Against the Manichaeans

Truth dissolves error and destroys deceit, and does not allow any falsehood to advance. Let us beseech the Lord Jesus, who is the truth, to shine upon our mind, so that deceit may not be able to destroy the mind or error prevail over it; and that, if it has seized and mastered it, it may not keep its mastery lasting. For if he only appears and shines forth the rays of his truth, he will scatter the deceit that has arisen and keep the mind undeceived. For he himself cries, “I am the way and the truth and the life”; he himself commands, “Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.” For since their manner was counterfeit and their character feigned, the Truth did not keep silent but laid them bare, not allowing the hidden part of their mind to be covered by what was feigned and assumed,

so that their deceit, once caught in the act, might become weak in its attempts, unable to seize anyone. Wickedness is many-formed and many-branched, spread out in various attempts, and has some of its parts more harmful and more destructive. Therefore we must neither keep silent about the lesser nor refrain from the greater, knowing that the lesser parts of wickedness cause smaller harms and the greater ones great harms; for whoever errs in greater things is punished more, and whoever is deceived by a greater deceit is chastised more. … For deceits are … and the … and I weigh … [God] leaves nothing unweighed, but measures both the deceit of each deceiver and the credulity of the deceived, and fixes the punishment. We must be eager, then, not to be caught even by the smallest; for even the smallest deceit, like a spark, taking the consent of the soul as fuel, kindles it and makes a great flame; for many, beginning from a little deceit, have been poured out into a sea of deceit. Therefore we must take care not to be caught even by the smallest deceit, building the finest wall for the soul, so that we may not be caught by the greater either; for whoever errs about the smallest things will one day stumble about the greater too, and whoever is caught by none of the small … will have the security … and the greater; since … many wolves clothed in fleeces … let it brandish the sword, providing security for the flock and exposing the attempt of the beasts. For see, many have come forth and wander here and there, clothed with the name of Christ instead of fleeces, called what they are not, and being what they will not bear to be called; hiding their own wickedness under the form of the name, sharing the name but striving to destroy the name of Christ utterly, campaigning against Jesus while called by Jesus' name. For this is the most grievous wickedness, that they bear the name of Christ while fighting Christ. For since wickedness was too weak to fight against God, it uses the name, so that by using the name it may give fools the impression that it belongs to Christ, and here and there, as it wishes, may ruin those who have believed in the Saviour. Here Valentinus came forth; here Marcion; here

Sitianus; from elsewhere Phanius; and last, the abortion of wickedness, which made all other wickednesses smaller, and by its greater wickedness showed the wickednesses of the others to be second, the madness of Mani came forth. In the prophets it is written, “Because Jerusalem was utterly negligent, Sodom was justified by you.” Now many absurd opinions, being astray, are measured together with the greatness of the Manichaeans' false belief and are drowned in a sea of wickedness. And so that we may not attack the absurdities at random, nor seem, by stating only their names, to go to the charges against them without proof, come, let us proceed to the argument of demonstration, so that we may both dissolve their errors and bring the truth into the open. Wickedness is without substance and without real existence; it is an action rather than a substance, and an action that arises from choice in those whose choice has become sick; an action that occurs as an accident, and is easily separated from those who have been sick. If it occurred but could no longer be separated, one could say that, though wickedness is nothing by itself, no substance can ever exist without wickedness. But if choice has it as an accident, it is easily separated, so that the subject is restored pure again and has no traces of wickedness; then wickedness will be nothing by itself, unable to exist, not always existing, but vanishing, and proved by its vanishing to be unable to exist; not existing at some time, but recently come forth from a choice that fell sick. That one cannot see by itself a soul evil by substance, so made and being, nor a body evil by substance in itself, words and deeds bear witness. For if self-control is a virtue and the body is evil by substance, a self-controlled body could not be found, lest a body shameful in substance become a body of virtue; for when the body is self-controlled, it has become a body of virtue, and since it is a body of virtue, it can also be a temple. If, then, every body were given to sexual immorality, and self-control could not be found in bodies, we could attribute essential evil to the substance of bodies. But if bodies have advanced so far, and been so honoured, and clothed with such self-control, as to be a house of their Maker, a storehouse of the Lord, so that the Father and the Son dwell in them, and to receive the indwelling

