The Power of the Cross

He remembers being named by men, from the very beginning of the contests of the name of Jesus Christ, from which all ought to be called. He does not complain about what is currently being said regarding dogmas, nor does he complain to them about this, but rather about what we have said before and what he demonstrates hereafter.

He asks: Are you not heirs with Christ, with whom he shared you, the believers? For he did not say, 'Christ was shared,' but rather, 'did Christ not share with you?' The argument demonstrates this, for he says: Was not Paul crucified for us? The Christ died for the salvation of the world, but none of us. From this, he shows that some intended to be named after the one who was baptizing them. This good thing, which the Savior also commanded and which brings salvation, became a burden to me, he says, if you were intending to be called from me, the one baptizing.

How then are we to understand that Christ did not send me to baptize, but to evangelize? Since even one who is not an apostle baptizes, yet the dignity of the apostles was held by few, and without being evangelized and being baptized, one could not be baptized, he says; I was sent to evangelize, for this is the preceding thing, not to baptize. It is therefore left here, by implication, that 'I was not previously sent to baptize.' Thus also elsewhere when he says: Does God not care for the oxen? Not because he does not care; for even in the Law, Moses says concerning oxen, truly concerning those who serve the farmers. And David says: Lord, you will save men and cattle, just as God has multiplied your mercy. And Solomon says: The righteous man has pity on the souls of his cattle, how much more God? But what is it that he says? That previously God does not care for the oxen. And here, by ellipsis, it is as if he said, 'that Christ did not send me to baptize.'

Moving to another fault and coming to another correction, not having completely set aside the first, he has used the second as a prelude. For the first was that Christ did not send me to baptize, regarding the fact that each of you says: 'I am of Paul,' or 'I am of Apollos'; the second is the word not in wisdom, the beginning of another administration. Thus, evangelizing has been set as the end of the first matter and the beginning of the second, so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied.

The proclamation declares that the power of the cross is not displayed. Concerning the word of the cross, it does not speak of the mere utterance or the sound, but of the power; for while the work appears to be weak, the cause, when sought, is revealed to be a great mystery. To us who are being saved, it is the power of God. Since Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God, and some desire to receive the word of God through Him, it must be observed that regarding the cross, the word speaks of the power of God.

For it is written: 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise.' Even though the apostle is himself credible in his teaching—for he had Christ speaking within himself—he has also made use of the testimony of the Old Testament, producing a more certain certainty for the disciples. Having used the testimony, 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,' he proceeds as if upon what has already been agreed, saying: Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? The wisdom of the Greeks, and the scribe of the Jews.

He mentions two wisdoms: one is the harmony observed in the created things, and the other is the wisdom according to which men, being rational, become intelligent. Since, he says, through the understanding coming to us we did not know God, nor through the wisdom observed in the created things, God was pleased to save those believing through the foolishness of the proclamation. Great is what he says, which is not shown to those passing by simply; for the power of God and all-wisdom demonstrates itself in this way.

The magnitude and the beauty of the world, he says, being immeasurable and ungraspable, did not persuade you to know God; rather, leaving the Maker, you worshipped these things through which it was necessary to know their Maker. God, showing the excess of His own power—whom creation did not persuade but even struck—enlightened the world through the agreed-upon weakness of the cross.

For showing the absurdity of those who have been emboldened in rationality and think to adorn piety through eloquence, he says that we must not answer not only those seeking wisdom among the Greeks, but also those Jews who ask for signs—the signs of the Spirit, and the wisdom of the words of external education. If they do not even ask for the wonders of the Spirit, it would have been fitting to give them the things of external wisdom—for not...