(NOTE: The electronic text obtained from The Electronic Bible Society was
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ST. ATHANASIUS

FOUR DISCOURSES AGAINST THE ARIANS

[Oxford translation of J. H. Newman, slightly revised by Rev. Archibald
Robertson, Principal of Bishop Hatfield's Hall, Durham, late fellow of
Trinity College, Oxford.]


DISCOURSE III

CHAPTER XXIII: TEXTS EXPLAINED; SEVENTHLY,  JOHN xiv. 10.

Introduction. The doctrine of the coinherence. The Father and the Son Each
whole and perfect God. They are in Each Other, because their Essence is One
and the Same. They are Each Perfect and have One Essence, because the
Second Person is the Son of the First. Asterius's evasive explanation of
the text under review; refuted. Since the Son has all that the Father has,
He is His Image; and the Father is the One God, because the Son is in the
Father.

   1. THE Ario-maniacs, as it appears, having once made up their minds to
transgress and revolt from the Truth, are strenuous in appropriating the
words of Scripture, 'When the impious cometh into a depth of evils, he
despiseth(1);' for refutation does not stop them, nor perplexity abash
them; but, as having 'a whore's forehead,' they 'refuse to be ashamed(2)'
before all men in their irreligion. For whereas the passages which they
alleged, 'The Lord created me(3),' and 'Made better than the Angels(4),'
and 'First- born(5),' and 'Faithful to Him that made Him(6)' have a right
sense(7), and inculcate religiousness towards Christ, so it is that these
men still, as if bedewed with the serpent's poison, not seeing what they
ought to see, nor understanding what they read, as if in vomit from the
depth of their irreligious heart, have next proceeded to disparage our
Lord's words, 'I in the Father and the Father in Me(8);' saying, 'How can
the One be contained in the Other and the Other in the One?' or 'How at all
can the Father who is the greater be contained in the Son who is the less?'
or 'What wonder, if the Son is in the Father, considering it is written
even of us, 'In Him we live and move and have our being(9)?' And this state
of mind is consistent with their perverseness, who think God to be
material, and understand not what is 'True Father' and 'True Son,' nor
'Light Invisible' and 'Eternal,' and Its 'Radiance Invisible,' nor
'Invisible Subsistence,' and 'Immaterial Expression' and 'Immaterial
Image.' For did they know, they would not dishonour and ridicule the Lord
of glory, nor interpreting things immaterial after a material manner,
pervert good words. It were sufficient indeed, on hearing only words which
are the Lord's, at once to believe, since the faith of simplicity is better
than an elaborate process of persuasion; but since they have endeavoured to
profane even this passage to their own heresy, it becomes necessary to
expose their perverseness and to shew the mind of the truth, at least for
the security of the faithful. For when it is said, 'I in the Father and the
Father in Me,' They are not therefore, as these suppose, discharged into
Each Other, filling the One the Other, as in the case of empty vessels, so
that the Son fills the emptiness of the Father and the Father that of the
Son(10), and Each of Them by Himself is not complete and perfect (for this
is proper to bodies, and therefore the mere assertion of it is full of
irreligion), for the Father is full and perfect, and the Son is the Fulness
of Godhead. Nor again, as God, by coming into the Saints, strengthens them,
thus is He also in the Son. For He is Himself the Father's Power and
Wisdom, and by partaking of Him things originate are sanctified in the
Spirit; but the Son Himself is not Son by participation, but is the
Father's own Offspring(11). Nor again is the Son in the Father, in the
sense of the passage, 'In Him we live and move and have our being;' for, He
as being from the Fount(12) of the Father is the Life, in which all things
are both quickened and consist; for the Life does not live in life(13),
else it would not be Life, but rather He gives life to all things.

   2. But now let us see what Asterius the Sophist says, the retained
pleader(1) for the heresy. In imitation then of the Jews so far, he writes
as follows; 'It is very plain that He has said, that He is in the Father
and the Father again in Him, for this reason, that neither the word on
which He was discoursing is, as He says, His own, but the Father's, nor the
works belong to Him, but to the Father who gave Him the power.' Now this,
if uttered at random by a little child, had been excused from his age; but
when one who bears the title of Sophist, and professes universal
knowledge(2), is the writer, what a serious condemnation does he deserve!
And does he not shew himself a stranger to the Apostle(3), as being puffed
up with persuasive words of wisdom, and thinking thereby to succeed in
deceiving, not understanding himself what he says nor whereof he
affirms(4)? For what the Son has said as proper and suitable to a Son only,
who is Word and Wisdom and Image of the Father's Essence, that he levels to
all the creatures, and makes common to the Son and to them; and he says,
lawless(5) man, that the Power of the Father receives power, that from this
his irreligion it may follow to say that in a son(6) the Son was made a
son, and the Word received a word's authority; and, far from granting that
He spoke this as a Son, He ranks Him with all things made as having learned
it as they have. For if the Son said, I am in the Father and the Father in
Me,' because His discourses were not His own words but the Father's, and so
of His works, then,--since David says, 'I will hear what the Lord God shall
say in me(7),' and again Solomon(8), 'My words are spoken by God,' and
since Moses was minister of words which were from God, and each of the
Prophets spoke not what was his own but what was from God, 'Thus saith the
Lord,' and since the works of the Saints, as they professed, were not their
own but God's who gave the power, Elijah for instance and Elisha invoking
God that He Himself would raise the dead, and Elisha saying to Naaman, on
cleansing him from the leprosy, 'that thou mayest know that there is a God
in Israel(9),' and Samuel too in the days of the harvest praying to God to
grant rain, and the Apostles saying that not in their own power they did
miracles but in the Lord's grace--it is plain that, according to Asterius
such a statement must be common to all, so that each of them is able to
say, 'I in the Father and the Father in me;' and as a consequence that He
is no longer one Son of God and Word and Wisdom, but, as others, is only
one out of many.

   3. But if the Lord said this, His words would not rightly have been, 'I
in the Father and the Father in Me,' but rather, 'I too am in the Father,
and the Father is in Me too,' that He may have nothing of His own and by
prerogative(1), relatively to the Father, as a Son, but the same grace in
common with all. But it is not so, as they think; for not understanding
that He is genuine Son from the Father, they belie Him who is such, whom
alone it befits to say, 'I in the Father and the Father in Me.' For the Son
is in the Father, as it is allowed us to know, because the whole Being of
the Son is proper to the Father's essence(2), as radiance from light, and
stream from fountain; so that whoso sees the Son, sees what is proper to
the Father, and knows that the Son's Being, because from the Father, is
therefore in the Father. For the Father is in the Son, since the Son is
what is from the Father and proper to Him, as in the radiance the sun, and
in the word the thought, and in the stream the fountain: for whoso thus
contemplates the Son, contemplates what is proper to the Father's Essence,
and knows that the Father is in the Son. For whereas the Form(3) and
Godhead of the Father is the Being of the Son, it follows that the Son is
in the Father and the Father in the Son(4).

   4. On this account and reasonably, having said before, 'I and the
Father are One,' He added, 'I in the Father and the Father in Me,(5)' by
way of shewing the identity(6) of Godhead and the unity of Essence. For
they are one, not(7) as one thing divided into two parts, and these nothing
but one, nor as one thing twice named, so that the Same becomes at one time
Father, at another His own Son, for this Sabellius holding was judged an
heretic. But They are two, because the Father is Father and is not also
Son, and the Son is Son and not also Father(8); but the nature is one; (for
the offspring is not unlike(9) its parent, for it is his image), and all
that is the Father's, is the Son's(10). Wherefore neither is the Son
another God, for He was not procured from without, else were there many, if
a godhead be procured foreign from the Father's(1); for if the Son be
other, as an Offspring, still He is the Same as God; and He and the Father
are one in propriety and peculiarity of nature, and in the identity of the
one Godhead, as has been said. For the radiance also is light, not second
to the sun, nor a different light, nor from participation of it, but a
whole and proper offspring of it. And such an offspring is necessarily one
light; and no one would say that they are two lights(2), but sun and
radiance two, yet one the light from the sun enlightening in its radiance
all things. So also the Godhead of the Son is the Father's; whence also it
is indivisible; and thus there is one God and none other but He. And so,
since they are one, and the Godhead itself one, the same things are said of
the Son, which are said of the Father, except His being said to be
Father(3):--for instance(4), that He is God, 'And the Word was God(5);'
Almighty, 'Thus saith He which was and is and is to come, the Almighty(6);'
Lord, 'One Lord Jesus Christ(7);' that He is Light, 'I am the Light(8);'
that He wipes out sins, 'that ye may know,' He says, 'that the Son of man
hath power upon earth to forgive sins(9);' and so with other attributes.
For 'all things,' says the Son Himself, 'whatsoever the Father hath, are
Mine(10);' and again, 'And Mine are Thine.'

