From Slaves to Friends

The Lord did not do away with the natural commands of the law, the commands by which a person is counted righteous — the commands that were kept, before the law was ever given, by those who were counted righteous through faith and who pleased God. He extended them and filled them out, and his own words show it. He says: “It has been said to those of old, Do not commit adultery. But I tell you that everyone who has looked at a woman to want her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” And again: “It has been said, Do not murder. But I tell you that everyone who is angry with his brother without cause will be liable to judgment.” And again: “It has been said, Do not swear falsely. But I tell you, do not swear at all; let what you say be Yes, yes and No, no.” [a]

And there are other statements like these. Not one of them holds or implies any opposition to what was commanded before, or any overturning of it, however strenuously Marcion’s followers insist that it does. They fill those commands out and extend them, as he declares himself: “Unless your righteousness goes beyond that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.” What did he mean by that going beyond? First, that we are to believe not only in the Father but in his Son as well, now that the Son has been revealed; for it is the Son who brings a man into fellowship and unity with God. Next, that we are not only to say but to do — for they said and did not do. And then, that we are to keep away not only from evil deeds but even from wanting them. He did not teach us these things as opposed to the law, but as filling the law full, planting in us the law’s righteousness in all its range. It would have been against the law if he had told his disciples to do something the law forbade. But what he did command — to keep away not only from what the law forbids but even from longing for it — is not against the law, as I have said. It is not the speech of a man destroying the law, but of a man fulfilling it, extending it, and giving it wider room.

The law was laid down for people in slavery, and so it trained the soul by means of bodily things outside a man, drawing it like a tether to obey its commands, so that he might learn to serve God. But the Word set the soul free, and taught that through the soul the body should be made clean willingly. Once that was done, the bonds of slavery a man had grown used to had of course to come off, and he had to follow God with nothing binding him. The laws of freedom had to be extended and obedience to the king increased, so that no one who turned to God would look unworthy of the one who had set him free, and so that the reverence and obedience owed to the Master of the house would be paid alike by servants and by children — though the children have more confidence than the servants, since the working of freedom is a greater and more glorious thing than the obedience given in slavery.

That is why the Lord, in place of “Do not commit adultery,” forbade even craving; and in place of “Do not murder,” forbade anger; and in place of the law that required tithes, told us to share everything we own with the poor; and told us to love not only our neighbors but even our enemies; and not merely to be generous in giving and handing out, but to make a free gift even to those who take our goods away. He says: “To the one who takes away your tunic, give your cloak as well; and from the one who takes away your goods, do not ask them back; and as you would have people do to you, do the same to them.” So we are not to grieve like men unwilling to be cheated, but to be glad like men who have given willingly, counting ourselves as doing our neighbors a favor rather than giving in to force. “And if anyone forces you to go a mile,” he says, “go with him two” — so that you may not trail after him like a slave, but go ahead of him like a free man, showing yourself in everything kind and useful to your neighbor, taking no notice of his bad intentions but doing him good, and making yourself like the Father, “who makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.”

Now all these commands, as I have already said, were not the orders of someone doing away with the law, but of someone fulfilling it, extending it, and widening it among us. It is as if a man were to say that the wider the working of freedom, the fuller the submission and affection toward our Liberator that has been planted in us. For he did not set us free so that we should go away from him — no one who has put himself out of reach of the Lord’s gifts has any power to get himself the means of salvation — but so that the more of his grace we receive, the more we should love him. And the more we have loved him, the more glory we will receive from him, when we are in the Father’s presence continually.