of bodies, how is their argument not absurd and ridiculous? For see, when Paul says in one place, “Do you not know that your bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit within you?” and God promises through the prophet, “I will dwell in them and walk among them, and I will be their God,” he both persuades the mind and bears witness to the bodies; he rejects the idea of an essential evil and ascribes the matter to practice. For when practice supplies what is fitting in conduct, then such a disposition is given to bodies that the bodies can serve the Spirit and serve reason too. How else can the tongue serve what has been thought? For if the tongue is evil in substance and the mind good, how can it share with hearers, bringing thoughts out into the light by expression? For as self-control is not born of sexual immorality, so nothing genuine can come forth from essential evil. So when you examine each of the members, the hearing, the eyes, the tongue, the other members, and see them becoming instruments of learning, then you will accept the body and not blame it, and will see them as pure works; and you will loathe the deceiver, the enemy of truth. If some bodies were always self-controlled and never slack, and others always slack and never embraced any part of self-control, one could say that there is a division in bodies, and some are so by nature and others otherwise; and their argument would be weak in this, for it would no longer apply to all bodies, if they used such a premise. But the refutation would again be easy: how could two opposite natures subsist from the same substance, when bodies have the same substance, and the same substance be divided into two natures, so that one part is always evil and the other always good, and they are incapable of each other, fighting themselves, destroying themselves, corrupting themselves in their exercises, though the same substance never fights itself or destroys itself? When such questions are asked, their proposition will again appear nonsense and folly. But if bodies are not so, and some are not always self-controlled and others always slack, but there is fear about the self-controlled, lest they grow slack … was caught, and was drunk with the passion of desire; and there is hope also about lustful and licentious bodies, since many bodies that once grew slack have advanced so far in self-control as to have no traces of their old licentiousness, so that through improvement and greater progress they are freed from every wrinkle and spot of the old

So when the Gospel says, “Tax collectors and prostitutes go before you into the kingdom of heaven,” and when Paul says, “By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who disobeyed,” of what substance or nature were their bodies? If of the good, how were they slack? If of the bad, how did they become self-controlled? And if they passed from slackness to self-control, were once slack and later self-controlled, could be slack and could be self-controlled, and the changes bear witness, then the idea of nature has been dissolved, choice has appeared, and the body is not evil in substance, but rather serves choice, the slave of choice and not of nature, and will become whatever choice makes it. For when the will takes up teachings and comes to love them, then the body too, freed from provoking movements, honours stability and does not fight the service of actions; but when neglect and slackness provoke the mind, and a kind of slackening and laxity of the will arises, then the passion is ascribed to the body, and the method of each appears, being nothing else. And what is written is true: “See, I have set before you death and life; choose what you will,” so that the one who acts, having the choice, may justly be required to give account, and not, as forced into something, have force and the necessity of things as an excuse, nor, being so by nature, be blameless as unable to fight nature; but having the choice of either, being master in his decisions, he is required to give account and defence of his own judgment. For what he chose, he chose willingly; and for this reason he is judged for voluntary things, having undertaken the deeds by his own choice. Otherwise the saints were crowned in vain, and the wicked tortured in vain, if the cause of the action were not ascribed to those who act. What then moved the Manichaeans to bring slanders against bodies, when they are accused by the writings and the ancient oracles? For self-control, being an action, bears witness to the self-controlled body. And the oracles crying out and saying, “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, pleasing to God,” give sufficient proof; for God neither accepts what is not his own nor demands what was formed by another, lest, accusing others of violence, he himself become violent; and lest he desire another's work as though unable to make it himself. For if bodies are precious and he wishes them to be self-controlled, how did he not make what he wished? And if he did not make them, but they are so by nature as to be evil, how did he change their nature, so that they no longer have their own and are no longer evil but holy? And if a nature can be changed, how is it still a nature, being altered and

