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Irenæus
Those who have become acquainted with the secondary (i.e., under Christ) constitutions of the apostles,[4868] are aware that the Lord instituted a new oblation in the new covenant, according to [the declaration of] Malachi the prophet. For, “from the rising of the sun even to the setting my name has been glorified among the Gentiles, and in every place incense is offered to my name, and a pure sacrifice;”[4869] as John also declares in the Apocalypse: “The incense is the prayers of the saints.”[4870] Then again, Paul exhorts us “to present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”[4871] And again, “Let us offer the sacrifice of praise, that is, the fruit of the lips.”[4872] Now those oblations are not according to the law, the handwriting of which the Lord took away from the midst by cancelling it;[4873] but they are according to the Spirit, for we must worship God “in spirit and in truth.”[4874] And therefore the oblation of the Eucharist is not a carnal one, but a spiritual; and in this respect it is pure. For we make an oblation to God of the bread and the cup of blessing, giving Him thanks in that He has commanded the earth to bring forth these fruits for our nourishment. And then, when we have perfected the oblation, we invoke the Holy Spirit, that He may exhibit this sacrifice, both the bread the body of Christ, and the cup the blood of Christ, in order that the receivers of these antitypes[4875] may obtain remission of sins and life eternal. Those persons, then, who perform these oblations in remembrance<page 575> of the Lord, do not fall in with Jewish views, but, performing the service after a spiritual manner, they shall be called sons of wisdom.
The[4876] apostles ordained, that “we should not judge any one in respect to meat or drink, or in regard to a feast day, or the new moons, or the sabbaths.”[4877] Whence then these contentions? whence these schisms? We keep the feast, but in the leaven of malice and wickedness, cutting in pieces the Church of God; and we preserve what belongs to its exterior, that we may cast away these better things, faith and love. We have heard from the prophetic words that these feasts and fasts are displeasing to the Lord.[4878]
Christ,[4879] who was called the Son of God before the ages, was manifested in the fulness of time, in order that He might cleanse us through His blood, who were under the power of sin, presenting us as pure sons to His Father, if we yield ourselves obediently to the chastisement of the Spirit. And in the end of time He shall come to do away with all evil, and to reconcile all things, in order that there may be an end of all impurities.
“And[4880] he found the jaw-bone of an ass.”[4881] It is to be observed that, after [Samson had committed] fornication, the holy Scripture no longer speaks of the things happily accomplished by him in connection with the formula, “The Spirit of the Lord came upon him.”[4882] For thus, according to the holy apostle, the sin of fornication is perpetrated against the body, as involving also sin against the temple of God.[4883]
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