5.19Peter turns the analogy of Caesar and his officials against polytheists: as no official may take Caesar's name, no being may take the name of God.
279. 5.20“God” is not God's true name, and the Egyptians insulted the incommunicable name by worshiping animals and even baser things.
280. 5.21The hearers laugh at Egyptian animal worship, and Peter tells them the Egyptians laugh back at their worship of lifeless images.
281. 5.22Nothing made can share the name of God, the uncreated maker of all, not even the corruptible world or its parts, and God's patience is no license to misuse his name.
282. 5.23The true image of God is man, honored by works of mercy and violated by murder, adultery, and every injury, not by images of stone or wood.
283. 5.24To the objection that God would not let idols exist if he disapproved, Peter answers that people have adored almost everything, and the sin lies with the worshiper, not the thing worshiped.
284. 5.25God patiently spares idolaters because many will repent; goodness requires free will, and to make God the author of evil thoughts is blasphemy.
285. 5.26Thanking God together with idols is like calling a physician alongside poisoners; God needs nothing, but gratitude draws the soul near to him while ingratitude gives it to the demon.
286. 5.27Creation itself, grieved by the wicked, would take vengeance through plagues and disasters, but God's goodness restrains it while he waits for sinners to repent.
287. 5.28The souls of the impious are immortal and suffer eternal fire, which Peter must proclaim in order to reconcile his hearers to God and make them his friends.
288. 5.29God's care for humanity is shown by the elements serving it, and his friendship by answered prayers like Elijah's, so honoring others as gods is like honoring a stranger in place of one's father.
289. 5.30Ancestral custom is no excuse for idolatry, and those who pray to God in drought but then offer their first fruits to idols are ungrateful.
290. 5.31Pagan festivals, with their frenzy, self-mutilation, and demonic rites, do not relieve the mind but enslave it to the serpent.
291. 5.32The religion of God calls to sobriety, chastity, patience, contentment, justice, and abstention from idol sacrifices, which give demons entry.
292. 5.33Idol worship gives demons power to drive people to crime, lust, rage, and even suicide, which God permits so that they may recognize whom they have forsaken.
293. 5.34True worshipers of God keep his law and are free from sufferings, while sinful believers are chastised in this life to pay their debt of sin before the judgment.
294. 5.35Peter preaches what he believes saving so that his hearers may share the age to come, and says the truth of it is proved by obedience and its outcome.
295. 5.36Peter urges perseverance against the serpent's obstacles, heals the sick, and in the evening answers his twenty companions' questions.
296. 6.1Peter explains that as the nights shorten in spring, one should keep the same length of sleep so as to protect both study time and digestion.
297. 6.2Peter compares the neglected mind to an uncultivated field overgrown with thorns, which the word of truth must cultivate without delay.
298. 6.3Peter calls for a just anger against oneself for past sins, a fire that burns out evil desire and prepares the heart for God's word.
299. 6.4Christ came to bring fire and a sword, the word of truth that separates believers from error even within families.
300. 6.5The separation from unbelieving family comes from the side of ignorance, while believers, following Christ's prayer on the cross, pray for those who persecute them.
301. 6.6Parents are only ministers of life, God its author; even if people cannot know what God is, they could easily know that wood and stone are not God.
302. 6.7Tracing images back through iron, fire, water, and spirit to God, Peter recounts how God made heaven and earth for humanity, who ungratefully ignore their giver.
303. 6.8As all things come from the waters made through the Only-begotten, so the Father wills that people be reborn through water, and baptism is necessary even for the just.
304. 6.9Baptism fulfills God's command and cuts off the frailty of natural birth; its waters, over which mercy has hovered from the beginning, quench the fire to come.
305. 6.10The baptized must show God's likeness by avoiding sin, and keep the purity rules of the law, beginning with abstaining from intercourse during menstruation.
306. 6.11Washing the body is good as a consequence of inner purity, as Christ taught in rebuking some Pharisees for cleaning only the outside of the cup.
307. 6.12Intercourse should be for the sake of children, not lust alone, and Christians must keep chastity more carefully than pagans do.
308. 6.13Christians should keep whatever good they practiced as pagans and surpass pagan virtue as the Sermon on the Mount teaches, or be shamed at the judgment.
309. 6.14As Christ said that the queen of the south and the Ninevites would condemn his generation, Christians who know the truth must surpass pagans in chastity.
