e moral law of nature
that had fallen into oblivion.[644] But when they made to themselves a
golden calf and chose to be slaves rather than free men, then the Word,
through the instrumentality of Moses, gave to them, as a particular
addition, the commandments of slavery (the ceremonial law) in a form
suitable for their training. These were bodily commandments of bondage
which did not separate them from God, but held them in the yoke. The
ceremonial law was thus a pedagogic means of preserving the people from
idolatry; but it was at the same time a type of the future. Each
constituent of the ceremonial law has this double signification, and
both of these meanings originate with God, i.e., with Christ; for "how
is Christ the end of the law, if he be not the beginning of it?"
("quomodo finis legis Christus, si non et initium eius esset") IV. 12.
4. Everything in the law is therefore holy, and moreover we are only
entitled to blame such portions of the history of the Jewish nation as
Holy Scripture itself condemns. This nation was obliged to circumcise
itself, keep Sabbaths, offer up sacrifices, and do whatever is related
of it, so far as its action is not censured. All this belonged to the
state of bondage in which men had a _covenant_ with God and in which
they also possessed the right faith in the one God and were taught
before hand to follow his Son (IV. 12, 5; "lex praedocuit hominem sequi
oportere Christum"). In addition to this, Christ continually manifested
himself to the people in the prophets, through whom also he indicated
the future and prepared men for his appearance. In the prophets the Son
of God accustomed men to be instruments of the Spirit of God and to have
fellowship with the Father in them; and in them he habituated himself to
enter bodily into humanity.[645] Hereupon began the last stage, in which
men, being now sufficiently trained, were to receive the "testamentum
libertatis" and be adopted as Sons of God. By the union of the Son of
God with the flesh the _agnitio filii_ first became possible to all;
that is the fundamental novelty. The next problem was to restore the law
of freedom. Here a threefold process was necessary. In the first place
the Law of Moses, the Decalogue, had been disfigured and blunted by the
"traditio seniorum". First of all then the pure moral law had to be
restored; secondly, it was now necessary to extend and fulfil it by
expressly searching out the inclinations of the heart in