Fragment
VIII.
Into this error, then, have they been carried, by
believing, unhappily, that that divine energy was made the property of
the flesh which was only manifested through the flesh in His miraculous
actions; by which energy Christ, in so far as He is apprehended as God,
gave existence to the universe, and now maintains and governs it.
For they did not perceive that it is impossible for the energy of the
divine nature to become the property1766
of a being of a different
nature1767
apart from
conversion; nor did they understand that that is not by any means the
property of the
flesh which is only manifested through it, and does not
spring out of it according to
nature; and yet the
proof thereof was
clear and evident to them. For I, by speaking with the
tongue and
writing with the
hand,
reveal through both these one and the same
thought of my intelligent
soul, its energy (or operation) being
natural; in no way showing it as springing naturally out of
tongue or
hand; nor yet (showing) even the spoken thought as made to
belong to
them in
virtue of its revelation by their means. For no
intelligent person ever recognised
tongue or
hand as capable of
thought, just as also no one ever recognised the perfectly holy
flesh
of
God, in
virtue of its assumption, and in
virtue of the revelation of
the
divine energy through its medium, as becoming in
nature
creative.
1768
But the
pious confession of the
believer is that, with a view to our
salvation,
and in order to connect the universe with unchangeableness, the Creator
of all things incorporated with Himself
1769
a rational
soul and a sensible
1770
| 1770 Or
sensitive, αἰσθητικοῦ. |
body from the
all-holy
Mary, ever-
virgin, by an
undefiled conception, without
conversion, and was made man in
nature, but separate from
wickedness: the same was
perfect God, and the same was
perfect
man; the same was in
nature at once
perfect God and man. In His
deity He
wrought divine things through His all-holy
flesh,—such
things, namely, as did not pertain to the
flesh by
nature; and in His
humanity He
suffered human things,—such things, namely, as did
not pertain to
deity by
nature, by the upbearing of the
deity.
1771
| 1771
ἀνοχῇ πάσχων
θεότητος. |
He
wrought nothing
divine without the body;
1772
nor did the same do anything human
without the participation of
deity.
1773
| 1773
ἄμοιρον
δράσας
θεότητος. |
Thus He
preserved for Himself a
new and fitting method
1774
by which He
wrought (according to the
manner of) both, while that which was
natural to both remained
unchanged;
1775
| 1775
τὸ κατ᾽
ἄμφω φυσικῶς
ἀναλλοίωτον. |
to the
accrediting
1776
of His
perfect
incarnation,
1777
| 1777
ἐνανθρωπήσεως.
[See Athanasian Creed, in Dutch Hymnal.] |
which is
really genuine, and has nothing lacking in it.
1778
| 1778
μηδὲν
ἐχούσης
φαυλότητος. |
Beron, therefore, since the
case stands with him as I have already stated, confounding together in
nature the deity and the humanity of Christ in a single
energy,
1779
and again
separating them in person, subverts the life, not knowing that
identical operation
1780
is indicative of the connatural identity
only of connatural persons.
1781
| 1781
μόνης
τῆς τῶν
ὁμοφυῶν
προσώπων
ὁμοφυοῦς
ταυτότητος. |
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