310. 6.15After three months at Tripolis Peter baptizes Clement and many others, celebrates the Eucharist, ordains Maro bishop with presbyters, deacons, and widows, and leaves for Antioch.
311. 7.1Leaving Tripolis with a large following, Peter sends Niceta and Aquila ahead with the brothers in two groups to avoid arousing envy.
312. 7.2Peter assures Niceta and Aquila of his love and asks them to go ahead to each city, preparing lodgings so as to avoid envy.
313. 7.3Niceta and Aquila agree to go ahead, instructing the brothers to enter each city in pairs rather than in a crowd.
314. 7.4Clement rejoices at staying with Peter, who teaches him that friends remain united in memory even when apart.
315. 7.5Clement explains that Peter is his only family and his guard against youthful desire, and that being free of family ties he wishes to serve him as a slave.
316. 7.6Peter jokingly lists the luxuries a slave would tend, describes his own simple life of bread, olives, and a single garment, and offers rather to serve Clement himself.
317. 7.7Clement weeps at Peter's offer to serve him, and Peter answers that Christ himself served, teaching his followers to serve their brothers.
318. 7.8Clement tells Peter of his noble family—father Faustinianus, mother Mattidia, twin brothers Faustinus and Faustus—and of his mother's dream ordering her to leave Rome.
319. 7.9Clement's father sent Mattidia and the twins to Athens, but his messengers found that they had never arrived and had vanished without trace.
320. 7.10Clement's father searched in vain, then left Clement at Rome at twelve and sailed off himself, and has not been heard of for twenty years.
321. 7.11Peter weeps at Clement's story and observes that pagans blame such misfortunes on fate, while for believers patient suffering purges sin.
322. 7.12The company visits the island of Aradus to see huge vine-wood columns and works of Phidias in a temple.
323. 7.13Peter questions a beggar woman at the temple door, who says she gnawed her hands useless in grief and lacked the courage to kill herself.
324. 7.14Peter warns that suicide brings greater punishment, and the woman says she would accept it to see her children again, so Peter asks the cause of her grief.
325. 7.15The woman tells how, to escape her brother-in-law's unlawful love without causing a family feud, she resolved to leave with her twin sons.
326. 7.16She feigned a dream to leave Rome for Athens with her twins, but was shipwrecked at night near Aradus, the only one cast ashore alive.
327. 7.17Unable to find her children, she was taken in by a poor widow who had remained faithful to her drowned husband.
328. 7.18Her hands became useless, her widowed hostess was paralyzed, and both now live on alms, so she asks Peter for the promised means to end her life.
329. 7.19Peter, suspecting the woman is Clement's mother, sends Clement away and questions her, but she hides her identity behind false names.
330. 7.20Peter tells the woman about a young Roman in his company whose mother left Rome with twin sons after a dream and vanished.
331. 7.21When Peter tells of the young man, the woman faints, then reveals that she is Clement's mother, and Peter agrees to take her to him.
332. 7.22Clement, not recognizing his mother, pushes her away when she embraces him and is annoyed with Peter.
333. 7.23Clement recognizes his mother; at her request her paralyzed hostess is brought, and Peter heals her in the name of Jesus Christ before the crowd.
334. 7.24Peter invites the people to Antioch for further teaching, and Clement provides for his mother's hostess and her comforters before sailing to Antaradus.
335. 7.25Mattidia learns her husband went to seek her, and the company travels along the coast to Laodicea, where Niceta and Aquila meet them.
336. 7.26Peter begins to tell Niceta and Aquila the story of Clement's family and the visit to Aradus.
337. 7.27Peter recounts the beggar woman's story as she told it, ending with her cry for her lost sons Faustus and Faustinus.
338. 7.28Niceta and Aquila reveal that they are the twins Faustinus and Faustus, and Peter makes them wait while he prepares their sleeping mother.
339. 7.29Peter explains to Mattidia that believers worship one God, keep his law, and do not share a table with the unbaptized, even family.
340. 7.30Mattidia asks to be baptized at once, saying she had already abandoned the gods and has always kept her chastity.
341. 7.31The twins embrace their mother, Peter tells her who they are, and she asks them what befell them after the shipwreck.
342. 7.32Niceta tells how pirates rescued the twins from the sea and sold them at Caesarea to the widow Justa, who raised them as sons and had them educated.
