Bad Advertisement?
Are you a Christian?
Online Store:Visit Our Store
| Prefatory remarks on the need of exact investigation of the most minute portions of theology.
PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP 
Chapter I.
Prefatory remarks on the need of exact investigation of
the most minute portions of theology.
1. Your desire for
information, my right well-beloved and most deeply respected brother
Amphilochius, I highly commend, and not less your industrious
energy. I have been exceedingly delighted at the care and
watchfulness shewn in the expression of your opinion that of all the
terms concerning God in every mode of speech, not one ought to be left
without exact investigation. You have turned to good account your
reading of the exhortation of the Lord, “Every one that asketh
receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth,”705
and by your diligence in asking might, I
ween, stir even the most reluctant to give you a share of what they
possess. And this in you yet further moves my admiration, that
you do not, according to the manners of the most part of the men of
our time, propose your questions by way of mere test, but with the
honest desire to arrive at the actual truth. There is no lack
in these days of captious listeners and questioners; but to find a
character desirous of information, and seeking the truth as a remedy
for ignorance, is very difficult. Just as in the
hunter’s snare, or in the soldier’s ambush, the trick is
generally ingeniously concealed, so it is with the inquiries of the
majority of the questioners who advance arguments, not so much with
the view of getting any good out of them, as in order that, in the
event of their failing to elicit answers which chime in with their
own desires, they may seem to have fair ground for
controversy.
2. If “To the fool on his asking for
wisdom, wisdom shall be reckoned,”706
at
how high a price shall we value “the wise hearer” who is
quoted by the Prophet in the same verse with “the admirable
counsellor”?707
It is right, I
ween, to hold him worthy of all approbation, and to urge him on to
further progress, sharing his enthusiasm, and in all things toiling at
his side as he presses onwards to perfection. To count the terms
used in theology as of primary importance, and to endeavour to trace
out the hidden meaning in every phrase and in every syllable, is a
characteristic wanting in those who are idle in the pursuit of true
religion, but distinguishing all who get knowledge of “the
mark” “of our calling;”708
for
what is set before us is, so far as is possible with human nature, to
be made like unto God. Now without knowledge there can be no
making like; and knowledge is not got without lessons. The
beginning of teaching is speech, and syllables and words are parts of
speech. It follows then that to investigate syllables is not to
shoot wide of the mark, nor, because the questions raised are what
might seem to some insignificant, are they on that account to be held
unworthy of heed. Truth is always a quarry hard to hunt, and
therefore we must look everywhere for its tracks. The acquisition
of true religion is just like that of crafts; both grow bit by bit;
apprentices must despise nothing. If a man despise the first
elements as small and insignificant, he will never reach the perfection
of wisdom.
Yea and Nay are but two syllables, yet there is
often involved in these little words at once the best of all good
things, Truth, and that beyond which wickedness cannot go, a Lie.
But why mention Yea and Nay? Before now, a martyr bearing witness
for Christ has been judged to have paid in full the claim of true
religion by merely nodding his head.709
| 709 i.e.,
confessed or denied himself a Christian. The Benedictine
Editors and their followers seem to have missed the force of the
original, both grammatically and historically, in referring it to
the time when St. Basil is writing; ἤδη
ἐκρίθη does not mean
“at the present day is judged,” but “ere now has
been judged.” And in a.d. 374
there was no persecution of Christians such as seems to be referred
to, although Valens tried to crush the Catholics. | If, then,
this be so, what term in theology is so small but that the effect of
its weight in the scales according as it be rightly or wrongly used is
not great? Of the law we are told “not one jot nor one
tittle shall pass away;”710
how then
could it be safe for us to leave even the least unnoticed? The
very points which you yourself have sought to have thoroughly sifted
by us are at the same time both small and great. Their use is
the matter of a moment, and peradventure they are therefore made of
small account; but, when we reckon the force of their meaning, they
are great. They may be likened to the mustard plant which,
though it be the least of shrub-seeds, yet when properly cultivated
and the forces latent in its germs unfolded, rises to its own
sufficient height.
If any one laughs when he sees our subtilty, to
use the Psalmist’s711
| 711 Ps. cxix. 85, lxx. “The lawless have
described subtilties for me, but not according to thy law, O
Lord;” for A.V. & R.V., “The proud have digged pits
for me which are not after thy law.” The word
ἀδολεσχία is
used in a bad sense to mean garrulity; in a good sense, keenness,
subtilty. | words, about
syllables, let him know that he reaps laughter’s fruitless fruit;
and let us, neither giving in to men’s reproaches, nor yet
vanquished by their
disparagement, continue our investigation. So far, indeed, am I
from feeling ashamed of these things because they are small, that, even
if I could attain to ever so minute a fraction of their dignity, I
should both congratulate myself on having won high honour, and should
tell my brother and fellow-investigator that no small gain had accrued
to him therefrom.
While, then, I am aware that the controversy contained
in little words is a very great one, in hope of the prize I do not
shrink from toil, with the conviction that the discussion will both
prove profitable to myself, and that my hearers will be rewarded with
no small benefit. Wherefore now with the help, if I may so say,
of the Holy Spirit Himself, I will approach the exposition of the
subject, and, if you will, that I may be put in the way of the
discussion, I will for a moment revert to the origin of the question
before us.
3. Lately when praying with the people, and
using the full doxology to God the Father in both forms, at one time
“with the Son together with the Holy Ghost,”
and at another “through the Son in the Holy
Ghost,” I was attacked by some of those present on the ground
that I was introducing novel and at the same time mutually
contradictory terms.712
| 712 It is
impossible to convey in English the precise force of the
prepositions used. “With” represents
μετά,
of which the original meaning is “amid;”
“together with,” σύν, of which the original meaning is
“at the same time as.” The Latin of the
Benedictine edition translates the first by
“cum,” and the second by “una
cum.” “Through” stands
for διά, which, with the genitive, is
used of the instrument; “in” for
ε'ν,
“in,” but also commonly used of the instrument or
means. In the well known passage in 1 Cor. viii. 6, A.V. renders δι᾽ οὗ τὰ
πάντα by
“through whom are all things;” R.V., by
“by whom.” | You, however,
chiefly with the view of benefiting them, or, if they are wholly
incurable, for the security of such as may fall in with them, have
expressed the opinion that some clear instruction ought to be published
concerning the force underlying the syllables employed. I will
therefore write as concisely as possible, in the endeavour to lay down
some admitted principle for the discussion.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
|
