Bad Advertisement?
Are you a Christian?
Online Store:Visit Our Store
| To the Monks of Constantinople.
PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP 
CXLV. To the Monks
of Constantinople.2012
| 2012 This, remarks Garnerius, is less a letter than a prolix exposition
of Theodoret’s view of the Incarnation. Theodoret mentions his
condemnation at the Latrocinium and the exile of Eutyches, but says
nothing of the favourable action towards himself of Marcianus.
Theodosius died on the 29th of July, and Marcian began his reign on the
25th of August, 450. Theodoret could not possibly hear of the exile of
Eutyches before the end of September. The document may therefore be
dated in the late autumn of 450 before Theodoret had received the
imperial permission to return to Cyrus. |
There is nothing new or
surprising in the fact that the men who have made their tongues weapons
against our God and Saviour should also aim their shafts of falsehood
against His right minded servants. It must needs be that the servants
who grieve sorely at the outrage inflicted on their Master should share
it. That so it should be they have been forwarned by their Lord
Himself, Who consoles His holy disciples with the words “If they
have persecuted me they will also persecute you.”2013
“If they have called the Master of
the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call them of His
household.”2014
Then He cheered
them by pointing out that calumny is easily detected, for He went on
“There is nothing covered that shall not be revealed and hid that
shall not be known.”2015
I have often seen
the truth of the divine prediction, but I see it with special clearness
now. The authors of the calumny against me, who have bought my
destruction for large sums of money, have been distinctly seen to be
involved in the unsoundness of Valentinus and Bardesanes. They had
hoped to cloke their own iniquity if only they could whet their tongues
on the hone of falsehood in order to wound me. For ever since I saw
that the heresy long ago extinguished had been renewed by these men I
never ceased to cry aloud, bearing my testimony in private and in
public, as well in social gatherings as in the temples of God, and
strive to confute their conspiracy against the faith. They have
consequently poured out their insults on my head, and allege that I
preach two sons. But they ought to have convicted me to my face, not
slandered me behind my back. They have done just the contrary. They
tied me hand and foot at Cyrus by the imperial decree; they compelled
the very righteous judges to condemn me without a trial, and delivered
their most equitable sentence against a man who was five and thirty
stages away. Such treatment was never suffered by any criminal charged
with witchcraft or robbery of the dead, by murderer or by adulterer.
But for the present I will leave the judges alone, for the Lord is at
hand “Who judges the world with righteousness and the people with
his truth;”2016
Who exacts an
account not only of words and deeds, but even of evil thoughts. But
think it right to refute the false charge which has been made. What
proof have they of my asserting two sons? Had I been one of the silent
kind there might have been some ground for the suspicion, but my task
has been to contend on behalf of the apostolic decrees, to bring the
pasture of instruction to the Lord’s flocks, and to this end I
have written five and thirty books interpreting the divine Scripture,
and proving the falsehood of the heresies. The falsehoods these men
have concocted are therefore easy of refutation. Tens on tens of
thousands of hearers testify that I have taught the truth of the
doctrines of the Gospel, and for any one who likes to bring them to the
test my writings lie before the world. Not on behalf of a duality of
sons, but of the only begotten Son of God, against the heathen, against
Jews, against the recipients of the plague of Arius and Eunomius,
against the supporters of the madness of Apollinarius, against the
victims of the corruption of Marcion, I have never ceased to struggle;
trying to convince the heathen that the Eternal Son of the ever living
God is Himself Creator of the Universe; the Jews that about Him the
prophets uttered their predictions, the Arians and Eunomians that He is
of one substance, of one dignity and of equal power with the Father;
Marcion’s mad adherents that He is not only good but just; and
Saviour not, as they fable, of another’s works, but of His own.
Once for all, fighting against each heresy, I charge men to fall down
and worship the one Son.
And what need is there of many
words, when it is possible to refute falsehood in few? We provide that
those who year by year come up for holy baptism should carefully learn
the faith set forth at Nicæa by the holy and blessed Fathers; and
initiating them as we have been bidden,2017
| 2017 μυσταγωγοῦντες μυσταγωγέω
came ultimately to equal “baptize.” The
word and its correlatives had long passed out of special mystic use. In
Cicero a μυσταγωγός
is a “Cicerone” (Verr. iv. 59) and Strabo
uses μυσταγωγεῖν
for to be a guide. (812.) |
we baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Ghost, pronouncing each name singly. Furthermore when performing
divine service in the churches, both at the beginning and the decline
of day and when dividing the day itself into three parts, we glorify
the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost.2018
| 2018 Reference appears to be made here to offices at the 3d, 6th, and
9th hours, and to morning and evening services, without specification
of their number. |
If, as our slanderers allege, we preach two sons, which do we glorify
and which do we leave unworshipped? It were the wildest folly to
believe that there are two sons, and to give the doxology to one alone.