   5. And on hearing the attributes of the Father spoken of a Son, we
shall thereby see the Father in the Son; and we shall contemplate the Son
in the Father, when what is said of the Son is said of the Father also. And
why are the attributes of the Father ascribed to the Son, except that the
Son is an Offspring from Him? and why are the Son's attributes proper to
the Father, except again because the Son is the proper Offspring of His
Essence? And the Son, being the proper Offspring of the Father's Essence,
reasonably says that the Father's attributes are His own also; whence
suitably and consistently with saying, 'I and the Father are One,' He adds,
'that ye may know that I am in the Father and the Father in Me(1).'
Moreover, He has added this again, 'He that hath seen Me, hath seen the
Father(2);' and there is one and the same sense in these three(3) passages.
For he who in this sense understands that the Son and the Father are one,
knows that He is in the Father and the Father in the Son; for the Godhead
of the Son is the Father's, and it is in the Son; and whoso enters into
this, is convinced that 'He that hath seen the Son, hath seen the Father;'
for in the Son is contemplated the Father's Godhead. And we may perceive
this at once from the illustration of the Emperor's image. For in the image
is the shape and form of the Emperor, and in the Emperor is that shape
which is in the image. For the likeness of the Emperor in the image is
exact(4); so that a person who looks at the image, sees in it the Emperor;
and he again who sees the Emperor, recognises that it is he who is in the
image(5). And from the likeness not differing, to one who after the image
wished to view the Emperor, the image might say, 'I and the Emperor are
one; for I am in him, and he in me; and what thou seest in me, that thou
beholdest in him, and what thou hast seen in him, that thou holdest in
me(6).' Accordingly he who worships the image, in it worships the Emperor
also; for the image is his forth and appearance. Since then the Son too is
the Father's Image, it must necessarily be understood that the Godhead and
propriety of the Father is the Being of the Son.

   6. And this is what is said, 'Who being in the form of God(1),' and
'the Father in Me.' Nor is this Form(2) of the Godhead partial merely, but
the fulness of the Father's Godhead is the Being of the Son, and the Son is
whole God. Therefore also, being equal to God, He 'thought it not a prize
to be equal to God;' and again since the Godhead and the Form of the Son is
none other's than the Father's(3), this is what He says, 'I in the Father.'
Thus 'God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself(4);' for the
propriety of the Father's Essence is that Son, in whom the creation was
then reconciled with God. Thus what things the Son then wrought are the
Father's works, for the Son is the Form of that Godhead of the Father,
which wrought the works. And thus he who looks at the Son, sees the Father;
for in the Father's Godhead is and is contemplated the Son; and the
Father's Form which is in Him shews in Him the Father; and thus the Father
is in the Son. And that propriety and Godhead which is from the Father in
the Son, shews the Son in the Father, and His inseparability from Him; and
whoso hears and beholds that what is said of the Father is also said of the
Son, not as accruing to His Essence by grace or participation, but because
the very Being of the Son is the proper Offspring of the Father's Essence,
will fitly understand the words, as I said before, 'I in the Father, and
the Father in Me;' and 'I and the Father are One(5).' For the Son is such
as the Father is, because He has all that is the Father's. Wherefore also
is He implied together with the Father. For, a son not being, one cannot
say father; whereas when we call God a Maker, we do not of necessity
intimate the things which have come to be; for a maker is before his
works(6).

But when we call God Father, at once with the Father we signify the Son's
existence. Therefore also he who believes in the Son, believes also in the
Father: for he believes in what is proper to the Father's Essence; and thus
the faith is one in one God. And he who worships and honours the Son, in
the Son worships and honours the Father; for one is the Godhead; and
therefore one(7) the honour and one the worship which is paid to the Father
in and through the Son. And he who thus worships, worships one God; for
there is one God and none other than He. Accordingly when the Father is
called the only God, and we read that there is one God(8), and 'I am,' and
'beside Me there is no God,' and 'I the first and I the last(9),' this has
a fit meaning. For God is One and Only and First; but this is not said to
the denial of the Son(10), perish the thought; for He is in that One, and
First and Only, as being of that One and Only and First the Only Word and
Wisdom and Radiance. And He too is the First, as the Fulness of the Godhead
of the First and Only, being whole and full God(11). This then is not said
on His account, but to deny that there is other such as the Father and His
Word.

CHAPTER XXIV: TEXTS EXPLAINED; EIGHTHLY, JOHN xvii. 3. AND THE LIKE.

Our Lord's divinity cannot interfere with His Father's prerogatives, as the
One God, which were so earnestly upheld by the Son. 'One' is used in
contrast to false gods and idols, not to the Son, through whom the Father
spoke. Our Lord adds His Name to the Father's, as included in Him. The
Father the First, not as if the Son were not First too, but as Origin.

   7. Now that this is the sense of the Prophet is clear and manifest to
all; but since the irreligious men, alleging such passages also, dishonour
the Lord and reproach us, saying, 'Behold God is said to be One and Only
and First; how say ye that the Son is God? for if He were God, He had not
said, "I Alone," nor "God is One(1);"' it is necessary to declare the sense
of these phrases in addition, as far as we can, that all may know from this
also that the Arians are really contending with God(2). If there then is
rivalry of the Son towards the Father, then be such words uttered against
Him; and if according to what is said to David concerning Adonijah and
Absalom(3), so also the Father looks upon the Son, then let Him utter and
urge such words against Himself, lest He the Son, calling Himself God, make
any to revolt from the Father. But if he who knows the Son, on the
contrary, knows the Father, the Son Himself revealing Him to him, and in
the Word he shall rather see the Father, as has been said, and if the Son
on coming, glorified not Himself but the Father, saying to one who came to
Him, 'Why callest thou Me good? none is good save One, that is, God(4);'
and to one who asked, what was the great commandment in the Law, answering,
'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is One Lords(5);' and saying to the
multitudes, 'I came down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will
of Him that sent Me(6);' and teaching the disciples, 'My Father is greater
than I,' and 'He that honoureth Me, honoureth Him that sent Me(7);' if the
Son is such towards His own Father, what is the difficulty(8), that one
must need take such a view of such passages? and on the other hand, if the
Son is the Father's Word, who is so wild, besides these Christ-opposers, as
to think that God has thus spoken, as traducing and denying His own Word?
This is not the mind of Christians; perish the thought; for not with
reference to the Son is it thus written, but for the denial of those
falsely called gods, invented by men.

   8. And this account of the meaning of such passages is satisfactory;
for since those who are devoted to gods falsely so called, revolt from the
True God, therefore God, being good and careful for mankind, recalling the
wanderers, says, 'I am Only God,' and 'I Am,' and 'Besides Me there is no
God,' and the like; that He may condemn things which are not, and may
convert all men to Himself. And as, supposing in the daytime when the sun
was shining, a man were rudely to paint a piece of wood, which had not even
the appearance of light, and call that image the cause of light, and if the
sun with regard to it were to say, 'I alone am the light of the clay, and
there is no other light of the day but I,' he would say this, with regard,
not to his own radiance, but to the error arising from the wooden image and
the dissimilitude of that vain representation; so it is with 'I am,' and 'I
am Only God,' and 'There is none other besides Me,' viz. that He may make
men renounce falsely called gods, and that they may recognise Him the true
God instead. Indeed when God said this, He said it through His own Word,
unless forsooth the modern(9) Jews add this too, that He has not said this
through His Word; but so hath He spoken, though they rave, these followers
of the devil(10). For the Word of the Lord came to the Prophet, and this
was what was heard; nor is there a thing which God says or does, but He
says and does it in the Word. Not then with reference to Him is this said,
O Christ's enemies, but to things foreign to Him and not from(11) Him. For
according to the aforesaid illustration, if the sun had spoken those words,
he would have been setting right the error and have so spoken, not as
having his radiance without him, but in the radiance shewing his own light.
Therefore not for the denial of the Son, nor with reference to Him, are
such passages, but to the overthrow of falsehood. Accordingly God spoke not
such words to Adam at the beginning, though His Word was with Him, by whom
all things came to be; for there was no need, before idols came in; but
when men made insurrection against the truth and named for themselves gods
such as they would(12), then it was that need arose of such words, for the
denial of gods that were not. Nay I would add, that they were said even in
anticipation of the folly of these Christ-opposers(13), that they might
know, that whatsoever god they devise external to the Father's Essence, he
is not True God, nor Image and Son of the Only and First.

