First question. Again the same religious appeared on his rung as before and said: "O Judge, I ask you: Since you are both God and man, why did you not show your divinity as well as your humanity? Then all would have believed in you."

Second question. "Item. Why did you not cause all your words to be heard in a single moment? Then it would not have been necessary for them to be preached through the intervals of time."

Third question. "Item. Why did you not do all your works in one hour?"

Fourth question. "Item. Why did your body grow through the intervals of time and not in one moment?"

Fifth question. "Item. At the approach of death, why did you not show yourself in the might of your divinity; and why did you not show your severity on your enemies when you said, 'All is consummated'?"

Response to the first question. The Judge answered: "O Friend, it is you that I answer - and yet, not you. On the one hand, I answer you in order that the malice of your thought may be noted by others. On the other hand, it is not you that I answer, for these things are shown, not for your own improvement, but as a benefit and as a warning for others in the present and in the future. For you do not intend to alter your obstinacy; and therefore you will not pass over from your death into my life because in your own life you hate true life.

Nevertheless, others who have heard about your life - I should say: your 'death' - will pass over and will fly to my life because, as it is written, for the saints, all things work together for good; and God permits nothing without a cause. Therefore, when spiritual things are discussed between us, I answer you, not as those who speak in human fashion, but in order that what you think and crave may be expressed in similitudes for others.

"You ask, therefore, why I did not openly show my divinity as well as my humanity. The reason is that the divinity is spiritual and the humanity is corporeal. Nevertheless, the divinity and the humanity are, and were, inseparable from the first moment that they were joined. The Godhead is uncreated, and all things that exist were created in it and through it, and all perfection and beauty is found in it. If, therefore, such great beauty and perfection were to be shown visibly to eyes of clay, who would endure the sight? Who could look at even the material sun in its clarity? Who would not be terrified by the sight of lightning and the sound of thunder? How much greater the fear if the Lord of lightnings and Creator of all were seen in his glory!

Thus it was for a two-fold cause that my Godhead was not shown openly. First, because of the weakness of the human body, which is earthen in its substance. If any human's body were to see the Godhead, it would melt like wax before a fire; and the soul would rejoice with such great exultation that the body would be annihilated like a cinder. Second, because of the divine goodness and its immutable stability. For if I showed to corporeal eyes my Godhead, which is incomparably more splendid than fire or the sun, I would be acting contrary to myself; for I said: 'No human shall see me and live.'

Not even the prophets saw me as I am in the nature of my Godhead; for even those who heard the voice of my Godhead and saw the smoking mountain were terrified and said: 'Let Moses speak to us, and we shall hear him.' Therefore, in order that man might better understand me, I, God the merciful, showed myself to him in a form like himself that could be seen and touched - namely, in my humanity, in which the Godhead exists but, as it were, veiled - in order that man might not be terrified by a form unlike himself. For, insofar as I am God, I am not corporeal and not corporeally portrayed; therefore, it was in my humanity that I could be heard and seen more tolerably by man."

Response to the second question. "Item. As to why I did not speak all my words in one hour, I answer you: Just as, materially, it goes against the body for it to take in one hour as much food as might content it for many years, so it is against the divine arrangement that my words, which are the food of the soul, would all have been spoken in one hour.
But just as bodily food is taken in little by little, to be chewed and, when chewed, to be carried to the interior, so my words were not to be spoken in one hour, but rather through the intervals of time, in accord with the intelligence of those who were making progress, in order that the hungry might have something by which to be satisfied and that when satisfied, they might be excited to higher things."

Response to the third question. "Item. As to why I did not do all my works in one moment, I answer: Of those who saw me in the flesh, there were some who believed and some who did not believe. For those who believed, it was necessary that they be instructed in words, through the intervals of time, and be occasionally aroused by examples and strengthened by works. As for those who did not believe, it was just that they showed their malicious disposition and were tolerated as long as my divine justice might permit.

If I had done all my works in a single moment, all would have followed me out of fear rather than out of love. And how, then, would the mystery of man's redemption have been fulfilled? Therefore, just as at the beginning of the world's creation, everything was brought to pass at distinct hours and in distinct ways - although everything that was to be made existed then, at one and the same time, without change, in my divine foreknowledge - so also, in my humanity, all things were to be done rationally and distinctly, for the salvation and instruction of all."

Response to the fourth question. "Item. As to why my body grew for a number of years and not in one moment, I answer: The Holy Spirit, who is eternally in the Father and in me, the Son, showed to the prophets what I would do and suffer when I came in the flesh.
Therefore it pleased the Godhead that I should take on such a body, in which I could labor from morn to evening and from year to year, even to the end of death. Therefore, lest the prophets' words seemed empty, I, the Son of God, took on a body like Adam except for sin - a body in which I would be like those whom I was going to redeem - in order that through my charity, man, who had turned away, might be led back; that man, who had died, might be revived; that man, who had been sold, might be redeemed."

Response to the fifth question. "Item. As to why I did not show the power of my Godhead and the truth of my divinity to all when, on the cross, I said: 'It is consummated,' I answer: All that was written about me had to be fulfilled. Therefore, I fulfilled all those things even to the last point. But, because many things had been foretold about my resurrection and ascension, it was therefore necessary that these words too should have their effect. If the power of my Godhead had been shown at my death, who would have dared to take me down from the cross and bury me?

In the end, it would have been a very small matter for me to come down from the cross and scatter my crucifiers; but how, then, would prophecy have been fulfilled; and where, then, would the virtue of my patience be? And if I had come down from the cross, would then all have really believed? Would they not have said that I had used the evil art? For if they were indignant because I raised the dead and healed the sick, they would have said even worse things if I had come down from the cross. Therefore, that captives might be loosed, I - the free - was captured; and that the guilty might be saved, I - the guiltless - stood fast upon the cross. And through my steadfastness, I steadied all that was unstable and strengthened the weak."