343. 7.33The twins were nearly deceived by Simon Magus, thinking him the promised prophet, until Zacchaeus brought them to Peter.
344. 7.34Mattidia begs to be baptized at once with her hostess, and Peter agrees to baptize her after a single day's fast because she has shown her faith.
345. 7.35Peter explains that Mattidia's wish to have her hostess baptized shows her faith, and rebukes believers who do not urge baptism on those they love.
346. 7.36Mattidia has already fasted for joy, but Peter says it was not a baptismal fast, while Niceta suggests God arranged it.
347. 7.37Peter insists that all fast one day before Mattidia's baptism, and explains Christ's saying about plucking out the eye as cutting off the purpose and causes of sin, not limbs.
348. 7.38Mattidia is baptized in the sea and dines with her sons, and Peter teaches that chastity is rewarded and must be guarded by flight from temptation.
349. 8.1After the morning bath and prayer, a poor old workman who has watched them offers to correct what he thinks is their error, and Peter welcomes him.
350. 8.2The old man declares that there is no God or providence but only chance and birth-fate, which he knows from astrology, and Clement feels strangely drawn to him.
351. 8.3Peter treats the poor old man with respect and agrees to a discussion before the gathering crowd, and the old man promises to yield to the truth.
352. 8.4Peter compares heralds of truth to sunlight, quoting Christ, and the old man proposes that each side state its thesis, asserting that birth-fate, not providence, rules the world.
353. 8.5Niceta asks to debate the old man in the Greek manner, leaving Peter, filled with the Spirit, to act as judge and give the final truth.
354. 8.6The crowd recognizes Peter, and Niceta states his thesis that the one just God governs the world by providence and will judge each by his deeds.
355. 8.7Niceta says he can state the old man's case himself, having studied Epicureanism while his brothers studied Pyrrhonism and Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy, and the old man adds that he holds birth-fate besides.
356. 8.8Clement offers to debate birth-fate; Aquila rebukes him for calling the old man father while doing so himself, and Peter begins to suspect who the old man is.
357. 8.9Niceta distinguishes the simple, which is one, unbounded, and uncreated, from the composite, which requires a maker, and identifies the simple with God, Father in goodness and Founder in power.
358. 8.10Niceta poses the question whether the world was made, and by itself or another, noting that without Providence virtue, justice, and immortality lose their meaning.
359. 8.11Niceta distinguishes general, special, and combined forms of providence, the last meaning that God made all things and cares for each to the end.
360. 8.12Niceta argues that belief in fixed fate contradicts prayer and sacrifice and abolishes worship, and asserts that God made the world and will dissolve it to reveal the eternal world.
361. 8.13Whether the world's matter was originally solid and then divided, or scattered and then gathered, it requires a maker who shaped it.
362. 8.14Since the world's bodies are mixed and dissoluble, they are composite, and whoever combined their elements is God, the author of the universe.
363. 8.15Niceta surveys the Greek philosophers' theories of first principles and argues that whatever the elements, a God who combined them is required.
364. 8.16The mutual dependence of the elements shows they were made from nothing, so God is the founder of all, leaving no room for Epicurus's atoms.
365. 8.17Niceta argues that atoms of different weights and tendencies could never meet and combine, as falling chaff can never overtake lead.
366. 8.18If atoms kept accumulating the world would be overloaded, and a dome built gradually by chance would have collapsed; nor can any ultimate foundation be found.
367. 8.19Fiery atoms could not form the world's foundation, and insensible atoms could not produce the ordered forms of things, which show the work of reason, the Word and God.
368. 8.20What is called nature is really God the maker, as Plato's Timaeus testifies; the ordered heavens, like a painted domed house, proclaim a wise maker.
369. 8.21Whether the cosmic sphere stands by its own equilibrium or floats on waters, its structure shows the work of a divine craftsman.
370. 8.22The ordered courses of stars and sun and the cycle of the seasons proclaim the wisdom of God.
371. 8.23Mountains that produce winds, sparse rain in hot southern lands, and the Nile's flood watering Egypt all show providence.
372. 8.24Rivers never fail and the sea never overflows because the sea is salt, which consumes the inflowing fresh water, another sign of providence.
373. 8.25Providence ordered the renewal of plants and animals by seed and offspring, and to show it is not mere nature, made some creatures arise in unusual ways.
