CHAPTER 7

That to the Hebrews alone of Old was the Knowledge of the True God revealed, being known by the Manifestation of the Christ.

INTO this truth Moses, the first mystic theologian, initiated the Hebrews of old, saying:

"7. Ask thy father, and he shall announce to thee, thine elders, and they shall tell thee. 8. When the Most High divided the nations, when he distributed the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the nations according to the number of the angels of God. 9. His people Israel became the portion of the Lord: Israel was the line of his inheritance." - 176 - 

In these words surely he names first the Most High God, the Supreme God of the Universe, and then as Lord His Word, Whom we call Lord in the second degree after the God of the Universe. And their import is that all the nations and the sons of men, here called sons of Adam, were distributed among the invisible guardians of the nations, that is the angels, by the decision of the Most (d) High God, and His secret counsel unknown to us. Whereas to One beyond comparison with them, the Head and King of the Universe, I mean to Christ Himself, as being the Only-begotten Son, was handed over that part of humanity denominated Jacob and Israel, that is to say, the whole division which has vision and piety.

For the one engaged in the contest of the practice of virtue, even now struggling and contending in the gymnasium of holiness, was called in Hebrew nomenclature Jacob: while he that has won victory and the prize of God is called Israel, one like that actual famed forefather of the whole race of the Hebrews, and his true sons and their descendants, (157) and their forefathers, all prophets and men of God. Do not suppose, I beg you, that the multitude of the Jews are thus referred to, but only those of the distant past, who were made perfect in virtue and piety.

These, then, it was, whom the Word of God, the Head and Leader of all, called to the worship of the Father alone, Who is the Most High, far above all things that are seen, beyond the heaven and the whole begotten essence, calling them quietly and gently, and delivering to them the worship of God Most High alone, the Unbegotten and the Creator of the Universe.