Dialogue with Trypho

What follows is: "My hope from my mother's breasts. From birth I have relied on You; from my mother's womb, You are my God because there is no other helper. Many young bulls have surrounded me; strong bulls have encircled me. They opened their mouths against me like a ravenous and roaring lion. My bones are poured out and scattered like water. My heart has turned like wax, melting within me. My strength is dried up like a broken piece of pottery, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth." This foretold what would happen; the phrase "My hope from my mother's breasts" is explained this way.

When He was born in Bethlehem, as I mentioned before, King Herod, after learning about Him from the Arabian Magi, plotted to kill Him. By God's command, Joseph took Him with Mary and went to Egypt. The Father had decided that He would be put to death, but not before reaching adulthood and declaring the word that came from Him.

But if anyone asks, "Could God not have put Herod to death instead?" I preemptively answer: Couldn't God have simply removed the serpent at the beginning so it never existed, rather than saying, "And I will put enmity between him and the woman, and between his descendants and hers?" Could He not have created a multitude of humans at once? Yet, knowing it would be good, He created both angels and humans free to choose what is right.

He appointed periods of time for them to exercise free will. And because He knew it would be good, He made both general and specific judgments, while protecting each one's freedom to choose.

Hence, Scripture says at the destruction of the tower, and the division and alteration of languages: "The Lord said, 'Look, the people are one, and they all have one language; and this is what they have begun to do. Now nothing they plan will be impossible for them.'" The statement "My strength is dried up like a broken pottery shard, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth" was also a prophecy of what He would endure according to the Father's will.

The power of His strong word, which always countered the Pharisees, Scribes, and teachers of your nation who questioned Him, ceased like a strong spring whose waters are turned off when He chose silence and gave no reply in Pilate's presence, as mentioned in the apostles’ writings, so that Isaiah's words might be fulfilled: "The Lord gives me a tongue, that I may know when to speak." Again, when He said, "You are my God; do not be far from me," He taught that all men should hope in God, who created everything, and seek salvation and help from Him alone; and should not think, like others do, that salvation comes from birth, wealth, strength, or wisdom.

Such have been your practices: you made a calf and consistently showed yourselves ungrateful, murderers of the righteous, and proud of your ancestry. For if the Son of God clearly states that He relies not on being a son, nor on strength or wisdom for salvation, but that without God He cannot be saved, even though He is sinless, as Isaiah declares that He committed no sin, including in His speech (for He did no wrong or deceit with His mouth), how can you or others hope to be saved without this hope, and not realize you are deceiving yourselves?