Now naturally virtue is hated by men. On which account God has honoured it, and gives the honour of bearing the first child to her who is hated. (48) And in another passage he says: “But if a man has two wives, one of them being loved and one of them being hated, and if they bear him children, and if the first-born son be the child of her who is hated; he will not be able to give the honours of the birthright to the child of the wife whom he loves, overlooking the firstborn son the child of her who is Hated.”{7}{#de 21:15.} For the productions of virtue which is hated, are the first and the most perfect, but those of pleasure, which is loved, are the last.
XIV. (49) “On this account a man will leave his father and his mother and will cleave to his wife; and they two shall become one flesh.” On account of the external sensation, the mind, when it has become enslaved to it, shall leave both its father, the God of the universe, and the mother of all things, namely, the virtue and wisdom of God, and cleaves to and becomes united to the external sensations, and is dissolved into external sensation, so that the two become one flesh and one passion. (50) And here you must observe that it is not the woman who cleaves to the man, but on the contrary, the man who cleaves to the woman; that is to say, the mind cleaves to the external sensations. For when that which is the better, namely, the mind, is united to that which is the rose, namely, the external sensation, it is then dissolved into the nature of flesh, which is worse, and into outward sensation, which is the cause of the passions. But when that which is the inferior, namely, the outward sensation, follows the better part, that is the mind, then there will no longer be flesh, but both will become one, namely, mind. And this is a thing of such a nature that it prefers the affections to piety. (51) There is also another being called by an opposite name, Levi; he who says to his father and mother: “He saw you not, and he did not recognize his brethren, and repudiated his Children.”{8}{#de 33:9.} This man leaves his father and mother; that is to say, his mind and the material of his body, in order to have as his inheritance the one God; “For the Lord himself is his Inheritance.”{9}{#de 10:9.} (52) And, indeed, suffering is the inheritance of him who is fond of suffering; but the inheritance of Levi is God. Do you not see that “he bids him on the tenth day of the months bring two goats as his share, one lot for the Lord and one lot for the scape-Goat.”{10}{#le 16:7.} For the sufferings inflicted on the scape goat are in real truth the lot of him who is fond of suffering.
XV. (53) “And they were both naked, both Adam and his wife, and they were not ashamed; but the serpent was the most subtle of all the beasts that were upon the earth, which the Lord God had Made:”{11}{#ge 2:25; 3:1.}–the mind is naked, which is clothed neither with vice nor with virtue, but which is really stripped of both: just as the soul of an infant child, which has no share in either virtue or vice, is stripped of all coverings, and is completely naked: for these things are the coverings of the soul, by which it is enveloped and concealed, good being the garment of the virtuous soul, and evil the robe of the wicked soul. (54) And the soul is made naked in these ways. Once, when it is in an unchangeable state, and is entirely free from all vices, and has discarded and laid aside the covering of all the passions. With reference to this Moses also pitches his tabernacle outside of the camp, a long way from the camp, and it was called the tabernacle of Testimony.{12}{#ex 33:7.} (55) And this has some such meaning as this: the soul which loves God, having put off the body and the affections which are dear to it, and having fled a long way from them, chooses a foundation and a sure ground for its abode, and a lasting settlement in the perfect doctrines of virtue; on which account testimony is borne to it by God, that it loves what is good, “for it was called the tabernacle of testimony,” says Moses, and he has passed over in silence the giver of the name, in order that the soul, being excited, might consider who it is who thus beareth witness to the dispositions which love virtue. (56) On this account the high priest “will not come into the holy of holies clad in a garment reaching to the feet; {13}{#le 16:1.} but having put off the robe of opinion and vain fancy of the soul, and having left that for those who love the things which are without, and who honour opinion in preference to truth, will come forward naked, without colours or any sounds, to make an offering of the blood of the soul, and to sacrifice the whole mind to God the Saviour and Benefactor; (57) and certainly Nadab and Abihu, {14}{#le 10:1.} who came near to God, and left this mortal life and received a share of immortal life, are seen to be naked, that is, free from all new and mortal opinion; for they would not have carried it in their garments and borne it about, if they had not been naked, having broken to pieces every bond of passion and of corporeal necessity, in order that their nakedness and absence of corporeality might not be adulterated by the accession of atheistical reasonings; for it may not be permitted to all men to behold the secret mysteries of God, but only to those who are able to cover them up and guard them; (58) on which account Mishael and his partisans concealed them not in their own garments, but in those of Nadab and Abihu, who had been burnt with fire and taken upwards; for having stripped off all the garments that covered them, they brought their nakedness before God, and left their tunics about Mishael. But clothes belong to the irrational part of the animal, which overshadow the rational part. Abraham also was naked when he heard, (59) “Come forth out of thy land and from thy kindred;”{15} {#Ge 13:1.} and as for Isaac, he indeed was not stripped, but was at all times naked and incorporeal; for a commandment was given to him not to go down into Egypt, {16}{#ge 26:2.} that is to say, into the body. Jacob also was fond of the nakedness of the soul, for his smoothness is nakedness, “for Esau was a hairy man, but Jacob,” says Moses, “was a smooth Man,”{17}{#ge 25:25.} on which account he was also the husband of Leah.