And who is so distraught as, while hearing the words of the divine Paul
“one Lord, one faith, one baptism,”2019
and again “there is one Lord Jesus Christ by Whom are all
things,”2020
to lay down the law
at variance with the teaching of the Spirit, and cut the one in two.
But I am prating unnecessarily, for these men, nurtured in falsehood as
they are, do not even dare to assert that they have ever heard me say
anything of the kind; but they affirm that I preach two sons because I
confess the two natures of our Master Christ. And they refuse to
perceive that every human being has both an immortal soul and a mortal
body; yet no one has hitherto been found to call Paul two Pauls because
he has both soul and body, any more than Peter two Peters or Abraham or
Adam. Everyone recognises the distinction of the natures, and does not
call one man two Pauls. Precisely in the same way, when styling our
Lord Jesus Christ the only begotten Son of God, God the Word incarnate,
both Son of God and Son of Man, as we have been taught by the divine
Scripture, we do not assert two sons, but we do confess the peculiar
properties of the Godhead and of the manhood. The party however who
deny the nature assumed of us men cannot hear these arguments without
irritation.
It is only right that I should
point out from what sources they have derived this impiety. Simon,
Menander, Cerdo, and Marcion absolutely deny the incarnation, and call
the birth from a Virgin fable. Valentinus, however, Basilides,
Bardesanes, and Harmonius and their following, accept the conception of
the Virgin and the birth; but they deny that God the Word took anything
from the Virgin, but made as it were a transit through her as through a
conduit, and appeared to mankind in semblance only, and seeming to be a
man, in like manner as He was seen by Abraham and certain others of the
ancients. Arius and Eunomius on the contrary held that He assumed a
body, but that the Godhead played the part of the soul, in order that
they may attribute to it what was lowly in His words and deeds.
Apollinarius did indeed assert that He assumed a soul with the body,
not the reasonable soul, but the soul which is called animal or
phytic.2021
Their contention is that the Godhead
took the part of the mind. He had learnt the distinction of soul and of
mind from the philosophers that are without while divine Scripture says
that man consists of soul and body. For we read “And the Lord God
formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the
breath of life and man became a living soul.”2022
And the Lord in the sacred Gospels said to
His apostles “Fear not them which kill the body but are not able
to kill the soul.”2023
So great is the divergence between the doctrines. These men have
now done their best to outdo Apollinarius, Arius and Eunomius, in their
impiety and have now endeavoured to plant anew the heresy sown of old
by Valentinus and Bardesanes, and afterwards uprooted by most excellent
husbandmen. Like Valentinus and Bardesanes they have denied that the
body of our Lord was assumed of our nature. But the Church, following
the footprints of the Apostles, contemplates in the Lord Christ both
perfect Godhead and perfect manhood. For just as He took a body, not
that He needed a body, but by its means to give immortality to all
bodies; so too He took a soul, the guide of the body, that every soul
by its means might share His immutability. For even if souls are
immortal, they are not however immutable; for they undergo many and
frequent changes, as they experience pleasure, now from one object, and
now from another. Whence it cometh about that we err when we are
changed and are inclined to what is worse. But after the resurrection
our bodies enjoy immortality and incorruptibility, and our souls
impassibility and immutability. For this reason the only begotten Son
of God took both a body and a soul, preserved them free from all blame,
and offered the sacrifice for the race. And this is why He is called
our high priest; and He is named high priest not as God but as man. He
makes the offering as man, and accepts the sacrifice with the Father
and the Holy Spirit as God. If only Adam’s body had sinned, it
alone should have benefited by the cure. But since the soul not only
shared in the sin but was first in the sin, for first the thought forms
an image of the sin and then carries it out by means of the body, it
was just, I ween, that the soul too should be healed. But it is perhaps
superfluous to demonstrate these points by reasoning, when the divine
Scripture clearly proclaims them. This doctrine is distinctly taught by
the holy David and the very divine Peter, the one foretelling from
distant ages, and the other interpreting his prediction. The words of
the first of the apostles are “David therefore being a prophet,
and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit
of his loins, according to the flesh, He would raise up Christ to sit
on his throne; he seeing this before spake of the resurrection of
Christ that His soul was not left in hell neither His flesh did see
corruption.”2024
Now he has given us much
instruction on the same point in these few words. First he states that
the assumed nature derives its descent from the loins of David;
secondly that He took not a body only, but also an immortal soul, and
thirdly that He delivered body and soul to death, and, after taking
them again, raised them as He would. His own words are “Destroy
this temple and in three days I will raise it up.”2025
But we have learnt that the divine nature
is immortal. What suffered was the passible, and the impassible
remained impassible. For God the Word was made man not to render the
impassible nature passible, but on the passible nature, by means of the
Passion, to bestow the boon of impassibility. And the Lord Himself in
the holy Gospels at one time says “I have power to lay down my
life and I have power to take it again, no man taketh it from me but I
lay it down of myself;” “That I may take it again.”2026
| 2026 John x. 18;
17.
