忏悔录 Confessions | BOOK V Chapter 6 奥古斯丁与罗马的摩尼派

BOOKV Chapter6

奥古斯丁与罗马的摩尼派

Thou recoveredst me then of that sickness, and healedst the son of Thy handmaid, for the time in body, that he might live, for Thee to bestow upon him a better and more abiding health.

你治疗我的疾病，你使你婢女的儿子恢复肉体的健康，为了能给他另一种更好、更可靠的健康。

And even then, at Rome, I joined myself to those deceiving and deceived "holy ones"; not with their disciples only (of which number was he, in whose house I had fallen sick and recovered); but also with those whom they call "The Elect."

这时我在罗马依旧和那些骗人的伪“圣人”保持联系：因为我不仅和一般教徒、“听讲者”[21]——我的所寄居的家庭主人即是其中之一，我在他家中患病而痊愈的——还和他们所谓“选徒”交游。

For I still thought "that it was not we that sin, but that I know not what other nature sinned in us"; and it delighted my pride, to be free from blame; and when I had done any evil, not to confess I had done any, that Thou mightest heal my soul because it had sinned against Thee: but I loved to

excuse it, and to accuse I know not what other thing,

which was with me, but which I was not. But in truth it was wholly I, and mine impiety had divided me against myself: and that sin was the

more incurable, whereby I did not judge myself a sinner; and execrable iniquity it was, that I had rather have Thee, Thee, O God Almighty, to be overcome in me to my destruction, than myself of Thee to salvation.

那时我还以为犯罪不是我们自己，而是不知道哪一个劣根性在我们身上犯罪，我即以置身于事外而自豪；因此，我做了坏事，不肯认罪，不肯求你治疗我犯罪的灵魂，我专爱推卸我的罪责，而归罪于不知道哪一个和我在一起而并非我的东西。其实这完全是我，我的狂妄把我分裂为二，使我与我相持，我既不承认自己是犯罪者，这罪更是无可救药了；我是如此无赖凶悍，宁愿你全能上帝在我身上失败而任我毁灭，不愿你战胜我而挽救我。

Not as yet then hadst Thou set a watch before my mouth, and a door of safe keeping around my lips, that my heart might not turn aside to wicked speeches, to make excuses of sins, with men that work iniquity; and, therefore, was I still united with their Elect. But now despairing to make proficiency in that false doctrine, even those things (with which if I should find no better, I had resolved to rest contented) I now held more laxly and carelessly.

你尚未“为我的口设下遮拦，为我的唇装置关键，使我的心不倾向于邪恶的言语，使我不和作恶的人同恶相济”[22]，因此我依旧和他们的“选徒”往来，但我对于这种错误学说已不再希望深造；在我尚未找到更好的学说之前，我决定暂时保留，但已较为冷淡松弛了。

For there half arose a thought in me that those philosophers, whom they call Academics, were wiser than the rest, for that they held men ought to doubt everything, and laid down that no truth can be comprehended by man: for so, not then

understanding even their meaning, I also was clearly convinced that they thought, as they are commonly reported.

这时我心中已产生了另一种思想，认为当时所称“学园派”[23]哲学家的识见高于这些人，他们主张对一切怀疑，人不可能认识真理。我以为他们的学说就是当时一般人所介绍的，其实我尚未捉摸到他们的真正思想。

Yet did I freely and openly discourage that host of mine from that over-confidence which I perceived him to have in those fables, which the books of Manichaeus are full of. Yet I lived in more familiar friendship with them, than with others who were not of this heresy. Nor did I maintain it with my ancient eagerness; still my intimacy with that sect (Rome secretly harbouring many of them) made me slower to seek any other way: especially since I

despaired of finding the truth, from which they had turned me aside, in Thy Church, O Lord of heaven and earth, Creator of all things visible and invisible: and it seemed to me very unseemly to

believe Thee to have the shape of human flesh, and to be bounded by the bodily lineaments of our members. And because, when I wished to think on my God, I knew not what to think of, but a mass of bodies (for what was not such did not seem to me to be anything), this was the greatest, and almost only cause of my inevitable error.

我也毫不掩饰地批评我的寄居主人，我觉得他过于相信摩尼教书中所充斥的荒唐不经之说。但我和他们的交谊依旧超过其他不参加摩尼教的人。我已不像过去那样热心为该教辩护，可是由于我只和他们熟识——有许多教徒匿居罗马——我便懒于探求其他宗教，我也不再希望在你天地主宰、一切有形无形之物的创造者的教会内寻获他们先前使我脱离的真理。我以为相信你具有人的肉体，相信你和我们一样方趾圆颅，是太荒谬了。想到我的上帝，我只能想像一团物质——我以为凡存在的东西都是如此——这是我所以坚持我不可避免的错误的主要而几乎唯一的原因。

For hence I believed Evil also to be some such kind of substance, and to have its own foul and hideous bulk; whether gross, which they called earth, or thin and subtile (like the body of the air), which they imagine to be some malignant mind, creeping through that earth. And because a piety, such as it was, constrained me to believe that the good God never created any evil nature, I conceived two masses, contrary to one another, both unbounded, but the evil narrower, the good more expansive. And from this pestilent beginning, the other sacrilegious conceits followed on me.

