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of the Hebrews, and not a Jew, because the affairs of the Jews did not yet exist, is included among the most God-beloved and thrice-blessed. 7.8.37 But after the aforementioned Hebrews, since the race of their descendants was increasing to a great multitude and the nation of the Jews had already been constituted from them and they were increasing daily and multiplying, the pious conduct of their God-beloved forefathers of old was gradually weakened and blunted for them, while their sojourn among the Egyptians so prevailed over the aforementioned multitude that they came to forget their ancestral virtue, and their lives were carried away by conformity with the Egyptians, so that they seemed to differ in no way 7.8.38 from the Egyptians in their manner. Then indeed, when they had become such, the God of their forefathers sends out Moses as a leader and lawgiver, confirming the promises made through oracles to their ancestors; and then, having performed through Moses the recorded wonders and the extraordinary divine signs, he sets forth 7.8.39 a law suitable to the characters of his hearers; since indeed they were not able through the stupidity of their character to emulate their ancestral virtue, he delivered to them, as having souls subject to passion and diseased, a fitting constitution, ordaining some things openly and manifestly, but hinting at others through suggestions, both symbols and shadows, not proposing for them to keep and observe the naked 7.8.40 truth. And so the Jewish polity, beginning from this point somewhere with Moses, endures up until the coming of our savior Jesus Christ, in accordance with the voices of their own prophets, because this too was the oracle of Moses himself and of the prophets after him, that the customs and ordinances of Moses should not cease before those of Christ appeared, namely, those of the new covenant announced to all the nations through our savior; which also here came to their fulfillment, just as it has been proclaimed. 7.8.41 But since we have briefly discussed the life of the Hebrews before Moses and have presented the character of their piety, it is time also to examine their dogmatic manner from the writing of Moses and of the prophets after him.

7.9.1 10. CONCERNING THE DOGMATIC THEOREMS AMONG THE HEBREWS First of all then, that wonderful theologian and lawgiver himself, laying down beforehand for the Jewish nation through his own writing a constitution suited to piety, did not think it necessary to use the common and well-trodden prefaces to his words, but anticipating every law commanding things to be done and forbidding things not to be done, and the public and civil ordinances concerning contracts with one another, he thought it necessary to make the beginning of his teaching from the ancestral theology, considering 7.9.2 no other learning fitting for laws pertaining to piety than the theology that had come down to him from his forefathers of old. Therefore he begins from God according to the ancestral principles of the theology of the Hebrew forefathers, not as was customary for the Egyptians, nor similarly for the Phoenicians or the other nations who bring down the august name to a multitude, and who consider as visible gods the luminaries in the heaven, and as unseen and invisible ones, either those departed from among men, or also the chthonic 7.9.3 and aerial demons, as has been disproven by us previously. But, having made the beginning of his whole discourse from the cause of all things, the creator of visible and invisible things, he teaches that this one is the lawgiver of the constitution of the universe, having established him as king of the world 7.9.4, just as of some great city. he instructs

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Ἑβραίων, οὐχὶ δὲ Ἰουδαῖος, ὅτι μηδὲ ἦν πω τὰ Ἰουδαίων, ἐν τοῖς μάλιστα θεοφιλέσι καὶ τρισμακαρίοις ἀνείληπται. 7.8.37 Μετὰ δὲ τοὺς εἰρημένους Ἑβραίους, ἐπειδὴ εἰς πολυανθρωπίαν ἐπεδίδου τὸ τῶν ἀπογόνων γένος ἤδη τε καὶ τὸ Ἰουδαίων ἐξ αὐτῶν ἔθνος συνειστήκει ἐπλεόναζόν τε ὁσημέραι καὶ ἐπλήθυνον, τὰ μὲν τῆς εὐσεβοῦς ἀγωγῆς τῶν πρόπαλαι θεοφιλῶν προπατόρων κατὰ σμικρὸν αὐτοῖς ἐξησθένει καὶ ἀπημβλύνετο, τὰ δὲ τῆς παρ' Αἰγυπτίοις διατριβῆς τοσοῦτον τῆς τῶν δηλουμένων κατίσχυε πληθύος ὡς τῆς μὲν πατρίου ἀρετῆς εἰς λήθην ἐλθεῖν, τῇ δὲ παρ' Αἰγυπτίοις ὁμοιοτροπίᾳ τοὺς βίους περιενεχθῆναι, ὡς κατὰ μηδὲν 7.8.38 Αἰγυπτίων τὸν τρόπον διαφέρειν δοκεῖν. ἐνταῦθα δῆτα αὐτοῖς τοιοῖσδε ἀποτελεσθεῖσιν ὁ τῶν προπατόρων θεὸς ἡγεμόνα καὶ νομοθέτην ἐκπέμπει Μωσέα, τὰς διὰ χρησμῶν τῶν πρὸς τοὺς προγόνους αὐτῶν πιστούμενος ἐπαγγελίας· κἄπειτα διὰ Μωσέως τὰ ἀνάγραπτα θαύματα καὶ τὰς παραδόξους θεοσημείας ἐπιτελέσας τὸν ἁρμόδιον τοῖς τῶν ἀκροωμένων ἤθεσι προβάλ7.8.39 λεται νόμον· οὐχ οἵοις τε γοῦν οὖσι δι' ἀβελτερίαν τρόπου τὴν πάτριον ζηλοῦν ἀρετήν, οἷα δὴ τὰς ψυχὰς ἐμπαθέσι καὶ νενοσηλευμένοις τὴν κατάλληλον παρεδίδου πολιτείαν, τὰ μὲν προφανῶς ἐκ τοῦ προδήλου διαταττόμενος, τὰ δὲ δι' ὑπονοιῶν αἰνιττόμενος σύμβολά τε καὶ σκιάς, ἀλλ' οὐ γυμνὴν ἀλή7.8.40 θειαν φυλάττειν αὐτοῖς καὶ περιέπειν ὑποθέμενος. καὶ δὴ τὸ Ἰουδαίων πολίτευμα ἐντεῦθέν ποθεν ἀπὸ Μωσέως ἀρξάμενον μέχρι καὶ τῆς τοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ παρουσίας ταῖς τῶν οἰκείων προφητῶν ἀκολούθως φωναῖς διαρκεῖ, ὅτι δὴ καὶ τοῦτο Μωσέως ἦν αὐτοῦ καὶ τῶν μετέπειτα προφητῶν θέσπισμα, μὴ πρότερον ἐκλιπεῖν τὰ Μωσέως νόμιμά τε καὶ διατάγματα ἢ τὰ τοῦ Χριστοῦ φανῆναι, τὰ τῆς καινῆς δηλαδὴ διαθήκης τῆς διὰ τοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν πᾶσι τοῖς ἔθνεσι κατηγγελμένης· ἃ καὶ ὧδε τέλους ἔτυχεν, ᾗ καὶ ἀναπεφώνηται. 7.8.41 Ἀλλ' ἐπειδὴ τὸν τῶν πρὸ Μωσέως Ἑβραίων βίον ἐν ὀλίγῳ διεληλύθαμεν καὶ τόν γε τῆς κατ' αὐτοὺς εὐσεβείας χαρακτῆρα παρεστήσαμεν, ὥρα καὶ τὸν δογματικὸν αὐτῶν τρόπον ἀπό τε τῆς Μωσέως γραφῆς καὶ τῶν μετ' αὐτὸν προφητῶν ἐπισκέψασθαι.

