According
to a metaphor drawn from shepherds, who lead the sheep, is hereby
understood the Instructor, who leads the children—the Shepherd who
tends the babes. For the babes are simple, being figuratively described as
sheep. “And they shall all,” it is said, “be one flock,
and one shepherd.”1142
is employed variously. For there is the instruction of him who is led
and learns, and that of him who leads and teaches; and there is, thirdly,
the guidance itself; and fourthly, what is taught, as the commandments
enjoined.
As therefore the general directs the phalanx,
consulting the safety of his soldiers, and the pilot steers the vessel,
desiring to save the passengers; so also the Instructor guides the
children to a saving course of conduct, through solicitude for us; and,
in general, whatever we ask in accordance with reason from God to be
done for us, will happen to those who believe in the Instructor. And
just as the helmsman does not always yield to the winds, but sometimes,
turning the prow towards them, opposes the whole force of the hurricanes;
so the Instructor never yields to the blasts that blow in this world,
nor commits the child to them like a vessel to make shipwreck on a
wild and licentious course of life; but, wafted on by the favouring
breeze of the Spirit of truth, stoutly holds on to the child’s
helm,—his ears, I mean,—until He bring him safe to anchor
in the haven of heaven.
They say that Phœnix was the instructor of
Achilles, and Adrastus of the children of Crœsus; and Leonides
of Alexander, and Nausithous of Philip. But Phœnix was women-mad,
Adrastus was a fugitive. Leonides did not curtail the pride of Alexander,
nor Nausithous reform the drunken Pellæan. No more was the Thracian
Zopyrus able to check the fornication of Alcibiades; but Zopyrus was a
boughtslave, and Sicinnus, the tutor of the children of Themistocles, was
a lazy domestic. They say also that he invented the Sicinnian dance. Those
have not escaped our attention who are called royal instructors among the
Persians; whom, in number four, the kings of the Persians select with
the greatest care from all the Persians and set over their sons. But
the children only learn the use of the bow, and on reaching maturity
have sexual intercourse with sisters, and mothers, and women, wives and
courtesans innumerable, practiced in intercourse like the wild boars.
Who, then, has the power of
leading in and out? Is it not the Instructor? This was He who appeared
to Abraham, and said to him, “I am thy God, be accepted before
Me;”1148
and in a way most befitting an instructor, forms him
into a faithfulchild, saying, “And be blameless; and I will
make My covenant between Me and thee, and thy seed.” There is
the communication of the Instructor’s friendship. And He most
manifestly appears as Jacob’s instructor. He says accordingly to
him, “Lo, I am with thee, to keep thee in all the way in which thou
shalt go; and I will bring thee back into this land: for I will not leave
thee till I do what I have told thee.”1149
Now that the Word was
at once Jacob’s trainer and the Instructor of humanity [appears
from this]—“He asked,” it is said, “His name,
and said to him, Tell me what is Thy name.” And he said, “Why
is it that thou askest My name?” For He reserved the new name for
the new people—the babe; and was as yet unnamed, the LordGod not
having yet become man. Yet Jacob called the name of the place, “Face
of God.” “For I have seen,” he says, “God face
to face; and my life is preserved.”1152
The face of God is the Word
by whom God is manifested
and made known. Then also was he
named Israel, because he saw God the Lord. It was God, the Word, the
Instructor, who said to him again afterwards, “Fear not to go
down into Egypt.”1153
See how the Instructor follows the righteous
man, and how He anoints the athlete, teaching him to trip up his
antagonist.
It is He also who teachesMoses to act as instructor.
For the Lord says, “If any one sin before Me, him will I blot out
of My book; but now, go and lead this people into the place which I told
thee.”1154
Here He is the teacher of the art of instruction. For
it was really the Lord that was the instructor of the ancient people
by Moses; but He is the instructor of the new people by Himself, face
to face. “For behold,” He says to Moses, “My angel
shall go before thee,” representing the evangelical and commanding
power of the Word, but guarding the Lord’s prerogative. “In
the day on which I will visit them,”1155
He says, “I will
bring their sins on them; that is, on the day on which I will sit as judge
I will render the recompense of their sins.” For the same who is
Instructor is judge, and judges those who disobey Him; and the loving
Word will not pass over their transgression in silence. He reproves,
that they may repent. For “the Lord willeth the repentance of
the sinner rather than his death.”1156
And let us as babes,
hearing of the sins of others, keep from similar transgressions,
through dread of the threatening, that we may not have to undergo like
sufferings. What, then, was the sin which they committed? “For
in their wrath they slew men, and in their impetuosity they hamstrung
bulls. Cursed be their anger.”1157
Who, then, would train us
more lovingly than He? Formerly the older people had an old covenant,
and the lawdisciplined the people with fear, and the Word was an angel;
but to the fresh and new people has also been given a new covenant,
and the Word has appeared, and fear is turned to love, and that
mystic angel is born—Jesus. For this same Instructor said then,
“Thou shalt fear the LordGod;”1158
Wherefore also this is enjoined on us: “Cease from your own works,
from your old sins;” “Learn to do well;” “Depart
from evil, and do good;” “Thou hast lovedrighteousness,
and hatediniquity.” This is my new covenant written in the
old letter. The newness of the word must not, then, be made ground
of reproach. But the Lord hath also said in Jeremiah: “Say not
that I am a youth: before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee, and
before I brought thee out of the womb I sanctified thee.”1160
Such
allusions prophecy can make to us, destined in the eye of God to faith
before the foundation of the world; but now babes, through the recent
fulfilment of the will of God, according to which we are born now
to calling and salvation. Wherefore also He adds, “I have set
thee for a prophet to the nations,”1161
not by Moses, but by the Word, and through Moses His
servant. Wherefore it was only temporary; but eternalgrace and truth were
by JesusChrist. Mark the expressions of Scripture: of the law only is it
said “was given;” but truth being the grace of the Father,
is the eternalwork of the Word; and it is not said to be given,
but to be by Jesus, without whom nothing was.1163
Presently,
therefore, Moses prophetically, giving place to the perfect Instructor the
Word, predicts both the name and the office of Instructor, and committing
to the people the commands of obedience, sets before them the Instructor.
“A prophet,” says he, “like Me shall God raise up to you
of your brethren,” pointing out Jesus the Son of God, by an allusion
to Jesus the son of Nun; for the name of Jesus predicted in the law was
a shadow of Christ. He adds, therefore, consulting the advantage of the
people, “Him shall ye hear;”1164
him He threatens. Such a
name, then, he predicts as that of the Instructor, who is the author of
salvation. Wherefore prophecy invests Him with a rod, a rod of discipline,
of rule, of authority; that those whom the persuasive word heals not,
the threatening may heal; and whom the threatening heals not, the rod
may heal; and whom the rodheals not, the fire may devour. “There
shall come forth,” it is said, “a rod out of the root of
Jesse.”1166
For
to be chastised of the Lord, and instructed, is deliverance from death.
And by the same prophet He says:
“Thou shalt rule them with
a rod of iron.”1168
Thus also the apostle, in the Epistle to the
Corinthians, being moved, says, “What will ye? Shall I come unto
you with a rod, or in love, in the spirit of meekness?”1169
