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Proof of the Gospel
Eusebius of Caesarea, tr. Ferrar, 1920
Book 3, Preface
I HAVE now adequately completed the prolegomena1 to (87) my Proof of the Gospel: I have shewn the nature of our Saviour’s Gospel teaching, and given the reason of our regard for the oracles of the Jews, while we reject their rule of life. And I have also made it clear that their (88) prophetic writings in their foresight of the future recorded our own calling through Christ, so that we make use of them not as books alien to us, but as our own property. And now it is time for me to embark on my actual work, and to begin to treat of the promises. How these were actually concerned with the human dispensation of Jesus the Christ of God, and the teaching of the Hebrew prophets on the theology based on His Person, and predictions of His appearance among men, which I shall (b) shew immediately from their clear fulfilment can only apply to Him alone. But I must first of necessity consider the fact that the prophets definitely made mention2 of the Gospel of the Christ.
Notes
- Books I. and II. are the “prolegomena.” The Demonstratio itself begins here. Eusebius claims by his arguments to have established the Christian use of the O.T., since Christianity is its real fulfilment. The way is now clear for the work itself, ἡ αὐτὴ ὑπόθεσις, which is an examination of the prophetic witness to Christ, and of the correspondence of Jesus Christ with that witness, as described in the Gospels, and as evident in the effects of His coming on the world of heathenism.
- παρέλαβον = state concisely.