374. 8.26In the growth of seeds a vital spirit given to the waters from the beginning forms each plant after its kind, as the womb forms the child, showing divine wisdom.
375. 8.27Providence hides how things grow from the unworthy, but a thought experiment shows that plants grow from water, not earth, since the soil's weight remains unchanged.
376. 8.28Man, a little world, joins mortal body and immortal soul without impairing immortality; the soul has affections rather than separate parts, and the body grows from seed in the womb.
377. 8.29The symmetry and fitness of bones, limbs, eyes, ears, tongue, and teeth show the Craftsman's design.
378. 8.30The nostrils, lungs, heart, blood, liver, and spleen each serve the body's life in an ordered way.
379. 8.31The coiled intestines and the membranes that distribute moisture are also designed for the body's welfare.
380. 8.32The difference of male and female only in the organs of generation, and the use of the breasts in women, show the Founder's wise design.
381. 8.33The diversity of animals and plants and the regular cycle of the seasons and years also attest the Creator's reason.
382. 8.34Asking why the world was made when it was is idle, for the wise Maker had his reasons, and calling the maker “nature” only renames the divine Reason or Logos.
383. 8.35The old man postpones his reply; the leading citizen of Laodicea and Peter's company vie to provide for him, but he declines all offers for that day.
384. 8.36Peter arranges for the next day's debate to be held in the leading citizen's house, and Clement has the old man followed to learn where he lodges.
385. 8.37Peter urges his companions to teach others, but to add only their own eloquence to what he received from the true Prophet, never their own inventions.
386. 8.38Peter arranges for Aquila and then Clement to argue in turn, and in the leading citizen's theater-like hall he calls the hidden old man forward.
387. 8.39The old man accurately summarizes Niceta's argument: an ordered world implies a wise maker and providence, and a just God who will judge.
388. 8.40The old man says everything hinges on whether mind made the world, and objects that many well-formed things arise without mind and that injustice and fate show no providence.
389. 8.41Aquila takes up the debate, and the old man offers the rainbow as a perfectly formed thing produced without any mind.
390. 8.42Aquila answers that the rainbow is the sun's image impressed on clouds like a seal on wax, so its form derives from the sun, made by God, as a statue's shadow derives from its sculptor.
391. 8.43The old man cites fruits, leaves, and vermin as forms produced without mind, and Aquila warns him not to imagine God as working with two hands like a man.
392. 8.44The old man says disorder in the world prevents him from crediting order to mind, and Aquila replies that order requires reason, while disorder arises when something disturbs that order.
393. 8.45Aquila explains that God set the sun, moon, and five planets in the sky to order the seasons, and that through the same bodies he sends plagues for human sin.
394. 8.46Sun and moon, normally beneficial, become instruments of God's chastisement when, for just cause, he alters their tempering.
395. 8.47Common calamities purify the pious and leave the impious without excuse, and the prophets reveal the sins that brought disorder, beginning with the trembling punishment of Cain.
396. 8.48Evils entered the world through human sin, as shown by the chaste Seres, who keep purity laws and live long without disease, while believers suffer among the wicked in hope of what is to come.
397. 8.49To the objection that God should have forbidden the sins that harm the just, Aquila answers that he did, through the prophets, but men despised and persecuted those who obeyed.
398. 8.50After the flood, which pagans call Deucalion's, God promised no more floods but set evil angels over the nations with power only over those who sin, until the coming of the one who rejoices in good.
399. 8.51Disorder in the world comes from unbelief and sin: when humans shed blood and sacrificed to demons, the elements were corrupted and passed that corruption on to them.
400. 8.52God appointed two princes, one over the ordered good and one over disorder and evil, so that every good thing in nature has an opposing evil since human will turned to wickedness.
401. 8.53Every good has its counterfeit—false prophets, false philosophers, imitated circumcision, rival baptisms, magic healing and necromancy—so the old man should choose the side of order that proves providence.
402. 8.54Aquila argues that only a craftsman can produce both form and formlessness, as a sculptor's rough stone becomes a statue, so the world's apparent disorder also belongs to providence.
403. 8.55God, foreknowing human choices, kept the good as his inheritance and gave the wicked to be ruled by angels who fell by choice, though they have power only over those who first obey them.
404. 8.56Evil did not always exist and comes from rational creatures who exceed God's laws, not from God; what we will be judged on is simply not doing to others what we would not suffer.
