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Translated by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson.
Clement of Alexandria in Print
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This Part: 128 Pages
Page 97
Chapter VI.--The Gospel Was Preached to Jews and Gentiles in Hades. [3261]
But as the proclamation [of the Gospel] has come now at the fit time, so also at the fit time were the Law and the Prophets given to the Barbarians, and Philosophy to the Greeks, to fit their ears for the Gospel. "Therefore," says the Lord who delivered Israel, "in an acceptable time have I heard thee, and in a day of salvation have I helped thee. And I have given thee for a Covenant to the nations; that thou mightest inhabit the earth, and receive the inheritance of the wilderness; saying to those that are in bonds, Come forth; and to those that are in darkness, Show yourselves." For if the "prisoners" are the Jews, of whom the Lord said, "Come forth, ye that will, from your bonds,"--meaning the voluntary bound, and who have taken on them "the burdens grievous to be borne" [3262] by human injunction--it is plain that "those in darkness" are they who have the ruling faculty of the soul buried in idolatry.
For to those who were righteous according to the law, faith was wanting. Wherefore also the Lord, in healing them, said, "Thy faith hath saved thee." [3263] But to those that were righteous according to philosophy, not only faith in the Lord, but also the abandonment of idolatry, were necessary. Straightway, on the revelation of the truth, they also repented of their previous conduct.
[3261] [The ideas on which our author bases his views of Christ's descent into the invisible world, are well expounded by Kaye, p. 189.]
[3262] Matt. xxiii. 4; Luke xi. 46.
[3263] Matt. ix. 22, etc.
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