Chapter 14.—The Unobligated Death of Christ Has Freed Those Who Were Liable to Death.

18. What, then, is the righteousness by which the devil was conquered? What, except the righteousness of Jesus Christ? And how was he conquered? Because, when he found in Him nothing worthy of death, yet he slew Him. And certainly it is just, that we whom he held as debtors, should be dismissed free by believing in Him whom he slew without any debt. In this way it is that we are said to be justified in the blood of Christ.813    Rom. v. 9 For so that innocent blood was shed for the remission of our sins. Whence He calls Himself in the Psalms, “Free among the dead.”814    Ps. lxxxviii. 5 For he only that is dead is free from the debt of death. Hence also in another psalm He says, “Then I restored that which I seized not;”815    Ps. lxix. 4 meaning sin by the thing seized, because sin is laid hold of against what is lawful. Whence also He says, by the mouth of His own Flesh, as is read in the Gospel: “For the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me,” that is, no sin; but “that the world may know,” He says, “that I do the commandment of the Father; arise, let us go hence.”816    John xiv. 30–31 And hence He proceeds to His passion, that He might pay for us debtors that which He Himself did not owe. Would then the devil be conquered by this most just right, if Christ had willed to deal with him by power, not by righteousness? But He held back what was possible to Him, in order that He might first do what was fitting. And hence it was necessary that He should be both man and God. For unless He had been man, He could not have been slain; unless He had been God, men would not have believed that He would not do what He could, but that He could not do what He would; nor should we have thought that righteousness was preferred by Him to power, but that He lacked power. But now He suffered for us things belonging to man, because He was man; but if He had been unwilling, it would have been in His power to not so to suffer, because He was also God. And righteousness was therefore made more acceptable in humility, because so great power as was in His Divinity, if He had been unwilling, would have been able not to suffer humility; and thus by Him who died, being thus powerful, both righteousness was commended, and power promised, to us, weak mortals. For He did one of these two things by dying, the other by rising again. For what is more righteous, than to come even to the death of the cross for righteousness? And what more powerful, than to rise from the dead, and to ascend into heaven with that very flesh in which He was slain? And therefore He conquered the devil first by righteousness, and afterwards by power: namely, by righteousness, because He had no sin, and was slain by him most unjustly; but by power, because having been dead He lived again, never afterwards to die.817    Rom. vi. 9 But He would have conquered the devil by power, even though He could not have been slain by him: although it belongs to a greater power to conquer death itself also by rising again, than to avoid it by living. But the reason is really a different one, why we are justified in the blood of Christ, when we are rescued from the power of the devil through the remission of sins: it pertains to this, that the devil is conquered by Christ by righteousness, not by power. For Christ was crucified, not through immortal power, but through the weakness which He took upon Him in mortal flesh; of which weakness nevertheless the apostle says, “that the weakness of God is stronger than men.”818    1 Cor. i. 25

CAPUT XIV.

18. Christi mors indebita liberavit obnoxios morti. Quae est igitur justitia, qua victus 1028 est diabolus? Quae, nisi justitia Jesu Christi? Et quomodo victus est? Quia cum in eo nihil morte dignum inveniret, occidit eum tamen. Et utique justum est ut debitores quos tenebat, liberi dimittantur, in eum credentes quem sine ullo debito occidit. Hoc est quod justificari dicimur in Christi sanguine (Rom. V, 9). Sic quippe in remissionem peccatorum nostrorum innocens sanguis ille effusus est. Unde se dicit in Psalmis in mortuis liberum (Psal. LXXXVII, 6). Solus enim a debito mortis liber est mortuus. Hinc et in alio Psalmo dicit, Quae non rapui, tunc exsolvebam (Psal. LXVIII, 5): rapinam volens intelligi peccatum, quia usurpatum est contra licitum. Unde per os etiam carnis suae, sicut in Evangelio legitur, dicit, Ecce venit princeps mundi hujus, et in me nihil invenit, id est, nullum peccatum: sed ut sciant omnes, inquit, quia voluntatem Patris mei facio, surgite, eamus hinc (Joan. XIV, 30, 31). Et pergit inde ad passionem, ut pro debitoribus nobis quod ipse non debebat exsolveret. Numquid isto jure aequissimo diabolus vinceretur, si potentia Christus cum illo agere, non justitia voluisset? Sed postposuit quod potuit, ut prius ageret quod oportuit. Ideo autem illum esse opus erat, et hominem, et Deum. Nisi enim homo esset, non posset occidi: nisi Deus esset, non crederetur noluisse quod potuit, sed non potuisse quod voluit; nec ab eo justitiam potentiae praelatam fuisse, sed ei defuisse potentiam putaremus. Nunc vero humana pro nobis passus est, quia homo erat; sed si noluisset , etiam hoc non pati potuisset, quia et Deus erat. Ideo gratior facta est in humilitate justitia, quia posset si noluisset humilitatem non perpeti tanta in divinitate potentia: ac sic a moriente tam potente, nobis mortalibus impotentibus, et commendata est justitia, et promissa potentia. Horum enim duorum unum fecit moriendo, alterum resurgendo. Quid enim justius, quam usque ad mortem crucis pro justitia pervenire? et quid potentius, quam resurgere a mortuis, et in coelum cum ipsa carne in qua est occisus ascendere? Et justitia ergo prius, et potentia postea diabolum vicit: justitia scilicet, quia nullum peccatum habuit, et ab illo injustissime est occisus; potentia vero, quia revixit mortuus, nunquam postea moriturus (Rom. VI, 9). Sed potentia diabolum vicisset, etiamsi ab illo non potuisset occidi: quamvis majoris sit potentiae etiam ipsam mortem vincere resurgendo, quam vitare vivendo. Sed aliud est propter quod justificamur in Christi sanguine, cum per remissionem peccatorum eruimur a diaboli potestate: hoc ad id pertinet, quod a Christo justitia diabolus vincitur, non potentia. Ex infirmitate quippe quam suscepit in carne mortali, non ex immortali potentia crucifixus est Christus: de qua tamen infirmitate ait Apostolus, Quod infirmum est Dei, fortius est hominibus (I Cor. I, 25).