becoming the opposite of itself? For what receives changes and alterations no longer keeps the bounds of nature; but the body changes and alters, and having been slack becomes self-controlled. And the words cry, “You shall not commit sexual immorality”; they cry, “You shall not commit adultery,” removing by the command what is possible and restraining by exhortation what can be completed, and giving the word as an ally to the will, so that the mind, inclining toward virtue, may draw the body along too. Indeed the bodies of the saints advanced so far as to be honoured, and not to be empty of working or of divine power. The body of Elisha lay dead, and lying dead it raised a dead man; it drove away death, set the dead man free, sent the dead to the living, and procured resurrection for the one acted upon. And if the Manichaeans, raging against him, slander the oracle too, not honouring the law, let them at least be shamed by the parallel; let the shadow of Peter put their opinion to shame; for the shadow was a body's, and spreading over sick bodies it made the bodies free of their illnesses. Since, then, such are the arguments of proof and such the proof in deed, how are they not absurd, eager to fit together the unfitting by phrasing words? For the Manichaeans say, “We have borne the body of Satan, but the soul is God's; and the body is evil by nature, having come from evil, while the soul is good by nature, having its beginning from good. So there are two principles and two substances; and two principles have become causes, the one of the evil body, the other of the good soul. The soul, then, is good, and the body wicked.” Then how is the body often self-controlled and the soul often slack? And how does each not remain in its own rank? And it has turned out the reverse: what is the devil's has become God's, and what is God's the devil's; and the much-talked-of enmity has been dissolved, and friendship and truce have come about, God sending the soul off to the devil, and the devil sending the body over to God to serve. For the body serves when it is self-controlled; and what is God's serves the devil, for the soul serves when it disbelieves and utters blasphemies. How then is it not fitting for the wise to laugh loudly and mock them, eager as they are to introduce so absurd and ridiculous a doctrine? That the rational part itself was seized by folly, and was able again to leave the folly that seized it, and can leave it, sufficient proof is the story of the younger son, who grew slack in his father's house.

He left his father's house, set out on a journey toward the passions, lingered in prodigality; at last he took hold of himself, returned to his father and ran back, gave up shameful things, came to supplication, obtained forgiveness. For stability in teachings, becoming costly, wiped away the lament of sin and gave back a rational and divine festival. I do not know whether they slander the apostle too, or count him among the apostles because of the new things. If they slander him because of the old, what will they say about the new? And if they praise the new, what do they say about the old? For the first things do not agree with the second: he was a wolf and was found a shepherd; he was a destroyer, and today a weapon; as a defender he chooses to pour out the blood of the flock, and at last he runs risks and is eager to pour out his own blood. For he did not remain the same from the time he was born and passed the pangs of the womb until the hour of the tomb, but underwent various exchanges and changes; finding a happy end, but having lived a new course of life of opposite report. Indeed he does not blush, does not keep silent about the old things; he considers them a praise of his new life, that from such baseness he has passed and gone up to so great a summit of virtue, and he cries, “For this reason Christ Jesus came into the world, to save sinners, of whom I am the first; but for this reason I received mercy, that Jesus might show in me all his patience, as an example for those who were to believe.” And when we see the chorus of the apostles, we shall know that it is made up of sinners and profane men, who had stumbled much of old and no longer erred, and had had both, and had erred in many things. If they were of evil nature, they would always stumble; if of good nature, they would never stumble; but if, having erred much and sinned greatly, they came to not sinning and to living securely, the definition of the soul is shown to be free and self-choosing, not made so by nature for anything, but making its change by choice, turning wherever it wishes and running back wherever it prefers; living sometimes this way, sometimes that way as it wishes; and making its own will the rule of its affairs. For the rule of action is the will of the one who acts. And if they have loved what they hated and hated what they loved, and the will is not fixed in hatred, but like a bird moves lightly wherever it longs, where is nature? For nature, if it hates, must always hate what it hated, and if it loves, always love what it loved; never love what was hated nor hate what was loved. For where wills change,

