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TERTULLIAN ON THE RESURRECTION
OF THE FLESH

1 The resurrection of the dead is Christian men's confidence.
By believing it we are what we claim to be. This belief the truth
exacts: the truth is what God reveals. But the multitude mocks,
reckoning that nothing remains over after death. Yet they offer
sacrifices to the deceased, and that with most lavish devotion in
accordance with their customs and the seasonableness of victuals,
so as to create the supposition that those whom they deny to have
any sensation are even conscious of being in need. I however shall
with better reason mock at the multitude, especially on occasions
when they savagely burn up those very deceased whom they
presently supply with gluttonous meals, with the same fires both
currying favour and provoking hostility. Thus does piety toy with
cruelty. Is it sacrifice, or insult, to cremate to the cremated?
Doubtless at times even philosophers conjoin their own judgement 
with the multitude. That there is nothing after death is
Epicurus' doctrine: and Seneca affirms that after death all things
come to an end, including death itself. But it is enough if the not
younger judgement of Pythagoras, as well as Empedocles and the
Platonics, make the contrary claim that the soul is immortal, yea
more, assert that it is destined very soon afterwards to return into
bodies, albeit not the same bodies, nor human bodies only, with
the result that Euphorbus is reborn as Pythagoras, and Homer as a
peacock. At least they have pronounced that the soul has a
corporal recurrence (the alteration of its quality is more tolerable
than the denial of it), knocking at truth's door though not entering
into its house. Thus not even when it goes astray is the world
ignorant of the resurrection of the dead.

2 If however even among God's people there is a sect more akin
to the Epicureans than to the Prophets, we shall take cognizance of
what Christ says to the Sadducees.¹ For to Christ it was reserved
to lay bare all things formerly hidden, to give direction to things

¹ Cf. Matt. 22. 23-33.

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in doubt, to fill up things sampled, to make present the things that
were preached of, certainly to prove the resurrection of the dead
not only by himself but also in himself. Now however we arm
ourselves against other Sadducees, who hold only part of the views
of those former. Just so, they acknowledge half a resurrection,
that is, of the soul alone, spurning the flesh as they also spurn even
the Lord of the flesh. In fact the only people who envy the bodily
substance its salvation are precisely these heretical upholders of a
second deity. Consequently, forced to assign Christ also to a different 
dispensation lest he be considered to belong to the Creator,
they have first gone astray in respect of his flesh, maintaining
either, according to Marcion and Basilides, that it had no true
existence, or, according to the successors of Valentinus, with
Apelles, that it was of a quality of its own. And thus it follows
that they shut the door against the salvation of that substance of
which they deny that Christ is partaker: for they are aware that it
is equipped with the strongest precedent of resurrection if already
in Christ the flesh has risen again. For that reason I also have issued
a preparatory volume On the Flesh of Christ, in which I both prove
its substantiality as opposed to the emptiness of a phantasm, and
vindicate its humanity as opposed to its having a special quality of
its own, it being flesh of such condition as to have registered Christ
as both Man and Son of Man. For while we prove that he is
possessed of flesh and of body, we forthwith as by a precedent
judgement forestall the possibility of belief in any other God but
the Creator, inasmuch as we show that Christ, in whom God is
discerned, is such a one as is promised by the Creator. Forestalled
for the future as concerning God the author of flesh and Christ the
redeemer of flesh, they shall next be refuted in respect of the
resurrection of the flesh. Appropriately so. And after this fashion
I affirm that one ought as a rule to enter upon disputation with
heretics----for due order demands that deduction should always be
made from first principles----that agreement should first be reached
concerning him by whom one says the thing under enquiry has
been ordained. And this is the reason why heretics also, from a
consciousness of their weakness, never discuss things in due order.
For, well aware what heavy weather they make when insinuating

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a second deity in opposition to the God of the world, by nature
known to all on the evidence of his works, and undoubtedly prior
in the types and more manifest in the preachings, these people,
under cover of what they say is a more pressing case----that is, of
man's salvation demanding enquiry before all else----begin with
questions on the resurrection, because it is harder to believe the
resurrection of the flesh than the unity of the deity: and thus,
having stripped the discussion of the strength of its proper
sequence and burdened it instead with scruples which belittle the
flesh, they step by step, as a result of the bankruptcy and depreciation 
of the hope, water it down into conformity with the mind of
that other deity. For each several individual, cast down or thrust
back from his stance on that hope which he had embraced in the
sight of the Creator, thereafter is easily led away, without further
suggestion from elsewhere, to surmise an author of the other hope.
For by diversity of promises is suggested a diversity of gods. Thus
we find many enmeshed, while they are first caused to crash in
respect of the resurrection of the flesh, and afterwards crash in
respect of the unity of the deity. So, as far as heretics are concerned, 
I have shown in what formation we must attack them:
and the attack has already been made, under each one's docket,
concerning the one only God and his Christ against Marcion, and
concerning the Lord's flesh against four heresies, chiefly to pave the
way for the present discussion: so that we have now to consider
only the resurrection of the flesh, as though it were uncertain in
our, that is the Creator's, sight. For there are many unlearned, and
a number doubtful of their own faith, and not a few plain men,
who will need to be equipped, guided, and protected, seeing that
on this flank also the unity of the deity calls for defence. For just as
its foundations are shaken by the denial of the resurrection of the
flesh, so by the vindication of it they are made strong. The salvation
of the soul I believe needs no discussion: for almost all heretics, in
whatever way they accept it, at least do not deny it. We may leave
to his own devices the one single solitary Lucan, who spares not
even this entity, but in Aristotelian fashion disperses it and 
substitutes something else for it: for he expects to rise again as a third
something, neither soul nor flesh, that is, not a man, but a bear

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perhaps, being a Lucanian. He also has from me a treatise Concerning 
the whole Status of the Soul. This I maintain is in a primary
sense immortal, while I admit the defection of the flesh alone and
make a special assertion of its refection, reducing to an orderly body
of material all things that elsewhere I have postponed after touching 
upon them as each case arose. For as it is common practice for
some things to be sampled beforehand, so must they of necessity be
postponed, provided the things sampled be fully supplied in their
own stock,and the things postponed be paid up in their own account.

3 Now it is possible even on the basis of popular ideas to be
knowledgeable in the things of God, though for evidence of the
truth, not in support of falsehood, to establish what is in accordance 
with the divine ordinance, not what is opposed to it. For
some things are known even by nature, as is the immortality of the
soul among many people and as is our God among all. Consequently 
I shall use the pronouncement of one Plato who declares,
'All soul is immortal':¹ I shall use also the private knowledge of
the people <of Israel> when it calls to witness the God of gods:
I shall use also other nations' popular ideas, which proclaim that
God is judge,' God sees', and 'I entrust it to God'. But when they
say, 'What is dead is dead', and 'Live whilst thou livest', and
'After death all things come to an end, even death itself, then
I shall remember that the heart of the multitude is reckoned by
God as ashes,² and that the very wisdom of the world is declared
foolishness:³ then, if the heretic take shelter under the vices of the
multitude or the devices of the world, I shall say, 'Depart from the
gentile, O heretic: even though there is substantial unity among
all you who fabricate a god, yet so long as you do this in Christ's
name, so long as you regard yourself as a Christian, you are a 
different man from the gentile: give him back his own ideas, for
neither does he equip himself with yours. Why, if you have sight,
do you lean on a blind guide? Why, if you have put on Christ, do
you accept clothing from one naked?⁴ Why, if you have been
armed by the apostle,⁵ do you use another man's shield? Rather

¹ Plato, Phaedrus, 245 c.                  ² Cf. Isa. 44. 20.
³ Cf. 1 Cor. 1. 20; 3. 19.                    ⁴ Cf. Gal. 3. 27; Rom. 13. 14.
⁵ Cf. Eph. 6. 13-17.

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let that man learn from you to confess the resurrection of the flesh
than you from him to repudiate it: for even though there were
cause for Christians to deny it, it were better for them to be
equipped of their own knowledge, not of the multitude's ignorance.' 
Thus one cannot be a Christian who denies that resurrection 
which Christians confess, and denies it by such arguments as
non-Christians use. In short, take away from heretics the ideas
they have in common with the gentiles, and make them base
their questionings on the scriptures alone, and they will not be
able to stand. For popular ideas are commended by their very
simplicity and by the agreeableness of their pronouncements
and the familiarity of the thoughts, and are considered the more
trustworthy in that they define things open and apparent and
generally known: whereas divine reason is in the marrow, not
on the surface, and is frequently in opposition to things as they
seem.

4 For this reason heretics immediately begin operations and lay
their foundations and afterwards erect their scaffolding with those
materials by which they know it is easy for them to entice men's
minds, the popularity of the ideas making things favourable for
them. Is there anything a heretic says, which a gentile has not
already said, and said more frequently? Is there not, forthwith and
throughout, reviling of the flesh, attacks upon its origin, its
material, its fate, its whole destiny, as being from its first beginning 
foul from the excrement of the earth, more foul thereafter
because of the slime of its own seed, paltry, unstable, reproachable,
troublesome, burdensome, and (following on the whole indictment 
of its baseness) fated to fall back into the earth from whence
it came and to be described as a corpse, and destined to perish
from that description too into no description at all from thenceforth, 
into a death of any and every designation? 'Do you then,
as a philosopher, wish to persuade us that this flesh, when it has been
ravished from your sight and touch and remembrance----that it is
sometime to recover itself to wholeness out of corruption, to 
concreteness out of vacuity, to fullness out of emptiness, in short to
somethingness out of nothingness, and that even the funeral pyre
or the sea or the bellies of wild beasts or the crops of birds or the

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intestines of fishes or the peculiar gluttony of time itself will give it
back again? And is this same flesh which has disappeared to be an
object of hope simply that the lame and the one-eyed and the blind
and the leprous and the palsied may revert, so as to wish they had
not returned, to what they were before? Or are they to be whole,
so as to be apprehensive of suffering the same things a second time?
Then what of the appurtenances of the flesh? Will these all again
be necessary to it, and particularly food and drink? And will it again
have to breathe with lungs and heave in its intestines and be shameless 
with its private parts and have trouble with all its members?
Must it again expect sores and wounds and fever and gout and death?
In that case the hope of the recovery of the flesh will amount to just
this, the desire to escape from it a second time.' Now I have
expressed this somewhat more decently, out of respect for my
pen: but how much licence is given even to foulspeaking, you
may find out for yourselves in these people's discussions, whether
they be gentiles or heretics.

5 Therefore since also all the unlearned still think in terms of
popular ideas, and doubters and plain men through these same
ideas are disquieted anew, and since in every case the first battering-
ram poised against us is this by which the quality of the flesh is
shaken, we too shall of necessity begin by providing the quality of
the flesh with defence-works, routing the vilification of it by
means of an encomium. Thus the heretics challenge us to displays
of rhetoric, as philosophers do to exercises in philosophy. Though
this trivial fragile body, which they are not afraid to call an evil
thing, had been the handiwork of angels (as Menander and Marcus
hold), though it had been fabricated by some fiery being, this too
an angel (as Apelles teaches), the patronage of secondary deities
would have sufficed for the dignity of the flesh: we do acknowledge 
angels----after God. So then, whichsoever each heretic's
supreme god is, I should with complete justification deduce the
nobility of the flesh from that god from whom had proceeded the
will to produce it. For assuredly, when he knew it was being
made, he would have forbidden it to be made if he had not desired
it to be made. Thus according to them also the flesh no less belongs
to a god. No part of a work can fail to belong to him who has

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permitted it to be. Observe moreover that the majority of the
sects, especially all the more durable ones, concede the whole
formation of man to our God. How great he is is sufficiently
known to you who believe him the only one. Then let the flesh
begin to find favour with you, in view of the greatness of its
artificer. 'But', you reply, 'the world also is God's work, and yet,
on no less authority than the apostle's, the fashion of this world
passeth away,¹ and the fact that the world is God's work cannot be
taken as a proof that it will be restored again: and in fact, if the
whole universe is not to be reconstituted after its decease, why
should a portion of it be?' Evidently it cannot, if the portion is
equated with the whole. But I appeal to the differences between
them: in the first place that all things were made by the word of
God,² and without it was nothing, whereas the flesh came into
being both by the word of God, for the sake of the general rule, so
that nothing should exist without the word (for he had already
said, Let us make man),³ and besides this by his hand, for the sake of
pre-eminence, lest it should be kept equal with the whole: And
God, it says, formed man.⁴ Without doubt this is a factor of great
unlikeness, in proportion to the quality of the two objects: for the
things which were made are inferior to him for whom they were
made; and indeed they were made for man, to whom shortly
afterwards God put them in subjection. Rightly therefore the
whole universe of things, being servants, came into existence by
behest and command and by the sole power of the voice: whereas
man, being their lord, was for this very purpose constructed by
God himself, that he might be capable of being a lord because
made by the Lord. And remember that 'man' in the strict sense
means the flesh, for this was the first possessor of the designation
'man': And God formed man, clay from the earth----already is he man
who is still clay----and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and
man----that is, the clay----became a living soul,⁵ and God placed in
paradise the man whom he had formed. Thus 'man' is first that
which was formed, and afterwards is the whole man. This submission 
I would offer, so that you may understand that whatsoever 

¹ 1 Cor. 7. 31.        ² Cf. Joh. 1. 3.        ³ Gen. 1. 26.
⁴ Gen. 1. 27.         ⁵ Gen. 2. 7, 8.

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at all was provided and promised beforehand by God to man
became a debt not to the soul only but also to the flesh, if not by
kindred of origin surely at least by prior possession of the name.

6 So I shall follow out my project, if perchance I may but vindicate 
for the flesh as much as he conferred upon it who made it even
then with cause for pride: because that paltry thing, clay, came
into God's hands----whatever they may be----though it would have
been blessed enough had it been no more than touched. For what
if, by no further operation, it had at once taken form and fashion
at the touch of God? So great was the matter in hand, the thing
which was being constructed of that material: and so it as often
receives honour as it is worked upon by God's hands, when
touched, when broken off the lump, when kneaded, when
moulded. Recollect that God was wholly concerned with it and
intent upon it, with hand, mind, work, counsel, wisdom, providence, 
and especially with that affection which prescribed its
features. For whatever expression the clay took upon it, the
thought was of Christ who was to become man (which the clay
was) and of the Word who was to become flesh (which at that
time the earth was). For the Father had already spoken to the Son
in these words, Let us make man unto our own image and likeness.
And God made man (the same thing of course as 'formed'):¹ unto
the image of God ('of Christ', it means) made he him. For the Word
also is God, who being in the form of God thought it not robbery
to be equal with God.² Thus that clay, already putting on the image
of Christ who was to be in the flesh, was not only a work of God
but also a token of him. What is the use now, with intent to sully
the origin of the flesh, of flinging about the name of earth, as of a
dirty ignoble element, when even though some other material had
been to hand for the sculpturing of man, it were needful to bear in
mind the dignity of the Artificer who both by choosing judged it
worthy and by handling made it so? The hand of Phidias builds out
of ivory the Olympian Jove, which is worshipped, being no longer
the tusk of a wild beast, and a very stupid one at that, but this
world's supreme divinity, not because the elephant is so great but
because Phidias is: and could not the living God, the true God, by

¹ Gen. 1. 26, 27.           ² Cf. Phil. 2. 6.

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his own operation have cleaned away any baseness of his material,
and healed it of all infirmity? Or shall we have to suppose it more
honourable for a man to have formed a god than for God to have
formed man? For even if clay was an offence, it is now something
else: it is flesh I now take hold of, not earth. Even though the flesh
also hear it said, Earth thou art and unto earth shah thou return,¹ it is
its origin which is being recounted, not its substance which is being
revoked. It has been made possible for a thing to be more noble
than its origin, and richer by reason of change: for even gold is
earth, because it is from the earth, yet it is no longer earth after it
becomes gold, but another material by far, more resplendent and
noble by contrast with the dullness of its origin. So also God was
not precluded from smelting the gold of flesh from what you consider 
the foulness of clay, removing the reproach of its birth.

7 But lest the dignity of the flesh appear somewhat watered down
because the divine hand did not actually touch it, as it had the clay,
<I answer that> since it did touch the clay, with the intent that
forthwith it should become flesh instead of clay, it by that very
fact served the interests of the flesh. And moreover I would have
you learn how and when flesh blossomed out of clay. For it can
not be the case, as some will have it, that those coats of skins which
Adam and Eve put on when stripped of paradise,² were themselves
a transforming of clay into flesh: for somewhat earlier Adam had
already recognized in the female's flesh the offshoot of his own
substance----This is now bone out of my bones and flesh out of my flesh³
--------and the transfusion from the male into the female was itself
made good with flesh, though I suppose it would have had to be
made good with clay if Adam had still been clay. Therefore the
clay was blotted out and swallowed up into flesh. When? When
man was made into a living soul by the breath of God,⁴ a fiery
breath, competent as it were to bake clay into a different quality,
into flesh as though into earthenware. Thus also the potter may
with a tempered blast of fire re-embody potter's clay into a firmer
material, and out of one species extract another, more useful than
the original, and now of its own kind and designation. For

¹ Gen. 3. 19.         ² Cf. Gen. 3. 21.
³ Gen. 2. 23.        ⁴ Cf. Gen. 2. 7.

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although it is written, Shall the potter's clay say to the potter¹----that
is) shall man say to God----, and although the apostle says, In
vessels of earthenware,² yet man is called potter's clay because he was
previously clay, and flesh is called earthenware because it was made
of clay by means of the heat of the divine breathing. It was afterwards 
that coats of skins (that is, cuticle) were drawn on over it and
clothed it: and the proof of this is, that if you strip off the skin you
leave the flesh naked. Thus what today becomes spoil if it is
stripped off, became a garment while it was being made a superstructure. 
Hence also the apostle, when he called circumcision a
despoiling of the flesh,³ affirmed that the skin is a coat. This being
so, you have both clay glorious from God's hand, and flesh more
glorious from God's breathing: and by this breathing the flesh at
the same time laid aside the rudiments of clay and took upon it the
adornments of soul. Your care for your property is not greater
than God's: yet you mount Scythian and Indian gems, and the
gleaming pearls of the Red Sea, neither in lead nor bronze nor
iron nor even silver, but in choice gold carefully separated from its
dross, while for all precious wines and ointments you first provide
suitable vessels, and likewise for swords of perfect ironwork you
make scabbards of equal dignity: and is it conceivable that God
has consigned to some very cheap receptacle the reflection of his
own soul, the breath of his own spirit, the workmanship of his
own mouth, and has thus by giving it an unworthy lodging
definitely brought about its damnation? But did he give it a
lodging, or not rather entwine and commingle it with the flesh?
Yes, in such close concretion that it may be considered uncertain
whether the flesh is the vehicle of the soul or the soul the vehicle of
the flesh, whether the flesh is at the service of the soul or the soul at
the service of the flesh. Yet though it is more credible that the soul,
as more akin to God, is the rider and the master, this also redounds
to the glory of the flesh, that it both contains this soul which is
God's kin, and puts it in possession of that selfsame mastery. For
what enjoyment of nature, what fruition of the world, what
savouring of the elements, does the soul feed upon except by
means of the flesh? What think you? Through it as intermediary

¹ Rom. 9. 20.        ² 2 Cor. 4. 7.         ³ Cf. Col. 2. 11.

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it is enriched by the whole apparatus of the senses, sight, hearing,
taste, smell, touch. Through it it is aspersed with divine power,
seeing it provides for nothing except by speech previously
expressed, at least in silence: for speech also derives from the flesh
as its organ. By the flesh are the manual arts, by the flesh are
liberal and professional studies, by the flesh are activities, occupations, 
and services: and to such a degree does the whole of the
soul's living belong to the flesh, that to the soul to cease to live is
exactly the same thing as to retire from the flesh. Thus also dying
itself belongs to the flesh, because to it living belongs. Moreover, if
it is through the flesh that all things are subject to the soul, they are
subject to the flesh as well: you must of necessity have for partner
in your use of a thing the instrument by which you use it. Thus
the flesh, while it is reckoned the servant and handmaid of the soul,
is found to be its consort and coheir: if in things temporal, why
not also in things eternal?

8 Thus far let it suffice me to have produced judgements in
favour of the flesh as it were from the common law of human
nature. We must next consider also from the private law of the
Christian nation how great a prerogative this pitiful and squalid
substance enjoys in the sight of God: though it would be sufficient
for it that no soul can ever obtain salvation unless while it is in the
flesh it has become a believer. To such a degree is the flesh the
pivot of salvation, that since by it the soul becomes linked with
God, it is the flesh which makes possible the soul's election by God.
For example, the flesh is washed that the soul may be made spotless: 
the flesh is anointed that the soul may be consecrated: the
flesh is signed <with the cross> that the soul too may be protected:
the flesh is overshadowed by the imposition of the hand that the
soul may be illumined by the Spirit: the flesh feeds on the Body
and Blood of Christ so that the soul also may be replete with God.
There is then no possibility of these, which the work associates,
being divided in the wages. For those sacrifices also that are
pleasing to God----I mean these conflicts of the soul, fastings,
deferred and meagre food, and the squalor which accompanies
this observance----the flesh initiates at its own proper inconvenience. 
Virginity besides, and widowhood, and the secret continent

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dissimulation of matrimony, and abstention from second marriages,
are offered in sacrifice to God from the possessions of the flesh.
Come now, what think you of the flesh when for the faith of the
Name it is dragged into public and fights it out exposed to popular
hatred, when it is tormented in prisons by loathsome exile from
light, by lack of adornment, by squalor, filth, abusive food, free
not even in sleep, since even on its bed it is chained, and is mangled
even by its mattress----when next even in daylight it is rent by
every contrivance of torture, when at length it is destroyed by
execution, having striven to pay Christ back by dying for him,
often enough by means of the same cross, not to mention also more
dire devices of punishment? Yea, most blessed it is and most
glorious, when it is able in the presence of Christ the Lord to meet
so great a debt, so as to owe him naught but what it has ceased to
owe him, so much the more bound as having been set free.

9 So then, to resume. The flesh, which God with his own hands
constructed in God's image, which from his own breathing he
made animate in the likeness of his own abounding life, which he
set in authority over the denizens, the fruits, the dominion of his
whole workmanship, which he has clothed with his own mysteries
and doctrines, whose cleanliness he loves, whose discipline he
approves, whose sufferings he counts precious to himself----shall
this not rise again, so many times over a thing of God? God
forbid, God forbid, that God should abandon to eternal destruction 
the work of his own hands, the product of his own skill, the
receptacle of his own breath, the queen of his own creation, the
heir of his generosity, the priest of his cult, the warrior of his
testimony, the sister of his Christ. We know that God is good:¹
that he alone is supremely good we learn in addition from his
Christ. He who enjoins love, first of himself, and afterwards
towards one's neighbour,² himself also performs that which he
commands. He loves the flesh, which in so many ways is his
neighbour: weak though it be, yet strength is made perfect in
weakness:³ feeble, yet none know the need of a physician except
such as are sick:⁴ uncomely, yet upon uncomely things we bestow

¹ Cf. Matt. 19. 17; Luke 18. 19.        ² Cf. Matt. 22. 37.
³ Cf. 2 Cor. 12. 9.                             ⁴ cf. Luke 5. 31.

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the greater comeliness:¹ lost, yet he says, I am come to save that which
is lost:² sinful, yet he says, I would rather have the saving of a sinner
than his death:³ condemned, yet he says, I will smite and I will heal.⁴
Why do you reprove the flesh for those attributes which look to
God, which hope towards God? These are honoured by him, for to
their rescue he came. I would boldly say: If the flesh had not had
these disabilities, God's kindness, grace, mercy, every beneficent
function of God's, would have remained inoperative.
10 You retain the scriptures by which the flesh is brought under
a cloud: retain those also by which it is made glorious. You read
when it is brought low: apply your eyes also whenever it is lifted
up. All flesh is grass:⁵ not this pronouncement alone did Isaiah
make, but also, All flesh shall see the salvation of God.⁶ The Lord is
recorded in Genesis as saying, My Spirit shall not abide upon these men,
seeing they are flesh:⁷ but he is also heard, through Joel, saying,
I will pour forth of my Spirit upon all flesh.⁸ The apostle also you
ought to know not from that single theme in which he frequently
stigmatizes the flesh.⁹ For though he says that in his flesh dwelleth
no good thing,¹⁰ though he affirms that those who are in the flesh
cannot please God, because the flesh lusteth against the spirit¹¹----
and any other expressions he uses with the effect of accusing not
indeed the substance but the activity of the flesh----I shall reply later
on that no reproach ought in a particular sense to be brought
against the flesh, but only for a reproof to the soul which subdues
the flesh to menial service to itself. Enough for the present that
Paul is also <described> in those scriptures as bearing in his body
the marks of Christ,¹² as saying that our body, being the temple of
God, must not be defiled,¹³ as making our bodies the members of
Christ¹⁴, and admonishing us to uplift and magnify God in our
body.¹⁵ And so, if the ignominies of the flesh involve rejection
of its resurrection, why shall not its dignities rather suggest its
acceptance? For it is more consistent with God to restore to

¹ Cf. 1 Cor. 12. 23.        ² Luke 19. 10.        ³ Ezek. 18. 23.
⁴ Deut. 32. 39.              ⁵ Isa. 40. 6.           ⁶ Cf. Isa. 40. 5.
⁷ Gen. 6. 3.                   ⁸ Joel 2. 28.           ⁹ Cf. Rom. 7. 18.
¹⁰ Cf. Rom. 8. 8.          ¹¹ Cf. Gal. 5. 17.   ¹² Cf. Gal. 6. 17.
¹³ Cf. 1 Cor. 3. 16, 17.   ¹⁴ Cf. 1 Cor. 6. 15.      ¹⁵ Cf. 1 Cor. 6. 20.

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salvation that of which he has perhaps for a time disapproved,
than to surrender to perdition that of which he has even expressed
his approval.

11 Thus far in commendation of the flesh against those enemies
who are none the less its greatest friends. For no man lives so
carnally as those who deny a carnal resurrection; for while denying
the penalty they also despise the discipline. Concerning these the
paraclete also expressly says, by Prisca the prophetess, 'Lumps of
flesh they are, and the flesh they hate'. And now that the flesh is
protected by warrants strong enough to establish its claim to be
worthy of salvation, must we not also reckon up the power, the
authority, the liberty of action of God himself, asking whether he
is not great enough to be competent to rebuild and restore the
tabernacle of the flesh after it has fallen down or been swallowed
up or in whatsoever manner been dismantled? Or has he not
published for us some instances of this his right, in the records of
nature, lest any persons perchance be still athirst to know God,
belief in whom is conditioned by belief that he can do all things?
Certainly among philosophers you have such as claim that this
world is unbegotten and uncreated: but it is much more to the
point that almost all the sects, admitting that this world is begotten
and created, ascribe its foundation to our God. Trust therefore
that he has brought forth this everything out of nothing, and you
will at once know God by trusting that God has so much power.
Some indeed, too weak for this prior belief, will have it that the
universe was constructed by him from subjacent material, according 
to the philosophers. Yet even if this were in fact the case, since
the allegation would be that by the refashioning of the material he
produced very different substances and very different species
from the material itself, I should no less maintain that he brought
them forth out of nothing, seeing he had brought forth things
which had been in fact non-existent. For what does it matter
whether a thing is brought forth out of nothing or out of something, 
so long as what was not comes into being, when even not to
have been is to have been nothing? So also on the contrary, to
have been is to have been something. As it is, although it does
matter, yet I win approval in either case. For if out of nothing

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God has built up all things, he will be able also out of nothing to
produce the flesh reduced to nothing: or if out of material he has
contrived things other than it, he will be able also out of something
other than it to recall the flesh, into whatsoever it may have been
drained away. And certainly he who has made is competent to
remake, seeing it is a greater thing to make than to remake, to give
a beginning than to give back again. Thus may you believe that
the restitution of the flesh is easier than its institution.

12 Look next at actual instances of divine power. Day dies into
night and is on every side buried in darkness. The beauty of the
world puts on mourning, its every substance is blackened. All
things are squalid, silent, numb: everywhere there is vacation,
cessation of business: such lamentation is there for the light that is
lost. And yet again the same light, entire and whole, together
with its adornment and endowment, together with the sun,
revives for the whole world, slaying its own death, the night,
stripping off its funeral-trappings, the darkness, becoming heir to
its own self, until night also revive, herself also with her own
appurtenance. For there is also a rekindling of the beams of the
stars, which the lighting up of morning had put out; there is a
returning home of constellations which have been abroad, which
the dividing; of seasons had removed; ,a refurbishing of the mirrors
of the moon, which the date of the month had worn away; a
revolution of winters and summers, of springs and autumns, with
their own functions, fashions, and fruits. Moreover the earth also
learns from heaven: to clothe the trees after their stripping,
to colour the flowers anew, to dress itself in grass again, to bring to
light the same seeds as have perished, and not to bring them to
light until they have perished. A marvellous exchange: by
defrauding she preserves, so as to give back she takes away, so as to
guard she wastes, so as to make alive she slays, so as to make whole
she corrupts, so that she may even multiply she first goes bankrupt,
inasmuch as she restores things more abundant and more elegant
than she has abolished, destruction verily being profit, injury
interest, and loss gain. To put it in one word, the whole creation is
recurrent. Whatsoever you are to meet with has been: whatsoever
you are to lose will be. Nothing exists for the first time. All

|35

things return to their estate after having departed: all things begin
when they have ceased. They come to an end simply that they may
come to be: nothing perishes except with a view to salvation.
Therefore this whole revolving scheme of things is an attestation
of the resurrection of the dead. God wrote down resurrection in
works before he put it in writing, he preached it by acts of power
before he told of it in words. He first gave you nature for a
teacher, intending also to add prophecy, so that as previously a
disciple of nature you might the more readily believe prophecy,
might at once assent on hearing what you had already everywhere
seen, and might not doubt that God is also a raiser up of the flesh
when you knew that he is a restorer of all things. And further, if
all things rise again for man, for whose benefit they are adminis-
tered, and moreover not for man except as including the flesh,
how could that flesh utterly perish, for the sake and for the benefit
of which all things are kept from perishing?

13 If the universe is not a satisfactory parable of the resurrection,
if the creation sets the seal on nothing of this sort, in that its single
elements are alleged not so much to die as to cease to be, and are
supposed not to be re-animated but to be re-formed, accept what
is a very complete and unshakable example of this hope, seeing it
is an animate creature, one subject to life and to death. I refer to
that bird, the special property of the East, notable because there is
only one of it at a time, portentous in respect of its progeny, the
bird which renews itself while of its own will performing its own
obsequies, deceasing and inheriting by a death which is a birth,
phoenix again where just now there was none, once more himself
who but now was not, another and the same. What more manifestly 
and with better attestation meets this case, what other fact
has such a proof? God also says, in his own scriptures, And thou
shalt flourish like the phoenix,¹ that is, out of death, out of burial, so
that you may believe that the substance of the body can be exacted
of the flames as well. Our Lord has declared that we are of more
value than many sparrows:² if not also phoenixes, there is not
much in it. But shall men die once for all, while birds of Arabia
are assured of their resurrection?

¹ Ps. 92. 12.        ² Cf. Matt. 10. 31.

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14  Such for the mean while being the broad outlines of those
divine powers which God has wrought out in parables as well as
expressed in speech, let us now come to his actual edicts and
decrees, since this is the way we are at present arranging this division
of our subject-matter. For we began with the dignity of the flesh,
asking whether it is the kind of thing for which after collapse
salvation is practicable: and thereafter we proceeded to treat of the
power of God, whether it is great enough to be accustomed to
confer salvation on a thing which has collapsed. Now, if we have
proved both points, I would ask you to raise the question of
purpose, whether there is one good enough to establish the resurrection 
of the flesh as necessary, and as indubitably in every way
a debt to reason: because it is still possible to suggest that although
the flesh be capable of restoration, and although deity be competent
to restore it, for all that, restoration will need to have a purpose to
justify it. Hear then of its purpose, you who are a disciple of God
who is supremely good and also righteous, supremely good in
respect of what is his, righteous in respect of what is ours. For if
man had not become a delinquent he would have known God
only as supremely good, by that nature which is properly his; but
now he also experiences him as righteous, by the necessity of his
own purpose, yet also supremely good precisely in this that he is
also righteous. For while he displays righteousness by aiding that
which is good and punishing that which is bad, both the sentences
he gives are a tribute to the good, whether he is exacting vengeance
of the one or rewarding the other. But in my books against
Marcion you will learn more fully whether this is the whole of
what God is. Meanwhile such is our----necessarily Judge because
Lord, necessarily Lord because Maker, necessarily Maker because
God. Hence also that----whatever you may call him----of the
heretics is necessarily not judge, for he is not lord, necessarily not
lord, for he is not maker, and I suppose then not god, seeing he is
neither maker, which God is, nor lord, which a maker is. Therefore 
since it is most appropriate for one who is God and Lord and
Maker to appoint for man judgement concerning precisely this,
whether or not he has taken care to acknowledge and respect
his Lord and Maker, and since the resurrection will bring that

|39

judgement into actuality, this will be the whole purpose, yea
the necessity, of the resurrection, such a provision of judgement
as is most appropriate to God. And concerning the ordering of
it you have to discern whether the divine censureship presides
over the judgement of both the human substances, the flesh no
less than the soul: for that which it is fitting should be judged,
will with good reason also be raised up again. I affirm that
God's judgement must be believed to be in the first place plenary
and complete, as being by that time final, and thereafter everlasting, 
so that it may in this also be just as not being in any
respect defective, and in this also worthy of God that in accordance 
with all his great patience it is plenary and complete: and
that thus the plenity and completeness of judgement can be
assured only by the production <in court> of the whole man----in
fact that the whole man appears <in court> in the assemblage of
both substances----and consequently he must be made present
in both, seeing he needs to be judged as a whole, as assuredly he
has not lived except as a whole. Therefore in that state in which he
has lived, in that will he be judged, because he has to be judged in
respect of his life as he has lived it. For life is the purpose of judgement, 
and this must be made complete in as many substances as it
has employed in living.

15   Well now, let our opponents first sever the warp and woof of
flesh and soul in life's administration, that then they may be bold
enough to make such a severance also in life's remuneration: let
them deny their association in workmanship, so as with good
reason to be able also to deny it in wages. Let the flesh be no
partner in the sentence, if it has not also been partner in the suit.
Let the soul alone be recalled, if it alone has departed. It has however 
no more been alone in departure than it was alone in running
that course from which it has departed, I mean this present life.
So far is the soul from being alone in the conduct of life, that not
even the thoughts, though only thoughts, though not by means of
the flesh brought into effect, do we remove from the partnership
of the flesh, seeing that it is in the flesh and in company with the
flesh and by means of the flesh that that is wrought by the soul which
is wrought in the heart. Indeed this portion of the flesh, the soul's

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citadel, our Lord himself censures in his castigation of thoughts:
Why think ye evil in your hearts?¹ and, Whoso looketh for the sake of
lusting hath already committed adultery in his heart.² Thus, apart from
either deed or performance, thought is an activity of the flesh. But
even if that headquarters of the senses, which is called <in Greek>
hegemonicon, is established in the brain, or perhaps in the space
between the eyebrows, or wherever philosophers decide, any and
every thinking-house of the soul must be flesh. Never is soul apart
from flesh, so long as it is in the flesh: it performs no act without it,
for apart from it it does not exist. Can you still ask whether
thoughts too are administered by means of the flesh, when by
means of the flesh they are externally cognizable? Let the soul
consider a matter: the countenance tells the tale, the face is a
mirror of all intentions. Can they deny it association in things
done, when they cannot deny it association in things thought of?
And these are the very people who enumerate the delinquencies of
the flesh: consequently, as a sinner it will be liable to punishment.
We however set in opposition even the virtues of the flesh: con-
sequently, having also done well, it will be liable to reward. And
if it is the soul which gives leading and impulse to all acts, to the
flesh belongs the obedience. But we ought not to think that God is
either an unjust judge or an indolent one----unjust if he excludes
from rewards an ally in good works, indolent if he shelters from
penalties an ally in evil ones----when man's judgement is considered
the more perfect in that it cites even the abettors of every act,
neither sparing them nor envying them but that they may share
with their principals the fruit either of penalty or of grace.

16   But when we assign empire to the soul and submission to the
flesh, we must take precautions lest our opponents overturn even
this by a further quibble, being content in this manner to place the
flesh in the employment of the soul, not as a free servant, lest
consequently they be forced to acknowledge it as an associate. For
they will allege that servants and associates have free choice in
service and association, with power over their own will in both
directions, as being themselves also men, and that therefore they
share the merits or demerits of those principals to whom of their

¹ Matt. 9. 4.        ² Matt. 5. 28.

