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| That the Son is the Co-existing Word, argued from the New Testament. Texts from the Old Testament continued; especially Ps. cx. 3. Besides, the Word in Old Testament may be Son in New, as Spirit in Old Testament is Paraclete in New. Objection from Acts x. 36; answered by parallels, such as 1 Cor. i. 5. Lev. ix. 7. &c. Necessity of the Word's taking flesh, viz. to sanctify, yet without destroying, the flesh.
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§§26–36. That
the Son is the Co-existing Word, argued from the New Testament. Texts
from the Old Testament continued; especially Ps. cx. 3. Besides, the Word in Old Testament
may be Son in New, as Spirit in Old Testament is Paraclete in New.
Objection from Acts x.
36; answered by
parallels, such as 1
Cor. i. 5. Lev. ix. 7.
&c. Necessity of the Word’s taking flesh, viz. to sanctify,
yet without destroying, the flesh.
26. But that the Son has no beginning of being,
but before He was made man was ever with the Father, John makes clear
in his first Epistle, writing thus: ‘That which was from the
beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which
we have looked upon, and our hands have handled of the Word of Life;
and the Life was manifested, and we have seen it; and we bear witness
and declare unto you that Eternal Life, which was with the Father, and
was manifested unto us3387
.’ While he
says here that ‘the Life,’ not ‘became,’ but
‘was with the Father,’ in the end of his Epistle he says
the Son is the Life, writing, ‘And we are in Him that is True,
even in His Son, Jesus Christ; this is the True God and Eternal Life3388
.’ But if the Son is the Life, and the
Life was with the Father, and if the Son was with the Father, and the
same Evangelist says, ‘And the Word was with God3389
,’ the Son must be the Word, which is
ever with the Father. And as the ‘Son’ is
‘Word,’ so ‘God’ must be ‘the
Father.’ Moreover, the Son, according to John, is not merely
‘God’ but ‘True God;’ for according to the same
Evangelist, ‘And the Word was God;’ and the Son said,
‘I am the Life3390
.’ Therefore
the Son is the Word and Life which is with the Father. And again, what
is said in the same John, ‘The Only-begotten Son which is in the
bosom of the Father3391
,’ shews that
the Son was ever. For whom John calls Son, Him David mentions in the
Psalm as God’s Hand3392
, saying, ‘Why
stretchest Thou not forth Thy Right Hand out of Thy bosom3393
?’ Therefore if the Hand is in the bosom, and the Son in the bosom, the
Son will be the Hand, and the Hand will be the Son, through whom the
Father made all things; for it is written, ‘Thy Hand made all
these things,’ and ‘He led out His people with His Hand3394
;’ therefore through the Son. And if
‘this is the changing of the Right Hand of the Most
Highest,’ and again, ‘Unto the end, concerning the things
that shall be changed, a song for My Well-beloved3395
;’ the Well-beloved then is the Hand
that was changed; concerning whom the Divine Voice also says,
‘This is My Beloved Son.’ This ‘My Hand’ then
is equivalent to ‘This My Son.’
27. But since there are ill-instructed men who,
while resisting the doctrine of a Son, think little of the words,
‘From the womb before the morning star I begat Thee3396
;’ as if this referred to His relation
to Mary, alleging that He was born of Mary ‘before the morning
star,’ for that to say ‘womb’ could not refer to His
relation towards God, we must say a few words here. If then, because
the ‘womb’ is human, therefore it is foreign to God,
plainly ‘heart’ too has a human meaning3397
, for that which has heart has womb also.
Since then both are human, we must deny both, or seek to explain both.
Now as a word is from the heart, so is an offspring from the womb; and
as when the heart of God is spoken of, we do not conceive of it as
human, so if Scripture says ‘from the womb,’ we must not
take it in a corporeal sense. For it is usual with divine Scripture to
speak and signify in the way of man what is above man. Thus speaking of
the creation it says, ‘Thy hands made me and fashioned me,’
and, ‘Thy hand made all these things,’ and, ‘He
commanded and they were created3398
.’
