EPISTLE TO DIOGNETUS

 

          I.  Since I see, most excellent Diognetus, that thou hast shown an eager desire to understnad the religion of the Christians, and art making precise and diligent inquiry about them, what there is in the God whom they trust, and in their worship of Him, that leads them to look beyond the world and despise death, and neither recognize as gods those who are counted such by the Greeks, nor keep the religious observances of the Jews; and what is the nature of the affection which they exhibit towards one another; and why this new race of men or profession of life has come into the world now and not earlier, - I welcome thy zeal, and I pray God, who bestows upon us the power both to speak and to hear, that it may be given to me to speak in such a way that thou mayest be most helped by what thou hearest, and to thee to hear in such a way that he who speaks may have no cause for regret.

          II.  Come now, purify thyself of all the ideas that preoccupy thy mind, put aside the familiarity that misleads thee, become as it were a new man from the beginning, since thou art about to listen to a doctrine which is itself a new thing, as thou thyself didst acknowledge; and observe not only with thine eyes but with thine understanding also, what is the real nature and form of those whom you {Greeks} describe and regard as gods. 2. Is not one of them stone that is troden under foot; another bronze, no better than the utensils moulded for our daily use; another wood, already decayed; another silver, requiring a man to guard it against theft; another iron, corroded by rust; another earthenware, no more comely than that which has been prepared for the meanest service? 3. Are not all these made of corruptible material? Are they not wrought by iron and fire? Was not one of them fashioned by a stonemason, another by a brazier, another by a silversmith, another by a potter? Before they were modelled into the form of these gods by the arts of these craftsmen, was not each of them transformed by its own craftsman, as is still the case? Might not vessels now made of the same material, if they happened to fall into the hands of the same craftsmen, be made similar to images such as these? 4. On the other hand could not these which are now worshipped by you be made by men into vessels like any other? Are they not all deaf, blind, destitute of life, of sense, of motion? Are they not all subject to decay and corruption? 5. These are the things that ye call gods, ye serve them, ye worship them, and ye become completely like unto them. 6. For this reason ye hate Christians, because they do not regard these things as gods. 7. But with all the honour ye are accustomed and supposed to pay them, are not ye guilty yourselves of greater contempt for them than Christians are? Do ye not heap much greater ridicule and insult upon them by worshipping those that are made of stone and earthenware without troubling to guard them, while ye shut up at night those that are made of silver and gold, and post guards beside them in the daytime for fear they should be stolen? 8. And the very honours that ye think to offer them are more of a punishment if they are sensible of them; if, on the other hand, they are without sensation, then ye convict them of this fact by worshipping them with blood and the fat of victims. 9. Let one of you submit to this treatment, let one of you permit such things to be done to himself. Why, not one single man will voluntarily submit to this infliction, for a man has sensation and reason; the stone submits, for it has no sensation. Certainly ye do not prove by your conduct that it has sensation. 10. Indeed I could say many other things about Christians not being enslaved to gods like these; but if what is here said should seem to any one insufficient, I consider it a waste of time to say more.

          III.  In the next place I suppose thou art most desirous to hear about their not worshipping after the same fashion as the Jews. 2. Now the Jews, described above, are right in claiming to worship one God of the universe, and to recognize Him as Lord; but so far as they offer Him this worship in similar fashion to the Greeks, they are altogether wrong. 3. For whereas the Greeks present an example of folly by making their offerings to things insensible and deaf, these Jews, on the other hand, ought rightly to regard it as absurdity rather than piety to imagine that they are presenting these offerings to God as though He were in need of them. 4. He that made heaven and earth and all that is in them, and bestoweth upon all of us the things that we need, cannot Himself need any of the things that He Himself provides for those who fancy they are giving them to Him. 5. They who imagine that they are performing sacrifice to Him with blood and fat and whole burnt offerings, and that they are honouring Him by these tributes, seem to me to differ in no respect from those who display the same zeal towards senseless objects; for the latter think to provide offerings for things that cannot partake of the honour, the former for a God who stands in need of nothing.

