Chapter Two
Objection based on the saying of S. Paul that "we which are alive shall be caught up in the clouds" (1 Thess. iv. 15-17).
Let us consider another wise remark of his, astounding and perverted, wherein he says, "We which are alive and remain, shall not go before them that are asleep unto the coming of the Lord, for the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive shall be caught up together with them in a cloud, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord" (1 Thess. iv. 15-17).1 Here is a thing that indeed rises in the air and shoots up to heaven, an enormous and far-reaching lie. This, when recited to the beasts without understanding, causes even them to bellow and croak out their sounding din in reply, when they hear of men in the flesh flying like birds in the air, or carried on a cloud. For this boast is a mighty piece of quackery, that living things, pressed down by the burden of physical bulk, should receive the nature of winged birds, and cross the wide air like some sea, using the cloud as a chariot. Even if such a thing is possible, it is monstrous, and apart from all that is suitable. For nature which created all things from the beginning appointed places befitting the things which were brought into being, and ordained that each should have its proper sphere, the sea for the water creatures, the land for those of the dry ground, the air for winged creatures, and the higher atmosphere for heavenly bodies. If one of these were moved from its proper abode, it would disappear on arrival in a strange condition and abode. For instance, if you wanted to take a creature of the water and force it to live on the dry land, it is readily destroyed and dies. Again, if you throw a land animal of a dry kind into the water, it will be drowned. And if you cut off a bird from the air, it will not endure it, and if you remove a heavenly body from the upper atmosphere, it will not stand it. Neither has the divine and active Word of God done this, nor ever will do it, although He is able to change the lot of the things that come into being. For He does not do and purpose anything according to His own ability, but according to its suitability He preserves things, and keeps the law of good order. So, even if He is able to do so, He does not make the earth to be sailed over, nor again does He make the sea to be ploughed or tilled; nor does He use His power in making virtue into wickedness nor wickedness into virtue, nor does He adapt a man to become a winged creature, nor does He place the stars below and the earth above.
Wherefore we may reasonably declare that it is full of twaddle to say that men will ever be caught up into the air.
And Paul's lie becomes very plain when he says, "We which are alive." For it is three hundred years since he said this,2 and no body has anywhere been caught up, either Paul's or any one else's. So it is time this saying of Paul became silent, for it is driven away in confusion.
Chapter Twelve
Answer to the objection based on S. Paul's words that "we which are alive shall be caught up in the clouds" (1 Thess. iv. 15-17).
[We must act as reasoning beings, and look for a mystic meaning in the words. He means that at Christ's second coming the godly will be caught up from the corruption of this life. Just as the water in the sea is heavy, and yet is drawn up into the air in clouds, so shall man be drawn up by angelic might. For the "cloud," which is sometimes high and sometimes near the earth, signifies the angels, who both rise to heaven and descend to earth in the course of their service. For this we may refer to Abbakum,3 drawn up by a cloud from Judaea, and carried and set down over the Babylonian pit, or to the angels which Jacob saw ascending and descending. The prophets also show angels to be clouds, as when Isaiah says (xv. 6), " I will command the clouds not to rain upon the vine," i.e. the angels are not to rain visions upon Israel. Again Daniel says (vii. 13) that Christ will come "with the clouds of heaven," while Christ said He would come and all the angels with Him (Matt. xxv. 31).
Also the Psalms speak of "Clouds and darkness round about him" (Ps. xcvii. 2), where His judgment-seat is the severity of the law, which will be combined with the grace of the Gospel (cf. Ps. civ. 3). Also the Gospel says, "He shall send forth his angels and gather the elect from the four winds of heaven " (Mark xiii. 26, 27).
That it was the Apostle's habit to allegorise thus, may be seen from such pasages as "The night is far spent, the day is at hand."
At the end of the world, it is the trumpet of angelic voices which will sound, and give man the power to rise, just as the horses of fire, which were really angels, took up Elijah.
With regard to your argument that everything must remain in its own element, mark that it is not by remaining in themselves, but in something different, that created things are preserved. You cannot keep fire in fire, but in the air. What is wet is kept in what is dry, as water in a vessel, etc. The same applies to things light and heavy, and to soul and body.
And mark further that things are only what they are, relatively to something else. For example, there would be no test of an unrighteous man if there were no righteousness. So it is not strange that angels should draw men up just as clouds draw water. (For the identification of men with water, see Isaiah xvii. 13, " Behold many nations as water.")
There is no falsehood in Paul declaring that "We shall be caught up," although the resurrection did not take place in his day, for he is very fond of identifying his own humanity with that of the whole race.
Footnotes:
1He places too late the words "unto the coming of the Lord' and omits "and remain" after the second occurrence of "we which are alive." "Cloud" for "clouds" is another unimportant inaccuracy.
2He does not intend to substitute an impersonal power for the Creator; indeed, further on he attributes creation to the Word of God.
3The story is taken from the Apocryphal part of Daniel, viz. xiv. 34-36 (Bel and the Dragon). The LXX gives the name as Αμβακούμ, in A.V. Habbacuc.