The Ear of the Soul

So much, then, has been written about the one who truly knows — and written in passing, as it were. Now we go on to what follows, and we must look at faith once more. For there are some who draw a distinction here: faith, they say, has to do with the Son, and knowledge with the Spirit. But they have not noticed that in order to believe truly in the Son we have to believe that he is the Son, and that he came, and how, and for what, and about his suffering; and we have to know who the Son of God is. Knowledge does not exist without faith, and faith does not exist without knowledge. Nor is the Father without the Son, for the Son is with the Father. And the Son is the true teacher about the Father. So in order to believe in the Son we must know the Father, with whom the Son also is; and again, in order to know the Father we must believe in the Son, that it is the Son of God who teaches. For the road from faith to knowledge runs by way of the Son and ends at the Father. And the knowledge of the Son and of the Father which follows the rule of true knowledge — the knowledge that really is knowledge — is the taking hold of the truth, and the grasp of it, by means of the truth. [a]

We, then, are the people who believe what is not believed, and who know what is not known — that is, we know what is unknown to everyone and disbelieved by everyone, and believed and known by only a few. And we know it not by describing our actions in speech, but by the practice of contemplation. Happy is the man who speaks into the ears of those who hear. Now faith is the ear of the soul. And this is what the Lord hints faith is when he says, “Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear” — so that by believing a man may take in what the Lord says, as he says it. Homer, too, the oldest of the poets, uses the word “hear” where he means “perceive” — putting the particular word in place of the general one — when he writes:

For, in short, the agreement and harmony of the faith on both sides work toward one end: salvation. In the apostle we have a witness who cannot go wrong: “For I long to see you, so that I may share some spiritual gift with you and you may be strengthened — that is, that I may be encouraged along with you, by the faith we hold in common, yours and mine.” And a little further on he adds, “The righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith.” So the apostle plainly announces a twofold faith — or rather one faith that admits of growth and of being brought to completion; for the faith we all share lies underneath as a foundation. That is why, to those who wanted to be healed and were moved by faith, he added, “Your faith has saved you.” But the faith that is well built on top of that foundation is finished off in the believer, and is brought to completion again by the faith that comes from instruction and from the word, so that the commands may be carried out. The apostles were men of that kind. It is said of them that faith “moved mountains and transplanted trees.” And when they saw how great its power was, they asked “that faith might be added to them” — a faith that bites healthily into the ground “like a grain of mustard seed” and grows magnificently there, until the reasons of the highest things rest upon it.

Suppose a man knows God by nature. That is what Basilides thinks, who calls a superior order of intelligence both faith and kingship at once, and a created thing worthy of the being that made it; who explains that what stands near God is not power but being and nature and substance; and who says that faith is not the reasoned assent of a soul exercising its own free choice, but an undefined beauty belonging to the creature from the first. If that is so, then the commands of both the Old and the New Testament are pointless — pointless, that is, if a man is saved by nature, as Valentinus would have it, and is by nature a believer and one of the chosen, as Basilides thinks. On that showing, nature would have been able at some time or other to shine out on its own, without the Savior ever appearing. But if they say that the Savior’s visit was necessary, then the properties they claim for nature are gone from them: the chosen are saved by instruction, and by being made clean, and by doing good works. Take Abraham. He heard and believed the voice that promised him, under the oak at Mamre, “I will give this land to you and to your descendants.” Was he one of the chosen, or not? If he was not, how did he believe on the spot, as though by nature? And if he was, their theory is finished, since even before the coming of the Lord a chosen people was found, and it was saved: “For it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” And if anyone, following Marcion, should dare to say that the Craftsman saved the man who believed in him even before the Lord came — the chosen being saved by a salvation properly their own — then the power of the Good One is thrown into the shade. For only late, and after the Craftsman they name with such fine words, did it make its attempt at saving, and then by instruction and in imitation of him. But if the Good One does the saving, on their account, then what he saves is not his own; and he does not undertake this rescue with the consent of the one who formed the creation, but by force or by fraud. And how can he still be good, acting like that, and coming second? But if the place is different, and the dwelling of the Almighty is far off from the dwelling of the good God, still the will of the one who saved first, since it began first, is not inferior to the will of the good God.