Since, then, all the natural commands are shared by us and by them, the Jews, in them those commands had their beginning and their origin, while in us they have received their growth and their completion. To give assent to God, to follow his Word, to love him above everything and one’s neighbor as oneself — and a man’s neighbor is another man — to keep away from every evil deed, and everything else of the same kind that belongs to both covenants: these things reveal one and the same God. And this is our Lord, the Word of God, who at first drew slaves to God and afterward set free those who were under him, as he says himself to his disciples: “I no longer call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, because everything I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.” In saying “I no longer call you servants,” he shows as plainly as anything can be shown that it was he himself who first appointed for men that state of bondage toward God through the law, and afterward gave them freedom. And in saying “the servant does not know what his master is doing,” he points out, by his own coming, how ignorant a people in a servile condition had been. But when he calls his disciples the friends of God, he plainly declares himself to be the Word of God — the Word whom Abraham also followed of his own accord and with nothing binding him, because his faith was of a noble kind, and so became “the friend of God.” Yet the Word of God did not accept Abraham’s friendship as though he needed it, for he was perfect from the beginning — “Before Abraham was,” he says, “I am” — but so that in his goodness he might give eternal life to Abraham himself, since the friendship of God passes on immortality to those who take hold of it.

So in the beginning God formed Adam, not because he needed man, but so that he might have someone on whom to bestow his gifts. For not only before Adam, but before all creation, the Word was glorifying his Father while remaining in him, and was himself glorified by the Father, as he said himself: “Father, glorify me with the glory I had with you before the world was.” And he had no need of our service when he ordered us to follow him; it was salvation he was bestowing on us. To follow the Savior is to share in salvation, and to follow light is to receive light. People who are in the light do not light up the light; they are lit up by it and shown by it. They contribute nothing to it at all: they receive the benefit and are lit by the light. [n]

In the same way, service done for God adds nothing to God, and God has no need of human obedience. But to those who follow and serve him he gives life, and freedom from decay, and eternal glory. He does good to those who serve him because they serve him, and to those who follow him because they follow; but he receives no benefit from them, for he is rich and perfect and in need of nothing. This is why God asks for service from men: so that, being good and merciful, he may do good to those who keep on serving him. As much as God is in want of nothing, so much does man stand in need of fellowship with God. For this is man’s glory — to keep on and remain in the service of God. And so the Lord said to his disciples: “You did not choose me; I chose you.” He was indicating that they did not glorify him by following him; rather, in following the Son of God they were glorified by him. And again: “I want them to be with me where I am, so that they may see my glory.” He did not say this out of empty boasting, but because he wanted his disciples to share in his glory. Of them Isaiah also says: “I will bring your offspring from the east and gather you from the west; and I will say to the north, Give them up, and to the south, Do not hold them back: bring my sons from far away and my daughters from the ends of the earth — all of them, as many as have been called by my name; for in my glory I have prepared and formed and made him.” And since “wherever the body is, there the eagles will be gathered,” we do share in the glory of the Lord, who both formed us and prepared us for this: that when we are with him we may have a share in his glory.

That is how it went. God formed man at the first out of his own generosity; he chose the patriarchs for the sake of their salvation; he prepared a people beforehand, teaching the headstrong to follow God; he raised up prophets on the earth, getting man used to carrying the Spirit within him and to holding fellowship with God. He himself needed nothing, but he granted fellowship with himself to those who did need it, and, like an architect, he sketched out the plan of salvation for those who pleased him. He gave guidance himself, in Egypt, to those who could not see him; to those who grew unruly in the desert he laid down a law well suited to them; on the people who entered the good land he bestowed a fine inheritance; and for those who turned back to the Father he killed the fattened calf and brought out the best robe. In all these different ways he was fitting the human race for agreement with salvation. This is why John declares in the Revelation, “and his voice was like the sound of many waters.” For the Spirit is truly like many waters, since the Father is both rich and great. And the Word, passing through all these men, freely gave his gifts to those under him, drawing up in writing a law fitted and suited to every sort of person among them.

In the same way he laid on the people the making of the tabernacle, the building of the temple, the choosing of the Levites, sacrifices and offerings, the law’s warnings, and all the rest of the service of the law. He himself needs none of it, for he is always full of everything good, and had in himself every scent of kindness and every sweet-smelling perfume even before Moses existed. But he was training a people who were quick to turn to idols, calling to them again and again to hold on and to serve God, leading them to what mattered most by way of what mattered less — to the real by way of the figures, to the eternal by way of the temporary, to the spiritual by way of the bodily, to the heavenly by way of the earthly. It was said to Moses in the same way: “You shall make everything after the pattern of the things you saw on the mountain.” For forty days Moses was learning to keep in his memory the words of God, and the heavenly patterns, and the spiritual images, and the figures of things to come. Paul says the same: “They drank from the rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ.” And again, after first going through what the law contains, he adds: “Now all these things happened to them as figures, and they were written down as a warning for us, on whom the ends of the ages have come.” For by means of these figures they were learning to fear God and to keep on devoted to his service.

