NPNF2-08. Basil: Letters and Select Works - Holy Bible Institute

Objection that some were baptized unto Moses and believed in him, and an answer to it;with remarks upon types.Chapter XIV.Objection that some were baptized unto Moses and believed in him, and an answer to it; withremarks upon types.31. But even if some are baptized unto the Spirit, it is not, it is urged, on this accountright for the Spirit to be ranked with God. Some “were baptized unto Moses in the cloudand in the sea.” 971 And it is admitted that faith even before now has been put in men; for“The people believed God and his servant Moses.” 972 Why then, it is asked, do we, on accountof faith and of baptism, exalt and magnify the Holy Spirit so far above creation, whenthere is evidence that the same things have before now been said of men? What, then, shallwe reply? Our answer is that the faith in the Spirit is the same as the faith in the Father andthe Son; and in like manner, too, the baptism. But the faith in Moses and in the cloud is, asit were, in a shadow and type. The nature of the divine is very frequently represented bythe rough and shadowy outlines 973 of the types; but because divine things are prefiguredby small and human things, it is obvious that we must not therefore conclude the divinenature to be small. The type is an exhibition of things expected, and gives an imitative anticipationof the future. So Adam was a type of “Him that was to come.” 974 Typically, “Thatrock was Christ;” 975 and the water a type of the living power of the word; as He says, “If anyman thirst, let him come unto me and drink.” 976 The manna is a type of the living breadthat came down from heaven; 977 and the serpent on the standard, 978 of the passion of salvationaccomplished by means of the cross, wherefore they who even looked thereon werepreserved. So in like manner, the history of the exodus of Israel is recorded to shew forththose who are being saved through baptism. For the firstborn of the Israelites were preserved,like the bodies of the baptized, by the giving of grace to them that were marked with blood.For the blood of the sheep is a type of the blood of Christ; and the firstborn, a type of thefirst-formed. And inasmuch as the first-formed of necessity exists in us, and, in sequenceof succession, is transmitted till the end, it follows that “in Adam” we “all die,” 979 and that20971 1 Cor. x. 2.972 Ex. xiv. 31, lxx.973 σκιαγραφία, or shade-painting, is illusory scene-painting. Plato (Crit. 107 c.) calls it “indistinct and deceptive.”cf. Ar. Eth. Nic. i. 3, 4, “παχυλῶς καὶ ἐν τύπῳ.” The τύπος gives the general design, not an exact anticipation.974 Rom. v. 14.975 1 Cor. x. 4.976 John vii. 37.977 John vi. 49, 51.978 σημεῖον, as in the LXX. cf. Numb. xxi. 9 and John iii. 14.979 1 Cor. xv. 22.182