Письмо XXVI. Пресвитеру Фалассию, спросившему, как это некоторые из языческих царей ради Божиего гнева, угрожавшего их подданным, приносили в жертву детей и родственников, и гнев прекращался, как описано у многих древних писателей

And God deigned to tell the Greeks how to foreknow their future and free themselves from disasters, and often granted them the outcome of affairs according to their desires, providentially preparing for everyone, as far as everyone could accept, the path to the perception of the coming great mystery. After all, there is nothing strange or incredible in the fact that the love of rulers for their subordinates, expressed in action, saved all their subjects from impending misfortune, since the only Creator and King of people, loving by nature, gave His Son to death through the incarnation for the sake of all people, in order to redeem them from the evil that had taken possession of them. How, after all, when under the holy Elisha the prophet the kings of Israel and Judah went to war against the Moabites and, after a great victory, were going to destroy their entire capital, the king of that country - as it seems, according to the custom of the pagans - took his son and, in front of the kings, sacrificed him on the wall (2 Kings 3:27), and thus the kings were appeased and stopped [359] by turning their anger upon themselves, and their subjects saved God allowed the Greeks to act according to their own laws, wisely inclining them to accept the great mystery, but He gave the people of Israel a law in which the future mystery was fully depicted. Therefore, after the mystery of our salvation appeared and was realized, He abolished some of the customs of the Hellenes and Jews that He had previously established or allowed for the sake of depicting the future. After all, “from Him, by Him, and to Him are all things” (Rom. 11:36), which is or will be at all times and in every way: one by good will, another by dispensation, something else by permission. Therefore, what the ancients talk about is not a fairy tale, but truly happened, and after that, deliverance from trouble. We will talk about books in detail when, with God’s help, I am with you. However, whoever knows how even snake meat can heal the sick with the help of art will easily believe in this method of action of Divine Providence. That is, the pagans. – Approx. comp. You might be interested in: