Isaias 28:16

7. On this account also, Daniel, foreseeing His advent, said that a stone, cut out without hands, came into this world. For this is what “without hands” means, that His coming into this world was not by the operation of human hands, that is, of those men who are accustomed to stone-cutting; that is, Joseph taking no part with regard to it, but Mary alone co-operating with the pre-arranged plan. For this stone from the earth derives existence from both the power and the wisdom of God. Wherefore also Isaiah says: “Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I deposit in the foundations of Zion a stone, precious, elect, the chief, the corner-one, to be had in honour.” So, then, we understand that His advent in human nature was not by the will of a man, but by the will of God.

“What, then, sir,” I said, “if these men, being such as they are, repent and put away their desires after these women, and return again to the virgins, and walk in their strength and in their works, shall they not enter into the house of God?” “They shall enter in,” he said, “if they put away the works of these women, and put on again the strength of the virgins, and walk in their works. For on this account was there a cessation in the building, in order that, if these repent, they may depart into the building of the tower. But if they do not repent, then others will come in their place, and these at the end will be cast out. …

My preliminary remarks on the preceding epistle called me away from treating of its superscription, for I was sure that another opportunity would occur for considering the matter, it being of constant recurrence, and in the same form too, in every epistle. The point, then, is, that it is not (the usual) health which the apostle prescribes for those to whom he writes, but “grace and peace.” I do not ask, indeed, what a destroyer of Judaism has to do with a formula which the Jews still use. For to this day they salute each other with the greeting of “peace,” and formerly in their Scriptures they did the same. …

In the Creator, however, the two courses were perfectly compatible, both the predestination before the ages and the revelation at the end thereof, because that which He both fore-ordained and revealed He also in the intermediate space of time announced by the pre-ministration of figures, and symbols, and allegories. But because (the apostle) subjoins, on the subject of our glory, that “none of the princes of this world knew it, for had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory,” the heretic argues that the princes of this world crucified the Lord (that is, the Christ of the rival god) in order that this blow might even recoil on the Creator Himself. …

The expression “rock,” he says, he uses of Adam. This, he affirms, is Adam: “The chief corner-stone become the head of the corner.” For that in the head the substance is the formative brain from which the entire family is fashioned. “Whom,” he says, “I place as a rock at the foundations of Zion.” Allegorizing, he says, he speaks of the creation of the man. The rock is interposed (within) the teeth, as Homer says, “enclosure of teeth,” that is, a wall and fortress, in which exists the inner man, who thither has fallen from Adam, the primal man above. And he has been “severed without hands to effect the division,” and has been borne down into the image of oblivion, being earthly and clayish . And he asserts that the twittering spirits follow him, that is, the Logos:

VI. Hence the aged Simeon, putting off the weakness of the flesh, and putting on the strength of hope, in the face of the law hastened to receive the Minister of the law, the Teacher with authority, the God of Abraham, the Protector of Isaac, the Holy One of Israel, the Instructor of Moses; Him, I say, who promised to show him His divine incarnation, as it were His hinder parts; Him who, in the midst of poverty, was rich; Him who in infancy was before the ages; Him who, though seen, was invisible; Him who in comprehension was incomprehensible; Him who, though in littleness, yet surpassed all magnitude, at one and the same time in the temple and in the highest heavens, on a royal throne, and on the chariot of the cherubim Him who is both above and below continuously; Him who is in the form of a servant, and in the form of God the Father; a subject, and yet King of all. …

43. “Among those same persecutors of the saints the Apostle Paul had once also ranked; and he raged with eminent violence against the Christians. But, subsequently, he became a believer and an apostle, and was sent to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, suffering (in that ministry) things more grievous on behalf of the name of Christ than were those which he had done against the name of Christ. Moreover, in establishing churches throughout all the nations where he was sowing the seed of the gospel, he was wont to give earnest injunction that, as these converts (coming as they did from the worship of idols and without experience in the worship of the one God) could not readily serve God in the way of selling and distributing their possessions, they should make offerings for the poor brethren among the saints who were in the churches of Judea which had believed in Christ. …

23. Already on a former occasion I have spoken of these ascending and descending angels; but lest you should have forgotten, I shall speak of the latter briefly by way of recalling it to your recollection. I should use more words if I were introducing, not recalling the subject. Jacob saw a ladder in a dream; and on a ladder he saw angels ascending and descending: and he anointed the stone which he had placed at his head. You have heard that the Messias is Christ; you have heard that Christ is the Anointed. For Jacob did not place the stone, the anointed stone, that he might come and adore it: otherwise that would have been idolatry, not a pointing out of Christ. What was done was a pointing out of Christ, so far as it behoved such a pointing out to be made, and it was Christ that was pointed out. A stone was anointed, but not for an idol. …

8. “They have said in their heart (the kindred of them is in one)”, Have said what? “Come ye, let us suppress the solemnities of the Lord from the land” ( ver. 8 ). “Of the Lord,” hath been inserted in the person of this man, that is, in the person of Asaph. For they raging would not have called Him the Lord whose temple they were overthrowing. “Come ye, let us suppress all the solemnities of the Lord from the land.” What of Asaph? What understanding hath Asaph in these words? What? Doth he not profit even by the discipline accorded? Is not the mind’s crookedness made straight? Overthrown were all things that were at first: nowhere is there priest, nowhere Altar of the Jews, nowhere victim, nowhere Temple. …

You see how he produces witnesses, whether to the faith, or to the confession of it. For the words, “Every one that believeth,” point out the faith. But the words, “Whosoever shall call upon,” set forth confession. Then again to proclaim the universality of the grace, and to lay their boasting low, what he had before demonstrated at length, he here briefly recalls to their memory, showing again that there is no difference between the Jew and the uncircumcised. “For there is,” he says, “no difference between the Jew and the Greek.” And what he had said about the Father, when he was arguing this point, that he says here about the Son. For as before he said in asserting this, “Is He the God of the Jews only? Is He not of the Gentiles also? Yes, of the Gentiles also: seeing it is one God” ( Rom. iii. …

13. It would be tedious were I tell of the valley of Achor, that is, of ‘trouble and crowds,’ where theft and covetousness were condemned; and of Bethel, ‘the house of God,’ where Jacob poor and destitute slept upon the bare ground. Here it was that, having set beneath his head a stone which in Zechariah is described as having seven eyes and in Isaiah is spoken of as a corner-stone, he beheld a ladder reaching up to heaven; yes, and the Lord standing high above it holding out His hand to such as were ascending and hurling from on high such as were careless. …

3. Believe thou In One Lord Jesus Christ, the Only-Begotten Son of God . For we say “One Lord Jesus Christ,” that His Sonship may be “Only-begotten:” we say “One,” that thou mayest not suppose another: we say “One,” that thou mayest not profanely diffuse the many names of His action among many sons. For He is called a Door; but take not the name literally for a thing of wood, but a spiritual, a living Door, discriminating those who enter in. He is called a Way, not one trodden by feet, but leading to the Father in heaven; He is called a Sheep, not an irrational one, but the one which through its precious blood cleanses the world from its sins, which is led before the shearers, and knows when to be silent. This Sheep again is called a Shepherd, who says, I am the Good Shepherd : a Sheep because of His manhood, a Shepherd because of the loving-kindness of His Godhead. …