   9. If then the Father be called the only true God, this is said not to
the denial of Him who said, 'I am the Truths(1),' but of those on the other
hand who by nature are not true, as the Father and His Word are. And hence
the Lord Himself added at once, 'And Jesus Christ whom Thou didst send(2).'
Now had He been a creature, He would not have added this, and ranked
Himself with His Creator (for what fellowship is there between the True and
the not true?); but as it is, by adding Himself to the Father, He has shewn
that He is of the Father's nature; and He has given us to know that of the
True Father He is True Offspring. And John too, as he had learned(3), so he
teaches this, writing in his Epistle, 'And we are in the True, even in His
Son Jesus Christ; This is the True God and eternal life(4).' And when the
Prophet says concerning the creation, 'That stretcheth forth the heavens
alone(5),' and when God says, 'I only stretch out the heavens,' it is made
plain to every one, that in the Only is signified also the Word of the
Only, in whom 'all things were made,' and without whom 'was made not one
thing.' Therefore, if they were made through the Word, and yet He says, 'I
Only,' and together with that Only is understood the Son, through whom the
heavens were made, so also then, if it be said, 'One God,' and "I Only,'
and 'I the First,' in that One and Only and First is understood the Word
coexisting, as in the Light the Radiance. And this can be understood of no
other than the Word alone. For all other things subsisted out of nothing
through the Son, and are greatly different in nature; but the Son Himself
is natural and true Offspring from the Father; and thus the very passage
which these insensates have thought fit to adduce, 'I the First,' in
defence of their heresy, doth rather expose their perverse spirit. For God
says, 'I the First and I the Last;' if then, as though ranked with the
things after Him, He is said to be first of them, so that they come next to
Him, then certainly you will have shewn that He Himself precedes the works
in time only(6); which, to go no further, is extreme irreligion; but if it
is in order to prove that He is not from any, nor any before Him, but that
lie is Origin and Cause of all things, and to destroy the Gentile fables,
that He has said 'I the First,' it is plain also, that when the Son is
called First-born, this is done not for the sake of ranking Him with the
creation, but to prove the framing and adoption of all things(7) through
the Son. For as the Father is First, so also is He both First(8), as Image
of the First, and because the First is in Him, and also Offspring from the
Father, in whom the whole creation is created and adopted into sonship.

CHAPTER XXV: TEXTS EXPLAINED; NINTHLY, JOHN x. 30; xvii. II, &c.

Arian explanation, that the Son is one with the Father in will and
judgment; but so are all good men, nay things inanimate; contrast of the
Son. Oneness between Them is in nature, because oneness in operation.
Angels not objects of prayer, because they do not work together with God,
but the Son; texts quoted. Seeing an Angel, is not seeing God. Arians in
fact hold two Gods, and tend to Gentile polytheism. Arian explanation that
the Father and Son are one as we are one with Christ, is put aside by the
Regula Fidei, and shewn invalid by the usage of Scripture in illustrations;
the true force of the comparison; force of the terms used. Force of 'in us;
'force of 'as; 'confirmed by S. John. In what sense we are 'in God' and His
'sons.'

   10. HOWEVER here too they introduce their private fictions, and contend
that the Son and the Father are not in such wise 'one,' or 'like,' as the
Church preaches, but, as they themselves would have it(1). For they say,
since what the Father wills, the Son wills also, and is not contrary either
in what He thinks or in what He judges, but is in all respects
concordant(2) with Him, declaring doctrines which are the same, and a word
consistent and united with the Father's teaching, therefore it is that He
and the Father are One; and some of them have dared to write as well as say
this(3). Now what can be more unseemly or irrational than this? for if
therefore the Son and the Father are One and if in this way the Word is
like the Father it follows forthwith(4) that the Angels(5) too, and the
other beings above us, Powers and Authorities, and Thrones and Dominions,
and what we see, Sun and Moon, and the Stars, should be sons also, as the
Son; and that it should be said of them too, that they and the Father are
one, and that each is God's Image and Word. For what God wills, that will
they; and neither in judging nor in doctrine are they discordant, but in
all things are obedient to their  Maker. For they would not have remained
in their own glory, unless, what the Father willed, that they had willed
also. He, for instance, who did not remain, but went astray, heard the
words, 'How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning(6)?'
But if this be so, how is only He Only-begotten Son and Word and Wisdom? or
how, whereas so many are like the Father. is He only an Image? for among
men too will be found many like the Father, numbers, for instance, of
martyrs, and before them the Apostles and Prophets, and again before them
the Patriarchs. And many now too keep the Saviour's command, being merciful
'as their Father which is in heaven(7),' and observing the exhortation, 'Be
ye therefore followers of God as dear children, and walk in love, as Christ
also hath loved us(8);' many too have become followers of Paul as he also
of Christ(8a). And yet no one of these is Word or Wisdom or Only-begotten
Son or Image; nor did any one of them make bold to say, 'I and the Father
are One,' or, 'I in the Father, and the Father in Me(9);' but it is said of
all of them, 'Who is like unto Thee among the gods, O Lord? and who shall
be likened to the Lord among the sons of Gods(10)?' and of Him on the
contrary that He only is Image true and natural of the Father. For though
we have been made after the Image(11), and called both image and glory of
God, yet not on our own account still, but for that Image and true Glory of
God inhabiting us, which is His Word, who was for us afterwards made flesh,
have we this grace of our designation.

   11. This their notion then being evidently unseemly and irrational as
well as the rest, the likeness and the oneness must be referred to the very
Essence of the Son; for unless it be so taken, He will not be shown to have
anything beyond things originate, as has been said, nor will He be like the
Father, but He will be like the Father's doctrines; and He differs from the
Father, in that the Father is Father(1), but the doctrines and teaching are
the Father's. If then in respect to the doctrines and the teaching the Son
is like the Father, then the Father according to them will be Father in
name only, and the Son will not be an exact Image, or rather will be seen
to have no propriety at all or likeness of the Father; for what likeness or
propriety has he who is so utterly different from the Father? for Paul
taught like the Saviour, yet was not like Him in essence(2).' Having then
such notions, they speak falsely; whereas the Son and the Father are one in
such wise as has been said, and in such wise is the Son like the Father
Himself and from Him, as we may see and understand son to be towards
father, and as we may see the radiance towards the sun. Such then being the
Son, therefore when the Son works, the Father is the Worker(3), and the Son
coming to the Saints, the Father is He who cometh in the Son(4), as He
promised when He said, 'I and My Father will come, and will make Our abode
with hire(5);' for in the Image is contemplated the Father, and in the
Radiance is the Light. Therefore also, as we said just now, when the Father
gives grace and peace, the Son also gives it, as Paul signifies in every
Epistle, writing, 'Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ.' For one and the same grace is from the Father in the Son, as
the light of the sun and of the radiance is one, and as the sun's
illumination is effected through the radiance; and so too when he prays for
the Thessalonians, in saying,' Now God Himself even our Father, and the
Lord Jesus Christ, may He direct our way unto you(6),' he has guarded the
unity of the Father and of the Son. For he has not said, 'May they direct,'
as if a double grace were given from two Sources, This and That, but 'May
He direct,' to shew that the Father gives it through the Son;--at which
these irreligious ones will not blush, though they well might.

   12. For if there were no unity, nor the Word the own Offspring of the
Father's Essence, as the radiance of the light, but the Son were divided in
nature from the Father, it were sufficient that the Father alone should
give, since none of originate things is a partner with his Maker in His
givings; but, as it is, such a mode of giving shews the oneness of the
Father and the Son. No one, for instance, would pray to receive from God
and the Angels(1), or from any other creature, nor would any one say, 'May
God and the Angel give thee; 'but from Father and the Son, because of Their
oneness and the oneness of Their giving. For through the Son is given what
is given; and there is nothing but the Father operates it through the Son;
for thus is grace secure to him who receives it. And if the Patriarch
Jacob, blessing his grandchildren Ephraim and Manasses, said, 'God which
fed me all my life long unto this day, the Angel which delivered me from
all evil, bless the lads(2),' yet none of created and natural Angels did he
join to God their Creator, nor rejecting God that fed him, did he from
Angel ask the blessing on his grandsons; but in saying, Who delivered me
from all evil,' he shewed that it was no created Angel, but the Word of
God, whom he joined to the Father in his prayer, through whom, whomsoever
He will, God doth deliver. For knowing that He is also called the Father's
'Angel of great Counsel(3),' he said that none other than He was the Giver
of blessing, and Deliverer from evil Nor was it that he desired a blessing
for himself from God but for his grandchildren from the Angel, but whom He
Himself had besought saying, 'I will not let Thee go except Thou bless
me(4)' (for that was God, as he says himself, 'I have seen God face to
face'), Him he prayed to bless also the sons of Joseph. It is proper then
to an Angel to minister at the command of God, and often does he go forth
to cast out the Amorite, and is sent to guard the people in the way; but
these are not his doings, but of God who commanded and sent him, whose also
it is to deliver, whom He will deliver. Therefore it was no other than the
Lord God Himself whom he had seen, who said to him, 'And behold I am with
thee, to guard thee in all the way whither thou[5] goest;' and it was no
other than God whom lie had seen, who kept Laban from his treachery,
ordering him not to speak evil words to Jacob; and none other than God did
he himself beseech, saying, 'Rescue me from the hand of my brother Esau,
for I fear him[6];' for in conversation too with his wives he said, 'God
hath not suffered Laban to injure me.'

   13. Therefore it was none other than God Himself that David too
besought concerning his deliverance, 'When I was in trouble, I called upon
the Lord, and He heard me; deliver my soul, O  Lord, from lying lips and
from a deceitful tongue[1].' To Him also giving thanks he spoke the words
of the Song in the seventeenth Psalm, in the day in which the Lord
delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul,
saying, 'I will love Thee, O Lord my strength; the Lord is my strong rock
and my defence and deliverer[2].' And Paul, after enduring many
persecutions, to none other than God gave thanks, saying, 'Out of them all
the Lord delivered me; and He will deliver in Whom we trust[3].' And none
other than God blessed Abraham and Isaac; and Isaac praying for Jacob,
said, 'May God bless thee and increase thee and multiply thee, and thou
shall be for many companies of nations, and may He give thee the blessing
of Abraham my father[4].' But if it belong to none other than God to bless
and to deliver, and none other was the deliverer of Jacob than the Lord
Himself and Him that delivered him the Patriarch besought for his
grandsons, evidently none other did he join to God in his prayer, than
God's Word, whom therefore he called Angel, because it is He alone who
reveals the Father. Which the Apostle also did when he said, 'Grace unto
you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ[4a].' For thus
the blessing was secure, because of the Son's indivisibility from the
Father, and for that the grace given by Them is one and the same. For
though the Father gives it, through the Son is the gift; and though the Son
be said to vouchsafe it, it is the Father who supplies it through and in
the Son; for 'I thank my God,' says the Apostle writing to the Corinthians,
'always on your behalf, for the grace of God which is given yon in Christ
Jesus[5].' And this one may see in the instance of light and radiance; for
what the light enlightens, that the radiance irradiates; and what the
radiance irradiates, from the light is its enlightenment. So also when the
Son is beheld, so is the Father, for lie is the Father's radiance; and thus
the Father and the Son are one.

   14. But this is not so with things originate and creatures; for when
the Father works, it is not that any Angel works, or any other creature;
for none of these is an efficient cause[1], but they are of things which
come to be; and moreover being separate and divided from the only God, and
other in nature, and being works, they can neither work what God works,
nor, as I said before, when God gives grace, can they give grace with Him.
Nor, on seeing an Angel would a man say that he had seen the Father; for
Angels, as it is written, are 'ministering spirits sent forth to
minister[2],' and are heralds of gifts given by Him through the Word to
those who receive them. And the Angel on his appearance, himself confesses
that he has been sent by his Lord; as Gabriel confessed in the case of
Zacharias, and also in the case of Mary, bearer of God[3]. And he who
beholds a vision of Angels, knows that he has seen the Angel and not God.
For Zacharias saw an Angel; and Isaiah saw the Lord. Manoah, the father of
Samson, saw an Angel; but Moses beheld God. Gideon saw an Angel, but to
Abraham appeared God. And neither he who saw God, beheld an Angel, nor he
who saw an Angel, considered that he saw God; for greatly, or rather
wholly, do things by nature originate differ from God the Creator. But if
at any time, when the Angel was seen, he who saw it heard God's voice, as
took place at the bush; for 'the Angel of the Lord was seen in a flame of
fire out of the bush, and the Lord called Moses out of the bush, saying, I
am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the
God of Jacob[4],' yet was not the Angel the God of Abraham, but in the
Angel God spoke. And what was seen was an Angel; but God spoke in him[5].
For as He spoke to Moses in the pillar of a cloud in the tabernacle, so
also God appears and speaks in Angels. So again to the son of Nun He spake
by an Angel. But what God speaks, it is very plain He speaks through the
Word, and not through another. And the Word, as being not separate from the
Father, nor unlike and foreign to the Father's Essence, what He works,
those are the Father's works, and His framing of all things is one with
His; and what the Son gives, that is the Father's gift. And he who hath
seen the Son, knows that, in seeing Him, he has seen, not Angel, nor one
merely greater than Angels, nor in short any creature, but the Father
Himself. And he who hears the Word, knows that he hears the Father; as he
who is irradiated by the radiance, knows that he is enlightened by the sun.

   15. For divine Scripture wishing us thus to understand the matter, has
given such illustrations, as we have said above, from which we are able
both to press the traitorous Jews, and to refute the allegation of Gentiles
who maintain and think, on account of the Trinity, that we profess many
gods[6]. For, as the illustration shows, we do not introduce three Origins
or three Fathers, as the followers of Marcion and Manich'us; since we have
not suggested the image of three suns, but sun and radiance. And one is the
light from the sun in the radiance; and so we know of but one origin; and
the All- framing Word we profess to have no other manner of godhead, than
that of the Only God, because He is born from Him. Rather then will the
Ario-maniacs with reason incur the charge of polytheism or else of
atheism[7], because they idly talk of the Son as external and a creature,
and again the Spirit as from nothing. For either they will say that the
Word is not God; or saying that He is God[8], because it is so written, but
not proper to the Father's Essence, they will introduce many because of
their difference of kind (unless forsooth they shall dare to say that by
participation only, He, as all things else, is called God; though, if this
be their sentiment, their irreligion is the same, since they consider the
Word as one among all things). But let this never even come into our mind.
For there is but one form[9] of Godhead, which is also in the Word; and one
God, the Father, existing by Himself according as He is above all, and
appearing in the Son according as He pervades all things, and in the Spirit
according as in Him He acts in all things through the Word[10]. For thus we
confess God to be one through the Triad, and we say that it is much more
religious than the godhead of the heretics with its many kinds[11], and
many parts, to entertain a belief of the One Godhead in a Triad.

   16. For if it be not so, but the Word is a creature and a work out of
nothing, either He is not True God because He is Himself one of the
creatures, or if they name Him God from regard for the Scriptures, they
must of necessity say that there are two Gods[1], one Creator, the other
creature, and must serve two Lords, one Unoriginate, and the other
originate and a creature; and must have two faiths, one in the True God,
and the other in one who is made and fashioned by themselves and called
God. And it follows of necessity in so great blindness, that, when they
worship the Unoriginate, they renounce the originate, and when they come to
the creature, they turn from the Creator. For they cannot see the One in
the Other, because their natures and operations are foreign and
distinct[2]. And with such sentiments, they will certainly be going on to
more gods, for this will be the essay[3] of those who revolt from the One
God. Wherefore then, when the Arians have these speculations and views, do
they not rank themselves with the Gentiles? for they too, as these, worship
the creature rather than God the Creator of all[4], and though they shrink
from the Gentile name, in order to deceive the unskilful, yet they secretly
hold a like sentiment with them. For their subtle saying which they are
accustomed to urge, We say not two Unoriginates[5],' they plainly say to
deceive the simple; for in their very professing 'We say not two
Unoriginates,' they imply two Gods, and these with different natures, one
originate and one Unoriginate. And though the Greeks worship one
Unoriginate and many originate, but these one Unoriginate and one
originate, this is no difference from them; for the God whom they call
originate is one out of many, and again the many gods of the Greeks have
the same nature with this one, for both he and they are creatures. Unhappy
are they, and the more for that their hurt is from thinking against Christ;
for they have fallen from the truth, and are greater traitors than the Jews
in denying the Christ, and they wallow[6] with the Gentiles, hateful[7] as
they are to God, worshipping the creature and many deities. For there is
One God, and not many, and One is His Word, and not many; for the Word is
God, and He alone has the Form[8] of the Father. Being then such, the
Saviour Himself troubled the Jews with these words, 'The Father Himself
which hath sent Me, hath borne witness of Me; ye have neither heard His
voice at any time nor seen His Form; and ye have not His Word abiding in
you; for whom He hath sent, Him ye believe not[9].' Suitably has He joined
the 'Word' to the 'Form,' to shew that the Word of God is Himself Image and
Expression and Form of His Father; and that the Jews who did not receive
Him who spoke to them, thereby did not receive the Word, which is the Form
of God. This too it was that the Patriarch Jacob having seen, received a
blessing from Him and the name of Israel instead of Jacob, as divine
Scripture witnesses, saying, 'And as he passed by the Form of God, the Sun
rose upon him[10].' And This it was who said, 'He that hath seen Me hath
seen the Father,' and, 'I in the Father and the Father in Me,' and, 'I and
the Father are one[11];' for thus God is One, and one the faith in the
Father and Son; for, though the Word be God, the Lord our God is one Lord;
for the Son is proper to that One, and inseparable according to the
propriety and peculiarity of His Essence.

   17. The Arians, however, not even thus abashed, reply, 'Not as you say,
but as we will[1];' for, whereas you have overthrown our former expedients,
we have invented a new one, and it is this:--So are the Son and the Father
One, and so is the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father, as we too
may become one in Him. For this is written in the Gospel according to John,
and Christ desired it for us in these words, 'Holy Father, keep through
Thine own Name, those whom Thou hast given Me, that they may be one, as We
are[2].' And shortly after; 'Neither pray I for these alone, but for them
also which shall believe on Me through their Word; that they all may be
one, as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one
in Us, that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me. And the glory
which Thou gavest Me I have given them, that they may be one, even as We
are one; I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one,
and that the world may know that Thou didst send Me[3].' Then, as having
found an evasion, these men of craft[4] add, 'If, as we become one in the
Father, so also He and the Father are one, and thus He too is in the
Father, how pretend you from His saying, "I and the Father are One," and "I
in the Father and the Father in Me," that He is proper and like[5] the
Father's Essence? for it follows either that we too are proper to the
Father's Essence, or He foreign to it, as we are foreign.' Thus they idly
babble; but in this their perverseness I see nothing but unreasoning
audacity and recklessness from the devil[6], since it is saying after his
pattern, 'We will ascend to heaven, we will be like the Most High.' For
what is given to man by grace, this they would make equal to the Godhead of
the Giver. Thus hearing that men are called sons, they thought themselves
equal to the True Son by nature such[7]. And now again bearing from the
Saviour, 'that they may be one as We are[8],' they deceive themselves, and
are arrogant enough to think that they may be such as the Son is in the
Father and the Father in the Son; not considering the fall of their 'father
the devil[9],' which happened upon such an imagination.

   18. If then, as we have many times said, the Word of God is the same
with us, and nothing differs from us except in time, let Him be like us,
and have the same place with the Father as we have; nor let Him be called
Only-begotten, nor Only Word or Wisdom of the Father; but let the same name
be of common application to all us who are like Him. For it is right, that
they who have one nature, should have their name in common, though they
differ from each other in point of time. For Adam was a man, and Paul a
man, and he who is now born is a man, and time is not that which alters the
nature of the race[1]. If then the Word also differs from us only in time,
then we must be as He. But in truth neither we are Word or Wisdom, nor is
He creature or work; else why are we all sprung from one, and He the Only
Word? but though it be suitable in them thus to speak, in us at least it is
unsuitable to entertain their blasphemies. And yet, needless[2] though it
be to refine upon[3] these passages, considering their so clear and
religious sense, and our own orthodox belief, yet that their irreligion may
be shewn here also, come let us shortly, as we have received from the
fathers, expose their heterodoxy from the passage. It is a custom[4] with
divine Scripture to take the things of nature as images and illustrations
for mankind; and this it does, that from these physical objects the moral
impulses of man may be explained; and thus their conduct shewn to be either
bad or righteous. For instance, in the case of the bad, as when it charges,
'Be ye not like to horse and mule which have no understanding[5].' Or as
when it says, complaining of those who have become such, 'Man, being in
honour, hath no understanding, but is compared unto the beasts that
perish.' And again, 'They were as wanton horses[6].' And the Saviour to
expose Herod said, 'Tell that fox[7];' but, on the other hand, charged His
disciples, 'Behold I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves; be ye
therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves[8].' And He said this, not
that we may become in nature beasts of burden, or become serpents and
doves; for He hath not so made us Himself, and therefore nature does not
allow of it; but that we might eschew the irrational motions of the one,
and being aware of the wisdom of that other animal, might not be deceived
by it, and might take on us the meekness of the dove.

   19. Again, taking patterns for man from divine subjects, the Saviour
says; 'Be ye merciful, as your Father which is in heaven is merciful[1];'
and, 'Be ye perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect[2].' And He said
this too, not that we might become such as the Father; for to become as the
Father, is impossible for us creatures, who have been brought to be out of
nothing; but as He charged us, 'Be ye not like to horse,' not lest we
should become as draught animals, but that we should not imitate their want
of reason, so, not that we might become as God, did He say, 'Be ye merciful
as your Father,' but that looking at His beneficent acts, what we do well,
we might do, not for men's sake, but for His sake, so that from Him and not
from men we may have the reward. For as, although there be one Son by
nature, True and Only-begotten, we too become sons, not as He in nature and
truth, but according to the grace of Him that calleth, and though we are
men from the earth, are yet called gods[3], not as the True God or His
Word, but as has pleased God who has given us that grace; so also, as God
do we become merciful, not by being made equal to God, nor becoming in
nature and truth benefactors (for it is not our gift to benefit but belongs
to God), but in order that what has accrued to us from God Himself by
grace, these things we may impart to others, without making distinctions,
but largely towards all extending our kind service. For only in this way
can we anyhow become imitators, and in no other, when we minister to others
what comes from Him. And as we put a fair and right[4] sense upon these
texts, such again is the sense of the lection in John. For he does not say,
that, as the Son is in the Father, such we must become:--whence could it
be? when He is God's Word and Wisdom, and we were fashioned out of the
earth, and He is by nature and essence Word and true God (for thus speaks
John, 'We know that the Son of God is come, and He hath given us an
understanding to know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true,
even in His Son Jesus Christ; this is the true God and eternal life[5]),
and we are made sons through Him by adoption and grace, as partaking of His
Spirit (for 'as many as received Him,' he says, 'to them gave He power to
become children of God, even to them that believe on His Name[6]), and
therefore also He is the Truth (saying, 'I am the Truth,' and in His
address to His Father, He said, 'Sanctify them through Thy Truth, Thy Word
is Truth[7]'); but we by imitation[8] become virtuous[9] and sons:--
therefore not that we might become such as He, did He say 'that they may be
one as We are;' but that as He, being the Word, is in His own Father, so
that we too, taking an examplar and looking at Him, might become one
towards each other in concord and oneness of spirit, nor be at variance as
the Corinthians, but mind the same thing, as those five thousand in the
Acts[10], who were as one.

   20. For it is as 'sons,' not as the Son; as 'gods,' not as He Himself;
and not as the Father, but 'merciful as the Father.' And, as has been said,
by so becoming one, as the Father and the Son, we shall be such, not as the
Father is by nature in the Son and the Son in the Father, but according to
our own nature, and as it is possible for us thence to be moulded and to
learn how we ought to be one, just as we learned also to be merciful. For
like things are naturally one with like; thus all flesh is ranked together
in kind[1]; but the Word is unlike us and like the Father. And therefore,
while He is in nature and truth one with His own Father, we, as being of
one kind with each other (for from one were all made, and one is the nature
of all men), become one with each other in good disposition[2], having as
our copy the Son's natural unity with the Father. For as He taught us
meekness from Himself, saying, 'Learn of Me for I am meek and lowly in
heart[3],' not that we may become equal to Him, which is impossible, but
that looking towards Him, we may remain meek continually, so also here
wishing that our good disposition towards each other should be true and
firm and indissoluble, from Himself taking the pattern, He says, 'that they
may be one as We are,' whose oneness is indivisible; that is, that they
learning from us of that indivisible Nature, may preserve in like manner
agreement one with another. And this imitation of natural conditions is
especially safe for man, as has been said; for, since they remain and never
change, whereas the conduct of men is very changeable, one may look to what
is unchangeable by nature, and avoid what is bad and remodel himself on
what is best.

