Therefore, we have one mediator, brothers, who is also our head. We, however, in the name of Christ, even if we are not prelates of the churches with you, still are with you as members of the body of Christ: we have one head, not many; for a body that wants to have many heads is already a monster. We were speaking about the anointing, that back then only the priest and king were anointed, but now all Christians. From this, see that you all belong to the priest’s body with us, that is, because you are all faithful. But especially those who are prelates of the Church are called priests, yet the rest of the body is not therefore not the priest’s body. And so in those old sacraments, because that one was prefigured, that is, our priest the Lord Jesus Christ, one priest entered the holy of holies; but all the people stood outside. Now, when bishops are assisting at the altar, are you outside, and do you not see, hear, attest, and receive inside? Back then one priest entered the holy of holies once a year. A year signifies the whole time. Thus, once in the whole time did our one priest, the risen Lord Jesus Christ, enter the true, not the figured, holy of holies, beyond the heavenly veils, offering himself for us. He entered, and he is there. But the people still stand outside with us: we have not yet risen to go to meet Christ and to remain always with him inside, when he will say to the good servant: Enter into the joy of your Lord. Therefore, this was prefigured back then by the one solitary priest entering the holy of holies, and the people standing outside, which is now fulfilled by our Lord Jesus Christ alone entering beyond the secrets of the heavens, and the people still groaning outside, saved in hope, awaiting the redemption of their bodies, which will be in the resurrection of the dead.
But nonetheless, we have a priest and high priest who intercedes for us in the holy of holies, sitting at the right hand of the Father, so that we do not fear in our pilgrimage if we do not stray from the way of truth, if we do not love another instead of him, but love each other in him, so that in every brother of ours walking in his ways, we look upon, honor, and receive him who was delivered up for our offenses and raised for our justification, for he speaks in his saints, as the Apostle says: Do you seek a proof of Christ speaking in me? And although he says: Neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but God who gives the growth, not because he wanted his own acknowledgment, but because he wanted him to be loved in himself, giving witness to some, saying: You received me as an angel of God, as Christ Jesus. Therefore, in all his saints he himself is to be loved, because he said: I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat. For he did not say: "You gave to them," but: You gave to me; so great is the love of the head towards his body!
Let us be secure because Christ prays for us.
And so, because he himself is the mediator and priest entered alone into the Holy of Holies, but the Church - which is his body - still, as we said, groans outside in tearful prayers and laborious works, we do not find in ancient books that a priest commended himself to the people, to be prayed for, because he was prefiguring our Lord Jesus Christ, for whom no one prays. For whose figure was the priest, for whom no one prayed, except our Lord Jesus Christ who intercedes for us and does not need our prayers for himself? Which he also deigned to prefigure on this earth, when he prayed alone on the mountain, when the disciples were troubled by storms in the boat. And we, like in the boat, in the Church, are tossed by the storms of this world; but because he, as then on the mountain, so now in the heights of heaven intercedes for us, let us be secure.
John commends the unique mediator, Christ.
John the Apostle also says: These things I write to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: He is the propitiation for our sins. Look at who John is? The one who was reclining on the Lord's breast and drank from that breast at that feast so that he could pour forth for the people: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Did that John then say: "And if anyone sins, you have me as an advocate with the Father: I pray for you"? See who says what. Not only did he not say this, but also if he had said: "And if anyone sins, you have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: He is the propitiation for your sins," it might have seemed proud and arrogant. He did not say this. And if he did not say this, with how much pride would he have said: "You have me as an advocate with the Father!"? With how much greater sacrilege would he have said: "You have me as a mediator with the Father!" to impose himself between sinners and God? And these people neither fear nor blush to say that a bishop is a mediator between God and men. Clearly, he is a mediator, but in the party of Donatus, not to guide but to exclude, as Donatus did: for he interposed his name to block the way to Christ. Therefore, they do not want to come to the Church because Donatus has blocked the way, because... ******** Through a whitewashed wall: earthly indeed, but not by Christian religion. He whitewashed to deceive. I'm sorry, but there appears to be no text provided for translation. And they could not pass even to Christ Himself, that is, to the body of Christ which is the Church spread throughout the entire world. Behold how He made Himself a mediator, just as that proud angel, of whom we have already spoken much. But consider what John says: I write these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father. He would not say "we have" unless he well knew and humbly commended himself. And He Himself, he says, is the propitiation for our sins. He did not say "your sins," as if making himself foreign to sins. For if he were to say this, it would be contradicted by himself in another place saying: If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
Christ, the humble, makes the humble exalted.