From what has been proved already, those who do not believe are shown to be senseless. “For their paths are crooked, and they do not know peace,” says the prophet. And “foolish and ignorant questions” the divine Paul urged us to “avoid, because they breed quarrels.” And Aeschylus cries out:

For the inquiry that goes along with faith, that builds the majestic knowledge of the truth on faith’s foundation, is the best kind of inquiry there is — that much we know. And we know that things already clear are not made subjects of inquiry, such as whether it is day, while it is day; nor things unknown that will never become clear, such as whether the stars are even or odd in number; nor things that can be turned either way, and those are the ones that can be argued just as well by a man taking the opposite side, such as whether what is in the womb is a living creature or not. A fourth case is when, on either side of these, an argument is brought forward that cannot be answered and cannot be broken. If the ground of inquiry is taken away in all of these ways, then faith is established. For we bring against them the consideration that cannot be answered: that it is God who is speaking, and who comes to our help in writing, about every single point I am investigating. Who, then, is so irreverent as to disbelieve God, and to demand proofs from God as though from a man? Again, some questions call for the evidence of the senses — as if a man were to ask whether fire is warm, or snow white. Some call for a warning and a scolding, such as the question whether you ought to honor your parents. And there are questions that deserve punishment, such as asking for proofs that Providence exists. Since, then, there is a Providence, it would be irreverent to think that the whole of prophecy, and the whole arrangement made in connection with a Savior, came about in any way but according to Providence. Perhaps one should not even attempt to demonstrate such things, since God’s Providence is plain from the sight of all its skillful and wise works that stand before us — some of which happen in order, and some of which appear in order. And the one who gave us being and life gave us reason as well, wanting us to live reasonably and rightly. For the Word of the Father of the universe is not the word that is spoken aloud, but the wisdom and the most evident kindness of God, and his power too, which is almighty and truly divine, and not out of reach of the mind even of those who do not confess it — the all-powerful will.

But since some are unbelieving and some are argumentative, not everyone arrives at the completeness of what is good. For it cannot be reached without the exercise of free choice; and yet the whole of it does not depend on our own purpose either — as, for instance, what is fixed to happen. “For by grace we are saved” — not, however, without good works. We have to be shaped for what is good and so come to lean toward it. And we must have the healthy mind that is fixed on the pursuit of the good; and for that we have the greatest need of God’s grace, of right teaching, of a holy readiness to receive, and of the Father’s drawing us to himself. For while we are bound in this earthly body we take hold of the objects of sense by means of the body, but we grasp the objects of thought by the reasoning power itself. If a man expects to take hold of everything by his senses, he has fallen far from the truth. That is why the apostle writes about the knowledge of God in a spiritual way: “For now we see as through a mirror, but then face to face.” For the sight of the truth is given to few. Plato says the same thing in the Epinomis: “I do not say that it is possible for all men to be blessed and happy — only a few. While we are alive, I declare that this is how it stands. But there is good hope that after death I shall obtain everything.” What we find in Moses comes to the same thing: “No man shall see my face and live.” For plainly no one, during the span of this life, has been able to take hold of God clearly. But “the pure in heart will see God,” when they arrive at the final completeness. Since the soul had grown too weak to take hold of realities, we needed a divine teacher. So the Savior is sent down — a teacher, and a leader in getting what is good, the secret and sacred token of the great Providence.

“Where, then, is the scribe? Where is the searcher of this world? Has not God made the wisdom of this world foolish?” it is said. And again, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent” — plainly meaning those who are wise in their own eyes, and argumentative. So Jeremiah puts it excellently: “This is what the Lord says: Stand in the ways and ask for the everlasting paths — which is the good way — and walk in it, and you will find cleansing for your souls.” Ask, he says, and inquire of those who know, without quarreling and without disputing. And once we have learned the way of truth, let us walk the straight road and not turn aside until we reach what we long for. It was with good reason, then, that the king of the Romans — his name was Numa — being a Pythagorean, was the first man of all to put up a temple to Faith and to Peace.

“And to Abraham, when he believed, righteousness was reckoned.” He had been pursuing the lofty study of what happens in the air and the high study of the movements in the heavens, and he was called Abram, which is interpreted “lofty father.” But afterwards, when he looked up to heaven — whether it was that he saw the Son in the spirit, as some explain it, or a glorious angel, or in some other way recognized that God is above the creation and all the order in it — he receives in addition the letter A, the knowledge of the one and only God, and is called Abraam. Instead of a student of nature he has become a wise man and a lover of God. For the name is interpreted “chosen father of sound.” Sound is the spoken word; the mind is its father; and the mind of a good man is a chosen one. I cannot help praising the poet of Agrigentum very highly, who celebrates faith like this:

That is why the apostle urges “that your faith should not rest in the wisdom of men” — who claim to be persuading you — “but in the power of God,” which alone, with no proofs, by faith and nothing else, is able to save. “The most approved of the men with a reputation knows how to keep watch. And Justice will lay hold of the makers and the witnesses of lies,” says the man of Ephesus. He drew his knowledge from the barbarian philosophy, and so he knows about the cleansing by fire of those who have lived badly — what the Stoics later called the Conflagration, in which they also teach that each man will rise again exactly as he was, and so deal with the resurrection. Plato, meanwhile, says that at fixed periods the earth is cleansed by fire and by water: “There have been many destructions of men in many ways, and there will be very great ones by fire and water, and other, briefer ones from countless causes.” And a little later he adds: “And in truth there is a shifting of the bodies that move around the earth and the sky, and over long stretches of time the things on earth are destroyed by a great burning.” Then he adds this about the flood: “But when the gods flood the earth again to cleanse it with water, the ones up on the mountains — herdsmen and shepherds — are saved, while the ones in your cities are swept down by the rivers into the sea.”

And we showed in the first book of these notes that the philosophers of the Greeks are called thieves, since they took the chief of their teachings from Moses and the prophets without saying so. To that we will add this: the angels who had been given the higher rank sank down into pleasures and told the women the secrets that had come to their knowledge, while the rest of the angels kept those secrets hidden — or rather kept them back until the Lord came. From that source came the teaching about providence and the revealing of high things; and since prophecy had already been passed along to the philosophers of the Greeks, the working up of doctrine started among the philosophers — sometimes true, when they hit the mark, and sometimes wrong, when they failed to understand the secret meaning of the prophetic allegory. This is what I propose to point out briefly as I run over the matters that need mentioning. Faith, we say, must be shown not to be inert and by itself, but accompanied by inquiry. For I am not saying that we are not to inquire at all. “Search, and you will find,” it is said.

according to Sophocles. Menander the comic poet says much the same:

But we ought to aim the soul’s power of sight straight at discovery, and clear away whatever is in the way, and throw off altogether contention and envy and strife, which are bound to perish miserably from among men. For Timon of Phlius writes very beautifully:

Then a little below he adds:

He means the argument that denies what is false, and the dilemma, and the argument from what is concealed, and the Heap and the Crocodile, and the argument from what is open, and ambiguities and sophisms. To inquire about God, then, is healthy, so long as it tends toward discovery and not toward strife. For it is written in David: “The poor will eat and be filled, and those who seek him will praise the Lord. Your heart shall live forever.” For those who seek him by the true search, praising the Lord, will be filled with the gift that comes from God — that is, with knowledge. And their soul will live; for the soul is called the heart by a figure of speech, since it is what supplies life. For it is by the Son that the Father is known.

We ought not to hand our ears over to everyone who speaks and writes carelessly. Cups, after all, that a great many people take hold of by the ears get dirty and lose their ears; and besides, when they fall they break. In the same way, those who have polluted the pure hearing of faith with a great many trifles end by going deaf to the truth: they become useless, and they fall to the ground. It is not without reason, then, that we told boys to kiss their relatives while holding them by the ears — the sign that the feeling of love is produced by hearing. And “God,” who is known to those who love, “is love,” just as “God,” who through instruction is shared with the faithful, “is faithful.” We must be bound to him by divine love, so that by what is like we may see what is like, hearing the word of truth without guile and purely, like children who obey us. And this is what the man meant — whoever he was — who wrote the inscription over the entrance of the temple at Epidaurus:

And being pure is “to think holy thoughts.” “Unless you become like these little children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven,” it is said. For there the temple of God is seen, set on three foundations: faith, hope, and love.

About faith we have brought forward enough evidence from the writings of the Greeks. But so as not to run past all bounds in my eagerness to collect a great many passages about hope and love as well, let it be enough simply to say this: in the Crito, Socrates, who prefers a good life and a good death to life itself, thinks that we have hope of another life after death. In the Phaedrus, too, he says: “Only when it is in a state apart can the soul share in the wisdom that is true and beyond human power; and when, having reached the end of hope through the love that belongs to philosophy, desire carries it up to heaven, then it receives the beginning of another life, an immortal one.” And in the Symposium he says: “There is planted in all things a natural love of producing what is like themselves — in men, of producing men, and in the good man, of producing his own counterpart. But the good man cannot do this without having the complete virtues, in which he will train the young men who come to him.” And as he says in the Theaetetus: “He will beget men and bring them to completion. For some procreate by the body, others by the soul.” Among the barbarian philosophers too, to teach and to enlighten is called being born again; and “I have fathered you in Jesus Christ,” the good apostle says somewhere. [ah]

Empedocles, too, counts friendship among the elements, thinking of it as a love that binds things together: “Look at it with your mind; do not sit there gaping with your eyes.” And Parmenides, in his poem, speaks like this, pointing at hope: