Against Helvidius, on the Perpetual Virginity of the Blessed Mary

Therefore I must invoke the Holy Spirit, that He may defend the virginity of the blessed Mary by His own sense, through my mouth. The Lord Jesus must be invoked, that He may guard from every suspicion of intercourse the lodging of the sacred womb, which He inhabited for ten months. God the Father Himself, too, must be entreated, that He may show the mother of His Son to have been a virgin after childbirth, who was a mother before she was a wife. We do not seek the field of rhetorical eloquence, nor the snares of the dialecticians, nor do we hunt after the thorn-bushes of Aristotle: the very words of the Scriptures must be set forth; by the very testimonies which he has used against us, let him be refuted, that he may understand that he was able to read what has been written, but was not able to comprehend what has been confirmed by piety.

His first proposition was: Matthew speaks: Now the birth of Christ was in this way: When his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child of the Holy Ghost. Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to expose her publicly, wished to put her away privately. But while he thought on these things, behold, the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in his sleep, saying: Joseph, son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife. For that which is born in her is of the Holy Ghost. Behold, he says, you have "espoused," not, as you say, "entrusted," and certainly espoused for no other reason than that she should at some time be married. For the Evangelist would not have said, of those who were not going to come together, "before they came together": since no one says of one who is not going to dine, "before he dined." Then she was called his wife and joined to him by the Angel.

Let us now hear what the Scripture pronounces: "Then Joseph, rising from sleep," it says, "did as the Angel of the Lord had commanded him, and took unto him his wife, and knew her not till she brought forth her firstborn son".

Let us run through each point, and, pursuing his impiety along the very footsteps by which it entered, let us show that he has said things contradicting one another. He confesses her espoused: and at once he wants her to be a wife whom he has confessed to be a betrothed. Again, whom he names wife, he says was espoused for no other reason than that she should at some time be married. And lest we think this a small matter: "You have," he says, "'espoused,' and not 'entrusted,' that is, not yet a wife, not yet joined by the marital bond." But as to what he says, "For the Evangelist would not have said, of those not going to come together, 'before they came together': since no one says of one who is not going to dine, 'before he dined,'" I do not know whether to grieve or laugh. Shall I charge it to ignorance, or accuse it of rashness?

As if, should someone say: "Before I dined in the harbor, I sailed to Africa," the statement could not stand, unless he must at some time dine in the harbor. Or if we wished to say: "The apostle Paul, before he went to Spain, was cast into chains at Rome." Or indeed this: "Helvidius, before he did penance, was overtaken by death": it would immediately follow either that Paul must go to Spain after his chains, or that Helvidius must do penance after death; whereas Scripture says: "But in hell who shall confess to thee?" Rather is it not to be understood that the preposition "before," though it often indicates a consequence, nevertheless sometimes shows only what was previously intended? Whence it is not necessary that the things intended should come to pass, since something else may have intervened precisely so that the things intended should not come to pass.

Therefore, when the Evangelist says, "before they came together," he shows the imminent time of the marriage, and that matters had already reached the point where she who had been a betrothed was beginning to be a wife. As if he had said: Before they mingled kisses and embraces; before they performed the act of marriage, she was found to be with child. And she was found so by no one else but Joseph, who detected the swelling womb of his betrothed, almost already with a husband's license, and with inquiring eyes. Yet it does not follow, as we have taught by earlier examples, that he came together with Mary after the birth, since his desire of coming together was removed by the conception of the womb.

And as to what is said to Joseph in his sleep: "Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife." And again: "Then Joseph, rising from sleep, did as the Angel of the Lord commanded him, and took unto him his wife"—this ought to trouble no one, as though, because she is called "wife," she had ceased to be "betrothed": since we know this to be the custom of divine Scripture, to call betrothed women "wives." As is proved by the following testimonies of Deuteronomy: "If a man," it says, "find a virgin that is espoused to a husband in the field, and, forcing her, lie with her, he shall die, because he has humbled the wife of his neighbor".

And in another place: "But if a young woman be espoused to a man, and one find her in the city, and lie with her, you shall bring out both to the gates of that city, and they shall be stoned with stones, and they shall die: the young woman, because she did not cry out, though she was in the city; and the man, because he humbled the wife of his neighbor: and you shall put away the evil from among yourselves". And elsewhere also: "And what man is there that has espoused a wife, and has not taken her? Let him go and return to his house, lest perhaps he die in the battle, and another man take her". But if any scruple troubles someone as to why a virgin, being espoused, and not rather without a betrothed or (as Scripture calls him) a husband, conceived, let him know there was a threefold reason. First, that through the genealogy of Joseph, to whom Mary was related, the origin of Mary also might be shown.

Second, lest, according to the law of Moses, she be stoned by the people as an adulteress. Third, that, in fleeing to Egypt, she might have the comfort of a guardian rather than a husband. For who at that time would have believed that a virgin had conceived of the Holy Spirit; that the angel Gabriel had come, had brought God's command; and would not rather have condemned her by the judgment of all as an adulteress, after the example of Susanna—seeing that even today, with the whole world now believing, the Jews argue, when Isaiah says, "Behold a virgin shall conceive in the womb, and bear a son", that in the Hebrew it is written "young woman," not "virgin," that is, "almah," not "bethulah"? Against these we shall discourse more fittingly in another place.

Finally, except for Joseph and Elizabeth and Mary herself, and a very few besides, if we can reckon any to have heard it from these, all thought Jesus the son of Joseph: to such a degree that even the Evangelists, expressing the opinion of the crowd, which is the true law of history, called him the father of the Savior, as here: "And he came by the Spirit into the Temple" (no doubt Simeon), "and when his parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the law". And elsewhere: "And his father and mother were marveling at the things which were spoken concerning him". And again: "And his parents went every year to Jerusalem, at the solemn day of the Passover". And then: "And when the days were fulfilled, as they returned, the boy Jesus remained in Jerusalem, and his parents knew it not".

Mary herself too, who had answered Gabriel, saying, "How shall this be, since I know not a man," listen to what she says of Joseph: "Son, why have you done so to us? Behold, your father and I have been seeking you sorrowing". This is not, as many argue, the voice of the Jews mocking. The Evangelists call Joseph "father"; Mary confesses him "father." Not because (as I indicated above) Joseph was truly the father of the Savior; but because, in order to preserve Mary's reputation, he was regarded by all as father—he who, before he was warned by the Angel, "Joseph, son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife; for that which is born in her is of the Holy Ghost", was thinking of putting her away privately. So much did he trust that the child conceived was not his own.

But enough has now been argued, in the spirit rather of teaching than of replying, as to why Joseph is called the father of the Lord, why Mary was called "wife": in which is also briefly contained the reason why certain persons are said to be His brothers.

But since we reserve its own place for this little question, and our discourse hastens on to the rest, we must now discuss how Scripture says: "Then Joseph, rising from sleep, did as the Angel of the Lord commanded him, and took unto him his wife, and knew her not till she brought forth her son, and he called his name Jesus". In this our adversary first labors with superfluous effort, arguing that the word "knew" is to be referred rather to intercourse than to knowledge: as if anyone had denied this, and as if any prudent person could ever have suspected those absurdities which he refutes. Then he wishes to teach that the adverb "until," or "till," signifies a fixed time: at the completion of which that comes to pass which, up to that appointed time, was not happening—as in the present case: "and knew her not till she brought forth her son." It appears, he says, that she was known after the birth, whose "knowing" the birth of the son was merely delaying.

And to prove this he heaps up a great many examples from the Scriptures, brandishing his sword in the dark after the manner of the Andabatae, and clashing the sound of his tongue only to wound the members of his own body.

To this we briefly reply, that both "knew" and "until," in the holy Scriptures, are understood in a twofold manner. And indeed concerning that which is written, "he knew," that it is to be referred to intercourse, he himself has argued: no one doubting that it is often referred to knowledge, as here: The boy Jesus remained in Jerusalem, and his parents did not know it. Now this must be shown, that just as he there followed the custom of Scripture, so also in the word "until" the authority of that same Scripture must break his argument, which often (as he himself argued) signifies a fixed time in its usage, but often an unlimited one, as in that instance where God speaks to certain persons in the Prophet: I am he, I am he, and until you grow old I am he. Does God then cease to be, after they have grown old? And the Savior in the Gospel says to the Apostles, Behold I am with you all the days, even to the consummation of the world.

Will the Lord, then, depart from his disciples after the consummation of the world, and at that time when they are to judge the twelve tribes of Israel sitting upon twelve thrones, will they be deprived of the Lord's company? Paul the apostle also, writing to the Corinthians, says: Christ the firstfruits: afterward they who are Christ's, who have believed at his coming: then the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God and the Father, when he shall have destroyed all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, until he puts all enemies under his feet, for he has put all things under his feet. Let it be granted that this was said of the man—we do not deny that it refers to him who suffered the cross, who afterward is bidden to sit at the right hand. What does he mean by saying, For he must reign, until he puts all enemies under his feet?

Will the Lord reign only so long as until the enemies begin to be under his feet; and after they have been placed under his feet, will he cease to reign—when in fact he will then rather begin to reign, when the enemies have begun to be under his feet? David also, in the fourth psalm of degrees, says: As the eyes of a handmaid are upon the hands of her mistress, so are our eyes unto the Lord our God, until he have mercy upon us. Will the Prophet, then, keep his eyes upon the Lord only so long as he obtains mercy, and after mercy has been obtained, will he turn his eyes down to the earth? He who in another place says: My eyes have failed for thy salvation, and for the word of thy righteousness. I could heap up countless examples on this point, and cover all the impudence of my challenger with a cloud of testimonies; but for now I will add a few more, that the reader may find similar ones for himself.

The divine word speaks in Genesis: And they gave to Jacob the strange gods which were in their hands, and the earrings which were in their ears. And Jacob hid them under the terebinth which is at Shechem, and he destroyed them unto this day. Likewise at the end of Deuteronomy: And Moses the servant of the Lord died in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord, and they buried him in Geth, near the house of Phegor, and no one knows his sepulchre unto this day. Certainly "this day" is to be reckoned as belonging to that time in which the history itself was composed—whether you wish to call Moses the author of the Pentateuch, or Ezra its restorer, I do not object. Now the question here is, whether that which is said, "unto this day," is to be referred to that age in which the books were published or written.

Let him then show that after that day, so many years' worth of volumes having elapsed down to us, either the idols which had been hidden under the terebinth were found, or the tomb of Moses was discovered—since he stubbornly asserts that after "until" and "even to," that must begin which did not exist so long as "until" and "even to" remained unfulfilled. Rather let him take note of the idiom of holy Scripture, and understand with us—in a matter about which he was hesitating—that those things are marked which could be doubtful if they had not been written, while the rest is left to our understanding. For if, even in a time still recent, while those who had seen Moses were still living, his sepulchre could be unknown, much more so after so many ages have passed.

According to which also that statement concerning Joseph is to be understood: the Evangelist indicated this concerning a matter which could have given rise to scandal—that she was not known by her husband until the birth—so that we might understand all the more that she was not known after the birth either, from whom he abstained at that time, when he could still be in doubt about the vision.

In sum, I ask this: why did Joseph abstain until the day of the birth? He will answer, doubtless, because he had heard the Angel saying: For that which is born in her is of the Holy Spirit. To which we reply: and surely Joseph had also heard, "Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife". He had been forbidden to leave her, lest he should think his wife an adulteress. Was he also separated from conjugal intercourse, when in fact he would rather have been more strongly warned against separating? And did he dare, says he—the just man, hearing that the Son of God was in the womb—to think of intercourse with his wife? Beautifully argued!

He, then, who believed a mere dream so far as not to dare to touch his wife: after he had learned from the voice of the shepherds that the Angel of the Lord had come from heaven, and had said to them, Fear not; behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people, for unto you is born this day a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, in the city of David; and had joined with him in the praises of the heavenly host: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will: he who had seen righteous Simeon, amid his embraces of the little child, proclaiming, Now dismiss thy servant, O Lord, according to thy word, in peace; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation: he who had seen Anna the prophetess, the Magi, the star, Herod, the Angels; who, I say, had known such great miracles—did he dare to touch the temple of God, the seat of the Holy Spirit, the mother of his Lord?

And indeed Mary kept all these words, pondering them in her heart. And lest you shamelessly deny that Joseph was ignorant of these things: "And his father," says Luke, "and his mother were marveling at the things which were said of him." Though with astonishing shamelessness you contend that these things have been falsified in the Greek codices—which almost all the commentators of Greece have left in their volumes; and which some even of the Latins have adopted, just as it is found in the Greek. Nor is it necessary now to discuss the variety of copies, since the whole body of both the Old and New Scripture has been translated thence into the Latin tongue, and it is to be believed that the water flows much purer from the spring than from the streams.

Helvidius: "These things, you say, are trifles to me, and superfluous argumentations, and a discussion more curious than true. Could not Scripture have said: 'And he took his wife, and was not any longer bold to touch her', just as it said of Thamar and Judah? Or did Matthew lack words by which he could express what he wished to be understood? 'He knew her not,' he says, 'until she brought forth a son'. After the birth, then, he knew her, whose knowledge of her he had deferred until the birth." Jerome: If you are so contentious, you shall now be overcome by your own reasoning. I do not want you to insert any interval of time between the birth and the intercourse.

I do not want you to say: "Whatsoever woman has conceived and borne a male child shall be unclean seven days, according to the days of her separation and purification she shall be unclean; and on the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised, and for thirty-three days she shall remain in the blood of her purification, and shall touch nothing holy," and so on. Let Joseph fall upon her at once: let him at once hear through Jeremiah: "They were become as raging horses after women, everyone neighed after his neighbor's wife". Otherwise how can it stand, "He knew her not, until she brought forth a son," if he waits through the time of purification—if the lust so long delayed is again deferred through forty days? Let the woman in childbirth be defiled with blood: let the midwives receive the wailing infant: let the husband embrace his exhausted wife. Let the marriage begin thus, lest the Evangelist should have lied.

But far be it that this should be thought of the mother of the Savior and of a just man. There was no midwife present: no bustle of women intervened. She herself wrapped the infant in swaddling clothes; she herself was both mother and midwife. "And she laid him," it says, "in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn". This statement both refutes the ravings of the apocryphal writings, since Mary herself wrapped the infant in swaddling clothes; and it does not allow the satisfaction of Helvidius's desire, since there was no room in the inn for a wedding.

But since we have now answered sufficiently and abundantly to that which he had proposed, "Before they came together," and "He knew her not, until she brought forth a son," we must come to the third question, so that, following the order of his disputation, the order of our reply may likewise proceed. For he wishes also to establish that Mary bore other children; and from that which is written: "And Joseph also went up into the city of David, that he might be enrolled with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child. And it came to pass, that while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered, and she brought forth her firstborn son": he strives to prove that "firstborn" cannot be said, except of one who has also brothers, just as he is called "only-begotten" who alone is a son to his parents.

But we define it thus: Every only-begotten is first-begotten: not every first-begotten is only-begotten. He is first-begotten, not only after whom others follow, but before whom none precedes. "Every," says the Lord to Aaron, "that openeth the womb, of all flesh which is offered to the Lord, from man to beast, shall be thine: only they shall redeem with a price the first-born of men, and the first-born of unclean beasts". The word of God has defined what a first-born is: "Every," it says, "that openeth the womb." Otherwise, if none is first-born except one whom brothers follow, then first-born offerings would not be owed to the priests so long as no others had yet been produced; lest perhaps, should no further birth follow, he would be only-begotten and not first-begotten. "The redemption of it," it says, "shall be from a month old, at the price of five shekels. A shekel, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, is twenty oboli.

Only the firstlings of calves, and the firstlings of sheep, and the firstlings of goats thou shalt not redeem, because they are holy". The word of God compels me to vow to God every one that openeth the womb, if it be of clean animals; if of unclean, to redeem it, giving the price to the priest. Can I answer and say, Why do you press me with the space of a single month? Why do you call him first-born, when I do not know whether brothers will follow him? Wait until a second is born. I owe nothing to the priest, unless that other also be produced, through whom he who was born before begins to be first-born. Will not the very letters themselves speak to me, and convict me of folly, that he is called first-born who opens the womb, not he who also has brothers? Finally, I ask concerning John, who is agreed to be only-begotten, whether he was also first-born?

Was he himself, according to the Law, subject to the whole of the Law concerning this? It cannot be doubted. Certainly Scripture speaks thus of the Saviour: "And when the days of their purification, according to the law of Moses, were accomplished, they carried him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord, as it is written in the law of the Lord: Every male that openeth the womb shall be called holy to the Lord, and to offer a sacrifice according to that which is said in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons". If this law pertains only to the first-born, and it is those who follow that make one first-born, then he who did not know whether any would follow ought not to have been bound by the law of the first-born.

But since he is bound by the law of the first-born—he whom no other brothers follow—it is gathered that he is called first-born who opens the womb and before whom none exists, not he whom a brother born afterward follows. Moses writes in Exodus: "And it came to pass at midnight, the Lord smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh who sat upon his throne, unto the first-born of the captive that was in the dungeon, and all the first-born of cattle". Answer me: those who were then slain by the destroyer, were they first-born or also only-begotten? If only those are called first-born who have brothers, then the only-begotten were freed from the slaughter. But if they were slain as being only-begotten, this was done against the very statement, and both first-born and only-begotten would have died together.

Either you will free the only-begotten from the punishment, and be ridiculous; or, if you confess that they were slain, we will obtain, even against your will, that the only-begotten are called first-born.

The last proposition was (though this too he wished to demonstrate concerning the first-born) that the brothers of the Lord are named in the Gospels, as here: "Behold, his mother and his brethren stood without, seeking to speak with him". And elsewhere: "After this he went down to Capernaum, he, and his mother, and his brethren". And there: "His brethren therefore said to him: Pass hence, and go into Judea, that thy disciples also may see thy works which thou doest. For no man doth anything in secret, and himself seeketh to be known openly. If thou do these things, manifest thyself to the world". John adding above: "For neither did his brethren believe in him". Likewise Mark and Matthew: "And he taught them in their synagogue in his own country, so that they were astonished, and said: How came this man by all this wisdom and mighty works? Is not this the carpenter's son?

Is not his mother called Mary, and his brethren James and Joseph, and Simon and Jude, and are not his sisters all with us"? Luke too in the Acts of the Apostles relates thus: "All these were persevering with one mind in prayer, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren". And the Apostle Paul agrees in the same historical truth with equal voice: "But I went up according to revelation, and I saw no one except Peter and James the brother of the Lord". And again in another place: "Have we not power to eat and to drink? Have we not power to lead about a wife, as also the rest of the apostles, and the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas"?

And lest perhaps some Jew should not admit the testimony—those who indeed gave out the names of his brothers, asserting that they were deceived by a like error regarding the brothers as they had fallen into concerning the father—he cautiously forestalls this and says: These same names are named by the Evangelists in another place, and these are the same brothers of the Lord, sons of Mary. Matthew speaks: "And there were there (no doubt before the cross of the Lord) many women beholding afar off, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto him. Among whom was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee".

Likewise Mark: "And there were also women looking on afar off; among whom was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less, and of Joseph, and Salome"; and shortly after: "And many other women that came up with him to Jerusalem." And Luke also: "And there were Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, and the rest with them".

We have repeated these things for this reason, lest he calumniate and cry out that what makes for his case has been suppressed by us, and that his opinion has been overthrown, not by the testimonies of the Scriptures, but by slippery disputation. "Behold," he says, "James and Joseph, sons of Mary, the very ones whom the Jews called brothers. Behold, Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses.

'The less,' moreover, in distinction from the greater, who was the son of Zebedee, as also in another place Mark states: 'And Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joses, saw where he was laid: and when the sabbath was past, they bought spices, and came unto the sepulchre.'" And indeed he says: How wretched and impious it would be to think this of Mary, that while other women had care of the burial of Jesus, we should say his mother was absent; or that we should invent some other Mary, I know not whom—especially since the Gospel of John testifies that she was present there, when the Lord from the cross was commending her, now a widow, as a mother to John. Or do the Evangelists both err and deceive, in saying that the mother of those whom the Jews said were brothers of Jesus was Mary?

O blind fury, and mind maddened to its own ruin! You say that his mother was present at the cross of the Lord, you say she was commended to John the disciple on account of widowhood and solitude: as though, according to you, she did not have four sons and countless daughters, whose companionship she might enjoy? You also call her a widow, which Scripture does not say. And though you propose all the examples of the Evangelists, John's words alone do not please you. You say in passing that she was present at the cross of the Lord, lest you seem to have deliberately passed over it: and yet you are silent as to which women were with her. I would forgive one who did not know, if I did not see one deliberately keeping silence. Hear, then, what John says: "Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene".

No one doubts that there were two Apostles called by the name James, James the son of Zebedee, and James the son of Alphaeus. This other one, I know not what "lesser" James, whom Scripture calls the son of Mary, yet not of the mother of the Lord—do you wish him to be an Apostle, or not?

If he is an Apostle, he will be the son of Alphaeus; and he will believe in Jesus; and he will not be of those brothers of whom it is written: "For neither did his brethren then believe in him." If he is not an Apostle, but some third James, I know not whom, how is he to be thought the brother of the Lord, and how will a third be called "lesser" in distinction from a "greater," when "greater" and "lesser" are wont to express difference not among three but between two; and the brother of the Lord is an Apostle, Paul saying: "Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and I tarried with him fifteen days. But other of the apostles I saw none, save James the brother of the Lord"? And in the same Epistle: "And when they had known the grace that was given to me, James and Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars".

And lest you think this James to be the son of Zebedee, read the Acts of the Apostles: he had already been slain by Herod. It remains as a conclusion, that this Mary who is written as the mother of James the less was the wife of Alphaeus, and the sister of Mary the mother of the Lord, whom John the Evangelist calls Mary of Cleophas, giving her this name either from her father, or from the lineage of her family, or from some other cause. But if it seems to you that she is different in different places, because elsewhere she is called "Mary the mother of James the less," and here "Mary of Cleophas": learn the custom of Scripture, whereby the same person is called by different names. Raguel, the father-in-law of Moses, is also called Jethro. Gideon, with no cause of the change of name previously mentioned, is suddenly read as Jerobaal. Ozias king of Judah is in turn called Azarias. Mount Tabor is called Itabyrium.

Again, the Phoenicians call Hermon "Sanior," and the Amorite calls it "Sanir." The same region of the sky is called by three names, Nageb, Theman, Darom—read Ezekiel. Peter is called both Simon and Cephas. Judas the Zealot is called Thaddaeus in another Gospel: and many other such examples pertaining to this pattern the reader will be able to gather for himself from all the Scriptures.

Now this is what we are attempting to show, in what way the brothers of the Lord are called sons of His maternal aunt, Mary, who at first did not believe, but afterward believed. It may well have happened that, while one believed at once, the others remained unbelieving for a long time, and that this was the mother of James and Joses, that is, Mary the wife of Cleophas, who was Alphaeus, and that she was called Mary of James the less. Now if she were the mother of the Lord, she would rather have been called, as in all other places, "his mother," and would not, by calling herself the mother of others, have wished another to be understood. But on this point I will not draw out a contentious rope: let Mary of Cleophas be one, and Mary of James and Joses another, provided it be agreed that this same Mary of James and Joses is not the mother of the Lord. And whence, you say, are they called brothers of the Lord who were not brothers?

You shall now be taught that in the divine Scriptures brothers are spoken of in four ways: by nature, by race, by kinship, by affection. By nature, as Esau and Jacob, the twelve Patriarchs, Andrew and Peter, James and John. By race, whereby all Jews are called brothers to one another, as in Deuteronomy: "But if thou buy thy brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, he shall serve thee six years, and in the seventh year thou shalt let him go free from thee". And in the same book: "Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the Lord thy God shall choose, one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee; thou mayest not set a foreigner over thee, who is not thy brother". And again: "Thou shalt not see thy brother's ox or his sheep go astray, and hide thyself from them: thou shalt in any case bring them again unto thy brother.

And if thy brother be not nigh unto thee, or if thou know him not, then thou shalt bring it unto thine own house, and it shall be with thee until thy brother seek after it, and thou shalt restore it to him again". And the Apostle Paul says: "I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites". Further, those are called brothers by kinship who are of one family, that is, of one paternal line, which the Latins call "paternities"; when from one root a great multitude of the race is spread abroad, as in Genesis: "And Abraham said unto Lot, Let there be no strife between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we are brethren." And there also: "And Lot chose him the region of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east, and they separated the one from the other, from his brother". And yet Lot is certainly not the brother of Abraham, but the son of his brother Haran.

For Terah begot Abraham and Nahor and Haran, and Haran begot Lot. And again: "And Abraham was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran. And Abraham took Sarah his wife, and Lot his brother's son". But if you still doubt that a brother's son can be called "brother," take an example. "And when Abraham heard that his brother Lot was taken captive, he armed his trained servants, three hundred and eighteen". And after describing that same nocturnal assault, he adds: "And he brought back all the horses of Sodom, and also brought again his brother Lot". These things would have sufficed to prove what we have said. But lest you cavil at anything, and slip away like a slippery serpent, you must be bound with the chains of testimonies, lest you hiss complainingly, and say that you were overcome more by twisted arguments than by the truth of the Scriptures.

Jacob, the son of Isaac and Rebecca, when fleeing the plots of his brother, went to Mesopotamia, came and rolled the stone from the mouth of the well, and watered the sheep of Laban, the brother of his mother. And Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice and wept, and told Rachel that he was her father's brother, and that he was Rebecca's son. Behold, here too, by the same rule as above, a sister's son is called "brother." And again: "And Laban said unto Jacob, Because thou art my brother, shouldest thou therefore serve me for nought? Tell me, what shall thy wages be?" So when twenty years were fulfilled, and, the father-in-law being unaware, he returned to his own country accompanied by his wives and others, Laban overtook him in Mount Gilead. And when, having searched for the idols which Rachel had hidden, he did not find them among the baggage, Jacob answered and said to Laban: "What is my trespass?

What is my sin, that thou hast so hotly pursued after me? Whereas thou hast searched all my stuff, what hast thou found of all thy household stuff? Set it here before my brethren and thy brethren, that they may judge betwixt us both". Answer me, who were these brothers of Jacob and Laban, who were then present? Esau, certainly, Jacob's brother, was absent, and Laban, the son of Bethuel, had no brothers except his sister Rebecca.

Innumerable instances of this kind are inserted throughout the divine books. But lest I make this too long, I return to the last part of the division, that is, that brothers are also so called by affection, which is itself divided into two, the spiritual and the common. In the spiritual sense, because all Christians are called brothers, as there: "Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity". And in another psalm the Savior says: "I will declare thy name unto my brethren". And elsewhere: "Go, tell my brethren". Further, in the common sense, because all being born of one father, we are joined together by an equal brotherhood among ourselves. "Say," he says, "to those that hate you, You are our brethren". And the Apostle to the Corinthians: "If any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner, with such an one no not to eat", and other things like these.

I now ask, according to which of these ways do you understand the brothers of the Lord to be called such in the Gospel? According to nature? But Scripture does not say so, nor does it call them sons either of Mary or of Joseph. According to race? But it is absurd that only a few out of the Jews should be called brothers, when all who were there, being Jews, might by that rule have been called brothers. According to the affection of human right and of the spirit? But if so, who were more brothers than the Apostles, whom he taught inwardly, whom he called mothers and brothers? Or if all men, because they are men, are brothers, it was foolish to announce, as though it were something special: "Behold, thy brethren seek thee," since by that rule all men generally are brothers. It remains, then, that according to the explanation given above, you should understand them to be called brothers by kinship, not by affection; not by the privilege of race, nor by nature.

Just as Lot is called the brother of Abraham, as Jacob is called the brother of Laban, as the daughters of Zelophehad receive an inheritance "among their brethren," as Abraham himself had Sarah his sister as his wife. For he says: "Verily she is my sister, the daughter of my father, but not of my mother", that is, she was the daughter of his brother, not of his sister. Otherwise, how is it that Abraham, a righteous man, should have taken his father's daughter as wife, when in the case of the first men, out of reverence for chaste ears, Scripture itself does not even name the thing, preferring that it be understood rather than stated; and God afterward by law sanctions and threatens: "He that taketh his sister, the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother, and seeth her nakedness, and she seeth his nakedness, it is a shameful thing; and they shall be cut off in the sight of their people: he hath uncovered his sister's nakedness, he shall bear his iniquity".

Most ignorant of men, you had not read these things, and, abandoning the whole sea of the Scriptures, you have turned your madness to the injury of the Virgin, after the pattern of him whom fables tell of, who, being commonly unknown, and unable to devise any good deed by which he might become famous, set fire to the temple of Diana; and when no one betrayed the sacrilege, he himself, it is said, came forward in public, crying out that he had committed the arson: and when the magistrates of Ephesus asked him for what reason he had wished to do this, he answered, "That since I could not become known by good means, I might become known to all by evil." This indeed is what the Greek history relates. But you have set fire to the temple of the Lord's body, and you have defiled the sanctuary of the Holy Spirit, out of which you would have proceed a fourfold team of brothers and a heap of sisters.

Finally, joining your voice with the Jews, you say: "Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not his mother called Mary, and his brothers James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas, and are not all his sisters with us?" It does not say "all," except from the crowd. Who, I ask you, knew you before this blasphemy, who reckoned you worth two farthings? You have obtained what you wished; you have become famous in wickedness. I myself, who write against you, though I dwell in the same city with you, do not know whether you are, as they say, white or black. I pass over the faults of language with which your whole book abounds. I say nothing of your ridiculous preface. O the times! O the manners! I do not ask for eloquence, which, lacking it yourself, you sought from your brother Craterius. I do not, I say, demand polish of speech; I seek purity of soul. For among Christians it is a great solecism and fault to relate, or to do, anything base.

I come to the point, and I close upon you with a two-horned question, and thus I will deal with you as though I had said nothing before: that the brothers of the Lord are called such in the same way that Joseph is called his father. "I and thy father," she says, "have sought thee sorrowing". It is the mother who speaks this, not the Jews. And the Evangelist himself, relating: "And his father and mother marvelled at those things which were spoken concerning him", and other similar passages, which we have already enumerated, in which they are called parents. And lest perhaps you should make an objection about the variety of manuscripts, because you have most foolishly persuaded yourself that the Greek codices are falsified, I come to the Gospel of John, in which it is most plainly written: "Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph". Surely this is contained in your own copy too.

Answer me, how is Jesus the son of Joseph, when it is certain that he was conceived of the Holy Spirit? Was Joseph truly his father? However dull you may be, will you dare to say so? Or was he only supposed to be? In the same way let the brothers also be reckoned, as the father was reckoned.

But since our discourse has now sailed past the rocks and rough places, the sails must be spread, and we must rush upon his conclusions, in which, seeming clever to himself, he calls Tertullian as a witness, and sets forth the words of Victorinus, bishop of Petavium. And of Tertullian indeed I say nothing more than that he was not a man of the Church. But of Victorinus I assert this, that, like the Evangelists, he called them brothers of the Lord, not sons of Mary. Brothers, moreover, in that sense which we have explained above, by kinship, not by nature. But we are wasting time on trifles, and, having left the fountain of truth, we pursue the streams of opinions. Could I not bring against you the whole series of the ancient writers: Ignatius, Polycarp, Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, and many other apostolic and eloquent men, who, writing against Ebion, and Theodotus, Byzantius, and Valentinus, holding this same view, composed volumes full of wisdom? Had you ever read these, you would know more.

But I think it better to answer each point briefly, rather than by lingering too long, to lengthen the volume.

I now make an attack upon that point in which you wished to appear eloquent, by comparing virginity and marriage. We have laughed at the proverb concerning you: "We have seen a camel dancing." You say: "Are the virgins better than Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who had wives? Are not infants daily fashioned by the hands of God in the womb, so that we ought rightly to blush that Mary married after childbirth?" But if this seems shameful to them, it follows that they should not believe either that God was born through the private parts of a virgin. For it is more shameful, according to them, that God should be born through the private parts of a virgin, than that a virgin should marry her husband after childbirth. Add, if you please, other insults to nature as well: the womb swelling for nine months, the loathings, the labor, the blood, the swaddling clothes. Let the infant himself be described to you, wrapped in the usual covering of membranes.

Let the hard manger be brought forward, the crying of the babe, the circumcision on the eighth day, the time of purification, that he might be proved unclean. We do not blush, we do not keep silence. The more humble the things he suffered for my sake, the more I owe him. And when you have gone through everything, you will find nothing more contumelious than the cross:

not that he distressed the virgin's womb, and unlocked the hall of her modesty, but that he who was from the beginning the firstborn of all creation, was himself also born of her, both only-begotten and firstborn, in the manner he willed, without the groaning and without the pain of a woman in travail.

which we profess and believe, and in which we triumph over our enemies.

But just as we do not deny the things which have been written, so we refuse the things which have not been written. We believe that God was born of a Virgin, because we read it. That Mary married after the birth, we do not believe, because we do not read it. Nor do we say this in order to condemn marriage, for virginity itself is the fruit of marriage: but because it is not permitted to us to make rash conjectures about holy men. For by this kind of conjecture of possibility we could contend that Joseph also had several wives, because Abraham had several, because Jacob had several; and that the brothers of the Lord were sons of these wives, which many fabricate with a boldness more audacious than pious. You say that Mary did not remain a virgin: I claim for myself even more, that Joseph himself was a virgin through Mary, so that from a virginal marriage a virgin son might be born.

For if fornication does not befit a holy man, and it is not written that he had another wife, but rather that he was the guardian of Mary, whom he is thought to have had, rather than her husband: it remains that he too remained a virgin with Mary, he who deserved to be called the father of the Lord.

And since I am about to say some things concerning the comparison of virginity and marriage, I beg my readers not to think that I have detracted from marriage in praising virgins, nor that I have made any distinction between the saints of the Old Testament and of the New, that is, between those who had marriages and those who withdrew entirely from the embrace of women, but rather that, according to the condition of the times, they then were subject to one sentence, and we to another, into whom the ends of the ages have run down. As long as that law remained: Increase, and multiply, and fill the earth; and, Cursed is the barren woman who does not bear seed in Israel, all married and were given in marriage, and, leaving their parents, became one flesh. But when that voice thundered forth: The time is short: it remains that they who have wives be as though they had none; cleaving to the Lord, we become one spirit with him. And why?