Suitable then is its language about everything; attributing to the Son
‘propriety’ and ‘genuineness,’ and to the
creation ‘the beginning of being.’ For the one God makes
and creates; but Him He begets from Himself, Word or Wisdom. Now
‘womb’ and ‘heart’ plainly declare the proper
and the genuine; for we too have this from the womb; but our works we
make by the hand.
28. What means then, say they, ‘Before the
morning star?’ I would answer, that if ‘Before the morning
star’ shews that His birth from Mary was wonderful, many others
besides have been born before the rising of the star. What then is said
so wonderful in His instance, that He should record it as some choice
prerogative3399
| 3399 ἐξαιρέτου, ii. 19, n. 6. | , when it is common to many? Next, to
beget differs from bringing forth; for begetting involves the primary
foundation, but to bring forth is nothing else than the production of
what exists. If then the term belongs to the body, let it be observed
that He did not then receive a beginning of coming to be when he was
evangelized to the shepherds by night, but when the Angel spoke to the
Virgin. And that was not night, for this is not said; on the contrary,
it was night when He issued from the womb. This difference Scripture
makes, and says on the one hand that He was begotten before the morning
star, and on the other speaks of His proceeding from the womb, as in
the twenty-first Psalm, ‘Thou art he that drew Me from the womb3400
.’ Besides, He did not say,
‘before the rising of the morning star,’ but simply
‘before the morning star.’ If then the phrase must be taken
of the body, then either the body must be before Adam, for the stars
were before Adam, or we have to investigate the sense of the letter.
And this John enables us to do, who says in the Apocalypse, ‘I am
Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.
Blessed are they who make broad their robes, that they may have right
to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers,
and idolaters, and whosoever maketh and loveth a lie. I Jesus have sent
My Angel, to testify these things in the Churches. I am the Root and
the Offspring of David, the Bright and Morning Star. And the Spirit and
the Bride say, Come; and let him that heareth say, Come; and let him
that is athirst, Come; and whosoever will, let him take of the water of
life freely3401
.’ If then ‘the Offspring
of David’ be the ‘Bright and Morning Star,’ it is
plain that the flesh of the Saviour is called ‘the Morning
Star,’ which the Offspring from God preceded; so that the sense
of the Psalm is this, ‘I have begotten Thee from Myself before
Thy appearance in the flesh;’ for ‘before the Morning
Star’ is equivalent to ‘before the Incarnation of the
Word.’
29. Thus in the Old also, statements are plainly
made concerning the Son; at the same time it is superfluous to argue
the point; for if what is not stated in the Old is of later date, let
them who are thus disputatious, say where in the Old is mention made of
the Spirit, the Paraclete? for of the Holy Spirit there is mention, but
nowhere of the Paraclete. Is then the Holy Spirit one, and the
Paraclete another, and the Paraclete the later, as not mentioned in the
Old? but far be it to say that the Spirit is later, or to distinguish the Holy Ghost as one and the
Paraclete as another; for the Spirit is one and the same, then and now
hallowing and comforting those who are His recipients; as one and the
same Word and Son led even then to adoption of sons those who were
worthy3402
. For sons under the Old were made such
through no other than the Son. For unless even before Mary there were a
Son who was of God, how is He before all, when they are sons before
Him? and how also ‘First-born,’ if He comes second after
many? But neither is the Paraclete second, for He was before all, nor
the Son later; for ‘in the beginning was the Word3403
.’ And as the Spirit and Paraclete are
the same, so the Son and Word are the same; and as the Saviour says
concerning the Spirit, ‘But the Paraclete which is the Holy
Ghost, whom the Father will send in My Name3404
,’ speaking of One and Same, and not
distinguishing, so John describes similarly when he says, ‘And
the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory,
glory as of one Only-begotten from the Father3405
.’ For here too he does not distinguish
but witnesses the identity. And as the Paraclete is not one and the
Holy Ghost another, but one and the same, so Word is not one, and Son
another, but the Word is Only-Begotten; for He says not the glory of
the flesh itself, but of the Word. He then who dares distinguish
between Word and Son, let him distinguish between Spirit and Paraclete;
but if the Spirit cannot be distinguished, so neither can the Word,
being also Son and Wisdom and Power. Moreover, the word
‘Well-beloved’ even the Greeks who are skilful in phrases
know to be equivalent with ‘Only-begotten.’ For Homer
speaks thus of Telemachus, who was the only-begotten of Ulysses, in the
second book of the Odyssey:
O’er the wide earth, dear
youth, why seek to run,
An only child, a well-beloved3406
| 3406 μοῦνος ἐ& 241·ν
ἀγαπητός, line 365. | son?
He whom you mourn, divine
Ulysses, fell
Far from his country, where the
strangers dwell.
Therefore he who is the only son of his father is
called well-beloved.
30. Some of the followers of the Samosatene,
distinguishing the Word from the Son, pretend that the Son is Christ,
and the Word another; and they ground this upon Peter’s words in
the Acts, which he spoke well, but they explain badly3407
. It is this: ‘The Word He sent to the
children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ; this is Lord of
all3408
.’ For they say that since the Word
spoke through Christ, as in the instance of the Prophets, ‘Thus
saith the Lord,’ the prophet was one and the Lord another. But to
this it is parallel to oppose the words in the first to the
Corinthians, ‘waiting for the revelation of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who shall also confirm you unto the end unblameable in the day
of our Lord Jesus Christ3409
.’ For as one
Christ does not confirm the day of another Christ, but He Himself
confirms in His own day those who wait for Him, so the Father sent the
Word made flesh, that being made man He might preach by means of
Himself. And therefore he straightway adds, ‘This is Lord of
all;’ but Lord of all is the Word.
31. ‘And Moses said unto Aaron, Go unto the
altar and offer thy sin-offering, and thy burnt-offering, and make an
atonement for thyself and for the people; and offer the offering of the
people, and make an atonement for them, as the Lord commanded Moses3410
.’ See now here, though Moses be one,
Moses himself speaks as if about another Moses, ‘as the Lord
commanded Moses.’ In like manner then, if the blessed Peter speak
of the Divine Word also, as sent to the children of Israel by Jesus
Christ, it is not necessary to understand that the Word is one and
Christ another, but that they were one and the same by reason of the
uniting which took place in His divine and loving condescension and
becoming man. And even if He be considered in two ways3411
, still it is without any division of the
Word, as when the inspired John says, ‘And the Word became flesh,
and dwelt among us3412
.’ What then
is said well and rightly3413
by the blessed
Peter, the followers of the Samosatene, understanding badly and
wrongly, stand not in the truth. For Christ is understood in both ways
in Divine Scripture, as when it says Christ ‘God’s power
and God’s wisdom3414
.’ If then
Peter says that the Word was sent through Jesus Christ unto the
children of Israel, let him be understood to mean, that the Word
incarnate has appeared to the children of Israel, so that it may
correspond to ‘And the Word became flesh.’ But if they
understand it otherwise, and, while confessing the Word to be divine,
as He is, separate from Him the Man that He has taken, with which also
we believe that He is made one, saying that He has been sent through
Jesus Christ, they are, without knowing it, contradicting themselves.
For those who in this place separate the divine Word from the divine
Incarnation, have, it seems, a degraded notion of the doctrine of His
having become flesh, and entertain Gentile thoughts, as they do,
conceiving that the divine Incarnation is an alteration of the Word.
But it is not so; perish the thought.
32. For in the same way that John here preaches
that incomprehensible union. ‘the mortal being swallowed up of life3415
,’ nay, of Him who is Very Life (as the
Lord said to Martha, ‘I am the Life3416
’), so when the blessed Peter says that
through Jesus Christ the Word was sent, he implies the divine union
also. For as when a man heard ‘The Word became flesh,’ he
would not think that the Word ceased to be, which is absurd, as has
been said before, so also hearing of the Word which has been united to
the flesh, let him understand the divine mystery one and simple. More
clearly however and indisputably than all reasoning does what was said
by the Archangel to the Bearer of God herself, shew the oneness of the
Divine Word and Man. For he says, ‘The Holy Ghost shall come upon
thee, and the Power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore
also that Holy Thing which shall be born of thee, shall be called the
Son of God3417
.’ Irrationally then do the
followers of the Samosatene separate the Word who is clearly declared
to be made one with the Man from Mary. He is not therefore sent through
that Man; but He rather in Him sent, saying, ‘Go ye, teach all
nations3418
.’
33. And this is usual with Scripture3419
, to express itself in inartificial and
simple phrases. For so also in Numbers we shall find, Moses said to
Raguel the Midianite, the father-in-law of Moses; for there was not one
Moses who spoke, and another whose father-in-law was Raguel, but Moses
was one. And if in like manner the Word of God is called Wisdom and
Power and Right-Hand and Arm and the like, and if in His love to man He
has become one with us, putting on our first-fruits and blended with
it, therefore the other titles also have, as was natural, become the
Word’s portions. For that John has said, that in the beginning
was the Word, and He with God and Himself God, and all things through
Him, and without Him nothing made, shews clearly that even man is the
formation of God the Word. If then after taking him, when enfeebled3420
| 3420 σαθρωθέντα, cf. ii. 66, n. 7. | , into Himself, He renews him again through
that sure renewal unto endless permanence, and therefore is made one
with him in order to raise him to a diviner lot, how can we possibly
say that the Word was sent through the Man who was from Mary, and
reckon Him, the Lord of Apostles, with the other Apostles, I mean
prophets, who were sent by Him? And how can Christ be called a mere
man? on the contrary, being made one with the Word, He is with reason
called Christ and Son of God, the prophet having long since loudly and
clearly ascribed the Father’s subsistence to Him, and said,
‘And I will send My Son Christ3421
,’ and in
the Jordan, ‘This is My Well-beloved Son.’ For when He had
fulfilled His promise, He shewed, as was suitable, that He was He whom
He said He had sent.
34. Let us then consider Christ in both ways, the
divine Word made one in Mary with Him which is from Mary. For in her
womb the Word fashioned for Himself His house, as at the beginning He
formed Adam from the earth; or rather more divinely, concerning whom
Solomon too says openly, knowing that the Word was also called Wisdom,
‘Wisdom builded herself an house3422
;’ which the Apostle interprets when he
says, ‘Which house are we3423
,’ and
elsewhere calls us a temple, as far as it is fitting to God to inhabit
a temple, of which the image, made of stones, He by Solomon commanded
the ancient people to build; whence, on the appearance of the Truth,
the image ceased. For when the ruthless men wished to prove the image
to be the truth, and to destroy that true habitation which we surely
believe His union with us to be, He threatened them not; but knowing
that their crime was against themselves, He says to them,
‘Destroy this Temple, and in three days I will raise it up3424
,’ He, our Saviour, surely shewing
thereby that the things about which men busy themselves, carry their
dissolution with them. For unless the Lord had built the house, and
kept the city, in vain did the builders toil, and the keepers watch3425
. And so the works of the Jews are undone,
for they were a shadow; but the Church is firmly established; it is
‘founded on the rock,’ and ‘the gates of hades shall
not prevail against it3426
.’ Theirs3427
it was to say, ‘Why dost Thou, being a
man, make Thyself God3428
| 3428 De
Decr. 1; Or. i. 4, iii. 27; de Syn. 50. | ?’ and their
disciple is the Samosatene; whence to his followers with reason does he
teach his heresy. But ‘we did not so learn Christ, if so be that
we heard’ Him, and were taught from Him, ‘putting off the
old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts,’ and
taking up ‘the new, which after God is created in righteousness
and true holiness3429
.’ Let Christ
then in both ways be religiously considered.