and such great friendships undergo such changes, how is the matter not a contest? Jesus was once hated by Paul, and is greatly loved by the one who hated him; robbery was loved by the robber, and virtue hated; and the mind was so changed as to love exceedingly what it hated greatly. For this is proper to the virtuous man, to love what was hated and hate what was loved. Many when young loved shameful things and hated holy things; and today, having come to knowledge, they have been set apart; for this reason they are not even recognized; for this reason they have struggled with themselves; for this reason they do not keep even their old image; and yet they too are human. They did not cease to be human: the substance remains, but the manners do not remain. The substances are not dissolved, but the manners are dissolved; each one's substance, the substance of man, stands; but I no longer recognize the man: he was given to sexual immorality and has become self-controlled; he was a robber and has imitated the life of a benefactor. He has not dissolved the stamp of his face; the stamp of his appearance remains; he has not destroyed the appearance of his nature. When I see the man, I recognize who he is; but when I look at his manner, I am astonished; I no longer recognize him; the change has given the astonishment. The substances have not been altered; the body remains, not having become another; for neither was the body changed into the bodiless, nor did the soul become different in substance; but while the substances remain, the practices did not remain. What then shall we say? If while the substances remain the practices did not remain, the practices are no longer essential; for otherwise they would have remained with the substances and not been removed. But if the substances have remained and the practices have not, rather the eye that was once caught by pleasure has acquired self-control as a counter-key; the tongue that was once rash and hasty, running ahead of counsels, now obeys the bridle, confesses, and speaks what is safe; and the body, once living without rule, is now quiet and restrained and henceforth self-controlled: the eye's craving was not its nature, nor the tongue's rashness, nor the body's slackness. One must not stop at natural things and keep silent about these; it was the eye's to see, not how to see; and the tongue's to speak, not how to speak; for the quality of movements lies in choice, while the simple and harmless movement of things has been given to the members. The simple movement, then, is harmless; but the change is hidden; and when will and teachings lead the eyes

and such great friendships undergo such changes, how is the matter not a contest? Jesus was once hated by Paul, and is greatly loved by the one who hated him; robbery was loved by the robber, and virtue hated; so far was the mind changed as to love exceedingly what it hated greatly. For this is proper to the virtuous man, to love what was hated and hate what was loved. Many when young loved shameful things and hated holy things; and today, having come to knowledge, they have been set apart; for this reason they are not even recognized; for this reason they have struggled with themselves; for this reason they do not keep even their old image; and yet they too are human. They did not cease to be human: the substance remains, but the manners do not remain. The substances are not dissolved, but the manners are dissolved; each one's substance, the substance of man, stands; but I no longer recognize the man: he was given to sexual immorality and has become self-controlled; he was a robber and has imitated the life of a benefactor. He has not dissolved the stamp of his face; the stamp of his appearance remains; he has not destroyed the appearance of his nature. When I see the man, I recognize who he is; but when I look at his manner, I am astonished; I no longer recognize him; the change has given the astonishment. The substances have not been altered; the body remains, not having become another; for neither was the body changed into the bodiless, nor did the soul become different in substance; but while the substances remain, the practices did not remain. What then shall we say? If while the substances remain the practices did not remain, the practices are no longer essential; for otherwise they would have remained with the substances and not been removed. But if the substances have remained and the practices have not, rather the eye once caught by pleasure has acquired self-control as a counter-key; the tongue once rash and hasty, running ahead of counsels, now obeys the bridle, confesses, and speaks what is safe; and the body, once living without rule, is now quiet and restrained and henceforth self-controlled: the eye's craving was not its nature, nor the tongue's rashness, nor the body's slackness. One must not stop at natural things and keep silent about these; it was the eye's to see, not how to see; and the tongue's to speak, not how to speak; for the quality of movements lies in choice, while the simple and harmless movement of things has been given to the members. The simple movement, then, is harmless; but the change is hidden; and when will and teachings lead the eyes

