Lactantius — Divine Institutes 4.17
But for the anger and envy they carried shut inside their hearts they put forward other causes: that he was loosing the law of God given through Moses—that is, that on the sabbath he was not idle but worked for human salvation, that he was emptying circumcision, that he was removing abstinence from swine’s flesh: in which things the sacraments of the Jewish religion consist. For these reasons the rest of the people, who had not yet gone over to Christ, was stirred by the priests to judge him impious for loosing God’s law—though he did this not by his own judgment but from God’s will and according to what the prophets had foretold. For Micah announced that a new law would be given: “A law will go out from Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” That earlier law given through Moses was given not on Mount Zion but on Mount Horeb; and the Sibyl showed that it would be loosed by the Son of God. Moses himself, through whom they stubbornly guard the law given to them—and so have fallen away from God and not recognized God—had predicted that a greatest prophet would be sent by God, who would be above the law and bring God’s will to humans. In Deuteronomy he left it written: “The Lord said to me: I will raise up for them a prophet from their brothers like you, and I will put my word in his mouth…” God announced through the lawgiver himself that he would send his Son—that is, the living and present law—and would loose that old law given through a mortal, so that again through him who is eternal he might establish an eternal law.
Likewise concerning the loosing of circumcision Isaiah prophesied: “Circumcise yourselves to your God and circumcise the foreskin of your heart…” Moses again: “In the last days God will circumcise your heart to love the Lord your God.” Joshua his successor: the Lord told Jesus (Joshua) to make sharp stone knives and circumcise the sons of Israel a second time. He said a second circumcision would come—not of the flesh, as the first still used by the Jews, but of heart and spirit, which Christ handed down, who was the true Jesus. For the prophet does not say “the Lord said to me,” but “to Jesus,” to show he was not speaking of himself but of Christ, to whom God was then speaking. That Jesus bore the figure of Christ: first called Auses, Moses, foreseeing the future, ordered him to be called Jesus, so that as chosen leader of the army against Amalek he might by the figure of the name defeat the adversary and lead the people into the land of promise. And therefore he also succeeded Moses, to show that a new law given through Christ Jesus would succeed the old law given through Moses.
For that circumcision of the flesh certainly lacks reason: if God had wanted it, he would from the beginning have formed the human without a foreskin. But it was a figure of this second circumcision, signifying that the breast must be bared—that is, that we ought to live with an open and simple heart—since that part of the body which is circumcised has a certain likeness to the heart and is shameful. For this cause God ordered it stripped, to warn us by this argument not to have a wrapped breast—that is, not to veil any shameful deed inside the secrets of conscience. This is the circumcision of the heart of which the prophets speak, which God transferred from mortal flesh to the soul, which alone will remain. Wanting in his eternal piety to look to our life and salvation, he set repentance before us in that circumcision, so that if we bare the heart—that is, if having confessed our sins we make satisfaction to God—we obtain pardon, which is denied to the stubborn who hide their admissions by him who looks not at the face as a human does, but at the inmost and hidden things of the breast. The ban on swine’s flesh looks the same way: when God ordered them to abstain from it, he chiefly wanted it understood that they should abstain from sins and uncleannesses. So all the precepts of the Jewish law look to showing justice, since they were given through ambiguity, so that through the figure of carnal things spiritual things might be known.
Latin
Sed irae atque inuidiae suae, quam in cordibus suis gerebant intus inclusam, alias causas praeferebant: quod legem dei per Moysen datam solueret, id est quod sabbatis non uacaret operans in salutem hominum, quod circumcisionem uacuefaceret, quod abstinentiam suillae carnis auferret: in quibus rebus Iudaicae religionis sacramenta consistunt. ob haec itaque cetera pars populi, quae nondum ad Christum secesserat, a sacerdotibus incitabatur ut inpium iudicaret eum, quod legem dei solueret, cum hoc ille non suo iudicio, sed ex dei uoluntate et secundum praedicta faceret prophetarum.
