Fragmenta in Ezechielem

And four wings to the one. For the intellectual and higher powers always stand, as it were, not sinking toward baser things, but traversing the straight and blameless path of the life befitting them. And they will be upon the mountains like doves. The blessed disciples: for they went about the whole earth under heaven, proclaiming the mystery of Christ, having him as their song and lyre. And if these three men are in their midst, Noah, Daniel, and Job. Since I think it necessary not to leave the prophet's utterances unexamined, come, let us say why it is that Noah and Job and Daniel, already dead—and perhaps even Daniel himself—he says will be saved in their own righteousness, even though all the rest of the earth, against which the sentence of death might be pronounced, is being destroyed. So he seems to liken to Noah those who benefit him through faith in God; to Daniel, the wise and discerning; and again to Job, those who please him through patience, clearly in whatever is praiseworthy. And I will take from the choice parts of the cedar from the top. By cedars he likens the lofty and most well-ordered ones from Israel, among whom the choice part, and as it were a kind of heart, was the blessed David, from whom God the Father took and planted the Emmanuel, who rose up as a great cedar and received all into his own shade; and then the whole world under the sun came to know the power and authority of the all-powerful God.

For the wet wood was humbled, and the dry wood was made to grow and sprout again—that is, a Church from the Gentiles, which had been withered by the rapacities of the devil. And I gave them commandments that were not good. For as far as spiritual contemplation was concerned, the law was holy, and the commandment was holy, just, and good. But as far as the emptiness of the matter and the mere service in shadows went, the commandments were not good, nor did they procure eternal life. For no one is justified by the law, according to what is written. Behold, you devour the milk. For, demanding tithes, firstfruits, and thank-offerings according to the law, and living dissolutely on the gifts brought by the peoples, they took no account of their salvation. And was it not enough for you that you grazed the good pasture? For being learned in the law, those of the blood of Levi, and having the finest pasture, as it were, and the clear and transparent water of the instruction through Moses, which was not insufficient to lead to the truth, they trampled upon the pasture, so to speak, and disturbed the water, setting forth a teaching that was thick, woody, and full of earthly filth to those who followed them like sheep under rams. And I will set over them one shepherd... my servant David. That these things are said about Christ is easy to see; for the blessed David had already died and was already lying in the tomb when the blessed Ezekiel prophesied. And God the Father made the promise as something that would happen in due time, and not as something already accomplished; for promises are about future things, not about things already done.