大马士革的圣若望《正统信仰阐详》卷二 章30 论预知与预定 试译

下文是我自己翻译的，来源：New Advent https://douc.cc/21Gn2u（如果译文有误，欢迎指正）

We ought to understand that while God knows all things beforehand, yet He does not predetermine all things. For He knows beforehand those things that are in our power, but He does not predetermine them. For it is not His will that there should be wickedness nor does He choose to compel virtue. So that predetermination is the work of the divine command based on fore-knowledge. But on the other hand God predetermines those things which are not within our power in accordance with His prescience. For already God in His prescience has prejudged all things in accordance with His goodness and justice. 

我们应该理解，天主虽然预知万事，然而祂并不预定万事。祂能预知我们能力范围之内的事，但祂并不预定它们。因为祂不愿有邪恶，也不愿强迫人有美德。所以，预定是天主基于祂的预知发布命令的工作。但另一方面，天主根据祂的预知，预定了那些不在我们能力范围之内的事，因为天主已经在祂的预见中根据祂的良善和公义预先判断了一切。

Bear in mind, too , that virtue is a gift from God implanted in our nature, and that He Himself is the source and cause of all good, and without His co-operation and help we cannot will or do any good thing. But we have it in our power either to abide in virtue and follow God, Who calls us into ways of virtue, or to stray from paths of virtue, which is to dwell in wickedness, and to follow the devil who summons but cannot compel us. For wickedness is nothing else than the withdrawal of goodness, just as darkness is nothing else than the withdrawal of light. While then we abide in the natural state we abide in virtue, but when we deviate from the natural state, that is from virtue, we come into an unnatural state and dwell in wickedness.

还要记住，美德是天主在我们天性之中植入的恩赐，祂本身是一切善的源泉和原因，没有祂的合作与帮助，我们就不能也不会作任何善事。但是，我们有能力要么遵从美德，追随召唤我们走上美德之路的天主；要么偏离美德之路，即生活在邪恶之中，追随召唤我们但不能强迫我们的魔鬼。恶无非是善的退隐，正如黑暗无非是光明的退隐。当我们遵循天性时，我们恪守美德；但当我们背离天性，也就是背离美德时，我们就进入了违反天性的状态，陷入邪恶之中。

Repentance is the returning from the unnatural into the natural state, from the devil to God, through discipline and effort. 

忏悔就是通过克制与努力，从违反天性的状态回到遵循天性的状态，离开魔鬼而回归天主。

Man then the Creator made male, giving him to share in His own divine grace, and bringing him thus into communion with Himself: and thus it was that he gave in the manner of a prophet the names to living things, with authority as though they were given to be his slaves. For having been endowed with reason and mind, and free-will after the image of God, he was fitly entrusted with dominion over earthly things by the common Creator and Master of all. 

起初，造物主创造了人类，赐他分享祂自己的恩宠，并使他与祂自己相通。因此，他以先知的方式为生物命名，仿佛它们都从属于他。由于他被赋予了理性和头脑，以及按照天主的形像所拥有的自由意志，因此他被万物的创造者和主宰恰当地托付了管理地上的事物的权能。

But since God in His prescience knew that man would transgress and become liable to destruction, He made from him a female to be a help to him like himself; a help, indeed, for the conservation of the race after the transgression from age to age by generation. For the earliest formation is called 'making' and not 'generation.' For 'making' is the original formation at God's hands, while 'generation' is the succession from each other made necessary by the sentence of death imposed on us on account of the transgression. 

但是，天主以祂的预知知道人类会犯罪，并变得易于毁灭。所以祂用他身上创造出一个像他一样的女人来协助他。实际上，这是为了在一代又一代的人类犯罪之后保护种族的延续。因为最早的“形成”是“创造”而非“繁育”。“创造”是在天主手中最初的形成，而“繁育”则是彼此的继承，由于人类的犯罪而遭受到必须死亡的惩罚，所以这种继承是必要的。

This man He placed in Paradise, a home that was alike spiritual and sensible. For he lived in the body on the earth in the realm of sense, while he dwelt in the spirit among the angels, cultivating divine thoughts, and being supported by them: living in naked simplicity a life free from artificiality, and being led up through His creations to the one and only Creator, in Whose contemplation he found joy and gladness. 