Micheas enim nouam legem datuiri denuntiauit hoc modo: lex de Sion proficiscetur et sermo domini ab Hierusalem. et iudi cabit inter plurimos populos et reuincet et detege ualidas nationes. illa enim prior lex quae per Moyseqj data est, non in monte Sion, sed in monte Choreb data est quam Sibylla fore ut a filio dei solueretur ostendit: † ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε δὴ ταῦτα πάντα τελειωθῇ ἅπερ εἶπον, εἰς αὐτὸν τότε πᾶς λύεται νόμος . sed et ipse Moyses, per quem sibi datam legem dum pertinaciter tuentur, exciderunt a deo et deum non adgnouerunt, praedixerat fore ut propheta maximus mitteretur a deo, qui sit supra legem, qui uoluntatem dei ad homines perferat. in Deuteronomio ita scriptum reliquit: et dixit dominus ad me: prophetam excitabo eis de fratribus eorum sicut te et dabo uerbum meum in os eius, et loquetur ad eos ea quae praecepero ei. et quisque non audierit ea quae loquetur propheta ille in nomine meo, ego uindicabo in eum. denuntiauit scilicet deus per ipsum legiferum quod filium suum id est uiuam praesentemque legem missurus esset et illam ueterem per mortalem datam soluturus, ut denuo per eum qui esset aeternus, legem sanciret aeternam.
item de circumcisione soluenda Esaias ita prophetauit: haec dicit dominus uiris Iuda et qui inhabitant in Hierusalem: renouate inter uos nouitatem et ne seminaueritis in spinis. circumcidite uos deo uestro et circumcidite praeputium cordis uestri, ne exeat ira mea sicut ignis et non sit qui extinguat item Moyses ipse: in nouissimis diebus circumcidet deus cor tuum ad dominum deum tuum amandum. item Iesus Naue successor eius: et dixit dominus ad Iesum: fac tibi cultellos petrinos nimis acutos et sede et circumcide secundo filios Israhel. secundam circumcisionem futuram esse dixit non carnis, sicut fuit prima, qua etiamnunc Iudaei utuntur, sed cordis ac spiritus, quam tradidit Christus, qui uerus Iesus fuit. non enim propheta sic ait \'et dixit dominus ad me\\ sed \'ad Iesum\', ut ostenderet quod non de se loqueretur, sed de Christo, ad quem tum deus loquebatur. Christi enim figuram gerebat ille Iesus. qui cum primum Auses uocaretur, Moyses futura praesentiens iussit eum Iesum uocari, ut quoniam dux militiae delectus esset aduersus Amalech, qui obpugnabat filios Israhel, et aduersarium debellaret per nominis figuram et populum in terram promissionis induceret. et idcirco etiam Moysi successit, ut ostenderetur nouam legem per Christum Iesum datam ueteri legi successuram, quae data per Moysen fuit. nam illa carnis circumcisio caret utique ratione, quia si deus id uellet, sic a principio formasset hominem, ut praeputium non haberet: sed huius secundae circumcisionis figura erat significans nudandum esse pectus, id est aperto et simplici corde oportere nos uiuere, quoniam pars illa corporis quae circumciditur habet quandam similitudinem cordis et est pudenda. ob hanc causam deus nudari eam iussit, ut hoc argumento nos admoneret, ne inuolutum pectus habeamus, id est ne quod pudendum facinus intra conscientiae secreta uelemus. haec est cordis circumcisio, de qua prophetae loquuntur: quam deus a carne mortali ad animam transtulit, quae sola mansura est. uolens enim uitae ac saluti nostrae pro aeterna sua pietate consulere, paenitentiam nobis in illa circumcisione proposuit, ut si cor nudauerimus, id est si peccata nostra confessi satis deo fecerimus, ueniam consequamur, quae contumacibus et admissa sua celantibus denegatur ab eo qui non faciem sicut homo, sed intima et arcana pectoris intuetur.
eodem spectat etiam carnis suillae interdictio. qua cum eos abstinere deus iussit, id potissimum uoluit intellegi, ut se peccatis atque inmunditiis abstinerent. est enim lutulentum hoc animal et inmundum nec umquam caelum aspicit, sed in terram toto et corpore et ore proiectum uentri semper et pabulo seruit, nec ullum alium cum uiuit praestare usum potest sicut ceterae animantes, quae uel sedendi uehiculum praebent uel in cultibus agrorum iuuant uel plaustra collo trahunt uel onera tergo gestant uel indumentum exuuiis suis exhibent uel copia lactis exuberant uel custodiendis domibus inuigilant. mterdixit ergo ne porcina carne uterentur, id est ne uitam porcorum imitarentur, qui ad solam mortem nutriuntur, ne uentri ac uoluptatibus seruientes ad faciendam iustitiam inutiles essent ac morte adficerentur; item ne se foedis libidinibus inmergerent sicut sus, qui se ingurgitat caeno, uel ne terrenis seruiant simulacris ac se luto inquinent. luto enim se oblinunt qui deos id est lutum terramque uenerantur. sic uniuersa praecepta Iudaicae legis ad exhibendam iustitiam spectant, quoniam per ambagem data sunt, ut per carnalium figuram spiritalia noscerentur.