Tratasse sobre o capitulo 53 do propheta lesaya (Treatise on the Message of Isaiah 53)
Elijah Montalto
Early 17th Century
In this chapter, the prophet speaks mainly of life and spiritual death, and your scholars concede this, as is seen in Nicolão de Lira’s exposition on the same chapter. And thus, you await greater clarity to understand that penitence reconciles man with the Blessed God, and that through such penitence one attains true happiness, which is eternal life. Great is the penitence whereby man reaches the Throne of Glory, and this is clearly proven by the prophet Jeremiah (4:1), where he says: If you return, Israel, to Me, Your God, etc., as it is said, by means of penitence you shall return and unite with the same divinity, and the prophet Malachi (3:7), says: Turn back to Me, and I shall turn back to you, says the Lord of Hosts, so that penitence is the only means and remedy to reconcile man with God, and to repair his spiritual doom and thus the first man had no need of the vain remedy that you feigned and fabricated.
You say that Adam’s sin was infinite. This is a most fallacious assertion; it is repugnant to true philosophy and theology, which teach that no substance or finite power can produce an infinite effect. Thus, since Adam is a finite substance and his power is limited, how could he produce an action or effect that is infinite? You say that Adam’s sin was objectively infinite, by reason of an infinite object, which is the same as God, against which it was committed. What a hollow refuge! An immediate action does not emanate from an object unless the object is intrinsic to that action, as intelligence will be infinite when it understands an infinite object.
The action by which Adam sinned was in eating forbidden fruit. Infinite was the disobedience engendered by such an action. However, it is not the action, rather the negation or deprivation wherein lies true infinity!
If you understand that Adam’s sin was infinite in the aforementioned sense, because it was committed against the infinite God, then you must also confess, despite yourself, that any action which man performs out of love for God will be infinite and much more than that of the sin, for the sin still contained disobedience; there was no intention to disobey. And virtuous deeds are performed with the intention and zeal of obeying and of pleasing the Blessed God, for it can be said of those works that the same God instituted them and commanded them, such as circumcision, the sacrifices mentioned in the Divine Law, including its precepts, which God commanded be directed toward Him when performed by man. Thus, there is a double reason for infinity according to your proposition, and therefore infinite satisfaction in performing them, namely, to reconcile man with God.
Translated by
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Credits
Elijah Montalto, Tratasse sobre o capitulo 53 do propheta Iesaya (Treatise on the Message of Isaiah 53), Ms Ets Hayyim (Amsterdam), 49 A1, pp. 10–12.
Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 5.