Chapter 61 [XXXII.]—The Serpent Lifted Up in the Wilderness Prefigured Christ Suspended on the Cross; Even Infants Themselves Poisoned by the Serpent’s Bite.

And since this great and wonderful dignity can only be attained by the remission of sins, He goes on to say, “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”220    John iii. 14, 15. We know what at that time happened in the wilderness. Many were dying of the bite of serpents: the people then confessed their sins, and, through Moses, besought the Lord to take away from them this poison; accordingly, Moses, at the Lord’s command, lifted up a brazen serpent in the wilderness, and admonished the people that every one who had been serpent-bitten should look upon the uplifted figure. When they did so they were immediately healed.221    Numb. xxi. 6–9. What means the uplifted serpent but the death of Christ, by that mode of expressing a sign, whereby the thing which is effected is signified by that which effects it? Now death came by the serpent, which persuaded man to commit the sin, by which he deserved to die. The Lord, however, transferred to His own flesh not sin, as the poison of the serpent, but He did transfer to it death, that the penalty without the fault might transpire in the likeness of sinful flesh, whence, in the sinful flesh, both the fault might be removed and the penalty. As, therefore, it then came to pass that whoever looked at the raised serpent was both healed of the poison and freed from death, so also now, whosoever is conformed to the likeness of the death of Christ by faith in Him and His baptism, is freed both from sin by justification, and from death by resurrection. For this is what He says: “That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”222    John iii. 15. What necessity then could there be for an infant’s being conformed to the death of Christ by baptism, if he were not altogether poisoned by the bite of the serpent?

CAPUT XXXII.

61. Serpens in deserto exaltatus Christum in cruce pendentem figuravit. Parvuli etiam ipsi serpentis morsu venenati. Magna haec miraque dignatio, quae quoniam fieri non potest nisi per remissionem peccatorum, sequitur, et dicit: Et sicut Moyses exaltavit serpentem in deserto, ita exaltari oportet Filium hominis; ut omnis qui crediderit in eum non pereat, sed habeat vitam aeternam. Quid tunc in deserto factum sit, novimus: serpentum morsibus multi moriebantur; tunc populus peccata sua confitens, per Moysen deprecatus est Dominum, ut hoc ab eis virus auferret: ac sic Moyses ex praecepto Domini exaltavit in deserto aeneum serpentem; admonuitque populum, ut illum exaltatum quisquis a serpente morderetur attenderet: hoc facientes continuo sanabantur (Num. XXI, 6-9). Quid est exaltatus serpens, nisi mors Christi, eo significandi modo, quo per efficientem id quod efficitur significatur? A serpente quippe mors venit, qui peccatum, quo mori mereretur, homini persuasit. Dominus autem in carnem suam non peccatum transtulit, tanquam venenum serpentis: sed tamen transtulit mortem; ut esset in similitudine carnis peccati poena sine culpa, unde in carne peccati et culpa solveretur et poena. Sicut ergo tunc, qui conspiciebat exaltatum serpentem, et a veneno sanabatur, et a morte liberabatur: sic nunc, qui conformatur similitudini mortis Christi per fidem baptismumque ejus, et a peccato per justificationem, et a morte per resurrectionem liberatur. Hoc est enim quod ait, ut omnis qui credit in eum non pereat, sed habeat vitam aeternam. Quid igitur opus est, ut Christi morti per Baptismum conformetur parvulus, si morsu serpentis non est omnino venenatus?