          IV.  With regard, however, to their scruples about meats, and their superstitious observance of the Sabbath, and their pride in circumcision, and the affectation of their keeping of fast and new moon- things ridiculous and undeserving of consideration- I think thou hast not any need to learn of me. 2. For to accept some of the things created by God for the use of man as rightly created, and to reject others as useless and unnecessary, is not this plainly wrong? 3. To misrepresent God as forbidding a man to do a good deed on the Sabbath day, is not this irreverent? 4. To boast of the mutilation of the flesh as a testimony of their election, as though they were especially beloved by God on that account, is not this ridiculous? 5. To watch the stars and the moon, and mark thereby the observance of months and days, to divide the arrangement of God and the changes of the seasons according to their own inclinations, and assign some of feasting and others for mourning, who would regard this as an example of piety and not rather of folly? 6. I think therefore that thou hast now learned sufficiently that Christians are right in holding aloof from the vanity and delusion of the pagan world, and from the punctiliousness and pride of the Jews; but as for the mystery of their own religion, expect not to be able to learn that from man.

          V.  For Christians are not distinguished from the rest of mankind by country, or by speech, or by customs. 2. For they do not dwell in cities of their own, or use a different language, or practise a peculiar life. 3. This knowledge of theirs has not been discovered by the thought and effort of inquisitive men; they are not champions of a human doctrine, as some men are. 4. But while they dwell in Greek or barbarian cities according as each man’s lot was cast, and follow the customs of the land in clothing and food, and other matters of daily life, yet the condition of citizenship which they exhibit is wonderful, and admittedly beyond all expectation. 5. They live in countries of their own, but simply as sojourners; they share the life of citizens, they endure the lot of foreigners; every foreign land is to them a fatherland, and every fatherland a foreign land. 6. They marry like the rest of the world, they beget children, but they do not cast their offspring adrift. 7. They have a common table, but not a common bed. 8. They exist in the flesh, but they live not after the flesh. 9. They spend their existence upon earth, but their citizenship is in heaven. 10. They obey the established laws, but in their own lives they surpass the laws. 11. They love all men, and are persecuted by all. 12. They are unknown, and yet they are condemned; they are put to death, and yet they give proof of new life. 13. They are poor, and yet make many rich; they lack everything, and yet in everything they abound. 14. They are dishonoured, and their dishonour becomes their glory; they are reviled, and yet are vindicated. 15. They are abused, and they bless; they are insulted, and repay insult with honour. 16. They do good, and are punished as evil-doers; and in their punishment they rejoice as finding new life therein. 17. The Jews war against them as aliens; the Greeks persecute them; and yet they that hate them can state no ground for their enmity.

          VI.  In a word, what the soul is in the body Christians are in the world. 2. The soul is spread through all the members of the body; so are Christians through all the cities of the world. 3. The soul dwells in the body, and yet it is not of the body; so Christians dwell in the world, and yet they are not of the world. 4. The soul, itself invisible, is detained in a body which is visible; so Christians are recognized as being in the world, but their religious life remains invisible. 5. The flesh hates the soul, and fights against it, though suffering no wrong, because it is prevented by the soul from indulging in its pleasures; so too the world, though suffering no wrong, hates the Christians because they set themselves against its pleasures. 6. The soul loves the flesh that hates it, and the members thereof; so Christians love them that hate them. 7. The soul is enclosed within the body, and itself holds the body together; so too Christians are held fast in the world as in a prison, and yet it is they who hold the world together. 8. Immortal itself, the soul abides in a mortal tenement; Christians dwell for a time amid corruptible things, awaiting their incorruption in heaven. 9. The soul when it is stinted of food and drink thrives the better; so Christians when they are punished increase daily all the more. 10. So great is the position to which God has appointed them, and which it is not lawful for them to refuse.

          VII.  For this is no earthly discovery, as I said, which was delivered into their charge; it is no mortal idea which they regard themselves bound so diligently to guard; it is no stewardship of merely human mysteries with which they have been entrusted. 2. But God Himself in very truth, the almighty and all-creating and invisible God, Himself from heaven planted among men and established in their hearts the Truth and the Word, the holy, incomprehensible Word, sending to men not a servant, as one might imagine, or an angel or ruler, or one of those who administer earthly things, or of those who have been entrusted with the ordering of things in heaven, but the very Artificer and Creator of the universe Himself, by whom He made the heavens, by whom He enclosed the sea within bounds of its own, whose mysteries all the elements faithfully observe, from whom the sun has received the measure of his daily courses to keep, whom the moon obeys as He bids her shine at night, whom the stars obey as they follow the course of the moon, by whom all things have been ordered and defined and placed in subjection, the heavens and things in the heavens, the earth and things in the earth, the sea and things in the sea, fire, air, abyss, things in the heights above, things in the depths beneath, things in the space between --- He it was whom God sent to men. 3. Did He send Him, as a man might think, on a mission of domination and fear and terror? 4. Indeed He did not, but in gentleness and meekness He sent Him, as a king sending his own son who is himself a king; He sent Him as God, He sent Him as man to men, He sent Him with the idea of saving, of persuading, not of forcing; for force is no part of the nature of God. 5. He sent Him as inviting, not as pursuing man; He sent Him in love, not in judgment. 6. For He will send Him in judgment; and who shall stand before His presence?... 7. (Dost thou not see them) flung to the wild beasts, to made them deny their Lord, and yet unconquered? 8. Dost thou not see that the more of them are punished the more their numbers increase? 9. These things look not like the achievements of man; they are the power of God; they are the proofs of His presence.