405. 8.57The old man insists that his own life proves all is governed by birth-fate, leaving no free will or judgment, and Aquila defers the astrological argument to Clement.
406. 8.58Clement agrees to debate birth-fate the next day, and Peter teaches that God's mind and works can be known only through a prophet he sends, not by human speculation.
407. 8.59Peter urges all to seek the true Prophet, who dwells within each mind but works only in those who seek him with a pure and patient desire for truth.
408. 8.60Rather than disputing, one should find the true Prophet and test whether his words are truly prophetic, then trust him in everything.
409. 8.61The philosophers' subtle words lead nowhere, while the true Prophet's simple knowledge, proved by fulfilled prophecy, gives certainty.
410. 8.62God made the world for the true Prophet, who is present everywhere to those who seek him but asleep to unbelievers; the old man declines to stay and leaves until the next day.
411. 9.1Peter clarifies that only God's own counsel, not ordinary arts and sciences, requires the true Prophet to be known.
412. 9.2The old man, moved by Peter's teaching on prophecy, admits human knowledge is uncertain but asks Clement to open the debate on birth-fate.
413. 9.3Clement explains that God, through his Son, made a two-storied world and raises humans as a bride for the Son, while the prince of this world, like an adulterer, seduces them.
414. 9.4God permitted the evil prince so that the good might be good by free choice in a world of diversity, not by necessity.
415. 9.5Human society needs many different roles, so inequality is necessary in this world.
416. 9.6God gave humans bodily needs to drive them to work, which tests whether they meet those needs justly or by crime; the wicked then blame the stars for their own choices.
417. 9.7Providence turns social inequality into an occasion for justice and mercy under God's law, and baptism's water quenches the fire of desire through which we were first born.
418. 9.8To the question of sickness and madness Clement replies that God permits hostile powers to wrestle with humans so that the just may win the prize.
419. 9.9Children may inherit defects when parents disregard God's law of intercourse, for the purity rules guard procreation as a farmer guards his sowing.
420. 9.10Demons can only incite, not compel; sin makes a person like pitch-smeared tow that catches fire, while the water of baptism makes one fireproof.
421. 9.11Sinners must be baptized and then curb desire by fear of judgment; just as fear of execution kills lust, full faith in eternal fire produces fear that keeps one from sin.
422. 9.12Astrologers attribute to the stars what demons do, inventing “climacterics” to cover their failures, but repentance and baptism cancel the death they predict.
423. 9.13God punishes those who sin from weakness quickly in this life, but defers the punishment of deliberate sinners to eternal fire, where repentance will be impossible.
424. 9.14Keeping future punishment in view would curb sin, for knowledge of heavenly things outshines desire as the sun outshines the stars.
425. 9.15Fear restrains men, animals, and all creation, and the fear of God can likewise extinguish the desires that demons stir up.
426. 9.16The old man sums up Clement's argument but rejects it, holding from experience that the configuration of the stars makes some people murderers or adulterers and others chaste.
427. 9.17The old man cites astrological configurations that supposedly produce murderers, incestuous adulterers, and women who act like men and men like women.
428. 9.18Clement undertakes to show from his own knowledge of astrology that birth-fate does not exist and that even human fear can restrain desire.
429. 9.19Clement begins his catalogue of national laws with the Seres, among whom law, not the stars, prevents murder, adultery, theft, and idolatry, though Mars rises over them daily.
430. 9.20The Brahmans keep their virtuous laws while other Indians commit crimes and some even eat strangers, and Persians practice incestuous marriage, all regardless of the stars.
431. 9.21The Magusaeans keep their incestuous Persian customs wherever they live, which refutes the claim that each region of the sky has its own influence.
432. 9.22Among the Geli, women work like men and are free in sexual relations while the men adorn themselves yet are warlike, though they cannot all share the horoscopes astrologers assign to such traits.
433. 9.23The women of Susa are licentious with their husbands' consent, some Eastern peoples kill boys who submit to homosexual acts while the Gauls permit it, which no common horoscope can explain.
434. 9.24Marriage customs differ by nation, the Amazons all bear children at one season yet differ in sex, and whole nations lack artists and poets, all contrary to astrological claims.
435. 9.25The customs of Medes, Indians, Germans, and others follow their laws, not the stars, proving that free will obeys law and overrides birth-fate.
436. 9.26To the astrologers' claim that each of seven climes has a ruling star that gives its laws, Clement replies that laws differ within single regions and are innumerable.
