Deceitful Wages and False Doctrines

My words. For those who agreed that my wages were thirty pieces of silver. It is appropriate to receive both a wage and silver. Often, the divine teachings and the word are signified by this name: 'The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace, tested, cleansed in the earth seven times' (Ps 12:6). And again, it is said proverbially: 'The tongue of the righteous is like refined silver' (Prov 10:20). For the word is signified by the name of the tongue.

And since not all silver mentioned allegorically is praised, but some is also reproached, thus God says to the false teachers of Israel: 'Your silver is worthless' (Jer 6:30); He does not mean a physical coin, but a deceitful word. And regarding those who use it to describe the discerning ones, to say of the generation producing these things: 'Call them rejected silver, for the Lord has rejected them,' it is manifest that they are deceitful and forbidden things.

This understanding is the proverbial ordinance brought forth thus: 'Silver given with deceit should be regarded as shards.' For the deceptive and contentious word brought forth with deceit by sophists—even if it seems to be about great things, the so-called 'exaltations, puffed up according to the knowledge of God'—is to be announced as being to be regarded as shards; such are those who are described as 'those who set their minds on earthly things' (Col 3:2), whom Isaiah said are 'those shouting from the earth' (Isa 28:9).

Since there is indeed a difference between logical silvers, having established the wage of those of the circumcision against those who toil over them as thirty pieces of silver, the Father says to the one having received the thirty pieces of silver: 'Cast them into the treasury and test if it is worthy' (Matt 27:5), the silver given, 'in the manner in which I was tested' on their behalf. For thus it will be revealed whether I am providing worthily the wage for which I accepted toil on their behalf, 'laying down my life and giving it as a ransom for many' (Mk 10:45).

Having said these things of the Father, I say this: Cast the thirty pieces of silver into the treasury, the one 'having become obedient unto death' (Phil 2:8) without hesitation, following what was commanded; they took, He says, the silver and threw it into the house of the Lord into the treasury (Matt 27:5). When this was fulfilled, it became known of the Pharisees and the others from...

The reward of circumcision is deceitful, just as those searching the scriptures which testify concerning the Savior as he spoke them have considered it to be a counterfeit coin.

For often in the Gospels the wicked word of those being accused is exposed, as in: 'This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; and in vain they worship me, teaching commandments of men as doctrines' (Matt 15:8), nullifying the commandment of God through their harmful tradition. Likewise, those proposing an unproven word concerning whether it is necessary to give tribute to Caesar or not are exposed, as they themselves were accused of being deceitful and speaking with much cunning from that very moment; for when being asked, the Savior said: 'Show me the coin' (Matt 22:19), meaning 'whose image and inscription it has.' And those saying: 'Caesar's,' were strongly rebated upon hearing: 'Therefore render to Caesar the things of Caesar, and to God the things of God' (Matt 22:21).

And not only do the Jews approaching the Savior in a testing manner possess an unproven word, but also the heretics in Christianity who pseudo-doctrinalize, 'walking in cunning and deceiving the word of the Lord,' diverting and distorting the will of the God-breathed oracles; whom one must also reject, considering their deceitful word to be as counterfeit silver. Is the word of those setting two unbegotten principles, good and evil—and these are Manichaeans—not unproven? And is it not unproven of those saying the Son is a creature and dividing the Holy Spirit from Father and Son? And is it not unproven of the impious ones regarding the incarnation of the Savior, those thinking the Savior appeared and was not true?

Not only is the counterfeit silver made manifest from the crucible of the house of God, but also the genuine silver bearing the image and character of the All-King Savior, 'having been purified sevenfold,' which must be held and in which one must prosper by possession. They are grasping that those whom Judas received, thirty pieces of silver from the Jews in order that he might betray the Lord (Matt 26:15), are signified also from the spoken word, and this is the greatest indictment of the Jews who gave and of Judas who received the thirty pieces of silver for betrayal. For it was necessary for them a reward...