Annotation LXXIII

”And after six days Jesus took,” etc. — Matthew 17:1

On the duration of the world.

Hilary, in canon 17 on Matthew, elucidating allegorically this number of six days, indicates that the universal resurrection, and the renovation of the whole age [world], will be [when] six thousand years from the creation of the world have been completed, saying thus: “When, after six days, the appearance of the Lord’s glory is shown — [that is,] the time of six thousand years having rolled by — the honor of the heavenly kingdom is prefigured.” Ambrose, explaining the present passage of the gospel, disapproves this opinion — in which, nevertheless, were once Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Lactantius, Jerome, Cyril, and Augustine. Consult Annotation 190 of book 5.