祂把人类安置在乐园之中，这是一个既属神又合乎情理的居所。因为他的身体居住在地上的感官世界中，他的精神却与天使同在，培养神圣的思想，并得到他们的支持。他过着赤身裸体的简朴生活，绝无虚伪做作，籍着受造诸物而被引导到唯一的造物主面前。在他的沉思之中，他得到了快乐与喜悦。

When therefore He had furnished his nature with free-will, He imposed a law on him, not to taste of the tree of knowledge. Concerning this tree, we have said as much as is necessary in the chapter about Paradise, at least as much as it was in our power to say. And with this command He gave the promise that, if he should preserve the dignity of the soul by giving the victory to reason, and acknowledging his Creator and observing His command, he should share eternal blessedness and live to all eternity, proving mightier than death: but if forsooth he should subject the soul to the body, and prefer the delights of the body, comparing himself in ignorance of his true dignity to the senseless beasts , and shaking off His Creator's yoke, and neglecting His divine injunction, he will be liable to death and corruption, and will be compelled to labour throughout a miserable life. For it was no profit to man to obtain incorruption while still untried and unproved, lest he should fall into pride and under the judgment of the devil. For through his incorruption the devil, when he had fallen as the result of his own free choice, was firmly established in wickedness, so that there was no room for repentance and no hope of change: just as, moreover, the angels also, when they had made free choice of virtue became through grace immoveably rooted in goodness. 

因此，当祂把自由意志赋予他的天性时，祂加给他一条法律：不可品尝知善恶树的果子。关于这颗树，我们已经在”乐园”一章里讨论过了，至少在我们能力之内所能说的都已经说了。与这个诫命同时赐下的是他的应许：如果他能通过理性的胜利来保全灵魂的尊严，承认他的创造者，遵守祂的命令，他就能分享永恒的幸福，永生不朽，证明自己的力量比死亡更强大；但是，如果他让灵魂屈服于身体，宁可选择身体的愉悦，对自己真正的尊严一无所知，使自己类于无知的野兽，摆脱造物主的约束，忽视祂的诫命。那么，他将易于死亡和堕落，并将被迫在痛苦的一生中劳作。因为在未经试探与考验的情况下，获得不朽对人类毫无益处，以免他陷入自负和魔鬼所受的刑罚之中。因为魔鬼是不朽坏的，当他由于自己的自由选择而堕落时，他就因邪恶而坚定不移，以致没有忏悔的余地，也没有改变的希望。此外，天使也一样，当他们自由选择了美德时，藉着天主的恩宠而坚定不移地根植于良善之中。

It was necessary, therefore, that man should first be put to the test (for man untried and unproved would be worth nothing ), and being made perfect by the trial through the observance of the command should thus receive incorruption as the prize of his virtue. For being intermediate between God and matter he was destined, if he kept the command, to be delivered from his natural relation to existing things and to be made one with God's estate, and to be immoveably established in goodness, but, if he transgressed and inclined the rather to what was material, and tore his mind from the Author of his being, I mean God, his fate was to be corruption, and he was to become subject to passion instead of passionless, and mortal instead of immortal, and dependent on connection and unsettled generation. And in his desire for life he would cling to pleasures as though they were necessary to maintain it, and would fearlessly abhor those who sought to deprive him of these, and transfer his desire from God to matter, and his anger from the real enemy of his salvation to his own brethren. The envy of the devil then was the reason of man's fall. For that same demon, so full of envy and with such a hatred of good, would not suffer us to enjoy the pleasures of heaven, when he himself was kept below on account of his arrogance, and hence the false one tempts miserable man with the hope of Godhead, and leading him up to as great a height of arrogance as himself, he hurls him down into a pit of destruction just as deep. 

因此，有必要首先让人类接受考验(因为未经考验和证明的人是没有价值的)，通过遵守命令的考验使人臻于完美，因此应该将不朽作为他美德的奖赏。因为人处在神与物质之间，如果他遵守命令，他就要从与现存事物的自然关系中被解放出来，与上帝的产业合一，在良善之中立于不败之地。但是，如果他违反命令，宁可倾向于物质，将他的心灵从他的创造者，我的意思是天主那里拉开，则他的命运将是堕落。他将为情欲所支配，而不再是无情欲的；成为必然死亡的，而不再是永生不朽的；依赖于结合和不稳定的生育。在他对生活的渴望中，他会依附享乐，仿佛享乐是维持生活的必要条件，并且大胆地憎恶那些企图使他失去享乐的人，并且将他的渴望从天主转移到物质，将他的忿怒从他的救恩的真正敌人而转移到他自己的弟兄身上。魔鬼的嫉妒是人类堕落的原因，那个充满了嫉妒和对美好事物的憎恨的恶魔，因为他的骄横而被禁锢于地下，不能忍受我们享受天国的快乐。因此，那说谎者就用对”神性” 的希望去引诱不幸的人，将他引向与自己一样骄横的顶点，然后将他推向同样深的堕落之渊中。