This power is present to you, that of which we did not hear from all time, nor were we able to say (which would be bearing false witness) that someone else was such a God, in the way that our eyes have now seen the effects in such works. We have neither seen God nor divine deeds except from you—to those waiting to see, you provide vision and understanding, which coming from outside ourselves is set in place. . . . For no one can see God, and no one can see my face and live.^[1] But it seems that the Christ of God is praised through these things, he who talked with Moses in the desert and was made visible to all people through his glory appearing to all, about which was said, we have beheld his glory.^[2]

David also said Lord, bend the skies and come down, and Moses said, Show me your face that I might see you clearly.^[1] For no one saw more closely than Moses when receiving the law of God. God was speaking from the clouds, and [Moses] witnessed that same presence of his majesty. How, since no one saw God closer than he did, could [Moses] demand a view that was closer still when he said, Show me yourself, that I might see you clearly?^[2] Indeed, we can pray the same thing to happen that the apostle declared already occurred; the Lord openly revealed himself in the flesh and clearly appeared in the world, was openly assumed into glory; the saints saw the things with their physical eyes that they had previously seen with their spiritual sight.

These things we suffered were not on ac-count of your weakness but on account of our transgression. For when you make your personal appearance from heaven, the mountains will melt and dissolve like wax too near to the fire. For fire will feast on our enemies, and your power will become obvious to all.

The brightness of the true light will not be able to be seen by the unclean sight, and that which will be happiness to minds that are bright and clean will be a punishment to those that are stained. Therefore, let the mists of earth’s vanities be shunned, and let your inward eyes be purged from all the filth of wickedness, that the sight may be free to feed on this great manifestation of God. For to the attainment of this we understand what follows to lead.

Let us scrutinize those who enjoy the good things of the world in this present life, I mean wealth and power and glory. Exulting with delight, they reckon themselves as no longer being on the earth. They act this way even though the things that they are enjoying are acknowledged not to be really good and do not abide with them but take to flight more quickly than a dream. And even if these things should even last for a little time, their favor is displayed within the limits of this present life and cannot accompany us further. Now if these things uplift those who possess them to such a pitch of joy, what do you suppose is the condition of those souls that are invited to enjoy the countless blessings in heaven, blessings that are always securely fixed and stable? And not only this, but also in their quantity and quality heaven’s blessings excel present things to such an extent as never entered even the heart of the human being.

But it may be argued that the apostle was not inspired by the Spirit of prophecy when he borrowed these prophetic words; that he was only interpreting at random the words of another man, and though, no doubt, everything the apostle says of himself comes to him by revelation from Christ, yet his knowledge of the words of Isaiah is only derived from the book. . . . Isaiah says that he has seen no God besides him. For he did actually see the glory of God, the mystery of whose taking flesh from the Virgin he foretold. And if you, in your heresy,^[1] do not know that it was God the Only Begotten whom the prophet saw in that glory, listen to the Evangelist: Isaiah said these things when he saw his glory and spoke of him.^[2] The apostle, the Evangelist, the prophet combine to silence your objections. Isaiah did see God; even though it is written, No one has seen God at any time, except for the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father; he has declared him.^[3] It was God whom the prophet saw. He gazed on the divine glory, and people were filled with envy at such honor graciously granted to his prophetic greatness. For this was the reason why the Jews passed sentence of death on him.

The apostle Paul inserts a paraphrase of this passage, like a Hebrew from the Hebrews, in the original text of the letters that he wrote to the Corinthians, not rendering it word for word, which he altogether despised doing, but expressing the truth of its meaning, a practice that he used for purposes of emphasis.^[1] Hence, the nonsense of the apocryphal texts,^[2] which are conveyed to the churches of Christ on the occasion of this passage, fall silent. It can truly be said of these texts that the devil would sit in ambush with the riches of the apocrypha to kill the innocent or that he would wait in the ‘apocrypha’ like a lion in its lair to seize the poor.^[3] For the Ascension of Isaiah^[4] and the Apocalypse of Elijah^[5] contain this very passage.

The divine is invisible in nature. For no one has ever seen God,^[1] as it is written. But God can be seen by the eyes of faith from those things that happen without explanation and beyond speech. For the invisible things, since the foundation of the world, are clearly understood by the things that are made, that is, his heavenly power and godhead.^[2] For he is often recognized through those in whom he works the good and makes a sign of the serenity dwelling in him, marvelously saving those deprived of all hope, and he extends a saving hand from the ground to those lying on the earth. In like manner, they who make this prayer speak, From the foundation of the world we have not heard nor have we seen such a God, except now for you and you alone. For you give mercy to those who wait for you and put their hope in you, refining and making them to fit together, those who work for your justice and who are mindful of your paths, that is, all who carry out the things you want. For we say that his commandments are the ways of the Lord.

He has shown the justice of mercy. For the mercy of God is not without judgment, nor is his judgment lacking in mercy. On that account he adds the provision of his mercy to those who are patient and acting justly. . . . He compares not their sin but their righteousness with an unclean rag. Now if it is their righteousness that is compared with this, it is because their sin does not have anything with which it can be compared. ^[1] THE WRATH AND THE MERCY OF GOD. ISHO‘DAD OF MERV: You were angry, and we sinned. This is a sentence with reversed terms, that is, since we have sinned, you were angry and had us deported; and this is analogous to the words and they made his grave with the wicked.^[1] Some day we will be saved. With the same mercy through which you saved us once from Egypt, we will be saved from Babylon as well. ^[2]

It is not because you are angry that we sinned, but rather it is because we sinned that you are angry. Because we sinned, you are angry with us, O Lord, for we strayed and abandoned the right path, or, according to the Hebrew text, we, who always lived in sin and are unclean in ourselves, will be saved only by your mercy.