Observe the inversion and inexactitude. | And again “Therefore doth my Father
love me because I lay down my life for the sheep,”2027
and again “Now is my soul
troubled”2028
“my soul
is exceeding sorrowful even unto death”2029
and of His body He says “The bread that I will give is my flesh
which I will give for the life of the world,”2030
and when He delivered the divine mysteries
and broke the symbol and distributed it, He added “This is my
body which is being broken for you for the remission of
sins,”2031
and again “This is my blood
which is shed for many for the remission of sins,”2032
and again “Except ye eat the flesh
of the Son of Man and drink His blood ye have no life in you”2033
and “Whosoever eateth my flesh and
drinketh my blood hath eternal life” “in himself” he
adds.2034
Innumerable passages of the same
character may be quoted, both in the old Testament and the new,
pointing out the assumption both of the body and of the soul, and that
they are descended from Abraham and David. Joseph of Arimathea when he
came to Pilate begged the body of Jesus, and the fourfold authority2035
| 2035 Cf.
note on page 302. | of the holy Gospels tells us how he
received the body, wrapped it in the linen cloth, and committed it to
the tomb. I do, indeed, sorrow and lament that I am compelled by the
attacks of error to adduce against men supposed to be of one and the
same faith with myself the arguments which I have already
urged against the victims of the plague of Marcion,—of whom, by
God’s grace, I have converted more than ten thousand, and brought
them to Holy Baptism. What child of the church ever had any doubts on
these points? Who has not cited this teaching of the holy Fathers? The
works of the great Basil are full of it; as well, as those of his
fellow soldiers Gregory and Amphilochius, and of those who in the West
have been illustrious teachers of grace, Damasus, bishop of great Rome,
and Ambrose of Milan; and Cyprian of Carthage who for the sake of these
doctrines won the martyr’s crown. Five times was the famous
Athanasius driven from his flock and compelled to dwell in exile; and
in the cause of these doctrines strove too his master Alexander.
Eustathius, Meletius, and Flavianus, luminaries of the East, and
Ephraim, harp of the Spirit, who daily waters the people of Syria with
the streams of grace; John and Atticus, loud heralds of the truth; and
men of an earlier age than they, Ignatius, Polycarp, Irenæus,
Justin, and Hippolytus, of whom the more part not only shine at the
head of the company of bishops, but also adorn the martyr’s
band.
He, too, who now rules great
Rome and diffuses in all directions from the West the rays of right
teaching, the most holy Leo, has expressed to me this distinctive mark
of the faith in his own letters. All these have clearly taught that the
only begotten Son of God and everlasting God, ineffably begotten of the
Father, is one Son; and that after the incarnation He was called both
Son of man and man, not because He was changed into manhood, for His
nature is immutable, but because He took what was ours. They teach too
that He was both impassible and immortal as God, and mortal and
passible as man; but after the resurrection even in relation to His
humanity He received impassibility and immortality, for, though the
body remained a body, still it is impassible and immortal, verily a
divine body and glorified with divine glory. This is distinctly told us
by the blessed Paul in the words “For our conversation is in
heaven from whence also we look for the Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ,
who shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like unto the
body of His glory.”2036
He does not say
to “His glory” but to “the body of His glory,”
and the Lord Himself, when He had said to His apostles “There be
some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the Son
of man coming in His Father’s glory,”2037
took them after six days into an
exceeding high mountain, and was transfigured before them, and His face
became as the sun, and His raiment was bright like the light.2038
By these means He shewed the manner of
the second advent. He taught that the assumed nature is not
uncircumscribed (for this is characteristic of the Godhead alone) but
that it shall send forth flashes of the divine glory, and emit rays of
light transcending the powers of the sense of sight. With this glory He
was taken up; with this the angels said that He should come; for their
words were “He who was taken from you into heaven shall so come
in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.”2039
When moreover He was seen by the divine
apostles after the resurrection, He shewed them both hands and feet;
and to Thomas He shewed also His side and the wounds of the nails and
of the spear. For on account of those men who positively deny the
assumption of the flesh, and further of those others who assert that
after the resurrection the nature of the body was changed into the
nature of Godhead, He preserved unaltered the prints of the nails and
of the spear. And while raising all other bodies free from every
disfigurement,2040
in His own body He
left the marks of His sufferings, to the end that deniers of the
assumption of the body may be convicted of their error by means of His
sufferings; and holders of the notion that His body was changed into