          VIII.  Who among men understood at all what God is, before He came? 2. Or dost thou accept the vain and foolish theories of those famous philosophers, of whom some said that God was fire (giving the name of God to the element into which they themselves are destined to go), and others that He was water, and others again some other of the elements created by God? 3. And indeed if any one of these theories deserves acceptance, each of the remaining creatures might just as readily be proved to be God. 4. But these notions are but the trickery and imposture of magicians. 5. No man ever saw God or made Him known; God revealed Himself. 6. And He revealed Himself through faith, to which alone it has been granted to see God. 7. For God, the Lord and Creator of the universe, who made all things, and set them in order, proved to be not only loving unto man but also longsuffering. 8. Such indeed He ever was and is and will be, kind and good and dispassionate and true -- in fact He alone is good. 9. But He conceived a great and unspeakable thought, and this He communicated to His Son alone. 10. While therefore He kept and guarded His wise counsel as a mystery, He seemed indeed to be negligent and careless of us. 11. But when He revealed it through His beloved Son, and made manifest what had been prepared from the beginning, then He bestowed upon us all things at once -- to partake of His benefits, and to see and understand things which none of us could ever have expected.

          IX.  Having therefore planned the whole dispensation already in His own mind in union with the Son, He permitted us during the former time to be carried along by disorderly inclinations just as we wished, and led astray by pleasures and desires, not in any way taking delight in our sins, but bearing with them, nor again assenting to that age of unrighteousness, but creating all the while the present age of righteousness, so that we, having then been by our own works convicted of our unworthiness of life, might now be rendered worthy by the goodness of God, and having plainly proved that we were unable of ourselves to enter into the kingdom of God, might be enabled so to enter by the power of God. 2. But when our unrighteousness had now been fulfilled, when it had been made completely manifest, that its retribution was awaited in chastisement and death, when the time came which God had ordained to manifest His own goodness and power (O the surpassing kindness and love of God for man!), He did not hate us or reject us or take vengeance upon us, but showed His longsuffering and forbearance; in His mercy He Himself took up the burden of our sins, He Himself gave His own Son as a ransom on our behalf, the holy for the lawless, the innocent for the guilty, the just for the unjust, the incorruptible for the corruptible, the immortal for the mortal.

          3. What else could cover our sins but His righteousness? 4. In whom could we lawless and ungodly men be justified but in the Son of God alone? 5. O sweet exchange! O inscrutable operation! O unexpected blessings, that the lawlessness of many should be hidden in one righteous person, and the righteousness of one should justify the lawless many! 6. Having therefore proved in the former time the powerlessness of our nature to win life, and having now revealed a Saviour powerful to save even the powerless, in both these ways He wished us to believe His goodness, to regard Him as guardian, father, teacher, counsellor, physician, mind light, honour, glory, strength, life and not to be anxious about clothing and food.

