BOOK ONE. Manifold ... ... ... let us understand those very things in the deeds themselves. Yet for them it is enough to have fitted even some appearance of an empty likeness, since the comparison must be wholly fulfilled from what follows, and must be sought as solid from present things. Now every work contained in the sacred volumes both announces in words, and expresses in deeds, and confirms by examples the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which, sent from the Father, born a man of a Virgin through the Spirit, he came. For he, through all the time of this appointed age, by true and complete prefigurations in the patriarchs, either begets, or washes, or sanctifies, or chooses, or distinguishes, or redeems the Church:
by the sleep of Adam, by the flood of Noah, by the blessing of Melchizedek, by the justification of Abraham, by the birth of Isaac, by the servitude of Jacob. Finally, through all time, the whole of prophecy, the fashioning of the mystery, was granted so that the flesh to be assumed by him might be brought to knowledge. And because in this little book it has seemed good to show that the whole of his coming and preaching and passion and resurrection and of our gathering is set forth in every single man and time and thing, as it were an image in a mirror, I shall not recount some things in passing. But I shall treat all things in their several times, beginning from Adam, from whom knowledge of the human race is granted, so that what was consummated in the Lord may be known to have been prefigured in very many things from the beginning of the world.
CONCERNING ADAM. Adam by his very name prefigures the nativity of the Lord; for according to the Hebrew tongue 'Adam,' which in Greek is 'gêpyrra,' means in Latin 'fiery earth,' and Scripture is accustomed to call the flesh of the human body 'earth.' This flesh, born of a Virgin in the Lord through the Spirit, changed into a new form foreign to itself, was made conformable to spiritual glory according to the Apostle: the second man from heaven, and Adam the heavenly one, because the earthly Adam is an image of the one to come. Therefore, on the authority of so great an author, we receive even the name of Adam not without some contemplation of the one to come. There follows the fact that, Adam being put to sleep, Eve is begotten from his side and bone. And when he is awakened, such a prophecy also follows:
'This now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken from her man, and the two shall be in one flesh.' Here there is no labour for me; for the Apostle, when he called to mind this very prophecy, says: 'This is a great mystery, but I speak in Christ and in the Church.' Yet we read that only the bone of Adam was taken away; and how is it said 'flesh of my flesh'? This matter can indeed be referred to the trustworthiness of the present deeds: that, since the bone which was taken from his side was clothed with flesh into a woman's body through him who is able to do all things, God — because the bone was drawn from flesh and, again clothed with flesh, came forth into a body — so that, as bone is from bone, so too flesh should be from flesh.
But the Lord in the Gospels, when he was tempted by the Jews about the giving of a bill of divorce, shows that this was said thus by himself rather than by Adam, saying: 'Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female?' As he said: 'For this cause a man shall leave father and mother, and the two shall be in one flesh.' For this follows after that which was said, 'flesh of my flesh.' Therefore the prophecy followed upon the thing which was being accomplished in Adam. For when the Lord, who made male and female, said that from his bone came bone and from his flesh came flesh, he himself spoke through Adam that which was wholly done in Adam himself; nor did he detract trustworthiness from the deeds, and he showed that from himself was prefigured that which was being enacted in another.
For since the Word was made flesh, and the Church is a member of Christ — she who was born from his side through water and made alive through blood — and since again the flesh, in which the Word abiding before the ages, which is the Son of God, was born, abides in us through the sacrament, he taught plainly that in Adam and Eve was contained the figure of himself and of the Church, which after the sleep of his death he signifies to have been sanctified by the communion of his flesh. He speaks also the same thing through the Apostle: that Adam did not sin, but the woman, sinning, was in transgression; yet she shall be saved through the procreation of children, if only they abide in faith. The Church, therefore, is from publicans and sinners and gentiles:
only by her second and heavenly Adam not sinning will she herself, the sinner, be saved through the generation of children who abide in faith. But it is not fitting to understand it thus, that the woman was not redeemed from her sin by the Lord, and that she would be baptized in vain if she were rather to be freed by the merit of childbearing. Nor even by the very generation of children would she be safe, since she is not saved unless those who are begotten remain faithful. And I know not how it is just that one should be made guilty by another's sin, or innocent by another's merit. But surely, comparing spiritual things with spiritual, we shall thus perceive above all that the Apostle refers the deeds of the great mystery in Adam and Eve, proclaiming that they belong already to Christ and the Church.