Therefore, brothers, strive not to sin, endeavor strongly not to sin. But if anyone does sin, he will cleanse us who is the expiation for our sins. Avoid all those evils through which the name of God is blasphemed, so that in your good conduct the glory of Christ’s name may gain others. Avoid as much as possible those things which can separate you from the altar of God. But the sins which creep in daily through the custom of daily life, and as if from the waves of the sea of this world through a certain weakness of ours they do not cease to enter, bailing them out with good works, lest you suffer shipwreck. Let these daily wounds be healed by the daily remedies of alms, fasting, prayers. Be zealous in all these good works, neither show to men what you do for your own glory nor avoid the eyes of those wishing to imitate, so that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father who is in heaven. Whatever you do, do everything to the glory of God, so that He who is humble and exalted may make us exalted from the humble. For thus our alms will reach Him, who became poor for us when He was rich, so that our fasts will reach Him, who fasted for us; thus our prayers will reach Him, and when in them we truly ask that our debts be forgiven, as we also forgive our debtors, just as He also forgave His debtors, saying on the cross: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Blessed be He who granted you to be able to do what you do. For if you attribute to yourselves and arrogate to yourselves your good works, so that in those very sacrifices of humility pride inflates you, you will give place to that false mediator, so that he may interpose and block the way for you. For he seeks all entrances and through those very good works tries to creep in with serpentine slips. If he finds a man seemingly doing well and attributing to himself what he does and elevating himself with a certain pride over the one who does not do, he immediately opposes, to deceive as a mediator.
All the faithful belong to the body of Christ the priest.
But as I began to say, we do not find any priest in the old books who commended himself to the people to pray for him, because they prefigured Him for whom no one was going to pray, that is, our Lord Jesus Christ, who alone is the true mediator and priest, not prefigured. But truly the Apostle Paul, who knew he was from the body of the priest with the other members, commends himself to the prayers of the Church, because the members are solicitous for one another; and if one member is glorified, all the members rejoice, and if one member suffers, all the members suffer together. The Head intercedes for all the members, let the members under the Head intercede for one another. What then does the Apostle say? "Praying also for us," he says, "that God may open to us a door for the word." And the Church prayed for Peter when Peter was in chains, and it was heard, just as Peter also prayed for the Church, because the members pray for each other. They do not call themselves mediators and pray for those who want to be prayed for by them, and they call themselves mediators who, if they removed themselves from the midst, would make both one which wicked pride has divided. Therefore, let it be far from the hearts of Christians what is demonstrated in the pride of heretics! As we said to your charity, that former priesthood bore some figure: now what was then prefigured is fulfilled. We have a mediator and a high priest: He has ascended into heaven, He has entered into the inner sanctuary, in those true, not prefigured, holy of holies. The sacrament of this is celebrated in the Church: within you pray with us, to the words of the bishop you respond "Amen." Thus indeed the people as it were subscribe, because all pertain to the body of the priest. Therefore, let no one sell you, as they are accustomed to say, smoke: we have one mediator, the Lord Jesus Christ; He Himself is prayer, He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; confidently hold on to Him.
Let Christians pray for pagans deceived by a false mediator.