another nature may be taught by the print of the nails that it abides
in its own proper qualities. Suppose any one to imagine that he has a
proof that the body of the Lord did not remain a body after the
resurrection in the fact that He came in to the disciples when the
doors were shut, let such an one remember how He walked upon the sea
while His body was still mortal, how He was born after keeping the
seals of virginity intact, and how again when encircled by them that
were plotting against Him He frequently escaped from their hands. But
why need I mention the Lord, who was not only man, but God before the
ages, and to whom it was easy to do whatsoever He would? Let them tell
how Habakkuk was translated from Judæa into Babylon in a moment of
time and passed through the covering of the den, and brought the food
to Daniel, and returned again. without destroying the seals of the
den.2041
It is sheer foolishness to enquire into the
manner of the miracles of the Lord, but in addition to what has
been said it ought also to be known that after the resurrection our
bodies also will be incorruptible and immortal, and being released from
what is earthly will become light and æthereal. This moreover is
distinctly taught us by the divine Paul in the words “It is sown
in corruption, it is raised in incorruption, it is sown in weakness, it
is raised in power; it is sown in dishonour it is raised in glory; it
is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body”2042
and in another place “We shall be
caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.”2043
If then the bodies of the saints become
light and æthereal and easily travel through the air, we cannot
wonder that the Lord’s body united to the Godhead of the only
begotten, when, after the resurrection, it had become immortal, entered
in when the doors were shut.
Countless other proofs might be
quoted without difficulty from apostles and prophets. But what has been
already said is enough to show the drift of my teaching. I believe in
one Father, one Son and one Holy Ghost; and I confess one Godhead, one
Lordship, one substance and three hypostases. For the incarnation of
the only begotten did not add to the number of the Trinity, and make
the Trinity a quaternity, but, even after the incarnation the Trinity
was still a Trinity. And while confessing that the only begotten Son of
God was made man I do not deny the nature which He took, but confess,
as I have said, both the nature which took and the nature which was
taken. The union did not confound the properties of the natures. For if
the air by receiving the light through all its parts does not cease to
be air, nor yet at the same time destroy the nature of the light, for
with our eyes we behold the light and by our feeling we recognise the
air, as it meets us cold or hot, or moist or dry, so it were sheer
folly to call the union of the Godhead and the manhood confusion. If
created natures which share at once subordinate and temporal existence,
when united and in some sense mingled, yet remain unimpaired, and, when
the light withdraws, the nature of the air is left alone, much more
proper is it, I apprehend, for the nature which fashioned all things,
when conjoined with and united to the nature which it assumed from us,
to be acknowledged to continue itself in its purity, and in like manner
to preserve unimpaired that which it had assumed. Gold, too, when
brought in contact with the fire, participates both in the colour and
power of fire, but it does not lose its own nature, but at the same
time remains gold and has the active qualities of fire. In this manner
also the Lord’s body is a body, but impassible, incorruptible,
immortal, of the Lord, divine and glorified with the divine glory. It
is not separated from the Godhead, nor yet is of any one else, save of
the only begotten Son of God Himself. For it does not show to us
another person, but the only-begotten Himself clad in our
nature.
This is the doctrine which I am
continually preaching. They on the other hand who deny the incarnation
wrought on our behalf have called me a heretic, adopting a course
something like that of unchaste females, who, while they sell their own
charms, assail honest women with the insults of their profession, and
apply language proper to their own wantonness to women who hold such
wantonness in abhorrence. This is how Egypt has acted. She has herself
fallen willingly into the thraldom of base desire. She has lavished her
servile adulation on a man of chaste character. Then, failing to entice
him by her wiles, or to trap him in the snares of her voluptuous
passion, she describes one who is faithful to purity as an
adulterer.
But these men will be called to
account by God, as well for their devices against the faith as for the
snares they have laid against me. I only charge those who have been
influenced by the false accusations uttered against me to keep one ear
for the accused, and not to give both to the accusers. In this manner
they will fulfil the divine law which lays down “Thou shalt not
raise a false report,”2044
and “Judge
righteously between every man and his brother.”2045
In these words the divine law charges us
not to believe the calumnies uttered against the absent but to judge
the accused face to face.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|