And these things indeed it befits us to reckon to have been said by him spiritually, in such a way that the discourse is to be referred no less to the present teaching and to the instruction of those whom he was admonishing. For proclaiming the manifold mercy of God in the first Epistle to the Corinthians, in the sanctifying of unbelievers through the marriages of the faithful, here too he taught that a sanctification of this sort is to be bestowed through the procreation of children who nevertheless believe, so that, just as the fellowship of one believing spouse profited the unbeliever through marriage, so the procreation of the faithful might come to the aid of unbelievers. This too is to be contemplated in the sleep of Adam and the embodiment of Eve: the sacrament of the mystery hidden in Christ and in the Church:
for in it is contained the faith and the rationale of bodily resurrection. For in the creation of the woman no clay is any longer taken up, nor is earth shaped into a form, nor is inanimate matter stirred by God's inbreathing into a living soul; but flesh grows upon the bone, and to the flesh the perfection of a body is given, and upon the perfection of the body there follows spiritual vigour. This order of resurrection God spoke through Ezekiel, teaching in those things which were to be done the power of his might. For there all things come together: the flesh is present, the spirit flies to it, and to God nothing perishes from his works, to whom, for the effecting of his own body, those things which were not were present. And this sacrament is, according to the Apostle, hidden from the ages in God:
that the gentiles are fellow-heirs and of the same body and joint-partakers of his promise in Christ, who is able, according to the same Apostle, to make the body of our lowliness conformable to the body of his glory. Therefore the Church, after the sleep of his passion, with the heavenly Adam rising again, recognizes her own bone, her own flesh — no longer created from clay nor quickened by inbreathing, but growing upon the bone and made perfect into a body from a body, with the spirit flying to it. For those who are in Christ shall rise according to Christ, in whom already the resurrection of all flesh has been consummated, since he himself was born in our flesh with the power of God, in which he was begotten of the Father before the ages.
And because Jew and Greek, barbarian and Scythian, slave and free, male and female, are all one in Christ, since the flesh is recognized as being from flesh, and the Church is the body of Christ, and the mystery which is in Adam and Eve is proclaimed unto Christ and unto the Church, there has already been perfected under Adam and Eve, at the beginning of the age, whatever is prepared for the Church through Christ unto the consummation of the times. CONCERNING CAIN AND ABEL. Upon the first prefiguration of Christ and the Church there follow the deeds of Cain and Abel, prefiguring in themselves the diversity of two peoples, and marking by their very names and offices the character and pursuits of each. For Cain was a tiller of the earth, and Abel a keeper of sheep.
Now each of them presented to God, out of his own fruits, a gift of the mystery: but the gifts of Abel are regarded, while Cain's are not looked upon. Yet the day of the sacrifice was undistinguished, and so was the place, and to God who beholds all things how is either the one in his sight or the other outside his sight? But by this signification it is taught that God's regard is an indication of things well-pleasing, and that, although all things are subject to him, nevertheless his gaze goes toward those things which are worthy. Yet nothing had before been said of Cain's character, so that his sacrifice should displease. But in the things which followed, the providence of God is understood, who did not receive the sacrifices of one who was to rage against his brother. For foreknowledge of the future with God is a proof of the deed:
for he who was about to slay, as though he had already slain, is unworthy of God's regard. Now in the tilling of the earth is contained the signification of carnal works, and every fruit of the flesh is in vices, which, being an abomination to God, drive his regard away from themselves. Regard, therefore, is not had toward the sacrifice which is from the labours of the earth. And only the first-fruits of the sheep in their fat are pleasing — namely the inward fruits — and the sacrifices of our very own conscience give delight, and those things which, pleasing among the first-fruits of the sheep, invite toward themselves the regard of the divine will.
For since Christ is the first-fruits, the firstborn of creation, the firstborn from the dead, and also the prince of priests, so that in all things he himself holds the primacy — himself also the Sheep, and, according to his bodily nativity, one from among the sheep — the sacrifice of Abel is already approvable under the sacrament of the Church, which thereafter would offer a victim from the first-fruits of the sheep of the holy body. And so Cain, envying, displeasing by his sacrifice and against God's decree, when admonished to be at peace, the approvable one is slain by the unapprovable. He is questioned as a guilty man unto the penitence of confession, but toward the increase of his crime he denies it;
despairing of the resurrection but thinking himself dead by death, yet groaning and trembling he is reserved unto the judgment of sevenfold vengeance, and he is cursed by all the earth which received the blood of his brother. Now the interpretation of the name Cain is 'laughter,' but of Abel 'weeping.' Are not these things which are set forth above consummated in the peoples? The offering of the younger is well-pleasing; the Jew envies the Christian; warned in vain by the prophets, he burned for his slaughter. He does not attain pardon even through the confession of penitence, but boldly denies the crime committed against God.
