על הגירת אברהם ט״וOn the Migration of Abraham 15
א׳
1[80] And similarly when the ideas to be expressed are in any way deficient in clearness, speech is stepping on empty air and is apt to slip and have a bad fall and be unable to get up again. “And thou shalt speak to him and shall put My words into his mouth.” This is equivalent to saying “Thou shalt suggest to him the thoughts,” for “thoughts” are nothing else than God’s “words” or speech.
ב׳
2[81] For without the prompter speech will give forth no utterance, and mind is the prompter of speech, as God is of mind. “And he shall speak to the people for thee, and he shall be thy mouth, and thou shalt be his Godward things” (Ex. 4:15 f.). Very vivid are his expressions. Not only does he say “he shall speak to them for thee,” as much as to say “he shall put thy thoughts into words”; but he adds “he shall be thy mouth”; for the stream of speech flowing over tongue and mouth carries forth the thoughts with it. But, whereas speech is understanding’s interpreter manward, understanding occupies toward speech the position of its Godward things, namely thoughts and intents, which are in God’s charge solely.
ג׳
3[82] It is a vital matter, then, for one about to face a contest with sophists to have paid attention to words with such thoroughness as not only to elude the grips of his adversary but to take the offensive in his turn and prove himself superior both in skill and strength.
ד׳
4[83] You must have observed how the aim of those who use charms and enchantments, when they bring their trickery into play against the Divine word and dare to attempt to do things like those which it does, is not so much to win honour for their own skill as to traduce and ridicule the miracles which are taking place. They transform the rods into real snakes, and turn the water to the colour of blood, and by incantations draw up on to land what frogs are still left (Ex. 7:12, 22, 8:7), and, as they add one thing to another tending to their own destruction, they are cheated, miserable fools, while they think that they are cheating.
ה׳
5[84] How would it have been possible for Moses to encounter these men, had he not had in readiness speech the interpreter of thought, who is called Aaron? In this place Aaron or speech is spoken of as a “mouth”; further on he will also bear the name of “prophet,” when the mind too is inspired and entitled “God.” For He says “I give thee as God to Pharaoh, and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet” (Ex. 7:1). How perfect is the harmony shewn in the sequence of thought! For it is the prophet kind, when under the influence of a Divine possession and ecstasy, that interprets the thoughts of God.
ו׳
6[85] Accordingly “Aaron’s rod swallowed up their rods” (Ex. 7:12), as the oracle shews. For all the arguments of sophists are devoured and done away with by Nature’s many-sided skill, and the acknowledgement is made that these events are the Finger of God (Ex. 8:19), and the word “Finger” is equivalent to a divine rescript, declaring that sophistry is ever defeated by wisdom; for holy writ, speaking of the tables on which the oracles were engraved, says that they were written by the Finger of God (Ex. 32:16). Wherefore the sorcerers can no longer stand before Moses, but fall as in a wrestling-bout vanquished by the sturdy strength of the opponent (Ex. 8:18).