   21. And for this reason also the words, 'that they may be one in Us,'
have a right sense. If, for instance, it were possible for us to become as
the Son in the Father, the words ought to run, 'that they may be one in
Thee,' as the Son is in the Father; but, as it is, He has not said this;
but by saying 'in Us' He has pointed out the distance and difference; that
He indeed is alone in the Father alone, as Only Word and Wisdom; but we in
the Son, and through Him in the Father. And thus speaking, He meant this
only, 'By Our unity may they also be so one with each other, as We are one
in nature and truth; for otherwise they could not be one, except by
learning unity in Us.' And that 'in Us' has this signification, we may
learn from Paul, who says, 'These things I have in a figure transferred to
myself and to Apollos, that ye may learn in us not to be puffed up above
that is written[1].' The words 'in Us' then, are not 'in the Father,' as
the Son is in Him; but imply an example and image, instead of saying, 'Let
them learn of Us.' For as Paul to the Corinthians, so is the oneness of the
Son and the Father a pattern and lesson to all, by which they may learn,
looking to that natural unity of the Father and the Son, how they
themselves ought to be one in spirit towards each other. Or if it needs to
account for the phrase otherwise, the words 'in Us' may mean the same as
saying, that in the power of the Father and the Son they may be one,
speaking the same things[2]; for without God this is impossible. And this
mode of speech also we may find in the divine writings, as 'In God will we
do great acts;' and 'In God I shall leap over the walls;' and 'In Thee will
we tread down our enemies[4].' Therefore it is plain, that in the Name of
Father and Son we shall be able, becoming one, to hold firm the bond of
charity. For, dwelling still on the same thought, the Lord says, 'And the
glory which Thou gavest Me, I have given to them, that they may be one as
We are one.' Suitably has He here too said, not, 'that they may be in Thee
as I am,' but 'as We are;' now he who says 'as'[5], signifies not identity,
but an image and example of the matter in hand.

   22. The Word then has the real and true identity of nature with the
Father; but to us it is given to imitate it, as has been said; for He
immediately adds,' I in them and Thou in Me; that they may be made perfect
in one.' Here at length the Lord asks something greater and more perfect
for us; for it is plain that the Word has come to be in us[6], for He has
put on our body. 'And Thou Father in Me;' 'for I am Thy Word, and since
Thou art in Me, because I am Thy Word, and I in them because of the body,
and because of Thee the salvation of men is perfected in Me, therefore I
ask that they also may become one, according to the body that is in Me and
according to its perfection; that they too may become perfect, having
oneness with It, and having become one in It; that, as if all were carried
by Me, all may be one body and one spirit, and may grow up unto a perfect
man[7].' For we all, partaking of the Same, become one body, having the one
Lord in ourselves. The passage then having this meaning, still more plainly
is refuted the heterodoxy of Christ's enemies. I repeat it; if He had said
simply and absolutely[8] 'that they may be one in Thee,' or 'that they and
I may be one in Thee,' God's enemies had had some plea, though a shameless
one; but in fact He has not spoken simply, but, 'As Thou, Father, in Me,
and I in Thee, that they may be all one.' Moreover, using the word 'as,' He
signifies those who become distantly as He is in the Father; distantly not
in place but in nature; for in place nothing is far from God[9], but in
nature only all things are far from Him. And, as I said before, whose uses
the particle 'as' implies, not identity, nor equality, but a pattern of the
matter in question, viewed in a certain respect[10].

   23. Indeed we may learn also from the Saviour Himself, when He says,
'For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale's belly, so
shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the
earth[1].' For Jonah was not as the Saviour, nor did Jonah go down to
hades; nor was the whale hades; nor did Jonah, when swallowed up, bring up
those who had before been swallowed by the whale, but he alone came forth,
when the whale was bidden. Therefore there is no identity nor equality
signified in the term 'as,' but one thing and another; and it shews a
certain kind[2] of parallel in the case of Jonah, on account of the three
days. In like manner then we too, when the Lord says 'as,' neither become
as the Son in the Father, nor as the Father is in the Son. For we become
one as the Father and the Son in mind and agreement[3] of spirit, and the
Saviour will be as Jonah in the earth; but as the Saviour is not Jonah,
nor, as he was swallowed up, so did the Saviour descend into hades, but it
is but a parallel, in like manner, if we too become one, as the Son in the
Father, we shall not be as the Son, nor equal to Him; for He and we are but
parallel. For on this account is the word 'as' applied to us; since things
differing from others in nature, become as they, when viewed in a certain
relation[5]. Wherefore the Son Himself, simply and without any condition is
in the Father; for this attribute He has by nature; but for us, to whom it
is not natural, there is needed an image and example, that He may say of
us, ' As Thou in Me, and I in Thee.' 'And when they shall be so perfected,'
He says, 'then the world knows that Thou hast sent Me, for unless I had
come and borne this their body, no one of them had been perfected, but one
and all had remained corruptible[6] Work Thou then in them, O Father, and
as Thou hast given to Me to bear this, grant to them Thy Spirit, that they
too in It may become one, and may be perfected in Me. For their perfecting
shews that Thy Word has sojourned among them; and the world seeing them
perfect and full of God[7], will believe altogether that Thou hast sent Me,
and I have sojourned here. For whence is this their perfecting, but that I,
Thy Word, having borne their body, and become man, have perfected the work,
which Thou gavest Me, O Father? And the work is perfected, because men,
redeemed from sin, no longer remain dead; but being deified[8], have in
each other, by looking at Me, the bond of charity[9].'

   24. We then, by way of giving a rude view of the expressions in this
passage, have been led into many words, but blessed John will shew from his
Epistle the sense of the words, concisely and much more perfectly than we
can. And he will both disprove the interpretation of these irreligious men,
and will teach how we become in God and God in us; and bow again we become
One in Him, and how far the Son differs in nature from us, and will stop
the Arians from any longer thinking that they shall be as the Son, lest
they hear it said to them, 'Thou art a man and not God,' and Stretch not
thyself, being poor, beside a rich man[1].' John then thus writes; 'Hereby
know we that we dwell in Him and He in us, because He hath given us of His
Spirit[2].' Therefore because of the grace of the Spirit which has been
given to us, in Him we come to be, and He in us[3]; and since it is the
Spirit of God, therefore through His becoming in us, reasonably are we, as
having the Spirit, considered to be in God, and thus is God in us. Not then
as the Son in the Father, so also we become in the Father; for the Son does
not merely partake the Spirit, that therefore He too may be in the Father;
nor does He receive the Spirit, but rather He supplies It Himself to all;
and the Spirit does not unite the Word to the Father[4], but rather the
Spirit receives from the Word. And the Son is in the Father, as His own
Word and Radiance; but we, apart from the Spirit, are strange and distant
from God, and by the participation of the Spirit we are knit into the
Godhead; so that our being in the Father is not ours, but is the Spirit's
which is in us and abides in us, while by the true confession we preserve
it in us, John again saying, 'Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son
of God, God dwelleth in him and he in Gods[5].' What then is our likeness
and equality), to the Son? rather, are not the Arians confuted on every
side? and especially by John, that the Son is in the Father in one way, and
we become in Him in another, and that neither we shall ever be as He, nor
is the Word as we; except they shall dare, as commonly, so now to say, that
the Son also by participation of the Spirit and by improvement of
conduct[6] came to be Himself also in the Father. But here again is an
excess of irreligion, even in admitting the thought. For He, as has been
said, gives to the Spirit, and whatever the Spirit hath, He hath from[7]
the Word.