437. 9.27Contrasting customs within one region, migrating peoples who keep their laws, and the replacement of national laws by Roman law all disprove the theory of climes.
438. 9.28Jews everywhere circumcise on the eighth day, keep one name, never expose infants, and rest on the Sabbath, showing that law, not birth-fate, governs conduct.
439. 9.29Within seven years of the true Prophet's coming, converts from many nations abandoned their sinful customs, as Thomas reports from Parthia, though their horoscopes remained the same.
440. 9.30A just God could not impose a fate that compels sin and then punish it; the flood, which destroyed people of all horoscopes in one hour, shows that punishment follows sin, not stars.
441. 9.31The mind errs through habit, bodily desire, and demonic urging, but knowledge of the truth and fear of judgment enable it to resist all three, so conduct is in our power.
442. 9.32The old man answers that his wife's horoscope foretold adultery with a slave and death at sea, which he believes came true.
443. 9.33The old man reveals that his brother told him the wife had loved him first, and that she then feigned a dream and left Rome with the twins, leaving the younger son behind.
444. 9.34Realizing the old man is Clement's father, Peter promises before witnesses to restore to him his chaste wife and three sons.
445. 9.35Peter reveals before the crowd that the old man is Faustinianus and that Clement, Niceta, and Aquila are his sons, and the old man collapses.
446. 9.36Peter revives Faustinianus and recounts the whole history of Mattidia's flight, the shipwreck, the twins' fortunes, Clement's conversion, and the recognitions so far.
447. 9.37Mattidia hears of the recognition, rushes in calling for her husband, and the couple embrace while Peter dismisses the crowd until the next day.
448. 9.38When the host's demon-possessed daughter is suddenly freed at Peter's presence and comes to him with her chains, Peter agrees to lodge with the family.
449. 10.1Peter advises the sons not to press their father to convert but to let him travel and listen freely for a year.
450. 10.2To Niceta's fear that their father might die unsaved, Peter replies that God judges motives and foreknows his own, and suggests they discuss useful topics in his hearing.
451. 10.3Clement suggests that the brothers should do the questioning, with Peter giving the answers, rather than Peter feigning ignorance.
452. 10.4Peter leaves the occasion to God; their father wakes and asks whether questions are allowed, and Peter invites him to ask freely.
453. 10.5Faustinianus presents the Greek view that nothing is good or evil by nature—not murder, adultery, or theft—and Plato's teaching that friends should hold all things, even wives, in common.
454. 10.6Faustinianus asks that Clement, not Peter, answer him, keeping Peter as final arbiter, and that Clement show whether anything is good or evil by nature.
455. 10.7Clement answers from astrology itself: the union of earth and water is fruitful, like lawful marriage, while harmful mixtures of elements are like adultery.
456. 10.8Faustinianus agrees that discordant mixtures produce evils such as fever, fire, slaughter, and grief.
457. 10.9Using astrology's own terms, Clement shows that adultery, murder, and theft come from the same malign stars as fevers and fires, so by the old man's own principles they are evil.
458. 10.10Faustinianus asks how God can justly judge sins compelled by fate; Clement reminds him that yesterday they agreed demons incite but do not compel, and the old man admits lingering doubts from his own experience.
459. 10.11Clement suggests testing astrologers by reporting the same date as unlucky to one and lucky to another, since their system always lets them find a configuration to explain any outcome.
460. 10.12Astrologers, like interpreters of ambiguous dreams, explain events only after the fact; they can detect desires stirred by demons but not whether free will will act on them.
461. 10.13Faustinianus accepts Clement's argument; a crowd gathers, and Peter invites any of his companions to speak on idolatry, while Clement praises his freedom from envy.
462. 10.14Peter says no one should be ashamed of not knowing everything, since even Christ professed not to know the day and hour; his followers know what the true Prophet judged sufficient.
463. 10.15Clement offers to recount the pagan myths of the gods, which Peter, raised in the Jewish law and untouched by Greek learning, knew less well.
464. 10.16Peter rebukes Niceta for signaling Clement to be silent, saying he wishes all disciples to teach, for the world needs many helpers.
465. 10.17Clement recounts the Orphic cosmogony of the cosmic egg and the androgynous Phanes, and the birth of the six Titans and six Titanesses.
