1 “What I mean is this. Jesus (Joshua), as I have often said, who was called Oshea, the one sent with Caleb to spy out the land of Canaan, was named Jesus (Joshua) by Moses. You do not ask why he did this; you are not puzzled by it and are not curious to find out. That is why Christ has escaped your notice, and though you read, you do not understand; and even now, when you hear that Jesus is our Christ, you do not stop to think that the name was not given to that man idly or by chance. 2 But you theorize about why one ‘α’ was added to Abraham’s original name, and you hold forth just as grandly about why one ‘ρ’ was added to Sarah’s name. Why, then, do you not likewise investigate why the name his father gave Oshea the son of Nave (Nun) was changed completely to Jesus (Joshua)? 3 But since not only was his name changed, but he also became Moses’ successor, and he alone of those of his age who came out of Egypt led the surviving people into the Holy Land; and as he, not Moses, led the people into the Holy Land, and as he distributed it by lot to those who entered with him, so Jesus the Christ will gather back the scattered people and distribute the good land to each one,⁠a though not in the same way. 4 For the one gave them a temporary inheritance, since he was neither Christ who is God nor the Son of God; but the other, after the resurrection of the saints, will give us the eternal possession. The first, after he had been renamed Jesus (Joshua) and had received strength from His Spirit, made the sun stand still. For I have proved that it was Jesus who appeared to and spoke with Moses, Abraham, and all the other patriarchs without exception, serving the will of the Father; and He, I say, also came to be born a man through the Virgin Mary, and He lives forever. 5 For He is the One after whom and through whom the Father will renew both the heaven and the earth; He is the One who will shine as an eternal light in Jerusalem; He is the king of Salem according to the order of Melchizedek, and the eternal Priest of the Most High. 6 The first is said to have circumcised the people a second time with knives of stone, which was a proclamation of this circumcision with which Jesus Christ Himself has circumcised us from stone idols and idols of other materials; and to have gathered into heaps those who were circumcised from the uncircumcision, that is, from the error of the world, everywhere by knives of stone, namely the words of our Lord Jesus.⁠b For I have shown that Christ was proclaimed by the prophets in parables as a Stone and a Rock. 7 So we will take the knives of stone to mean His words, by which so many who were astray have been circumcised from uncircumcision with the circumcision of the heart. With this circumcision God, through Jesus (Joshua), urged even those who had the circumcision that began with Abraham to be circumcised from that time on, when He said that Jesus (Joshua) circumcised a second time with knives of stone those who entered that holy land.