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Against the Donatists

St Optatus of Milevis, tr. Vassall-Phillips, 1917

Book 1, 8. The Flesh of Christ is Not Sinful

But before I say anything of these subjects separately, I shall show briefly that you have spoken wrongfully¹ of the Flesh of Christ, for you have said that the Flesh which was drowned by the floods of the Jordan, and was thus cleansed from all stains, was the Flesh of Sin. You might have said this with reason if the Baptism of the Flesh of Christ had sufficed for all, so that it were not necessary for any man to be baptised for himself. Had this been so, the whole human family would have been in the Jordan, and all that which is born in the flesh would have been there. In that case there would have been no difference between the Faithful and any one of the heathen, for flesh belongs to them all; and since there is no man who is without flesh, if, according to your mode of expression, the Flesh of Christ was drowned in the waters of the Jordan, the flesh of all men would have gained this benefit. But the Flesh of Christ is one thing in Christ----quite another is the flesh of each man in himself. What came over you to call the Flesh of Christ sinful? Would that you had said ‘the flesh of men in the Flesh of Christ.’ But even thus, you would have spoken without reason,² since each believer is baptised in the Name of Christ, not in the Flesh of Christ, which belonged to Himself exclusively. I may add that His Flesh, which was conceived by the Holy Ghost, could not be washed, amongst others, for the remission of sins, for It was without any sin.³ You have gone on to say that It was drowned in the floods of the Jordan.⁴ This word drowned, you have used inadvisedly enough, for it is a word which should be used only of Pharaoh and his people, who were so drowned by the weight of their offences, as to remain, like lead, beneath the waters. But the Flesh of Christ, when It went down into and came up from the Jordan, ought not to have been spoken of by you as drowned. His Flesh was found to be more holy than the very Jordan, so that rather did It cleanse the water by Its entrance, than Itself was cleansed.

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