466. 10.18Clement recounts how the Titans married the Titanesses, and how Saturn devoured his sons Aides and Neptune until Rhea hid Jupiter, with the Corybantes drowning out his cries.
467. 10.19Saturn swallows a stone in place of Jupiter, which forces him to disgorge Orcus, who takes the underworld, and Neptune, who takes the waters, while Jupiter is carried to heaven on a goat.
468. 10.20Clement recounts Jupiter's incest with his sister Juno, his swallowing of Metis, the births of Minerva and Liber, his incest with Persephone, his overthrow and castration of Saturn, and the birth of Aphrodite.
469. 10.21Clement lists dozens of women whom Jupiter seduced and the children born of them.
470. 10.22Clement lists the women and the youth Ganymede whom Jupiter seduced by changing into a satyr, eagle, bear, gold, bull, swan, serpent, and other forms.
471. 10.23Jupiter's adulteries, his cruelty to his own offspring, and his tomb in Crete show him a wicked man, honored as father of gods only because the evil one wished to promote imitation of his crimes.
472. 10.24The tombs of Jupiter's sons, shown in various places, prove they were mortal and wicked men.
473. 10.25Since peoples still worship recently deified mortals such as Adonis, Osiris, Hector, Achilles, and Alexander, the older gods too must have been dead men honored in error.
474. 10.26The poets added tales of mortals transformed into stars, trees, flowers, birds, springs, and rivers.
475. 10.27Peter notes the absurdity of the transformation myths, and Clement adds that pagans cannot honor all their gods' sacred taboos without starving.
476. 10.28Clement wonders why pagans worship a criminal like Jupiter, and Peter explains that his example excuses their own sins and that his myths are embedded in schoolboy education.
477. 10.29Niceta offers to present the allegorical defenses by which learned pagans justify their myths.
478. 10.30Niceta explains that the Greeks read Orpheus and Hesiod either literally or allegorically, and sets out the Orphic account of chaos, the cosmic egg, and the androgynous first principle that separated the elements.
479. 10.31From Hesiod's Titans the allegorists derive Rhea as primal matter (from “flowing”), Cronus as time, and the rest as qualities, which together generate all things.
480. 10.32The allegorists explain Aides as a sinking icy bubble, Neptune as the waters set free, and Jupiter as fire borne aloft by the storm-wind, called the goat from kataigis.
481. 10.33The allegorists interpret Jupiter as life-giving heat, Minerva born from his head as divine wisdom, Saturn's binding as the end of new creation, and his castration as the first division of the elements.
482. 10.34Niceta sets out the allegorists' identifications: Cronus as time, Rhea as matter, Aides as the depth, Neptune as water, Jupiter as ether, Venus as loveliness, Cupid as desire, Juno as air, and so on.
483. 10.35Aquila objects that if the myths hid honorable meanings their author was impious to clothe them in shameful stories, since pagan worship imitates the literal myths and the allegories reform no one.
484. 10.36Aquila argues that the wise used allegory to excuse shameful myths, as shown by the images of Zeus's adulteries that no one would tolerate if made of a living king.
485. 10.37The mysteries reenact the myths literally, and devotees even castrate themselves, proving that the shameful stories, not the allegories, are what is believed.
486. 10.38Aquila argues that if the myths really defame noble deeds, the poets' books ought to have been burned rather than taught to boys.
487. 10.39Peter explains that Providence allowed error to be weak and shameful, since a plausible error would be harder to abandon.
488. 10.40Clement asks Niceta to explain the pagan allegory of the gods' banquet at the wedding of Peleus and Thetis and the judgment of Paris.
489. 10.41Niceta explains the allegory: the banquet is the world, Peleus and Thetis the dry and moist elements, Juno, Minerva, and Venus chastity, courage, and lust, and Paris the untrained mind that chooses lust and brings ruin.
490. 10.42Peter warns that Scripture, like the myths, can be twisted by clever readers, so its sense must be learned from those who keep the tradition received from their elders, with liberal learning used only in support of the truth.
491. 10.43Peter urges Faustinianus, given the shortness of life, to repent, adorn his soul with virtue, keep the company of believers, pray, and help his repentance by almsgiving.
492. 10.44An older convert should be grateful that desire has waned, and should devote himself to knowledge and mercy, for God values the firmness of conversion, not its length.
493. 10.45Peter urges rich and poor, young and old, to turn to the gospel without delay, citing the parable of the rich fool.