          X.  If thou, too, desirest this faith, first obtain the knowledge of the Father. 2. For God loved men, for whose sake He made the world, to whom He subjected all things that are in the earth, to whom He gave reason and intelligence, to whom alone He granted to look upward to Him, whom He formed after His own image, to whom He sent His only-begotten Son, to whom He promised the kingdom that is in heaven, yea, and will give it to them that have loved Him. 3. And when thou hast attained this knowledge, with what joy, thinkest thou, wilt thou be filled? Or how wilt thou love Him who so first loved thee? 4. Loving Him, thou wilt be an imitator of His goodness. Wonder not that man can be an imitator of God; by the will of God he can. 5. For happiness consists not in exercising lordship over a neighbor, nor in wishing to have advantage of weaker men, nor in possessing wealth and using force against inferiors. Not in ways like these can a man imitate God; such ways are far removed from His majesty. 6. But whosoever takes up his neighbour’s burden, whosoever is willing to use his superiority as a means of benefiting another man who is in this respect his inferior, whosoever bestows upon the needy what he himself holds as a recipient of God’s bounty and so becomes a god to the recipients of his bounty, he is an imitator of God. 7. Then though thou art yet upon earth thou shalt behold that God ruleth in heaven, then shalt thou begin to speak the mysteries of God, then shalt thou love and admire them that are punished for their refusal to deny God, then shalt thou pass judgment upon the deception and delusion of the world, when thou hast learned to know the true life that is in heaven, to despise the seeming death here, and to fear the real death there, which is reserved for them that shall be condemned to the eternal fire which shall punish them that are delivered over unto it, even unto the end. Then shalt thou admire them that endure for righteousness’ sake the fire that lasteth but for a time, when thou hast learned to know that fire yonder...

          XI.  It is no strange message that I preach, no unreasonable argument that I pursue; but having been a disciple of the apostles, I am now become a teacher of the nations, and what was once delivered unto me I now minister rightly in my turn to those who become disciples of the truth. 2. For who that has been duly instructed and has become the friend of the Word does not seek to learn exactly the things that were shown plainly by the Word to the disciples, to whom the Word manifested these things on His own appearance in the world, speaking openly, not understood indeed by the unbelieving, but explaining things to the disciples, who, being counted faithful by Him, learned the mysteries of the Father? 3. For this cause He sent the Word, that He might appear unto the world, the Word who was dishonoured by the chosen people, proclaimed by the apostles, and believed on by the nations. 4. This is He who was from the beginning, who appeared as new and was found to be ancient, and is ever being born anew in the hearts of the saints. 5. This is He who is the eternal, who has been in this our day accounted a Son, through whom the Church is enriched, and grace unfolding increases among the saints, grace which gives understanding, reveals mysteries, proclaims seasons, rejoices over the faithful, and is bestowed upon those who seek, who break not the pledges of faith, nor trespass beyond the bounds set by the fathers. 6. Then the fear of the law is sung, and the grace of the prophets is recognized, and the faith of the gospels is established, and the tradition of the apostles is preserved, and the grace of the Church is joyous and strong. 7. If thou grieve not this grace, thou shalt understand the truths which the Word preaches by whom He chooses, when He wills. 8. For what we were moved to declare with much labour by the will of the Word commanding us, we impart unto you out of love for what has been revealed unto us.

          XII.  Meeting with these truths, and listening to them earnestly, ye will know all that God bestows upon them that love Him aright, ye who become thereby a very paradise of delight, producing in your midst a fruitful tree of abundant growth adorned with fruits of rich variety. 2. For in this ground hath been planted a tree of knowledge and a tree of life; but it is not the tree of knowledge that destroys, it is disobedience that destroys. 3. Not without significance is that which is written, how God planted from the beginning a tree (of knowledge and a tree) of life in the midst of the garden, indicating thereby life through knowledge; and it was through no using this knowledge in purity that the first human beings were left naked by the deception of the serpent. 4. There is no life without knowledge, nor is there sound knowledge without true life; wherefore the two trees are planted the one beside the other. 5. And the Apostle, observing the force of this (conjunction), and blaming the knowledge that is practised apart from the truth of the commandment that leadeth unto life, saith, “Knowledge puffeth up, but love edifieth.” 6. For he who thinks that he knows aught without the true knowledge which is testified by life has learned nothing; he is led astray by the serpent, not having loved the real life. But he who has acquired his knowledge with fear, and seeks after life, plants in hope, expecting fruit. 7. Let thy heart be knowledge, and let thy life be the true word understood in thy heart. 8. Bearing the tree thereof and taking its fruit, thou shalt ever reap the harvest that is desired in the sight of God, which the serpent toucheth not, and deception cometh not near to defile; and Eve is not corrupted, but is trusted in her maiden purity. 9. And salvation is set forth plainly, and the apostles are interpreted, and the Lord’s passover advances on its way, and the seasons are kept and are arranged in order, and the Word rejoices to teach the saints, the Word through whom the Father is glorified, to whom be the glory for ever. Amen.