BOOK IX

(416) IT remains for me now to redeem my promise to go on to expound the dispensation connected with the Incarnation of the very Word of God. My previous labours in the eight books already completed have been concerned (417) with Him. I have now devoted myself to tracing the Theology of His Person, now to considering His Descent to us from heaven, now His Character, His Name, and the time of His Advent. As the treatment of these subjects is complete, it is now time to consider the matters connected with His Coming, and to shew how these also were predicted among the Hebrews. And the fulfilment of the predictions shall be confirmed by the witness of (b) the Holy Evangelists, and their historical account of the actual events.

Let us then begin, as the proof about His Birth, tribe, and family is complete, by considering the star which appeared at His Birth, which was new and a stranger among the usual lights of heaven. For this, too, was proclaimed by Moses long before in times far distant in the following words.