THE LETTER OF BARNABAS
13 Again I will show you how he speaks to us. He made yet a second hu man form in the final days. And the Lord says, “See! I am making the final things like the first.”30 This is why the prophet proclaimed, “Enter into a land flowing with milk and honey, and rule over it.”31 14 See, then, that we have been formed anew, just as he again says in another prophet, “See, says the Lord, I will re move from these people their hearts of stone” (that is to say, from those whom the Spirit of the Lord foresaw) “and cast into them hearts of flesh.”32 For he was about to be revealed in the flesh and to dwell among us. 15 For the dwelling place of our heart, my brothers, is a temple holy to the Lord. 16 For again the Lord says, “And how will I appear before the Lord my God and be glorified?”33 He answers: “I will praise you in the assembly of my broth ers, and sing your praise in the midst of the assembly of saints.”34 And so we are the ones he has brought into the good land. 17 Why then does he speak of milk and honey? Because the child is first nourished by honey and then milk. So also, when we are nourished by faith in the promise and then by the word, we will live as masters over the earth. 18 For he already said above, “Let them increase and multiply and rule over the fish.”35 Who can now rule over wild beasts and fish and birds of the sky? For we ought to realize that ruling is a matter of authority, so that the one who issues commands is the master. 19 Since this is not happening now, he has told us when it will happen—when we have ourselves been perfected so as to become heirs of the Lord’s covenant.
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Lord has revealed everything to us in advance, that we may know whom to praise when we give thanks for every thing. 2 And so, if the Son of God suffered, that by being beaten he might give us life (even though he is the Lord and is about to judge the living and the dead), we should believe that the Son of God could not suffer unless it was for our sakes. 3 But also when he was crucified he was given vinegar and gall to drink. Lis ten how the priests in the temple made a revelation about this. For the Lord gave the written commandment that “Whoever does not keep the fast must surely die,”36 because he himself was about to offer the vessel of the Spirit as a sacrifice for our own sins, that the type might also be fulfilled that was set forth in Isaac, when he was offered on the altar. 4 What then does he say in the prophet? “Let them eat some of the goat offered for all sins on the day of fasting.” Now pay careful attention: “And let all the priests alone eat the intestines, un washed, with vinegar.”37 5 Why is this? Since you are about to give me gall mixed with vinegar to drink—when I am about to offer my flesh on behalf of the sins of my new people— you alone are to eat, while the people fast and mourn in sackcloth and ashes. He says this to show that he had to suffer at their hands. 6 Pay attention to what he commands: “Take two fine goats who are alike and offer them as a sacrifice; and let the priest take one of them as a whole burnt offer ing for sins.”38
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And so you should understand, children of gladness, that the good
Source unknown. 31Exod 33:3. 32Ezek 11:19. Ps 42:4. 34Ps 22: 22, 25. 35Gen 1:28. 36Lev 23: 29. 37Source unknown. Cf. Leviticus 16. 38Lev 16: 7, 9.
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