So they had a law, a course of discipline, and a prophecy of things to come. At first God warned them by means of the natural commands, which he had planted in the human race from the beginning — that is, by means of the Ten Commandments, and anyone who does not keep them has no salvation. Beyond that he demanded nothing of them at that time. As Moses says in Deuteronomy: “These are all the words the Lord spoke to the whole assembly of the sons of Israel on the mountain, and he added no more; and he wrote them on two stone tablets and gave them to me.” He did it that way so that those who were willing to follow him might keep these commands. [x]

But when they turned aside to make a calf, and in their minds went back to Egypt, wanting to be slaves instead of free men, from then on they were put into the very state of servitude they had wanted — a slavery that did not cut them off from God, but did put them under a yoke of bondage. Ezekiel the prophet, giving the reasons why such a law was given, says: “And their eyes went after the desire of their heart; and I gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments by which they would not live.” Luke has recorded, too, that Stephen — the first man the apostles chose as a deacon, and the first to be killed for bearing witness to Christ — spoke about Moses like this: “This man did receive the commands of the living God to give to us, and your fathers would not obey him but pushed him away, and in their hearts turned back again to Egypt, saying to Aaron, Make us gods to go ahead of us; for we do not know what has become of this Moses, who brought us out of the land of Egypt. And in those days they made a calf, and offered sacrifices to the idol, and were celebrating the works of their own hands. But God turned away, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets: House of Israel, did you offer me sacrifices and offerings for forty years in the wilderness? And you took up the tent of Moloch and the star of the god Remphan, the figures you made in order to worship them.” That shows plainly that a law of this sort was not given to them by some other God, but came, fitted to their state of servitude, from the very same God we worship. It is why he says to Moses in Exodus, “I will send my angel ahead of you; for I will not go up with you, because you are a stiff-necked people.”

And there is more. The Lord also showed that certain rules were laid down for them by Moses because of their hard hearts and their unwillingness to obey. When they said to him, “Why then did Moses command a man to give a certificate of divorce and send his wife away?” he answered: “Because of your hard hearts he allowed you these things; but from the beginning it was not so.” In saying that, he cleared Moses of blame as a faithful servant, acknowledged one God, who from the beginning made male and female, and rebuked them as hard-hearted and disobedient. That is why they got this law of divorce from Moses — a law fitted to their hard nature.

But why am I speaking only about the Old Testament? In the New the apostles are found doing the very same thing, and for the reason already given. Paul says plainly, “I say this, not the Lord.” And again: “I say this as a concession, not as a command.” And again: “About virgins I have no command from the Lord; but I give my judgment as one who by the Lord’s mercy is trustworthy.” And elsewhere he says, “so that Satan may not tempt you because you lack self-control.” If, then, even in the New Testament the apostles are found allowing certain things out of regard for human weakness, because some people lack self-control — so that such people will not grow hard, give up on their salvation altogether, and desert God — it should be no surprise that in the Old Testament the same God permitted the like for his people’s good, drawing them on by the ordinances I have mentioned, so that through those ordinances they might receive the gift of salvation while they kept the Ten Commandments, and, held in check by him, might not go back to idols or desert God, but learn to love him with their whole heart.

And if some people, pointing to the Israelites who disobeyed and were ruined, claim that the one who gave the law was weak, they will find the same thing in the order we ourselves live under: “many are called, but few are chosen.” They will find men who inwardly are wolves and outwardly wear sheep’s clothing. And they will find that God has always kept freedom, and man’s power over himself, while at the same time urging him on with his own appeals — so that those who do not obey him are justly judged for not obeying, and those who have obeyed and trusted him are honored with immortality.