Despairing of the glory of the resurrection, and made subject — with Jerusalem taken — to the power of those who rule, groaning and trembling he is reserved unto the judgment of vengeance, distinguished from the saints by the very interpretations of the names, the Lord saying: 'Woe to those who laugh, for they shall weep!' and: 'Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted!' And that the Lord might teach that all things befit the prefiguration of each people, he said: 'Therefore behold, I send to you prophets and wise men and scribes, and some of them you will kill in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that upon you may come all the just blood which has been shed upon the earth, from the blood of just Abel unto the blood of Zechariah son of Barachiah, whom you slew between the temple and the altar.'
And so the blood of Abel is required from him who, according to the prefiguration of Cain, persecuted the just and was cursed by the earth which, opening its mouth, received the blood of his brother. For in the body of Christ, in which are both the apostles and the Church, the whole flesh and posterity of them took upon itself the blood of all, they themselves crying out: 'His blood be upon us and upon our children.' And so the trustworthiness of the effects followed upon the prefiguration of the deeds done in Cain, nor can those be separated from the example of the prefiguration upon whom the vengeance of the same guilt has followed. Moreover, even in that which was said: 'If you offer rightly, but do not rightly divide, have you not sinned?' — beyond the effect of the present matter, the figure of the future is also contained;
for nothing pleases God except what is common and shared and made friendly. Therefore the people, awaiting the promises of God through the Law, even if with observance of the precepts it offers rightly to God, nevertheless, unless it shares this very Law of God — which is a shadow of things to come — with the congregation of the gentiles, has sinned. Rightly, therefore, not dividing, it will be held in the charge of crime. For Cain, envying his brother, had not shared with himself the grace of the sacrifice regarded by God, and, because he did not divide rightly, was constituted a sinner. By which example the sacrifices of the faithful from among the gentiles, approved by God, unless those who are under the Law divide them, even if they use the Law rightly, are in the charge of crime. CONCERNING LAMECH. But not even in Lamech are things done outside the figure of the future.
He is reported to have been the husband of two wives, to whose names was added even the name of a third woman, though one free from marriage to him; and this same Lamech is likewise written to have said this: 'And Lamech said to his wives, Adah and Zillah: Hear my voice, ye wives of Lamech, give heed to my words; for I have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt; for sevenfold vengeance shall be taken for Cain, but for Lamech seventy times seven.' And who is this man, more just than that just Abel, whose death is now to be avenged with so much greater a penalty? The name of the slain is passed over in silence; the wound is referred not to the slain but to the slayer, and the hurt is taught to be rather the striker's, not the stricken's. The killing of a young man is announced to the wives;
although the names of three women are contained, the discourse is addressed only to two. The impious man prophesies, and beyond the penalty of Cain he heaps up vengeance for the slaughter committed by himself. These things are not to be heard in passing, but in them the figuration of things to come is to be searched out. Lamech has the figure of the prince of priests, who, with the Jews and gentiles consenting to him, fastens the Lord to the cross; for from the hall of the prince of priests this same Lord was led to Herod, the people of the believers being kept apart from fellowship in the crime, and therefore he glories in the slaughter of the young man before two as it were his associates and wives. And because there is no sense of punishment concerning him, he took upon himself both the wounds and the hurt of the injury and slaughter. He spoke also by prophetic instinct;
for even then the prince of priests prophesied without knowing it, as is written in the Gospels: 'But one of them, Caiaphas by name, being high priest of that year, said to them: You know nothing at all, nor do you consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not.' And this he said not of himself, but being high priest of that year, he prophesied. Therefore all things come together for themselves in persons, in things, in effect, and the trustworthiness of the deeds embraces the figure of things to come. The number too of the penalty in Cain and Lamech is written down not without some signification.
For since, according to the prophets, a sevenfold penalty is appointed upon the unjust, Peter, upon whom as upon a living foundation the Lord was building the Church, asks whether he should forgive one sinning against him according to the Law seven times; to whom the Lord answered that he should pardon seventy times seven, teaching by this signification that the very penalty of his passion is to be remitted to those who would believe, since, in as great a measure as its vengeance had been multiplied, in that same measure again pardon would abound. Then Seth is born, and in the place of the slain Abel another seed is raised up in him, Eve speaking thus: 'God has raised up for me another seed in place of Abel, whom Cain slew.'
Now the interpretation of the name Seth is 'foundation of faith,' and since Abel was just, and since Seth was begotten in the place of the just one, it is understood that the generation of the saints, always reserved by God and renewed through successions, is a Church that will sustain faith for the faithful upon Peter as upon the foundations of faith. CONCERNING NOAH. The things done concerning Noah cannot be denied to be full both of the powers of God and of examples of things to come. For however dull the wit may be, or however averse from understanding of the truth the will, yet things were there said and done which draw out a sense of the truth even from the unwilling. And so that the prophetic power may be understood in the individual effects of things, what is to be compared to what thing must be set forth briefly.
For Noah, whom the Lord assumed from a Virgin, prefigures the Man; and, that this very thing may become known from the words of Scripture itself, it must be learned what sort of prophecy of him there was on the part of Lamech his father: 'And Lamech begot a son and called his name Noah, saying: This one shall make us rest from our works and from the sorrows of our hands and from the earth which the Lord God has cursed.' But these things, as I judge, cannot fully befit that Noah of whom the discourse is. For what rest did he bring to the human race, or from what works did he cause it to cease? Nay rather, under him the whole company of men is destroyed, the flood is poured out; the earth is given back to the sight of that man, and life is lived afterwards even amid graver labours.
And where has rest been given back through Noah? Now in him who is to make rest, the power of making it is designated. But further, it neither befits the nature of man, nor is it read as written, nor is it understood by the fact itself, that Noah did any of these things; but very many things which were proper to Noah, Scripture has set forth most plainly: when he is approved by God, when he is found just, when he is bidden to make an ark, when he enters into it, when he sends out the raven, when he both receives and sends back the dove, when he goes forth from the ark, when he plants a vineyard, when he is made drunk and stripped naked by its fruit, when he is mocked by Ham, when he is covered by Shem and Japheth, when he appoints a curse upon one and the order and manner of blessing upon two. These things, as they were done by him, are to be understood.
But a great sacrament of the future is contained in these things, and concerning each we shall treat in its own place, when it is fitting to confer things and persons with one another. Therefore to this Noah will our Lord be compared, who is the Word made flesh, who also says in the Gospels: 'Come to me, all you who labour and are burdened, and I will refresh you. Take my yoke upon you and learn, for I am meek and humble of heart, and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is sweet and my burden is light.'
Therefore he makes to rest and imparts rest to souls, and, on account of the impending judgment, into the ark of his teaching and his Church he stores away his sons — both the begotten and the named — and bestows the Holy Spirit, and dies, and is mocked, and rises again, and appoints for the human race a penalty and a sanctification of deeds rightly or wrongly done. And in this indeed, when Noah is bidden to enter the ark or to go forth from it, the rationale of the sanctification of the Church is to be contemplated. For it is written: 'You shall go into the ark, you and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives'; and again: 'The Lord God said to Noah, saying: Go forth from the ark, you and your wife and your sons and your sons' wives.'
He joins the sexes of those entering the ark to one another — the men to the man, the women to the woman — signifying, namely, that those about to enter the Church ought to be continent; that each would afterwards receive the abundance of his own marriage ... ... ... ... when the dove was thrice sent out. And indeed the following sending-out is not uncertain as to what it prefigures, since it returns with the fruitful leaves of the olive, no longer to be received by hand, but flying back again.
And this was fulfilled when, having received the Holy Spirit, the seventy disciples, sent out to preach the Gospel, returned with the glory of the unclean spirits subjected to them, the dove bringing back the fruit of God's mercy — which is signified in the olive — by the Holy Spirit; and because, when these afterwards departed from the Lord, he would have no rest at all, nevertheless the dove flew back to Noah with fruit, signifying by this the fruit of the Holy Spirit in the second return and the demons subjected, and no rest as yet for the disciples departing from the Lord. But the third sending-out and flight prefigures its dwelling-place — which is in the believer — with the Holy Spirit sent forth to remain forever in the souls of the faithful.
Now indeed, from the fruit of the planted vineyard, drunkenness is a figure of the passion. For 'the Lord brought a vine out of Egypt and planted it,' and again: 'the vineyard of the Lord of Sabaoth is the house of Israel.' For from the works of his transplanted and planted people is the cause of the passion. And if perchance someone should think that this drunkenness of Noah does not pertain to the figure of the Lord's death, he will be refuted by what follows, although the cup drunk in the Gospels shows the death of the passion. Now, though there were three sons, the nakedness of the father is mocked by one and again covered by two; but when the two covered it with one accord, with the third cursed, in the two there is nevertheless a diverse blessing of one and the same deed.
Under these three sons, however, the whole of mankind is signified: that is, those living under the Law, those justified under grace, and the Gentiles. Of these, the Gentiles mock the death of the Lord and the naked body of God, while in the two who cover the nakedness the Law and grace are contained. And since Japheth is settled in the tents of Shem, he displays the figure of the Gentiles, who have been led to the faith; but Shem bears the person of the people of Israel. Sarah too signifies the Church, Hagar the synagogue; and the seed called in Isaac is shown to be Christ.
In him too the prefiguration of the Passion is set forth: when he is summoned by his father for the sacrifice, when he takes up the wood of the offering, when a ram is present for the completion of the sacrifice. In the name of Abram one letter is added; in that which is given to Sarah, a hundred is contained; and the Saviour, leaving the ninety-nine on the mountains, went to seek the one that had strayed. Therefore one number is added in the name of Abram. For the one Lord Jesus Christ, born of a virgin, is one; and by that one all the sins of believers have been cleansed. And what was to be fulfilled through himself in Abraham he prefigures.
He, by the addition of one, is called the father of the Gentiles; He himself, by the assumption of one, is constituted father and redeemer of the Gentiles, the hundredth sheep being restored to Sarah, that is, to the Church, the firstfruits, the heavenly Jerusalem. Just as that householder in the Gospel visited the barren fig tree by a threefold coming, so holy mother Church, by the yearly return, has marked out for herself the coming of the Saviour through the hidden span of three weeks. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost. He came before the Law, because by natural understanding it was made known to each what he must do and what he must follow.
He came under the Law, because by the examples of the patriarchs and the proclamations of the prophets he confirmed the legal decrees for the seed of Abraham. He came a third time, after the Law, through grace, for the calling of the Gentiles, that from the rising of the sun to its setting the children might learn to praise the name of the Lord—whom, even to the end of the world, He does not cease to exhort to the worship of His majesty. Concerning Isaac: Rebecca has a twofold figure, of marriage and of childbirth, and in marriage she bears the type of the Church: she waters the camels, that is, the Gentiles made subject to Christ; through her earrings she teaches the hearing of faith; through the bracelets of her hands she shows the adornment of good works; questioned about the marriage, she answers according to the manner of those to be joined to Christ, so that she may come to the sight.
She goes forth from her father's house, showing that unless one has renounced vices and lusts, he cannot be Christ's servant; she signifies two nations, two peoples. Concerning Jacob: as Scripture interprets the meaning of this name—and Esau said to Jacob: 'Give me to taste of this red stew, for I am faint'; on this account his name was called Edom. Then he sold his birthright for food, saying: 'Behold, I am dying, and of what use to me are these rights of primogeniture?' Now among the ancients this dignity belonged to the firstfruits, that the firstborn should obtain the inheritance of the paternal house, the brothers who came after being subject to him.
Therefore, since for those living in the body the dignity of the firstborn pertains to life—which, under the prefiguration of the unbelieving people, Esau was selling for the sake of carnal desires—he does not despair of the present honour of the firstborn when he says, 'Behold, I am dying, and of what use to me are these rights of primogeniture?'—for before death that primacy which belongs to men was received; but rather, because, bearing in himself the form of the people, the firstborn himself through the Law—for this people had first been chosen for the inheritance of God—fell away from the hope of resurrection and of the glory of God, and, taken up with the desires of the body, declared that he had despaired of his own honour, which, as firstborn, it had befitted him to hope for after death.
When Esau had thus despaired of his firstfruits, the rest is carried out both according to the truth of the deed and according to the power of the prefiguration. Isaac, then, being dim of sight, according to custom bids Esau prepare for him food from the hunt and that he be blessed by him before the time of his death. When Rebecca had learned of this, she urges Jacob to prepare quickly food for his father from two kids and to be clothed in Esau's robe; and that his hands, because they are smooth, and his neck, be disguised with the skins of the kids bound upon him. When these things were done, he seized the blessing which had been prepared for Esau. Thereupon he is blessed with such words: 'Behold, the smell of my son is as the smell of a full field which the Lord has blessed.'