35. But if Scripture often calls even the body by
the name of Christ, as in the blessed Peter’s words to Cornelius,
when he teaches him of ‘Jesus of Nazareth, whom God anointed with
the Holy Ghost,’ and again to the Jews, ‘Jesus of Nazareth,
a Man approved of God for you3430
,’ and again
the blessed Paul to the Athenians, ‘By that Man, whom He ordained, giving assurance to all men, in
that He raised Him from the dead3431
’ (for we
find the appointment and the mission often synonymous with the
anointing; from which any one who will may learn, that there is no
discordance in the words of the sacred writers, but that they but give
various names to the union of God the Word with the Man from Mary,
sometimes as anointing, sometimes as mission, sometimes as
appointment), it follows that what the blessed Peter says is right3432
, and he proclaims in purity the Godhead of
the Only begotten, without separating the subsistence of God the Word
from the Man from Mary (perish the thought! for how should he, who had
heard in so many ways, ‘I and the Father are one,’ and
‘He that hath seen Me, hath seen the Father3433
?)’ In which Man, after the
resurrection also, when the doors were shut, we know of His coming to
the whole band3434
of the Apostles,
and dispersing all that was hard to believe in it by His words,
‘Handle Me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye
see Me have3435
.’ And He did not say,
‘This,’ or ‘this Man which I have taken to Me,’
but ‘Me.’ Wherefore the Samosatene will gain no allowance,
being refuted by so many arguments for the union of God the Word, nay
by God the Word Himself, who now brings the news to all, and assures
them by eating, and permitting to them that handling of Him which then
took place. For certainly he who gives food to others, and they who
give him, touch hands. For ‘they gave Him,’ Scripture says,
‘a piece of a broiled fish and of an honey-comb, and’ when
He had ‘eaten before them, He took the remains and gave to them3436
.’ See now, though not as Thomas was
allowed, yet by another way, He afforded to them full assurance, in
being touched by them; but if you would now see the scars, learn from
Thomas. ‘Reach hither thy hand and thrust it into My side, and
reach hither thy finger and behold My hands3437
;’ so says God the Word, speaking of
His own3438
side and hands, and of Himself as
whole man and God together, first affording to the Saints even
perception of the Word through the body3439
,
as we may consider, by entering when the doors were shut; and next
standing near them in the body and affording full assurance. So much
may be conveniently said for confirmation of the faithful, and
correction of the unbelieving.
36. And so let Paul of Samosata also stand
corrected on hearing the divine voice of Him who said ‘My
body,’ not ‘Christ besides Me who am the Word,’ but
‘Him3440
with Me, and Me with Him.’ For I
the Word am the chrism, and that which has the chrism from Me is the
Man3441
; not then without Me could He be called
Christ, but being with Me and I in Him. Therefore the mention of the
mission of the Word shews the uniting which took place with Jesus, born
of Mary, Whose Name means Saviour, not by reason of anything else, but
from the Man’s being made one with God the Word. This passage has
the same meaning as ‘the Father that sent Me,’ and ‘I
came not of Myself, but the Father sent Me3442
.’ For he has given the name of
mission3443
to the uniting with the Man, with Whom
the Invisible nature might be known to men, through the visible. For
God changes not place, like us who are hidden in places, when in the
fashion of our littleness He displays Himself in His existence in the
flesh; for how should He, who fills the heaven and the earth? but on
account of the presence in the flesh the just have spoken of His
mission. Therefore God the Word Himself is Christ from Mary, God and
Man; not some other Christ but One and the Same; He before ages from
the Father, He too in the last times from the Virgin; invisible3444
before even to the holy powers of heaven,
visible now because of His being one with the Man who is visible; seen,
I say, not in His invisible Godhead but in the operation3445
| 3445 ἐνεργεία, §14, n. 5. | of the Godhead through the human body and
whole Man, which He has renewed by its appropriation to Himself. To Him
be the adoration and the worship, who was before, and now is, and ever
shall be, even to all ages. Amen.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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