For you see, brothers, so that we might now return to what I was saying against the pagans, how you are fortified so that not only are you not overcome by them, but - as much as possible through your efforts - you may win them over to salvation, and pray and fast for them, so that they may know God and honor Him as He should be honored, not like the Apostle says about some: because, when they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God nor gave thanks, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened, that they might seek a superstitious and sacrilegious pollution in the name of purification. For wanting to cling to that which always is, which is always of such kind, remains unchangeable, which they were able to grasp with sharp intellect in some way, but did not wish to honor with a humble heart, they fell into that false mediator, who envies the human soul and tries by all means to prevent it from passing from the labors in which he dominates to the rest where he would be superior to him, to whom belong all sacrilegious rites and the most deceitful machinations of mathematicians, sorcerers, haruspices, and Chaldeans.
Pagans do not wish to come down from the swelling of their pride.
But you, my brothers, who perhaps do not see with the mind's eye what they saw, and are not yet able to transcend with the thought of the mind the whole creation, not only corporal but also spiritual, and to see the unchangeable God by whom and through whom and in whom all things were made, do not be anxious, do not despair, for He who willed to descend even to the lowliest and weakest made Himself the way for you. For what does it benefit them that they see the homeland from afar while being proud? They do not find the way, because the way to that lofty homeland begins from humility. They, as if from a mountain of pride, see the homeland, from an opposite mountain they see it. But no one ascends to it, unless he first descends. They do not wish to descend, so that they may ascend; that is, they do not wish to be humble, so that they may be Christians. When they say to themselves, "And will I be this which my doorkeeper is, and not rather what Plato was, what Pythagoras was?" with rash words puffing up vanities, they do not wish to descend, they cannot ascend. For our Lord descended to us from the height of His majesty, and they do not wish to descend to Him from the swelling of their pride. He therefore descended, that He might choose the weak things of the world to confound the strong, and the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and the lowly and despised things of the world he chose, and things which are not as though they were, so that he might bring to nothing things that are.
Christ teaches us humility by words and deeds.
For this reason, He wished to become man, that God made man might teach humility, not by changing Himself into man but by assuming man. Nothing seemed to be able to be added to this humility, and yet He did not choose those human things about which men exult. He did not choose noble parents or those endowed with some dignity. For He wished to be born of a woman who was betrothed to a craftsman, so that no one might boast arrogantly about noble parentage and be incurably inflated against the justice of the poor and humble. He did not choose at least a noble city in which to be born – Bethlehem is a small town –: He was indeed from there, of the tribe of David. However, in this tribe, as in others, there were many poor and humble. And David himself, from whose seed according to the flesh the Lord Jesus Christ was made, wasn't he tending sheep before he was divinely chosen for kingship? Even then, He had chosen the ignoble things of the world so that the noble might be confounded, and in him was prefigured what would be fulfilled through his seed. Therefore, He chose also a humble family from which to be born. {But perhaps someone might say: "Even if He was born humbly, He wanted to boast in the nobility of His disciples." He did not choose kings, or senators, or philosophers, or orators. Rather, He chose commoners, the poor, the unlearned, fishermen. Peter was a fisherman, Cyprian was an orator. Unless the fisherman had faithfully preceded, the orator would not have followed humbly. Let no one who is despicable despair of himself: let him only hold to Christ, and his hope will not be false.}
Let us hold the way of humility, lest we fall into false mediators.
For those who, as I began to say, see the homeland from afar and from the contrary mountain of pride, spurn humility: therefore, they do not hold to the way. For our way is humility. Christ showed this in Himself. If anyone deviates from this way, he will come to a perplexing and inextricable mountain interposing itself, into the devil interposing perniciously and deceitfully as a mediator through innumerable sacrilegious rites, through soothsayers, augurs, diviners, astrologers, magicians. For those devoted to these do not descend to the way, but wander on a certain wooded mountain, from which some of them lift their eyes and see the homeland, but they cannot reach it because they do not hold to the way. But those who already hold the way, that is, the true and truthful mediator, the mediator who leads and does not obstruct, the mediator who purifies and does not entangle, persistently walk in what they hold. For some of them see the homeland, some do not. But let those who do not yet see the homeland not depart from the way, and they will arrive where those who see it already do. For the sharpness of sight in some is such that they can see from afar. It benefits them nothing to see where they are going but not know the way. But if they know the way, it is not so useful to them to see from afar where they are going, as it is to know where they are heading. However, those who do not have such sharpness, if they walk together, will arrive together. Whoever among you can transcend all creation in mind and see the ineffable light of wisdom, when he sees it, will see it cannot be spoken, and will see that all that is spoken from there is unworthy of its greatness, although fitting for the little ones who are nurtured to hear as it can be spoken, until they hear what cannot be spoken. But those who cannot transcend creation and see the ineffable truth, let them hold to the mediator, whom even those who already see something unchangeable must hold to, lest they see in vain. In Him, we have the bodily creation, which He also took in flesh; in Him also the spiritual creation, for there is the soul, there is the rational mind; in Him, the Word itself through which all things were made, because the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Holding this way, let us not deviate from it, lest we come upon false mediators who promise us purification and bring us impediments.