   25. The Saviour, then, saying of us, 'As Thou, Father, art in Me, and I
in Thee, that they too may be one in Us,' does not signify that we were to
have identity with Him; for this was shewn from the instance of Jonah; but
it is a request to the Father, as John has written, that the Spirit should
be vouchsafed through Him to those who believe, through whom we are found
to be in God, and in this respect to be conjoined in Him. For since the
Word is in the Father, and the Spirit is given from[1] the Word, He wills
that we should receive the Spirit, that, when we receive It, thus having
the Spirit of the Word which is in the Father, we too may be found on
account of the Spirit to become One in the Word, and through Him in the
Father. And if He say, 'as we,' this again is only a request that such
grace of the Spirit as is given to the disciples may be without failure or
revocation[2]. For what the Word has by nature[3], as I said, in the
Father, that He wishes to be given to us through the Spirit irrevocably;
which the Apostle knowing, said, 'Who shall separate us from the love of
Christ?' for 'the gifts of God' and 'grace of His calling are without
repentance[4].' It is the Spirit then which is in God, and not we viewed in
our own selves; and as we are sons and gods[5] because of the Word in
us[6], so we shall be in the Son and in the Father, and we shall be
accounted to have become one in Son and in Father, because that that Spirit
is in us, which is in the Word which is in the Father. When then a man
falls from the Spirit for any wickedness, if he repent upon his fall, the
grace remains irrevocably to such as are willing[7]; otherwise he who has
fallen is no longer in God (because that Holy Spirit and Paraclete which is
in God has deserted him), but the sinner shall be in him to whom he has
subjected himself, as took place in Saul's instance; for the Spirit of God
departed from him and an evil spirit was afflicting him[8]. God's enemies
hearing this ought to be henceforth abashed, and no longer to feign
themselves equal to God. But they neither understand (for 'the
irreligious,' he saith, 'does not understand knowledge'[9]) nor endure
religious words, but find them heavy even to hear.

CHAPTER XXVI: INTRODUCTORY TO TEXTS FROM THE GOSPELS ON THE INCARNATION.

Enumeration of texts still to be explained. Arians compared to the Jews. We
must recur to the Regula Fidei. Our Lord did not come into, but became,
man, and therefore had the acts and affections of the flesh. The same works
divine and human. Thus the flesh was purified, and men were made immortal.
Reference to I Pet. iv. I.

   26. FOR behold, as if not wearied in their words of irreligion, but
hardened with Pharaoh, while they hear and see the Saviour's human
attributes in the Gospels[1], they have utterly forgotten, like the
Samosatene, the Son's paternal Godhead[2], and with arrogant and audacious
tongue they say, 'How can the Son be from the Father by nature, and be like
Him in essence, who says, 'All power is given unto Me;' and 'The Father
judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son;' and 'The
Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into His hand; he that
believeth in the Son hath everlasting life;' and again, 'All things were
delivered unto Me of My Father, and no one knoweth the Father save the Son,
and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him;' and again, 'All that the
Father hath given unto Me, shall come to Me[3].' On this they observe, 'If
He was, as ye say, Son by nature, He had no need to receive, but He had by
nature as a Son.' "Or how can He be the natural and true Power of the
Father, who near upon the season of the passion says, 'Now is My soul
troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save Me from this hour; but for
this came I unto this hour. Father, glorify Thy Name. Then came there a
voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it
again[4].' And He said the same another time; 'Father, if it be possible,
let this cup pass from Me;' and 'When Jesus had thus said, He was troubled
in spirit and testified and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, that one
of you shall betray Me[5].'" Then these perverse men argue; 'If He were
Power, He had not feared, but rather He had supplied power to others.'
Further they say; 'If He were by nature the true and own Wisdom of the
Father, how is it written, 'And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and
in favour with God and man[6]?' In like manner, when He had come into the
parts of Caesarea Philippi, He asked the disciples whom men said that He
was; and when He was at Bethany He asked where Lazarus lay; and He said
besides to His disciples, 'How many loaves have ye[7]? How then,' say they,
'is He Wisdom, who increased in wisdom and was ignorant of what He asked of
others?' This too they urge; "How can He be the own Word of the Father,
without whom the Father never was, through whom He makes all things, as ye
think, who said upon the Cross 'My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?'
and before that had prayed, 'Glorify Thy Name,' and, 'O Father, glorify
Thou Me with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was.' And He
used to pray in the deserts and charge His disciples to pray lest they
should enter into temptation; and, 'The spirit indeed is willing,' He said,
'but the flesh is weak.' And, 'Of that day and that hour knoweth no man,
no, nor the Angels, neither the Son[8].'" Upon this again say the miserable
men, "If the Son were, according to your interpretation[9], eternally
existent with God, He had not been ignorant of the Day, but had known as
Word; nor had been forsaken as being coexistent; nor had asked to receive
glory, as having it in the Father; nor would have prayed at all; for, being
the Word, He had needed nothing; but since He is a creature and one of
things originate, therefore He thus spoke, and needed what He had not; for
it is proper to creatures to require and to need what they have not."

   27. This then is what the irreligious men allege in their discourses;
and if they thus argue, they might consistently speak yet more daringly;
'Why did the Word become flesh at all?' and they might add; 'For how could
He, being God, become man?' or, 'How could the Immaterial bear a body?' or
they might speak with Caiaphas still more Judaically, 'Wherefore at all did
Christ, being a man, make Himself God[1]?' for this and the like the Jews
then muttered when they saw, and now the Ariomaniacs disbelieve when they
read, and have fallen away into blasphemies. If then a man should carefully
parallel the words of these and those, he will of a certainty find them
both arriving at the same unbelief, and the daring of their irreligion
equal, and their dispute with us a common one. For the Jews said; 'How,
being a man, can He be God?' And the Arians, 'If He were very God from God,
how could He become man?' And the Jews were offended then and mocked,
saying, 'Had He been Son of God, He had not endured the 'Cross;' and the
Arians standing over against them, urge upon us, 'How dare ye say that He
is the Word proper to the Father's Essence, who had a body, so as to endure
all this?' Next, while the Jews sought to kill the Lord, because He said
that God was His own Father and made Himself equal to Him, as working what
the Father works, the Arians also, not only have learned to deny, both that
He is equal to God and that God is the own and natural Father of the Word,
but those who hold this they seek to kill. Again, whereas the Jews said,
'Is not this the Son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how then
is it that He saith, Before Abraham was, I am, and I came down from
heaven[2]?' the Arians on the other hand make response[3] and say
conformably, 'How can He be Word or God who slept as man, and wept, and
inquired?' Thus both parties deny the Eternity and Godhead of the Word in
consequence of those human attributes which the Saviour took on Him by
reason of that flesh which He bore.

   28. Such error then being Judaic, and Judaic after the mind of Judas
the traitor, let them openly confess themselves scholars of Caiaphas and
Herod, instead of cloking Judaism with the name of Christianity, and let
them deny outright, as we have said before, the Saviour's appearance in the
flesh, for this doctrine is akin to their heresy; or if they fear openly to
Judaize and be circumcised[4], from servility towards Constantius and for
their sake whom they have beguiled, then let them not say what the Jews
say; for if they disown the name, let them in fairness renounce the,
doctrine. For we are Christians, O Arians, Christians we; our privilege is
it well to know the Gospels concerning the Saviour, and neither, with Jews
to stone Him, if we hear of His Godhead and Eternity, nor with you to
stumble at such lowly sayings as He may speak for our sakes as man. If then
you would become Christians[5], put off Arius's madness, and cleanse[6]
with the words of religion those ears of yours which blaspheming has
defiled; knowing that, by ceasing to be Arians, you will cease also from
the malevolence of the present Jews. Then at once will truth shine on you
out of darkness, and ye will no longer reproach us with holding two
Eternals[7], but ye will yourselves acknowledge that the Lord is God's true
Son by nature, and not as merely eternal[8], but revealed as co-existing in
the Father's eternity. For there are things called eternal of which He is
Framer; for in the twenty-third Psalm it is written, 'Lift up your gates, O
ye rulers, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting gates[9];' and it is plain
that through Him these things were made; but if even of things everlasting
He is the Framer, who of us shall be able henceforth to dispute that He is
anterior to those things eternal, and in consequence is proved to be Lord
not so much from His eternity, as in that lie is God's Son; for being the
Son, He is inseparable from the Father, and never was there when He was
not, but He was always; and being the Father's Image and Radiance, He has
the Father's eternity. Now what has been briefly said above may suffice to
shew their misunderstanding of the passages they then alleged; and that of
what they now allege from the Gospels they certainly give an unsound
interpretation[10], we may easily see, if we now consider the scope[11] of
that faith which we Christians hold, and using it as a rule, apply
ourselves, as the Apostle teaches, to the reading of inspired Scripture.
For Christ's enemies, being ignorant of this scope, have wandered from the
way of truth, and have stumbled[12] on a stone of stumbling, thinking
otherwise than they should think.

