Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume V/Hippolytus/Appendix to the Works of Hippolytus/Discourse on Eschatology/Section VI

by Philip Schaff et al.

VI.

But not to expend our argument entirely in going over the words of all the prophets,^[1] after citing one other, let us revert to the matter in hand. What is it, then, that Micah says in his prophecy? “Thus saith the Lord concerning the prophets that make my people err, that bite with their teeth, and cry to him, Peace; and if it was not put into their mouth,^[2] they prepared^[3] war against him. Therefore night shall be unto you, that ye shall not have a vision;^[4] and it shall be dark unto you, that ye shall not divine; and the sun shall not go down over the prophets, and the day shall be dark over them. And the seers shall be ashamed, and the diviners confounded.”^[5] These things we have recounted beforehand, in order that ye may know the pain that is to be in the last times, and the perturbation, and the manner of life on the part of all men toward each other,^[6] and their envy, and hate, and strife, and the negligence of the shepherds toward the sheep, and the unruly disposition of the people toward the priests.^[7]

1. Manuscript E gives the better reading, λόγον ἅπαντα τοῖς τῶν προφητῶν ῥήμασι, “our whole argument on the words of the prophets.”
2. εἰ οὐκ ἐδόθη. Manuscript B omits εἰ = and it was not put into their mouth.
3. The text reads ἡγίασαν.  Manuscript B reads ἤγγισαν. Migne suggests ἤγειραν.
4. ἐξ ὁράσεως.
5. Mic. iii. 5–7.
6. For τὴν πρὸς ἀλλήλους ἀναστροφήν, Codex B reads διαστροφὴν καὶ φθοράν.
7. For ἀνυπότακτον διάθεσιν, Codex B reads ἀταξίαν = unruliness, and adds, καὶ γονεῖς τὰ τέκνα μισήσουσι , καὶ τέκνα τοῖς γονεῦσιν ἐπιβάλλονται χεῖρας, “and parents shall hate their children and children lay hands on their parents.”