Some translators try to alter the meaning of this passage. . . . For it is not, they say, that the divine anger was the cause of their misdeeds, but that because they misbehaved, God was angry. For they are afraid lest God’s anger be thought of as the effector of sins. I think it ought to be said that there is no condemning the divine anger, if those receiving it were insufficiently motivated to flee the attack of sin. As long as the Savior is pleased in us, let us flee sin and forcefully leave the filth of vices and with increase be crowned in spiritual success. . . . For God is the Lord of powers. . . . Just as the kind clemency from above shows us how to be strong and brave for the resistance of evil, by the same reason when we fall under divine wrath, it is necessary that we bow in servile fashion.

Whatever righteousness that we who are unclean in ourselves appear to possess may be compared with the rag of a menstruating woman, for which Theodotion uses the Hebrew word eddim and which Symmachus translates with the Greek term kyēseōn, that is, of she who gives birth, while Aquila uses the word martyriōn, that is, of the witnesses, from when a woman is proven to be a virgin by the issue of blood during her first act of marital intercourse. And we fall, Isaiah continues, like leaves from a tree, which are then dispersed by the wind on account of our iniquities. It must be borne in mind here that the righteousness that is in the law will be called unclean in comparison with the purity of the gospel. For what was previously glorified is no longer glorified, due to the surpassing glory of the latter.^[1] Hence, the apostle Paul, who fulfilled everything according to the righteousness that is in the law, says that he considered everything as loss, or dung, in order to gain Christ, on account of the magnificent knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, and so that he may not be found having the righteousness in him that is from the law but the righteousness from God that comes through faith in Christ.^[2] For there is a righteous person who dies in his righteousness if, after receiving the truth of the gospel, he chooses to use legal shadows and to pursue righteousness in a manner that is not righteous.

Finally, just as our goodness with regard to the goodness above becomes like evil, so our righteousness compared with divine righteousness is like menstrual rags. This is considered to be so by Isaiah the prophet: All our righteousnesses are like menstrual rags. For although there is much of good works of the saints, nevertheless they are preoccupied with earthly endeavor and this holds them back and stops them from the contemplation of that higher good.

Here is what Isaiah deeply deplored by saying, We all have fallen like leaves, and our sins have carried us off like the wind. . . . But the righteous are able, through innocence they have received, to ward off the charges of the present accusation, but they are not strong enough in their own strength to drive out the bonds of death that result. . . . The Redeemer of the human race, who became the mediator of God and humanity through the flesh, . . . alone showed himself righteous among people, yet he received the punishment of blame without blame. He convicted humanity lest it get worse and stood before God lest he smite; he offered examples of innocence and took the punishment for evil.

There is no one who calls on your name. Since they worshiped the idols, they did not remember your name. There is no one who bestirs himself to take hold of you. They certainly put all their faith in the idols.

The Lord gives to each person according to his deeds; against those who sin greatly and often he is very angry indeed, but he is angry in a mild way against those who do wrong in a few things and only for a short time. He has also said concerning the instruments of his wrath that are his punishments, I was not all that angry, but they insisted on doing evil.^[1] And they who charge themselves with transgressions make a loud cry to the merciful and compassionate Lord, Do not be exceedingly angry with us. For as he judges with justice, strength and magnanimity, without extending his wrath from day to day,^[2] he moderates his anger against those he judges, not counting up all their faults.

They entreat God insistently concerning his removal from friendship with them. Since they had come to this situation through their many sins, they wove their prayers with great skill. For since they are unable to mollify the one who could save them with their own works and blameless lives, they now take another route. They ask him as the creator of his own work to be reasonable and sparing with those who were brought into being and life by him. . . . We are not unaware that we have offended you; we confess that we showed ourselves to deserve judgment and acted savagely towards the Son.

We can correlate this temple of our sanctification and our glory, in which our ancestors praised you, with the church or to the soul of a holy person, which can rightly be called beautiful^[1] or a vision of peace,^[2] when the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit dwell within it.

If, however, Zion is abandoned by the Lord due to wickedness, either ours or the people’s, a conflagration of the devil’s fiery arrows will appear immediately. For all are adulterers, with hearts like burning ovens.^[1] With the frigidity of shame expelled, the flame of desire will rage in the temple of God, such that whatever within us that was once glorious and brilliant will corrupt, be destroyed and perish. Then what was said in the Psalms will be fulfilled: They consumed your sanctuary with fire, they profaned the tabernacle of your name to the ground.^[2] And this fire can be extinguished only by him from whose heart flows rivers of living water.^[3]

The defendants speak of the damage in the soul and that they have been caught in their sins; they are like leaves blown about by every wind and, scattered all over, now remember the external misfortunes that came on them. And the destruction of Jerusalem is deplored along with the temple’s burning. For after the Savior’s crucifixion, these things were fulfilled.

If we who bear the name of your people, he says, are unworthy of your goodwill, judge the city worthy to be spared by reason of its founder, for it has become a desert. And he makes mention of his name [David] in order to evoke mercy. . . . As for the passage, the house, our sanctuary has become a curse, the other translators have rendered this by [it has gone] into disappearance. However, the term curse offers just as well a meaning that is in accord with the misfortune suffered; for it is usual to say, May you suffer what such a person suffered! So the famous temple, the temple full of holiness, the temple praised by all, has been burned by the enemy’s fire, and it now only serves as a formula to curse those who mock.