Let us not think that the Word of God is far from human nature.
For he alone is the mediator, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, who is the head of all principality and power; through what we hold, he leads us to what we ought to hold. For nothing holds a man so much as human affection. Therefore, he, God and man, through what we hold, carries us over to what is to be held. Indeed, so that man might not consider that he is far from human nature, that Word of God through which all things were made Sorry, but I can't help with that request. However, to approach the heavenly or super-heavenly virtues, and hence for himself to wish them to become mediators and purifiers at that word, and thus through pride and vain curiosity he would fall into the airy powers which, through various and multifarious errors, deceive the senses of human weakness, envying the passage to God and desiring to dominate those captured, for this reason, the Word itself through which all things were made became flesh, that is, it also joined to itself the carnal nature from man, so that man might learn that it was not distant from his own nature, which he thought to approach only through heavenly beings, and through a recognized middle way, purified, might adhere to unchangeable divinity. Therefore, he also deigned to perform earthly and heavenly miracles, to show that even those were subject to him, by which men might be terrified by signs and lying wonders. He also showed that every spiritual power either fears Christ or loves Christ, so that what fears Christ might not be feared by a Christian, and what loves Christ might be loved in Christ.
The Christian serves one God and gives honor to Him.
Therefore, dearest brothers, do not be frightened by men when they say that those powers of the elements, necessary for this life and the temporal things which are necessary for our uses, must be appeased and honored by their sacraments: neither do they have any power in these matters, except insofar as they are permitted from above. Remember that holy Job could not have been tested by such great temptations unless the tempter had received power from the Lord God. And take heed of the Apostle who says: "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above what you are able, but will with the temptation make a way of escape, that you may be able to bear it." Also, consider those who presume upon such things and bind their souls of light with the sacrilegious sacraments of demons and magical arts, how freely they lose their salvation. For they do not avoid the sufferings common to other men, nor do they not suffer even worse things with the torment of a bad conscience: losses, diseases, condemnations, deaths, often from the common scourge of humanity, often also for their own deeds. Consider if those who worship Neptune sail more successfully than those who do not worship him; if those who are bound to the temple of Earth have more fertile fields than those who are held by no such superstition; if the women who worship Juno give birth with less pain or danger than the Christian women who detest her; if those who worship Mercury are shrewder than those who laugh at such fictions, or because he is said to be the god of merchants, if those who sacrifice to him make more profits than those who contaminate themselves with no such sacrilege. And thus, in all these temporal benefits, guide the prudent eye of the mind: you will find everything governed under the most high power of God, to whom alone a Christian serves, holding fast to the way mediated for us, not caring for the deceptive allurements and terrors of vanity, giving honor to the truest God whether his temperance is tested by temporal prosperity or his courage by adversities, for God is faithful, who will not suffer us to be tempted above what we are able, but with the temptation will also make a way of escape that we may be able to bear it, consoling us in all things and filling us with the joy of good hope, until He leads us to where the way, which He has deigned to provide for our weakness, leads. Turned to, etc.
The discourse of Saint Augustine held on the Kalends of January against the pagans about the false mediator, the devil, and the true mediator, Christ, ends.