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Ignatius of Antioch

Epistle to the Philadelphians

Chapter 9

The Old Testament is good: the New Testament is better.

The priests1 indeed are good, but the High Priest is better; to whom the holy of holies has been committed, and who alone has been entrusted with the secrets of God. He is the door of the Father, by which enter in Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the prophets, and the apostles, and the church. All these have for their object the attaining to the unity of God. But the gospel possesses something transcendent [above the former dispensation], viz. the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ, His passion and resurrection. For the beloved prophets announced Him,2 but the gospel is the perfection of immortality.3 All these things are good together, if ye believe in love.

Notes

  1. i.e. the Jewish priests.↩
  2. Literally, “proclaimed as to Him.”↩
  3. The meaning is doubtful. Comp. 2 Tim. i. 10.↩

Translation by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson and Frederick Crombie: The Ante-Nicene Christian Library, vol. 1: The Apostolic Fathers (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1870).
Text from Project Gutenberg eBook #77576, proofread by Distributed Proofreaders from Internet Archive scans. Public domain.