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| That the holy Virgin is the Mother of God: an argument directed against the Nestorians.
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Chapter
XII.—That the holy Virgin is the Mother of
God: an argument directed against the Nestorians.
Moreover we proclaim the holy Virgin to be in strict truth2065
| 2065 See especially
Greg. Naz., Ep. 1 ad Cled.; Theod., Hær.
fab., v. 18. |
the Mother of God2066
| 2066 Greg. Naz.,
Epist. I. ad Cledon. | . For
inasmuch as He who was born of her was true God, she who bare the true
God incarnate is the true mother of God. For we hold that God was
born of her, not implying that the divinity of the Word received from
her the beginning of its being, but meaning that God the Word Himself,
Who was begotten of the Father timelessly before the ages, and was with
the Father and the Spirit without beginning and through eternity, took
up His abode in these last days for the sake of our salvation in the
Virgin’s womb, and was without change made flesh and born of
her. For the holy Virgin did not bare mere man but true
God: and not mere God but God incarnate, Who did not bring down
His body from Heaven, nor simply passed through the Virgin as channel,
but received from her flesh of like essence to our own and subsisting
in Himself2067
. For if
the body had come down from heaven and had not partaken of our nature,
what would have been the use of His becoming man? For the purpose
of God the Word becoming man2068
was that the very
same nature, which had sinned and fallen and become corrupted, should
triumph over the deceiving tyrant and so be freed from corruption, just
as the divine apostle puts it, For since by man came death, by man
came also the resurrection of the dead2069
. If the first is true the second must
also be true.
Although2070
, however, he
says, The first Adam is of the earth earthy; the second Adam is Lord
from Heaven2071
, he does not say
that His body is from heaven, but emphasises the fact that He is not
mere man. For, mark, he called Him both Adam and Lord, thus
indicating His double nature. For Adam is, being interpreted,
earth-born: and it is clear that man’s nature is earth-born
since he is formed from earth, but the title Lord signifies His divine
essence.
And again the Apostle says: God sent
forth His only-begotten Son, made of a woman2072
. He did not say “made by a
woman.” Wherefore the divine apostle meant that the
only-begotten Son of God and God is the same as He who was made man of
the Virgin, and that He who was born of the Virgin is the same as the
Son of God and God.
But He was born after the bodily fashion inasmuch as He
became man, and did not take up His abode in a man formed beforehand,
as in a prophet, but became Himself in essence and truth man, that is
He caused flesh animated with the intelligent and reasonable to subsist
in His own subsistence, and Himself became subsistence for it.
For this is the meaning of “made of a woman.” For how
could the very Word of God itself have been made under the law, if He
did not become man of like essence with ourselves?
Hence it is with justice and truth that we call the holy
Mary the Mother of God. For this name embraces the whole mystery
of the dispensation. For if she who bore Him is the Mother of
God, assuredly He Who was born of her is God and likewise also
man. For how could God, Who was before the ages, have been born
of a woman unless He had become man? For the son of man must
clearly be man himself. But if He Who was born of a woman is
Himself God, manifestly He Who was born of God the Father in accordance
with the laws of an essence that is divine and knows no beginning, and
He Who was in the last days born of the Virgin in accordance with the
laws of an essence that has beginning and is subject to time, that is,
an essence which is human, must be one and the same. The name in
truth signifies the one subsistence and the two natures and the two
generations of our Lord Jesus Christ.
But we never say that the holy Virgin is the
Mother of Christ2073
| 2073 χριστοτόκος,
as opposed to θεοτόκος. | because it was
in order to do away with the title Mother of God, and to bring
dishonour on the Mother of God, who alone is in truth worthy of honour
above all creation, that the impure and abominable Judaizing
Nestorius2074
| 2074 Cyril, ad
Monachos, Epist. 1. | , that vessel of
dishonour, invented this name for an insult2075
| 2075 ὡς
ἐπηρεαζομένην
is absent in Vegelinus. | . For David the king, and Aaron, the
high priest, are also called Christ2076
, for it is customary to make kings and
priests by anointing: and besides every God-inspired man may be
called Christ, but yet he is not by nature God: yea, the
accursed Nestorius insulted Him Who was born of the Virgin by calling
Him God-bearer2077
| 2077 θεοφόρος,
Deigerus. See Greg. Naz., Ep. 2, ad Cled.
Basil, De Spir. Sanc., ch. 5, &c. | . May it
be far from us to speak of or think of Him as God-bearer only2078
| 2078 Cyril, cont.
Nest., bk. 1. | , Who is in truth God incarnate. For
the Word Himself became flesh, having been in truth conceived of the
Virgin, but coming forth as God with the assumed nature which, as soon
as He was brought forth into being, was deified by Him, so that these
three things took place simultaneously, the assumption of our nature,
the coming into being, and the deification of the assumed nature by the
Word. And thus it is that the holy Virgin is thought of and
spoken of as the Mother of God, not only because of the nature of the
Word, but also because of the deification of man’s nature, the
miracles of conception and of existence being wrought together, to wit,
the conception the Word, and the existence of the flesh in the Word
Himself. For the very Mother of God in some marvellous manner was
the means of fashioning the Framer of all things and of bestowing
manhood on the God and Creator of all, Who deified the nature that He
assumed, while the union preserved those things that were united just
as they were united, that is to say, not only the divine nature of
Christ but also His human nature, not only that which is above us but
that which is of us. For He was not first made like us and only
later became higher than us, but ever2079
| 2079 ἀεί is absent in Vegelinus. |
from His first coming into being He existed with the double nature,
because He existed in the Word Himself from the beginning of the
conception. Wherefore He is human in His own nature, but also, in
some marvellous manner, of God and divine. Moreover He has the
properties of the living flesh: for by reason of the
dispensation2080
| 2080 οἰκονομίας
λόγῳ, by reason of the
incarnation. | the Word
received these which are, according to the order of natural motion,
truly natural2081
| 2081 Reading
γινόμενα,
for which Cod. R. 2930 gives ὑπῆρχον. | .E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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