7.9.1 ιʹ. ΠΕΡΙ ΤΩΝ ΠΑΡ' ΕΒΡΑΙΟΙΣ ∆ΟΓΜΑΤΙΚΩΝ ΘΕΩΡΗΜΑΤΩΝ Πρῶτος δ' οὖν ἁπάντων αὐτὸς ἐκεῖνος ὁ θαυμάσιος θεολόγος τε καὶ νομοθέτης πολιτείαν εὐσεβείᾳ προσήκουσαν διὰ τῆς οἰκείας γραφῆς τῷ Ἰουδαίων ἔθνει προκαταβαλλόμενος, οὐ τοῖς κοινοῖς καὶ πεπατημένοις ᾠήθη δεῖν χρήσασθαι προοιμίοις τῶν λόγων, προλαβὼν δὲ πάντα νόμον προστακτικὸν τῶν ποιητέων καὶ τῶν οὐ ποιητέων ἀπαγορευτικὸν τάς τε δημοτελεῖς καὶ πολιτικὰς περὶ τῶν πρὸς ἀλλήλους συμβολαίων διατάξεις, ἀπὸ τῆς πατρίου θεολογίας δεῖν ᾤετο τὴν καταρχὴν ποιήσασθαι τῆς διδασκαλίας, οὐδ' ἑτέραν μάθησιν οἰκείαν νόμοις εὐσεβείᾳ προσήκουσιν ἡγησά7.9.2 μενος ἢ τὴν ἄνωθεν ἐκ προπατόρων εἰς αὐτὸν ἥκουσαν θεολογίαν. ἄρχεται τοιγαροῦν ἀπὸ θεοῦ κατὰ τὰ πάτρια τῆς τῶν προγόνων Ἑβραίων θεολογίας, οὐχ ᾗπερ Αἰγυπτίοις φίλον ἦν, ἀλλ' οὐδὲ Φοίνιξιν ἢ τοῖς λοιποῖς ἔθνεσι παραπλησίως εἰς πλῆθος καταβάλλουσι τὴν σεβάσμιον προσηγορίαν θεούς τε ὁρωμένους μὲν τοὺς κατ' οὐρανὸν φωστῆρας νομίζουσιν, ἀφανεῖς δὲ καὶ ἀοράτους ἤτοι τοὺς ἐξ ἀνθρώπων κατοιχομένους ἢ καὶ τοὺς χθο7.9.3 νίους καὶ δαίμονας ἀερίους κατὰ τὰ πρόσθεν ἡμῖν ἀπεληλεγμένα. ἀλλὰ γὰρ ἀπὸ τοῦ πάντων αἰτίου ὁρατῶν τε καὶ ἀοράτων δημιουργοῦ τὴν καταρχὴν τοῦ παντὸς λόγου πεποιημένος νομοθέτην τοῦτον εἶναι διδάσκει τῆς τοῦ παντὸς συστάσεως, ὥσπερ μιᾶς τινος μεγαλοπόλεως τοῦ κόσμου βασιλέα 7.9.4 καταστήσας. παιδεύει