when such a thing is done, how is it not a wonder to escape notice? How can one not say that nothing is the soul's own, but the soul makes its own whatever it wishes to make its own? And none of the shameful things exists by itself, but seems to exist when it is imagined in thought; shameful things do not exist by themselves, but receive their existence from minds that turn aside and lean away. That is why the soul needed schools, receiving sharpening and brightness from schooling; that is why the same soul often speaks to itself, rousing itself, or, roused by another, hears, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, his holy name”; and, “Praise the Lord, O my soul.” For either the rousing and stirring words have made it still braver, or, coming from one who exhorts, they give it perfect stability. But often it also rouses itself toward what is shameful and turns to exhorting itself, granting itself absurd things in another way and crying, “Soul, you have good things laid up for many years; eat, drink, be merry.” If the souls that grant themselves absurd things were different, existing by themselves, and the self-controlled things belonged to others, one could say there are two kinds of souls; and those who say this should again be laughed at; and the absurd opinion of the Manichaeans should be shamed, because they cut and divide their madness in two, uttering things that fight each other and not even honouring the consistency of their own absurd opinion. But if they are the same, and the soul that just now urged absurd things on itself will at some time urge honourable things on itself, and the one now rousing itself to holy things will at some time send itself out to shameful things, and the one that once laid claim to holy things and honoured them will at some time abandon them, it will be proved self-determining by the change. Demas was with Paul, honouring Paul's company. He was caught by the devil's desire; he left the apostolic company; and becoming a fugitive he hastened to the glory of the world: “For Demas has forsaken me, having loved the present age, and has gone to Thessalonica.” Gehazi too once followed Elisha and was counted in his service; and when an opportunity for money appeared, he left divine things, and taking money, sold his own will in exchange for finding money. Judas, being among the apostles, once frightened away fevers and led the campaign against demons; he was one of those who said, “Lord, see, even the demons are subject to us”; and he who wielded a whip against demons, caught by a little bait, was hooked by desire. And these were such, not having passed into the substance of shameful things through such participation. But what does he say about Peter or Thomas? He who once

was a fisherman and was wicked; for he was not sinless, being human; and when called he left the nets and the fish and followed, leaving everything, so as to have Jesus alone; and abandoning the first things, he was not deprived of what he longed for. For he found what he sought, and came to such a state as to hear, “You are Simon son of Jonah; you shall be called Cephas, which is translated Peter”; as to hear, “I will give you, Peter, the keys of the kingdom of heaven”; as to be testified, “Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.” Later he was caught by a rash word, and coming under rebuke and not fleeing the rebuke, he heard, “Get behind me, Satan; you are a stumbling block to me, for you do not think the things of God but the things of men.” Just now he was receiving the keys of heaven; the Father spoke in him; Peter instead of Simon; and instead of the deed, he was caught by a word of rebuke. But the stumble was healed by improvement; the rebuke became a medicine; the will held to the healing; and he was great and divine, having healed the stumble and suffered no loss of what he had chosen. When the Lord was handed over and led to the high priest's court, the vigorous Peter was questioned and put to shame; the keeper of the keys was shaken; outside the doors he was in danger of not speaking the truth; the one who had been filled emptied his will; he was conquered by one girl; he feared a servant girl; he could not face a slave woman; the God-fearing, the God-loving, he who knew the manifestations, the eyewitness of the Lord fell through cowardice. I say this not to accuse; for he is persuaded that I speak these things so that the truth may not be slandered; I speak for the truth; and I bring forward the servant of the truth, so that falsehood may not win; I bring forward the minister of the truth. Since they want there to be natures and rage in their talk about nature, I have brought forward Peter so that nature may be refuted; for the many changes show what is accomplished by choice; and the babble about nature will fall idle, while judgment gives the prizes to choice; for we live by choice, by choice we store up our achievement. That is why I fear lest we be caught; indeed we always labour, lest, thinking ourselves secure, we fall suddenly into ruin through negligence. For our sake he says, “I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest after preaching to others I myself become disqualified.” I fear the word about being disqualified, knowing the slipperiness of choice; I secure its facility by diligence; I wall in the ease of choice with the labour of practice. And these things Peter both says and writes and rejoices in, so that both his stumbles and his achievements may become an introduction to the teachings. For this reason the sins of the saints too