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own will they have lent their assistance; whereas the flesh, having
no thoughts of its own, and no sensations, having of itself neither
assent nor refusal, attends upon the soul rather in the guise of a
receptacle, as a tool and not as a servant: and that thus the judgement 
is set in respect of the soul alone, as to how it has used its
receptacle the flesh, while the receptacle itself is not liable to
sentence, since neither is a cup condemned if someone has mixed
poison in it, nor does a sword receive capital sentence if someone
has committed highway-robbery with it. In that case, we reply,
the flesh will be innocent, in so far as evil actions are not to be
imputed to it, and there is nothing to prevent its being saved on
the ground of innocence. For though good works be not imputed
to it, as neither are evil, yet does it rather befit the kindness of God
to absolve the innocent. Welldoers he must absolve: but it appertains 
to him who is supremely good to grant even more than he
must. Moreover, as for the cup----I do not mean one that has held
poison, one into which someone has spewed out his life, but one
tainted with the breath of a witch or a sodomite or a gladiator or a
hangman----I wonder if you would condemn it any less than those
people's kisses. Even one that is clouded with our own filth or
that is not mixed to our taste, we are wont to smash, to signify
more clearly our annoyance with the pageboy. And as for the
sword that is drunken with murders, is there anyone who will not
expel it from his whole house, not to speak of his bed-chamber or
his pillow-head, under the impression, I suppose, that his dreams
could not help but be of the remonstrances of the souls which
would oppress and disquiet one who had taken to his bed their
own blood? On the other hand, a cup with a good conscience,
which has been praised because of the servant's care, will also be
adorned from the garland of him who drinks from it, or honoured
by the strewing of flowers: and a sword nobly bloodied in war, a
man-slayer of a better sort, will have its credit rewarded by 
consecration. 'Is it possible therefore to attach sentence even to
receptacles and tools, that they too may share in the merits of their
owners and principals?' I shall proceed to deal faithfully with this
quibble also----though the facts are of a different kind and not fully
met by the illustration. For any vessel or tool comes into use from

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without, its material being entirely external to man's substance;
whereas the flesh, being since its origin in the womb conceived and
formed and brought to birth in company with the soul, is also in
every operation commingled with it. For although in the apostle
it is called a vessel, which he commands to be held in honour,¹ yet
by the same apostle it is called the outer man,² being in fact that
clay which first was engraved with the inscription 'man', not
'cup', or 'sword', or any sort of 'receptacle'. For it is called a
vessel in view of the containership by which it contains and
encloses the soul, but 'man' because of the community of nature
which makes it in operations not a tool but a servant. So also, as a
servant, it will be held to judgement, even though of itself it does
no thinking, because it is the portion of that which thinks, not its
chattel. The apostle, with this in mind, that the flesh does nothing
of itself that is not imputed to the soul, none the less judges the
flesh sinful,³ lest because it seems to be set in motion by the soul it
should be thought to have been set free of judgement. So also
when he enjoins upon the flesh some works of praise----Glorify and
uplift God in your body⁴----though aware that these activities are
performed by the soul, yet he enjoins them on the flesh as well,
just because he also promises it the fruits of them. Else neither
would rebuke have appertained to it if it were a stranger to blame,
nor behest if a foreigner to glory: for both rebuke and behest would
have been void as regards the flesh if there had been a void also of
the wages which are expected at the resurrection.

17   The more artless supporters of my opinion will think that
another reason why the flesh will need to be brought under
review at the judgement is that otherwise the soul would be
incapable of experiencing torment or refreshment, as being
incorporal: for such is the vulgar idea. I however both state here,
and have proved in a treatise of its own, that the soul is corporal,
having its own particular kind of substance and solidity by which it
is capable both of perception and of suffering. For that even now
souls are tormented or comforted among those below, though
unclothed, and as yet exiles from the flesh, the instance of Lazarus⁵

¹ Cf. 1 Thess. 4. 4.        ² Cf. 2 Cor. 4. 16.        ³ cf. Rom. 8. 3.
⁴ 1 Cor. 6. 20.        ⁵ Cf. Lk. 16. 25.

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will prove. Thus I have left it possible for my adversary to say, 'In
that case, having its own bodily constitution, it will of its own
suffice for the faculty of suffering and perception, and so will have
no need for the flesh to be brought up for judgement'. Nay
rather, it will have need, not in the sense that without the flesh it is
devoid of sensation, but that it is essential for it to have the flesh to
share in its sensations. For in so far as of its own it suffices for
acting, in so far does it also suffice for suffering. For acting however 
it is of its own less than sufficient: for of its own it has no more
than thought, will, desire, determination, while for accomplishment 
it awaits the activity of the flesh. Likewise also for suffering
it demands the alliance of the flesh, so as by means of it to be able
as completely to suffer as without it it was unable completely to
act. Consequently, of the things for which it is of its own sufficient,
concupiscence and thought and will, it is in the mean time working 
off the sentence. Certainly if these things had been sufficient
for the fullness of its deserts, so that deeds as well were not brought
under inquisition, it would have wholly sufficed for the perfection
of judgement that the soul should be judged concerning those
matters for the doing of which it had itself sufficed. But since deeds
also are bound by deserts, and deeds are effected through the flesh,
it is evidently not sufficient for the soul without the flesh to be
comforted or tormented for works which belong to the flesh as
well, even though it has body, even though it has members, for they
do not suffice it for completeness of sensation, any more than they
do for perfection of action. Consequently, to the extent to which
it has acted, to that extent it also suffers among those below, being
the first to taste of judgement as it was the first to contract the fault,
yet waiting for the flesh so that it may pay the penalty of its deeds
besides by means of that flesh to which it has made its thoughts
into commands. This in fact will be the reason for the judgement
being appointed for the last end, namely, that by the presentment
of the flesh it may be possible for the whole divine censure to be
made complete. Otherwise the punishment of which souls even
now have the foretaste among those below would not be reserved
until the end, if it were designed for souls alone.

18   So far let it suffice me to have laid foundations for the protection

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of the meaning of all the scriptures which promise the restoration 
of the flesh. Since this has the advocacy of so many competent
authorities----I mean the dignities of the substance itself, the power
of God, instances of that power, the reasons for judgement, and its
implications----surely the scriptures will require to be understood
in accordance with the precedent of all these authorities, and not in
accordance with devices of heretics which proceed from mere
unbelief; because the restitution of a substance withdrawn in
destruction is considered incredible not because this is either
beyond the deserts of the substance itself or beyond the power of
God or without pertinence to the judgement. Incredible clearly it
would be, had it not been divinely preached: except that even
though that preaching had not been given by God, yet should we
have needed to assume it of our own accord, as not having been
preached simply because so many authorities had constituted a
previous judgement in its favour. Yet since it resounds in divine
words as well, it is so much the more impossible for it to be
otherwise interpreted than those facts require which even without
divine words are sufficiently persuasive.

Let us then first consider under what heading this hope has been
promulgated. One divine edict, I suppose, is posted in the sight of
all: THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD: two words, sharp, concise, 
and clear. These I shall confront, these I shall discuss, asking
to which substance they assign themselves. When I am told that
resurrection is man's destiny, I must needs ask what part of him it
is whose lot it is to fall, since nothing will expect to rise again
except that which has previously succumbed. Only one who is
unaware that it is the flesh which falls by means of death, can be
ignorant of it also standing up by means of life. The sentence of
God is that which nature pronounces, Earth thou art and into the
earth shalt thou go.¹ Even one who has not heard, sees it happen: all
death is a collapse of the members. This destiny of the body the
Lord also made manifest when, clothed with that very substance,
he said, Pull down this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again.²
He shows to what it appertains to be pulled down, to be thrown
to the ground, to lie low, that to which it also appertains to be

¹ Gen. 3. 19.        ² Joh. 2. 19.

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lifted up and raised again----though he also carried about with him
a soul that was troubled even unto death,¹ yet which did not fall
by means of death----because the scripture also says, He had spoken
of his body.² And so truly is it the flesh that is overthrown in
death, that thereafter it is described as cadaver, from cadere. The
soul however has no name signifying falling, because in its proper
habit it does not collapse: indeed it is it which, when expired,
produces collapse in the body, just as it is it which, when it was
breathed in, raised it up from the ground.³ It cannot fall, seeing
that by entering in it raised it up: it cannot collapse, seeing that by
its exit it throws down. Let me speak more particularly: not even
into sleep does the soul fall down along with the body, not even then
is it laid supine along with the flesh: for in sleep it moves and stirs,
whereas if it were lying down it would be quiet, and it would be
lying down if it fell. Thus, as it does not collapse in the image of
death, neither does it fall down in death's verity.

Now for the second word 'of the dead', distinguish no less
clearly to which substance it adheres. Although in this matter
I admit that at times mortality is ascribed by heretics to the soul----
with the result that if mortal soul is to attain to resurrection there
is a presumption that the flesh too, being no less mortal, will share
in the resurrection----yet now the sole right to the term must be
claimed for that which is entitled to it. At once then, by the very
fact that resurrection appertains to a thing liable to fall, namely
flesh, that same flesh will be indicated in the designation 'dead',
because the resurrection which is described as 'of the dead' is the
resurrection of a thing liable to fall. So also we learn through
Abraham, the father of the faith, a close friend of God: for in
demanding of the sons of Heth a place to bury Sarah he says,
Give me then the possession of a burying-place with you, and I will
bury my dead man,⁴ the flesh of course: for he would not have
wanted room to bury a soul, even if the soul were considered
mortal, even if it merited being described as 'dead man'. But if
dead man' is the body, the resurrection, since it is described as 'of
the dead', will specifically be of bodies.

¹ Cf. Matt. 26. 38.        ² Joh. 2. 21.
³ Cf. Gen. 2. 7.            ⁴ Gen. 23. 4.

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19   So then our inspection of the decree and of its contents,
through our outright insistence that the terms mean what they
say, must needs have the effect that, if our opponents cause
trouble by the allegation of figures and enigmas, things more
manifest in each case shall prevail, and things more certain lay
down the law concerning the uncertain. For some people, taking
hold upon a well-established usage of prophetic diction (which is
frequently, though not always, allegorical and figurative) distort
also the resurrection of the dead (though it is manifestly proclaimed) 
into an unreal signification, asserting that even death
itself must be spiritually understood. For death, they say, is not
really and truly this which is close to hand, the separation of flesh
and soul, but ignorance of God, whereby man, being dead to God,
lies low in error no less than in a tomb. So also, they add, the
resurrection must be maintained to be that by which a man, having
come to the truth, has been reanimated and revivified to God,
and, the death of ignorance being dispelled, has as it were burst
forth from the tomb of the old man:¹ because the Lord also likened
the scribes and pharisees to whitened sepulchres.² Thereafter then,
having by faith obtained resurrection, they are, they say, with the
Lord, whom they have put on in baptism. In fact, by this device
they are accustomed often enough to trick our people even in
conversation, pretending that they too admit the resurrection of
the flesh. 'Woe', they say, 'to him who has not risen again in this
flesh', to avoid shocking them at the outset by a forthright
repudiation of resurrection. But secretly, in their private thoughts,
their meaning is, Woe to him who has not, while he is in this
flesh, obtained knowledge of heretical secrets: for among them
resurrection has this meaning. Also some, maintaining that the
resurrection begins from the release of the soul, interpret ' come
forth from the tomb' as 'escape from the world' (on the ground
that the world is a habitation of dead men, that is, of men who
know not God) or even 'escape from the body' (on the ground
that the body, in the guise of a tomb, encloses and imprisons the
soul in the death which is this world's life).