Because he who is without a wife thinks on the things of God, how he may please God. But he who is with a wife is anxious about the things of this world, how he may please his wife. And the woman is divided, and the virgin: she who is not married thinks on the things of God, that she may be holy in body and in spirit. For she who is married thinks on the things of the world, how she may please her husband. Why do you bark? Why do you resist? The vessel of election speaks these things, saying: The woman is divided, and the virgin. See how great a happiness it is, that has even lost the name of its sex. A virgin is no longer called a woman. She who is not married thinks on the things of the Lord, that she may be holy in body and in spirit.

This is the definition of a virgin, to be holy in body and in spirit; because it profits nothing to have a virgin flesh, if one has married in mind. But she who is married thinks on the things of the world, how she may please her husband. Do you think it the same thing to spend days and nights free for prayer, free for fasting; and, at the coming of one's husband, to polish one's face, to affect a gait, to feign endearments? The former does this, that she may appear less becoming, and darkens the good of nature by injury to it. The latter paints herself before a mirror, and, to the insult of her Maker, strives to be more beautiful than she was born. Hence infants prattle, the household resounds, children hang from kisses and from the mouth, expenses are calculated, outlays are prepared. On one side the girded band of cooks minces meats, on another the crowd of weaving-women murmurs: meanwhile it is announced that the husband has come with his companions.

She, like a swallow, scans every corner of the house, whether the couch be smooth, whether the floors have been swept, whether the cups are adorned, whether the meal is prepared. Answer, I ask, amid all this, where is the thought of God? And are these happy households? Moreover, where the timbrels sound, the flute shrieks, the lyre chatters, the cymbal clashes, what fear of God is there? The parasite glories in his insults; there enter women exposed as victims of lust, and, naked through the thinness of their garments, they are thrust before shameless eyes. At these things the unhappy wife either rejoices, and perishes; or is offended, and her husband is stirred to quarrels. Hence discord, the seed-bed of divorce. Or if some house is found in which these things do not happen, which is a rare bird indeed; yet the very management of the household, the education of children, the necessities of the husband, the correction of the servants—how do these not draw one away from the thought of God?

"The womanly things of Sara had ceased," says Scripture: after which it is said to Abraham: "Whatever Sara says to you, hear her voice". She who is not in the anxieties and pain of childbirth, who, the offices of the monthly blood having ceased, has ceased to be a woman, is made free from the curse of God: nor is her turning toward her husband, but on the contrary her husband is made subject to her, and it is commanded to him by the voice of the Lord: "Whatever Sara says to you, hear her voice": and thus they begin to be free for prayer. For as long as the marriage debt is paid, the urgency of prayer is set aside.

We do not deny that widows, we do not deny that married women, are found to be holy; but rather those who have ceased to be wives, who, even in the very necessity of marriage, imitate the chastity of virgins. This is what the Apostle briefly testified, with Christ speaking in him: "The unmarried woman thinks on the things of God, how she may please God: but the married woman thinks on the things of the world, how she may please her husband": leaving to us on this point a field for understanding.

Nor, however, does he impose necessity or a snare upon anyone, but he advises what is honorable, wishing all to be as he himself is. And although he has no command of the Lord concerning virginity—because it is above men, and it would have been, in a certain way, an act of impudence to compel against nature, and to say otherwise, "I want you to be what the Angels are"; whence too the virgin has a greater reward, in that she disdains that which, if she had done it, she would not have sinned—nevertheless in what follows he adds: "Now concerning virgins I have no commandment of the Lord: but I give counsel, as one who has obtained mercy of the Lord, to be faithful. I think therefore that this is good for the present necessity, that it is good for a man to be so." What is this necessity? "Woe to them that are with child, and that give suck, in those days". Therefore the forest grows up, that it may afterward be cut down.

Therefore the field is sown, that it may be reaped. The world is already full, the earth does not contain us. Every day wars cut us down, diseases carry us off, shipwrecks swallow us up, and yet do we still quarrel over boundaries? Of this number are those who follow the Lamb, who have not defiled their garments, for they have remained virgins. Observe what "defiled" signifies. I do not dare to explain it, lest Helvidius should slander me. But as for what you say, that some virgins are shopkeepers; I say more to you still, that among them there are even adulteresses, and, what may surprise you more, that there are clergy who are tavern-keepers, and monks who are unchaste. But who does not at once understand that neither can a virgin be a shopkeeper, nor an adulterous woman a monk, nor a cleric a tavern-keeper? Is it the fault of virginity, if a pretender to virginity is guilty of a crime?

For my part, indeed, passing over other persons, let me come to the Virgin: she who practices the trade of a shopkeeper, I do not know whether she remains a virgin in body—but this I know, that she does not remain a virgin in spirit.

We are rhetoricians, and after the manner of declaimers, we have played a little. You, Helvidius, have forced us to it, you who, now that the Gospel shines forth, wish virgins and married women to be of the same glory. And because I think you have been overcome by the truth, and have turned to detraction of my life and to abuse (for even little women are wont to do this, who curse their conquering masters in corners), I say this beforehand, that your revilings will be a glory to me, since with the same mouth with which you have detracted from Mary, you tear at me, and the servant of the Lord together with his mother alike experiences your dog-like eloquence.