494. 10.46There is no reason to delay doing good: even without reward a good conscience suffices, and if the promise is true one gains eternal goods for small ones.
495. 10.47Peter invites inquirers to learn of the true Prophet, warns against disputing for victory, and summarizes the preaching: honor God the Father and his Son, the sole lawgiver and judge, by a sober, chaste, just, and merciful life.
496. 10.48The philosophers' ethics differ from Christian teaching because they lack a God who judges secret deeds, they still honor demons as gods, and they wrongly deny that God is angry with the wicked.
497. 10.49God did not make evil; creatures fell by disbelieving judgment, and God's patience delays punishment for the sake of conversion, offering baptism to wash away sins of ignorance.
498. 10.50Philosophers who denied God's anger, denied God altogether, or blamed fate gave license to sin, and those who promoted the gods promoted the worship of vice.
499. 10.51Philosophers speculate about invisible, past, and future things that only prophetic foreknowledge can reveal; Peter preaches only what the true Prophet has handed down, and offers proofs of his foreknowledge.
500. 10.52News comes that Appion and Anubion have arrived and are staying with Simon, and Faustinianus goes with Peter's permission to greet his old friends.
501. 10.53Faustinianus returns at dawn wearing Simon's face though keeping his own voice; his family recoils, but Peter alone sees his true face and explains.
502. 10.54A messenger from Antioch reports that Simon has turned the city against Peter by calling him a magician and murderer.
503. 10.55Cornelius the centurion devised a ruse, spreading word that he had come from Caesar to arrest sorcerers, so that Simon fled Antioch for Laodicea.
504. 10.56Peter explains that Simon, fearing arrest, put his own face on Faustinianus so that he would be seized in his place, and Faustinianus recalls Anubion's veiled warning.
505. 10.57Anubion reports Simon's flight to Judea; the family mourns the transformation, and Peter assures the sons that this is truly their father and that God will restore his face.
506. 10.58Faustinianus confesses his fault, and Anubion explains that Simon had them invite him to dinner and then anoint his face with a drug that gave him Simon's appearance.
507. 10.59Anubion explains that Simon meant Faustinianus to be arrested in his place and to grieve his sons, that he himself feigned illness to warn him, and that he alone can still see his true face.
508. 10.60Peter promises to restore Faustinianus's face once his Simon-like appearance has served a purpose, and sends him ahead to Antioch with his wife and twin sons.
509. 10.61Peter instructs Faustinianus, appearing as Simon, to declare publicly at Antioch that Simon's accusations against Peter were lies and that an angel has punished him.
510. 10.62Faustinianus agrees to Peter's plan; Mattidia at first refuses to travel with a man wearing Simon's face, but Anubion persuades her.
511. 10.63Faustinianus leaves for Antioch with Anubion; Appion and Athenodorus come looking for him, and Peter tells them that “Simon” came claiming to be Faustinianus and went off toward the sea.
512. 10.64Appion and Athenodorus lament, Appion inventing a story that Faustinianus fled with Simon to avoid his Jewish sons, and Clement, playing along, feigns indifference so that they leave in pursuit of Simon.
513. 10.65A messenger reports that Faustinianus, appearing as Simon, is publicly praising Peter at Antioch so that the people now long for Peter and threaten “Simon,” and urges Peter to come quickly.
514. 10.66Faustinianus, as Simon, publicly confesses that his wonders were demonic deceits, that his charges against Peter were lies, and that an angel has punished him, and urges the people to believe Peter.
515. 10.67The Antiochenes repent of their hostility to Peter, and that evening Faustinianus's own face is restored, as Peter had promised.
516. 10.68Simon is driven out of Antioch; Peter ordains a bishop and presbyters at Laodicea, baptizes and heals many, and sets out for Antioch, where the leading citizens meet him in penance.
517. 10.69The Antiochenes bring their sick to Peter, and he prays in thanksgiving to the Father who fulfills every promise of the Son.
518. 10.70Peter tells the sick that healing comes from Christ, not from him; when they confess Jesus Christ as the true God, a great light appears and all are healed.
519. 10.71Within seven days more than ten thousand are baptized at Antioch, and Theophilus dedicates the great hall of his house as a church, where a chair is set up for Peter.
520. 10.72Faustinianus declares his faith and asks for baptism; after a public fast Peter baptizes him on the Lord's day, and the city honors him.