为此我也相信存在着恶的本体，是一团可怖的、丑陋的、重浊的东西——摩尼教名之为“地”——或是一种飘忽轻浮的气体，这是他们想像中在地上爬行的恶神。由于我尚有一些宗教情感，我不得不相信善神不能创造恶的本体，因此我把这团东西和善对峙着，二者都是无限的，恶的势力比较小，善的势力比较大；从这个害人的原则上，产生了其他一切侮辱神明的谬论。

For when my mind endeavoured to recur to the Catholic faith, I was driven back, since that was not the Catholic faith which I thought to be so. And I seemed to myself more reverential, if I believed of Thee, my God (to whom Thy mercies confess out of my mouth), as unbounded, at least on other sides, although on that one where the mass of evil was opposed to Thee, I was constrained to confess Thee bounded; than if on all sides I should imagine Thee to be bounded by the form of a human body. And it seemed to me better to believe Thee to have created no evil (which to me ignorant seemed not some only, but a bodily substance, because I could not conceive of mind unless as a subtile body, and that diffused in definite spaces), than to believe the nature of evil, such as I conceived it, could come from Thee. Yea, and our Saviour Himself, Thy Only Begotten, I believed to have been reached forth (as it were) for our salvation, out of the mass of Thy most lucid substance, so as to believe nothing of Him, but what I could imagine in my vanity. His Nature then, being such, I thought could not be born of the Virgin Mary, without being mingled with the flesh: and how that which I had so figured to myself could be mingled, and not defiled, I saw not. I feared therefore to believe Him born in the flesh, lest I should be forced to believe Him defiled by the flesh.

我的思想每次企图返回到“公教”[24]信仰时，总觉障碍重重，因为我理想中的公教信仰，并非公教的信仰。我以为设想你上帝——我向你解说你是慈爱的上帝——除了和恶神对立的部分我认为必然有限度外，其余部分都是浩浩无垠，比了设想你各部分都限制于人的形体之中，一定更符合虔诚的宗教精神。我以为相信你没有创造恶——由于我的愚昧无知，我心目中的恶是一个实体，甚至是物质的实体，因为我只能想像精神是一种散布于空间的稀薄物体——因此相信恶的本体来自你，也比较好。至于我们的救主，你的“独子”，[25]我以为他为了拯救我们，从你光明的庞大体质中分出，除了我的凭空想像外，我对他什么不相信。因此，我以为这样的性体不可能生自童女玛利亚，否则必然和肉体混淆；而按照我的想像，我看不出怎样能混合而不受玷污。因此我害怕相信他降生成人，因为我将不得不相信他受血肉的玷污。

Now will Thy spiritual ones mildly and lovingly smile upon me, if they shall read these my confessions. Yet such was I.

现在，凡蒙被你的宠光的人读我的忏悔，将善意地、亲热地哂笑我；可是我当时的确是如此。

Furthermore, what the Manichees had criticised in Thy Scriptures, I thought could not be defended; yet at times verily I had a wish to confer upon these several points with some one very well skilled in those books,to make trial what he thought.

其次，在我看来，摩尼教中人对你的圣经所提出的批评，是无法辩驳的。但我有时很希望能和一位精通圣经的人讨论每一问题，听取他的见解。

There on; and for the words of one Helpidius, as he spoke and disputed face to face against the said Manichees, had begun to stir me even at Carthage: in that he had produced things

out of the Scriptures, not easily withstood, the

Manichees' answer whereto seemed to me weak. And this answer they liked not to give publicly, but only to us in private. It was, that the Scriptures of the New Testament had been corrupted by I know not whom, who wished to engraff the law of the Jews upon the Christian faith: yet themselves produced not any uncorrupted copies. But I, conceiving of things corporeal only, was mainly held down, vehemently oppressed and in a manner suffocated by those "masses"; panting under which after the breath of Thy truth, I could not breathe it pure and untainted.

有一位名埃尔比第乌斯的人曾对摩尼教徒作过演讲和辩论，我在迦太基时，他的言论已给我一些印象，因为他引用了圣经上几段很难解答的文字。摩尼教徒的答复，我认为是软弱无力的。所以他们也不轻易公开发表，仅仅私下对我们提出。他们说新约文字已经不知道由那些人窜改，窜改的目的是把犹太人的法律融入基督教教义，但他们却又拿不出一本未经窜改的本子。而我一方面，也只能想像物质，被那些“庞然大物”所掌握，压得我几乎透不过气，使我无从呼吸你的真理的清彻纯净的空气。