20   As against this kind of guesswork I shall push down their

¹ Cf. Eph. 4. 22; Col. 3. 9.        ² Cf. Matt. 23. 27.

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primary scaffoldwork, that by which they claim that the prophets
did all their preaching by means of pictures: for, if this had been
the case, not even the pictures would have been recognizable,
unless the verities had been first preached from which the pictures
might be sketched out. And in fact, if all things are figures, what
can that be of which they are figures? How can you hold out a
mirror, if there is nowhere a face? But to such a degree were all
things not pictures, but truths as well, nor all things shadows, but
bodies as well, that in regard to the Lord himself all the more 
outstanding facts were preached more clearly than light. For it was
not in a figure that the Virgin conceived in the womb, nor was it
indirectly that she bore Emmanuel, God with us:¹ and if it was
indirectly that he was to receive the strength of Damascus and the
spoils of Samaria,² yet openly was he to come into judgement with
the elders and princes of the people.³ So too the heathen raged, in
the person of Pilate, and the peoples imagined vain things, in the
person of Israel: the kings of the earth stood up, Herod, and the rulers
were gathered together, Annas and Caiaphas, against the Lord and
against his Christ.⁴ He was also brought as a sheep to the slaughter,
and as a lamb before his shearer, Herod in fact; and was voiceless ----
so he opened not his mouth⁵ ---- while he gave his back to smitings and
his cheeks to the palms of hands, and turned not his face from
missiles of spittings.⁶ Also he was numbered among the 
transgressors,⁷ was pierced in the hands and the feet, suffered the casting
of lots upon his vesture, and bitter things to drink,⁸ and the wagging 
of the heads of those that mocked,⁹ when he had been priced at
thirty pieces of silver by the traitor.¹⁰ Are there any figures here in
Isaiah, any pictures in David, any enigmas in Jeremiah? And these
also prophesied of his miracles, again not by parables. Or were the
eyes of the blind not made open, did not the tongue of the dumb
speak plain, did withered hands and feeble knees not become
strong again, did not lame men leap as an hart?¹¹ For although we

¹ Cf. Isa. 7. 14; Matt. 1. 23. ² Cf. Isa. 8. 4.
³ Cf. Isa. 3. 14.                       ⁴ Ps. 2. 1-2.        ⁵ Isa. 53. 7.
⁶ Cf. Isa. 50. 6.        ⁷ Cf. Isa. 53. 12.              ⁸ Cf. Ps. 22. 16, 18.
⁹ Cf. Ps. 22. 7.        ¹⁰ Cf. Zech. 11, 12; Matt. 27. 9.
¹¹ Cf. Isa. 35. 5, 6.

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are wont to interpret these things spiritually as well, equating them
with the diseases of the soul which the Lord healed, yet since they
were also fulfilled in fleshly sort they show that the prophets
preached in both forms, saving this, that most of their expressions
can be claimed as bare and simple and clear of every mist of
allegory, as when they cry aloud of the deaths of nations and
cities, Tyre and Egypt and Babylon and Edom and the ships of
Carthage, and when they make orations on Israel's own plagues
and pardons, captivities and restorations, and the death of the final
dispersion.¹ Is anyone disposed to interpret these, and not rather
acknowledge them? Facts are contained in the writings: the
writings are read in the facts. Thus the form of prophetic discourse
is allegorical neither always nor in all places, but sometimes and in
some places.

21   Well then, you ask, if 'sometimes and in some places', why
are they not to be spiritually understood in the edict of the
resurrection? Because, in fact, there is a high degree of difference.
In the first place, what will become of all those other passages of
divine scripture which so openly attest a corporal resurrection as
to admit of no suspicion of a figurative signification? And indeed
it would be equitable, as I have already postulated, that things
uncertain should be prejudged by things certain, and things obscure
by things manifest, at the least so that between the disagreement
of things certain and things uncertain, of things manifest and things
obscure, faith should not be frittered away, truth brought into
danger, and God himself stigmatized as inconstant. Secondly,
because it is not likely that that aspect of the mystery to which the
whole faith is entrusted, on which the whole discipline is supported,
should turn out to have been ambiguously announced and
obscurely propounded, when the hope of resurrection, unless it
were manifest in respect of peril and of reward, would persuade no
one to a religion, particularly of this kind, which is the object of
public hatred and hostile accusation. No work is certain, of which
the wages are uncertain: no fear is well founded, of a peril which is
in doubt. Yet both the wages and the peril depend on the issue of
the resurrection. Moreover, if such open prophecy has launched

¹ Cf. Isa. 23, 24.

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God's temporal and local and personal decrees and judgements
against cities and nations and kings, how can his eternal and
universal ordinances against the whole human race have fled from
the light that is themselves?¹ For the greater these are, the clearer
they would need to be, so as to be believed to be the greater. And
I suppose that to God one can ascribe neither envy nor guile nor
cowardice nor the fear of displeasing, which are the usual reasons
why the promulgation of great matters is wrapped up in subtilties.

22   Next I shall affirm that we must pay attention to those
scriptures also which forbid us, after the manner of these soulful
men----let me not call them spiritual----either to assume that the
resurrection is already present in the acknowledgement of the
truth, or to claim that it ensues immediately upon departure from
this life. For just as the times of the hope as a whole are determined
in the sacred page, and it is not permissible for it to be established
earlier, so likewise it will not be permissible for the scriptures
concerning it to be so interpreted as to allow it to be established
earlier. Our prayers, I suppose, yearn for Christ's coming, for the
sunset of this age, for the world also to pass away, at the great day
of the Lord, the day of wrath and retribution, that last and secret
day, known to none save the Father,² yet marked beforehand by
signs and wonders and clashes of the elements and strifes of nations.³
I should search the prophecies, if the Lord himself had kept
silence----except that the prophecies too were the Lord's voice: but
it matters more that he seals them with his own mouth. When
asked by the disciples when those things would come to pass which
he had just then hurled forth concerning the death of the Temple,
he set in array the order of the times, first the Judaic until the
destruction of Jerusalem,⁴ and thereafter the general ones until the
conclusion of the age.⁵ For after he had declared, And then shall
Jerusalem be trampled down among the gentiles, until the times of the
gentiles be fulfilled⁶----that is, for them to be made God's elect, and
gathered in with the remnants of Israel----from then on he preached
against the world and the age,⁷ in the manner of Joel and Daniel

¹ Cf. Isa. 13. 13; Zeph. 2. 1; Hos. 9. 7.
² Cf. Acts 1. 7.         ³ cf. Luke 21. 7.         ⁴ Cf. Luke 21. 9-24.
⁵ Cf. Luke 21. 25-8.        ⁶ Luke 21. 24.        ⁷ Cf. Luke 21. 25-6.

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and the whole assembly of the prophets, that there shall be signs in
the sun and the moon and the stars, constraint of nations, with
perplexity at the roaring of the sea, and the emotions of men who
wax cold through fear and expectation of the things that threaten
the world. For the powers of the heavens, he says, shall be shaken, and
then shall they see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with
great power and glory. But when these things begin to come to pass, ye
shall look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption will have
drawn nigh.¹ Now he says it 'draws nigh', not 'is already present',
and 'when these things begin to come to pass', not 'when they
have come to pass', because when they have come to pass, then
will our redemption be present, which until then will continue to
be said to draw nigh, while meantime it lifts up and bestirs our
minds towards that fruit of hope which is even now nigh at hand.
Of this there is also appended a parable, of the trees which wax
tender to form the bud which is the precursor of flower, and afterwards 
of fruit.² So also ye, when ye have seen all these things come to
pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand: watch therefore
at every season, that ye may be worthy to escape all these things, and
may stand before the Son of Man³----evidently by means of the 
resurrection, when all those things have previously been accomplished.
Thus, although in the acknowledgement of the mystery it comes
to bud, yet it comes to flower and fruit at the Lord's actual
presence. Who then in so untimely, so unripe, a sort, has summoned 
the Lord, now at the right hand of God, to shake terribly
the earth, as Isaiah says,⁴ when, I suppose, it is still intact? Who has
already subdued Christ's enemies under his feet, as David says,⁵ as
though swifter than the Father, while still every assembly of the
proletariat cries out for 'Christians to the lion'? Who has perceived 
Jesus coming down from heaven in like manner as the
apostles saw him going up, according to the angels' decree?⁶ Until
this present day no tribe unto tribe have smitten their breasts,⁷
recognizing him whom they pierced:⁸ no one yet has welcomed

¹ Luke 21. 26-8; Dan. 7. 13.
² Cf. Luke 21. 29-31.         ³ Luke 21. 31, 36.         ⁴ Cf. Isa. 2. 19.
⁵ Cf. Ps. 110. 1.                 ⁶ Cf. Acts 1. 11.         ⁷ Cf. Zech. 12. 12.
⁸ Cf. Zech. 12. 10.

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Elijah,¹ no one yet has fled from Antichrist,² no one yet has wept
for the death of Babylon.³ And is there any now who has risen
again, except a heretic? He, to be sure, has already come forth
from the sepulchre of the body, while even yet liable to fevers and
boils, and has already trodden down the enemies, although even
yet he has to wrestle with the rulers of the world:⁴ and in fact he is
now reigning, though he still has to pay to Caesar the things which
are Caesar's own.⁵

23   The apostle indeed teaches, when writing to the Colossians,
that we were at one time dead, alienated, and enemies of the mind
of the Lord, when we were engaged in evil works,⁶ but that afterwards 
we were buried together with Christ in baptism, and raised
up together in him through faith in the effectual working of God
who raised him from the dead:⁷ And you, when ye were dead in
trespasses and the undrcumdsion of your flesh, did he quicken together
with him, having for given you all trespasses:⁸ and again, If ye died with
Christ from the elements of the world, how is it that, as though living in
the world, some of you pass judgement?⁹ But since he in such sense
makes us dead spiritually as yet to acknowledge that we shall also
sometime die corporally, clearly, on the same principle, when he
reckons us spiritually raised again he equally does not deny that we
shall rise again corporally. If, he says in fact, ye have risen again
with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting
at the right hand of God: set your thoughts on the things which are above,
not on those which are beneath.¹⁰ Thus he indicates a resurrection in
mind, by which alone as yet we are able to reach up to heavenly
things, things which we should neither be seeking nor setting our
thoughts on if we were now in possession of them. He adds also,
For ye died----'to trespasses' of course, not 'to yourselves'----and your
life is hid with Christ in God.¹¹ Consequently that life, being hidden,
is not yet within our grasp: and so also John says, And it hath not
yet been made manifest what we shall he: we know that if he shall have
been made manifest we shall be like him.¹² So far are we from being

¹ Cf. Mal. 4. 5.           ² Cf. Apoc. 12. 6.         ³ cf. Apoc. 18. 9.
⁴ Cf. Eph. 6. 12.         ⁵ cf. Matt. 22. 21.         ⁶ Cf. Col. 1. 21.
⁷ Cf. Col. 2. 12.          ⁸ Col. 2. 13.         ⁹ Col. 2. 20.
¹⁰ Col. 3. 1-2.            ¹¹ Col. 3. 3.         ¹² 1 John 3. 2.

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already that which we know not: for we should certainly know it
if we were it already. Thus in this part of the course there is a
contemplation of the hope by means of faith, not its actual presence, 
and not the possession but the expectation of it. And of this
hope and expectation Paul says to the Galatians, For we by the
Spirit look for the hope of righteousness as a result of faith.¹ He does
not say 'we hold': and by 'righteousness' he means the righteousness 
of God resulting from the judgement by which we shall be
judged in respect of the reward: and on tenterhooks for this reward
he himself, when writing to the Philippians, says, If by any means
I may arrive at the resurrection from the dead: not that I have already
received it or am made perfect.² And yet he had become a believer,
and knew all mysteries, being a vessel of election, a doctor of the
gentiles:³ but he still adds, But I follow after, if that I may apprehend
that in which I have been apprehended by Christ. More than that:
Brethren, I count not myself yet to have apprehended: one thing 
however, forgetting things behind, and stretching myself out to the things in
front, I follow on after the mark towards the palm of blamelessness
which induced me to enter for the race⁴----evidently towards the
resurrection from the dead, yet at its due time, as he says to the
Galatians, Be not weary of well-doing, for in due time we shall reap:⁵
as also to Timothy concerning Onesiphorus, May the Lord grant
him to find mercy in that day.⁶ And with a view to that day and time
he instructs Timothy himself to keep the commandment unspotted, 
blameless, until the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ,
which at its due time he shall show, who is the blessed and only
potentate, the King of kings----meaning God.⁷ And of these times
Peter also says in the Acts, Repent ye therefore and look around, that
your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come upon
you from the presence of God, and he may send Christ who before was
appointed for you, whom the heavens must receive until the times of the
delivery of all things which God hath spoken by the mouth of the holy
prophets.⁸

¹ Gal. 5. 5.                    ² Phil. 3. 11-12.
³ Cf. Acts 9. 15; 1 Tim. 2. 7.         ⁴ Cf. Phil. 3. 12-14.
⁵ Gal. 6. 9.                    ⁶ 2 Tim. 1. 18.
⁷ 1 Tim. 6. 14-15.         ⁸ Acts 3. 19-21.

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24   What these times are, learn in company with the Thessalonians: 
for we read, Even as ye turned from idols to serve the living
and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, even Jesus,¹ whom
he raised from the dead. And again, For what is our hope or joy or
crown of rejoicing, but that ye also <may be> in the presence of our Lord
Jesus Christ, at his coming?² Again, In the presence of our God and
Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ along with all his saints.³
And when teaching of their falling asleep, that it is the less to be
sorrowed for, he also at the same time sets forth the times of the
resurrection, saying, For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, so
also them that are fallen asleep in Jesus will God bring forward with him.
For this we say unto you in a word of God, that we who are alive, who
remain behind until the coming of our Lord, shall not prevent those who
are fallen asleep: because the Lord himself will descend from heaven with
a rallying-cry and with the voice of the archangel and the trumpet of God,
and the dead in Christ will be the first to rise again, and then we who are
alive, who <remain>, shall be lifted up along with them in the clouds to
meet the Lord Christ in the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord.⁴
What voice of an archangel, what trumpet of God, has yet been
heard, except perhaps in the sleeping-places of heretics? For
though the word of the gospel can be described as a trumpet of
God, which has already called them, yet they must either have
already corporally died so as to have risen again, and in what sense
are they alive? or else have been snatched up in the clouds, and in
what sense are they here? Truly most miserable are they,⁵ as the
apostle has declared, for they must be reckoned as hoping in this
life only, because they shut out, while they snatch at it in advance,
that boon which is promised after it, being frustrate concerning
the truth no less than Phygellus and Hermogenes.⁶ For this reason
the majesty of the Holy Spirit, having discernment of thoughts of
that sort, alleges also in the same epistle to the Thessalonians, But
concerning the times and the spaces of times, brethren, there is no need to
write to you:for yourselves know most certainly that the day of the Lord
so cometh as a thief in the night: when they shall say 'Peace', and 'All

¹ 1 Thess. 1. 9-10.            ² 1 Thess. 2. 19.         ³ 1 Thess. 3. 13.
⁴ 1 Thess. 4. 14-17.         ⁵ Cf. 1 Cor. 15. 19.
⁶ Cf. 1 Tim. 1. 19, 20; 2 Tim. 1.15.

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things are safe', then shall sudden destruction come upon them.¹ And in
the second epistle he speaks with more plenary carefulness to the
same persons: But I beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ and our gathering together unto him, that ye be not quickly
shaken in mind, nor disturbed, either by spirit or by speech (of false
prophets, of course) or by epistle (of false apostles) as if it were ours,
as though the day of the Lord were here. Let no man seduce you in any
way: because unless the disruption come first (of this empire, he means)
and the man of delinquency be revealed (that is, Antichrist), the son of
perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself over everything that is
called God or Worship, so as to sit in the Temple of God affirming that
he is god----remember ye not that when I was with you I used to say these
things to you? And now ye know what retaineth, that he may be revealed
at his own time. For the secret of iniquity is already at work: only
he who now retaineth, must retain, until he be taken out of the midst²----
who but the Roman state, whose disruption, being dispersed
among ten kings, will bring in Antichrist?----and then will the wicked
one be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will slay with the spirit of his
mouth and will bring to naught by the presence of his coming----whose
coming is according to the operation of Satan in all power and signs and
lying wonders and in all the seduction of unrighteousness to them that are
perishing.³

25   Again in the Apocalypse of John the order of the times is laid
down. This order, while beneath the altar they cry aloud for
vengeance and judgement,⁴ the souls of the martyrs have learned to
wait for, so that first the world may drink up its own plagues from
the vials of the angels,⁵ and that harlot city may receive from the
ten kings the death it deserves,⁶ and the beast Antichrist with his
false prophet may bring conflict upon the church,⁷ and thus, the
devil having for a season been bound in the abyss, the prerogative
of the first resurrection may be set in order from the thrones,⁸ and
thereafter, <the devil> having been given over to the fire,⁹ the
censorial roll of the universal resurrection¹⁰ may be judged out of

¹ 1 Thess. 5. 1-3.              ² 2 Thess. 2. 1-7.                   ³ 2 Thess. 2. 8-10.
⁴ Cf. Apoc. 6. 9-11.         ⁵ Cf. Apoc. 15. 7; 16. 1.         ⁶ Cf. Apoc. 17. 12.
⁷ Cf. Apoc. 19. 19-20.    ⁸ Cf. Apoc. 20. 2-4.
⁹ Cf. Apoc. 20. 9.           ¹⁰ Cf. Apoc. 20. 12.

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the books. Since therefore the scriptures both note down the
characteristics of the last times, and place the whole harvest of the
Christian hope at the obsequies of the age, it is evident either that
then is fulfilled the whole of what is promised us by God----and in
that case that which is claimed here and now by the heretics is void
----or else, if the acknowledgement of the mystery is also a resurrection, 
this belief is without prejudice to that other resurrection which
is preached at the last, and it follows that, by the very fact that this
one is claimed as spiritual, that other is already judged to be corporal: 
because if there had been no announcement of one for that
time, this one might with good reason be claimed as the only one,
and solely spiritual; but since it is also advertised <as occurring> at
the last time, it is admittedly a corporal one, because for that time
no spiritual one is announced. For why should there be a second
announcement of a resurrection of the same character, a spiritual
character, when it would be seemly for it to be completed either
now without distinction of times, or else then at the whole conclusion 
of the times? Thus it befits us rather <than them> even to
maintain that there is a spiritual resurrection at entrance into faith,
seeing we recognize its plenitude at the end of the age.