have been told. For what harm was there in keeping the stumble silent? Who is the writer? Did the wicked accuse the good? Did not the good relate the stumbles of the good, and others their own? Paul his own; John Peter's; then Thomas's; one another's. If the accusers had been wicked, we would have charged it to hatred, and blamed envy and malice, since such words were brought forward by those who hated. But if they themselves told their own, or the good told the faults of the good, or rather the Holy Spirit in the saints spoke them; and the Lord himself related the stumbles of his servants and did not keep silent: we seek the cause. They were not told so that they might be slandered; they have cast off slander; but so that, if their sins were kept silent, they might not be supposed sinless by nature. So the account is for the sake of truth, and the telling of stumbles introduces truth. O new wonder! The sins of the saints were written so that the truth might be known: that, born of the same and born in the same way, they gained the greater by virtue, not winning by nature but distinguished by virtue. And if with Peter and the other apostles it is not nature but choice that has the defining power, among whom shall we find nature sinless, when we did not find it among the apostles? Where shall we be able to track it? We busy ourselves in vain with what does not exist. See, I question Peter; see, I examine Thomas; I do not speak of old things, I do not mention David; though I ought to have mentioned him, so that they might receive accusations from the things they ignorantly pray, and refutation from the things they study. Since they have studied the Gospels, the refutation has been brought from the Gospels. For this reason they call the law lawless, not studying it; for this reason they have no knowledge of the Gospel either, not having received the beginning of the Gospels: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet.” They have thrown out the beginning of teachings for the beginning of the webs of wickedness. … He who hides his benefaction in the soul, if he enters and comes within, divine and sacred festivals are held, dances that cannot be spoken, a gladness honoured by silence; for at once he draws the mind up, gives the soul wings, and makes it soar toward better things. Indeed, if anyone sees him, he will no longer look to himself, but struck by the beauty he has beheld, he thinks everything without beauty. Because of his comeliness he cries, “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity”; he cries, “I count all things refuse, that I may gain Christ.” But if he knocks, and the mind is slow and uses sleep and becomes the cause of delay, he lets his voice be heard: “Open to me, my sister,

my bride, for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night”; to show his friendship and signify his care; that even when shut out, the Word bears it, and being outside endures it, and does not depart until, by the persistence of the request and the knocking, the mind opens itself and gives place to the one who knocks. But sorcerers too go about, and false prophets and false christs, sometimes knocking and sometimes digging through: using a softer knock and imitating the true knocking, so that the mind, perhaps deceived by the likeness of the knock, may open as to one familiar and known; and not refusing even to break through walls, but eager to dig through, so as to entice minds by deceit or by force. Indeed they have taken some by force and bewitched others by deceit. That is why the wise and holy, being keepers of the keys, mixing knowledge with watchfulness, are never dug through because they are watchful, and never deceived because of their knowledge; for knowledge gives no place to sorcery, and watchfulness none to those who dig through. For this reason let us, holy men and holy women, keep the keys of our minds, conquering deceit by knowledge and wooing for ourselves inviolability by watchfulness.