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Chapter XIV.—Other Beings Called Gods.

“For we ourselves also know that angels are called gods by the Scriptures,—as, for instance, He who spake at the bush, and wrestled with Jacob,—and the name is likewise applied to Him who is born Emmanuel, and who is called the mighty God. 1297   Yea, even Moses became a god to Pharaoh, though in reality he was a man.  The same is the case also with the idols of the Gentiles.  But we have but one God, one who made creation and arranged the universe, whose Son is the Christ.  Obeying Christ, 1298 we learn to know what is false from the Scriptures.  Moreover, being furnished by our ancestors with the truths of the Scriptures, we know that there is only one who has made the heavens and the earth, the God of the Jews, and of all who p. 316 choose to worship Him.  Our fathers, with pious thought, setting down a fixed belief in Him as the true God, handed down this belief to us, that we may know that if any thing is said against God, it is a falsehood.  I shall add this remark over and above what I need say:  If the case be not as I have said, then may I, and all who love the truth, incur danger in regard to the praise of the God who made us.”


Footnotes

315:1297

Isa. ix. 6.

315:1298

Lit., “whom obeying:”  the “whom” might refer to God.


Next: Chapter XV