26   One further answer I shall give to their prior allegation that
the scriptures are allegorical, namely that we too have it no less in
our power by the support of figurative prophetic diction to prove
that the resurrection is corporal. For the primordial sentence of
God, by declaring that man is earth----Earth thou art and unto earth
shah thou go,¹ according to the substance of the flesh of course,
which was taken from the earth and first received the name of
'man', as I have shown----gives me the rule of interpreting with
reference to the flesh whatsoever else of wrath or of grace God has
determined with reference to the earth, for the reason that the
earth is not in a strict sense exposed to his judgement, having
committed nothing either of good or of evil. Cursed indeed is the
earth because it has drunk blood:² but this itself is a metaphor for
the flesh of the homicide. For even though the earth has to receive
benefit or injury, this also is for man's sake, that he may receive
benefit or injury by virtue of what befalls his dwelling-place, by

¹ Gen. 3. 19.        ² Cf. Gen. 4. 11.

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so much the more as he himself must pay those penalties which
the earth for his sake is to suffer. And so, even when God utters
threats against the earth, I shall affirm that he is really threatening
the flesh: and when he makes any promise to the earth, I shall
understand that he is really making a promise to the flesh, as in
David, The Lord is king, the earth shall rejoice¹----that is, the flesh of
the saints, to which pertains the fruition of the divine kingdom.
Then he adds, The earth saw it and was shaken, the mountains melted
like wax from before the face of the Lord²----this time the flesh of the
ungodly: for also, They shall look upon him who have pierced him?
So much so, that if one suppose that both pronouncements were
made, without metaphor, concerning the element of earth, how
with consistency can it be shaken and be melted from before the
face of the Lord, at whose reigning it has just now rejoiced? So
also in Isaiah, Ye shall eat the good things of the earth,⁴ we shall 
understand the good things of the flesh, which await it when in the
kingdom of God it has been brought again into shape and made
angelic, and is to obtain things which the eye hath not seen nor the
ear heard, nor have they ascended into the heart of man.⁵ Else
it were somewhat vain that God should entice it to obedience
with the fruits of the field and the victuals of this life which, by
having once for all assigned the creation to man, he distributes
even to the irreligious and blasphemous by making it to rain upon
good men and bad and sending forth his sunshine upon just men
and unjust.⁶ A happy thing indeed faith is if it is to obtain things
which the enemies of God and of Christ not only use but even
abuse by worshipping the creation itself in opposition to the
Creator.⁷ Shall you reckon onions and truffles among the good
things of the earth, when the Lord declares that not even by bread
shall man live?⁸ Thus the Jews, by hoping for earthly things and
nothing more, lose the heavenly things, not knowing that even the
bread that was promised is of the heavenly <sort>,⁹ the oil that of

¹ Ps. 97. 1.                                         ² Ps. 97. 4-5.
³ Zech. 12. 10; John 19. 37.          ⁴ Isa. 1. 19.
⁵ Cf. 1 Cor. 2. 9.                              ⁶ Cf. Matt. 5. 45.
⁷ Cf. Rom. 1. 25.                             ⁸ Cf. Deut. 8. 3; Luke 4. 4; Matt. 4. 4.
⁹ Cf. John 6. 51.

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divine unction, the water that of the Spirit, and the wine that of
the soul which receives strength from the vine which is Christ:¹
even as they reckon the holy land itself to be strictly the Jewish
territory, though it ought rather to be interpreted as the Lord's
flesh, so that flesh thenceforth also in all who have put on Christ is a
holy land, truly holy through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit,
truly flowing with milk and honey through the sweetness of his
own hope,² truly Judaean through the familiar converse of God ----
For he is not a Jew who is one openly, but who is one in secret?³ ---- so that
it is also the temple of God, and Jerusalem, to which Isaiah says,
Awake, awake, O Jerusalem, put on the strength of thine arm: awake as
in the beginning of the day⁴ ---- that is, in that integrity in which it was
before the sin of the transgression. For how can words of this kind
of exhortation and invitation befit that Jerusalem which killed the
prophets and stoned them that were sent unto her and at length
actually slew her own Lord?⁵ In fact to no earth at all is salvation
promised, for it must pass away, along with the fashion of the
whole world.⁶ Even if any be bold rather to argue that the holy
land is Paradise, which it is possible to say belongs also to the
fathers (I mean Adam and Eve), it will be seen to follow that the
promise of restoration to Paradise⁷ was made to the flesh whose
appointed task it was to inhabit and to keep it, to the end that man
may be called back there in that same condition in which he was
when driven out.

27   Also the mention of garments in the scriptures we have to
allegorize with reference to the hope of the flesh, because the
Apocalypse of John also says, These are they who have not defiled
their garments with women,⁸ meaning of course virgins and those
who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of kingdoms of
heaven.⁹ And thus they will be in white robes,¹⁰ that is, in the glory
of unwedded flesh. And in the gospel the wedding-garment can
be recognized as sanctity of the flesh.¹¹ And so when Isaiah, teaching

¹ Cf. John 15. 1.                 ² Cf. Exod. 3. 17.                 ³ Rom. 2. 28-9.
⁴ Isa. 51. 9.                         ⁵ cf. Matt. 23. 37; Luke 13. 34.
⁶ Cf. 1 Cor. 7. 31.               ⁷ Cf. Gen. 31. 3, 48. 21.
⁸ Apoc. 14. 4; 3. 4.            ⁹ Cf. Matt. 19. 12.
¹⁰ Cf. Apoc. 3. 5.              ¹¹ Cf. Matt. 22. 11.

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what kind of fast the Lord has chosen, added a reference to the
wages of goodness and said, Then shall thy light break forth betimes,
and thy garments shall arise speedily,¹ he wished these to be 
understood not as shirt or cloak but as the flesh, and preached of the
dawning of the flesh which will rise again from the sunset of death.
To this extent have we as well as they an allegory at our disposal to
prove our case for a corporal resurrection. For also when we read,
O my people, enter into your larders for a little until my wrath pass by,²
the larders will be the sepulchres in which those will have to rest
for a little who have deceased at the bounds of the age during the
last wrath by the violence of Antichrist. Or else, why did he prefer
to use the expression 'larders' and not that of some other place of
storage, except that in larders flesh is kept which has been salted
and put by for use, so as to be brought out from them in due time?
For in like manner bodies also, having been treated with the spicery
of burial, are laid aside in tombs and sepulchres so as to come forth
from them when the Lord commands. And since this is appropriately 
understood in this sense----for can any taking of refuge in
pantries preserve us from the wrath of God?----by the very fact
that he says, Until wrath pass by,³----the wrath which will extinguish
Antichrist----he indicates that after the wrath the flesh will come
forth from the sepulchre into which it will have been brought
before the wrath. For even from pantries nothing other is brought
out than what is brought in, and it is after the uprooting of Anti-
christ that the resurrection will be set in motion.

28   We know moreover that prophecy has been delivered in facts
no less than in words: the resurrection is preached by things done,
as well as by things said. When Moses hides his hand in his bosom
and brings it out dead, and again puts it in, and pulls it out alive, is
he not making this a forecast concerning man as a whole?⁴ In fact
by that set of three signs⁵ there was indicated, along with its due
order <of working>, the triple power of God, which will first
subdue to man the devil the serpent, formidable though he be, and
thereafter will withdraw the flesh from the bosom of death, and

¹ Isa. 58. 8.            ² Isa. 26. 20.
³ Isa. 26. 20.         ⁴ Cf. Exod. 4. 6-7.
5 Cf. Exod. 4. 2-9.

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then prosecute all blood with judgement. And of this God says, in
the same prophet, Because I will also require your blood of all beasts,
and of the hand of a man and of the hand of a brother will I require it.¹
Now requisition implies demand of what is due, and demand of
what is due involves payment of debt, and in fact that will be paid
as a debt which under the heading of vengeance will be demanded
and required. For there will be no possibility of avenging that
which has entirely ceased to exist: but that will exist, when brought
again into being for the purpose of being avenged. And thus
everything that is preached with reference to blood has a reference
to flesh, for without flesh blood cannot be. The flesh will be raised
again so that the blood may be avenged.

There are also some things stated in such form as to be free from
the fog of allegory, yet which none the less thirst for an interpretation 
of their very literalness, as is that in Isaiah, I will kill and will
make alive.² Evidently the making alive is subsequent to the
killing. Consequently, as he kills by means of death, he will make
alive by means of resurrection. But it is the flesh which is killed by
means of death, and so it is the flesh also which will be made alive
by means of the resurrection. Evidently if to kill is to take the soul
away from the flesh, while to make alive, the contrary of it, is to
bring the soul back to the flesh, the flesh must needs rise again,
since to it the soul which was taken away by means of the killing is
to be brought back again by means of the making alive.

29   Consequently, if both allegorical scriptures and the arguments 
of facts, as also plain words, though without naming the
substance itself, throw light upon the resurrection of the flesh, how
much more will it be impossible to call in question those scriptures
which by mention of their several elements fasten this hope upon
the corporal substances themselves. Hear Ezekiel: The hand of the
Lord, he says, came upon me and the Lord carried me out in the spirit and
set me in the midst of the field: this was packed with bones. And he led
me round and round over them, and behold they were many over the face
of the field, and behold they were very dry. And he said unto me, Son of
man, shall these bones live? and I said, O Lord Adonai, thou knowest.
And he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones and say, O dry bones,

¹ Gen. 9. 5.                 ² Deut. 32. 39; cf.