   29. Now the scope and character of Holy Scripture, as we have often
said, is this,--it contains a double account of the Saviour; that He was
ever God, and is the Son, being the Father's Word and Radiance and
Wisdom[1]; and that afterwards for us He took flesh of a Virgin, Mary
Bearer of God[2], and was made man. And this scope is to be found
throughout inspired Scripture, as the Lord Himself has said, 'Search the
Scriptures, for they are they which testify of Me[3].' But lest I should
exceed in writing, by bringing together all the passages on the subject,
let it suffice to mention as a specimen, first John saying, 'In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and
without Him was made not one thing[4];' next, 'And the Word was made flesh
and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of one Only-
begotten from the Fathers[5];' and next Paul writing, 'Who being in the
form of God, thought it not a prize to be equal with God, but emptied
Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men,
and being found in fashion like a man, He humbled Himself, becoming
obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross[6].' Any one, beginning
with these passages and going through the whole of the Scripture upon the
interpretation[7] which they suggest, will perceive how in the beginning
the Father said to Him, 'Let there be light,' and 'Let there be a
firmament,' and 'Let us make man[8];' but in fulness of the ages, He sent
Him into the world, not that He might judge the world, but that the world
by Him might be saved, and how it is written 'Behold, the Virgin shall be
with child, and shall bring forth a Son, and they shall call his Name
Emmanuel, which, being interpreted, is God with us[9].'

   30. The reader then of divine Scripture may acquaint himself with these
passages from the ancient books; and from the Gospels on the other hand he
will perceive that the Lord became man; for 'the Word,' he says, 'became
flesh, and dwelt among us[1].' And He became man, and did not come into
man; for this it is necessary to know, lest perchance these irreligious men
fall into this notion also, and beguile any into thinking, that, as in
former times the Word was used to come into each of the Saints, so now He
sojourned in a man, hallowing him also, and manifesting[10] Himself as in
the others. For if it were so, and He only appeared in a man, it were
nothing strange, nor had those who saw Him been startled, saying, Whence is
He? and wherefore dost Thou, being a man, make Thyself God? for they were
familiar with the idea, from the words, 'And the Word of the Lord came' to
this or that of the Prophets[2]. But now, since the Word of God, by whom
all things came to be, endured to become also Son of man, and humbled
Himself, taking a servant's form, therefore to the Jews the Cross of Christ
is a scandal, but to us Christ is 'God's power' and 'God's wisdom[3];' for
'the Word,' as John says, 'became flesh' (it being the custom[4] of
Scripture to call man by the name of 'flesh,' as it says by Joel the
Prophet, 'I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh;' and as Daniel said to
Astyages, 'I do not worship idols made with hands, but the Living God, who
hath created the heaven and the earth, and hath sovereignty over all
flesh[5];' for both he and Joel call mankind flesh).

   31. Of old time He was wont to come to the Saints individually, and to
hallow those who rightly[6] received Him; but neither, when they were
begotten was it said that He had become man, nor, when they suffered, was
it said that He Himself suffered. But when He came among us from Mary once
at the end of the ages for the abolition of sin (for so it was pleasing to
the Father, to send His own Son made of a woman, made under the Law'), then
it is said, that He took flesh and became man, and in that flesh He
suffered for us (as Peter says, 'Christ therefore having suffered for us in
the flesh[7], that it might be shewn, and that all might believe, that
whereas He was ever God, and hallowed those to whom He came, and ordered
all things according to the Father's will[8], afterwards for our sakes He
became man, and 'bodily[9],' as the Apostle says, the Godhead dwelt in the
flesh; as much as to say, 'Being God, He had His own body, and using this
as an instrument[10], He became man for our sakes.' And on account of this,
the properties of the flesh are said to be His, since He was in it, such as
to hunger, to thirst, to suffer, to weary, and the like, of which the flesh
is capable; while on the other hand the works proper to the Word Himself,
such as to raise the dead, to restore sight to the blind, and to cure the
woman with an issue of blood, He did through His own body[11]. And the Word
bore the infirmities of the flesh, as His own, for His was the flesh; and
the flesh ministered to the works of the Godhead, because the Godhead was
in it, for the body was God's[12]. And well has the Prophet said
'carried[13];' and has not said, 'He remedied our infirmities,' lest, as
being external to the body, and only healing it, as He has always done, He
should leave men subject still to death; but He carries our infirmities,
and He Himself bears our sins, that it might be shewn that He has become
man for us, and that the body which in Him bore them, was His own body;
and, while He received no hurt[14] Himself by 'bearing our sins in His body
on the tree,' as Peter speaks, we men were redeemed from our own
affections[15], and were filled with the righteousness[16] of the Word.

   32. Whence it was that, when the flesh suffered, the Word was not
external to it; and therefore is the passion said to be His: and when He
did divinely His Father's works, the flesh was not external to Him, but in
the body itself did the Lord do them. Hence, when made man, He said[1],' If
I do not the works of the Father, believe Me not; but if I do, though ye
believe not Me, believe the works, that ye may know that the Father is in
He and I in Him.' And thus when there was need to raise Peter's wife's
mother, who was sick of a fever, He stretched forth His hand humanly, but
He stopped the illness divinely. And in the case of the man blind from the
birth, human was the spittle which He gave forth from the flesh, but
divinely did He open the eyes through the clay. And in the case of Lazarus,
He gave forth a human voice as man; but divinely, as God, did He raise
Lazarus from the dead[2]. These things were so done, were so manifested,
because He had a body, not in appearance, but in truth[3]; and it became
the Lord, in putting on human flesh, to put it on whole with the affections
proper to it; that, as we say that the body was His own, so also we may say
that the affections of the body were proper to Him alone, though they did
not touch Him according to His Godhead. If then the body had been
another's, to him too had been the affections attributed; but if the flesh
is the Word's (for 'the Word became flesh'), of necessity then the
affections also of the flesh are ascribed to Him, whose the flesh is. And
to whom the affections are ascribed, such namely as to be condemned, to be
scourged, to thirst, and the cross, and death, and the other infirmities of
the body, of Him too is the triumph and the grace. For this cause then,
consistently and fittingly such affections are ascribed not to another[4],
but to the Lord; that the grace also may be from Him[5], and that we may
become, not worshippers of any other, but truly devout towards God, because
we invoke no originate thing, no ordinary[6] man, but the natural and true
Son from God, who has become man, yet is not the less Lord and God and
Saviour.

   33. Who will not admire this? or who will not agree that such a thing
is truly divine? for if the works of the Word's Godhead had not taken place
through the body, man had not been deified; and again, had not the
properties of the flesh been ascribed to the Word, man had not been
thoroughly delivered from them[1]; but though they had ceased for a little
while, as I said before, still sin had remained in him and corruption, as
was the case with mankind before Him; and for this reason:--Many for
instance have been made holy and dean from all sin; nay, Jeremiah was
hallowed[2] even from the womb, and John, while yet in the womb, leapt for
joy at the voice of Mary Bearer of God[3]; nevertheless 'death reigned from
Adam to Moses, even over those that had not sinned after the similitude of
Adam's transgression[4];' and thus man remained mortal and corruptible as
before, liable to the affections proper to their nature. But now the Word
having become man and having appropriated[5] what pertains to the flesh, no
longer do these things touch the body, because of the Word who has come in
it, but they are destroyed[6] by Him, and henceforth men no longer remain
sinners and dead according to their proper affections, but having risen
according to the Word's power, they abide[7] ever immortal and
incorruptible. Whence also, whereas the flesh is born of Mary Bearer of
God[8], He Himself is said to have been born, who furnishes to others an
origin of being; in order that He may transfer our origin into Himself, and
we may no longer, as mere earth, return to earth, but as being knit into
the Word from heaven, may be carded to heaven by Him. Therefore in like
manner not without reason has He transferred to Himself the other
affections of the body also; that we, no longer as being men, but as proper
to the Word, may have share in eternal life. For no longer according to our
former origin in Adam do we die; but henceforward our origin and all
infirmity of flesh being transferred to the Word, we rise from the earth,
the curse from sin being removed, because of Him who is in us[9], and who
has become a curse for us. And with reason; for as we are all from earth
and die in Adam, so being regenerated from above of water and Spirit, in
the Christ we are all quickened; the flesh being no longer earthly, but
being henceforth made Word[10], by reason of God's Word who for our sake
'became flesh.'

   34. And that one may attain to a more exact knowledge of the
impassibility of the Word's nature and of the infirmities ascribed to Him
because of the flesh, it will be well to listen to the blessed Peter; for
he will be a trustworthy witness concerning the Saviour. He writes then in
his Epistle thus; 'Christ then having suffered for us in the flesh[1].'
Therefore also when He is said to hunger and thirst and to toil and not to
know, and to sleep, and to weep, and to ask, and to flee, and to be born,
and to deprecate the cup, and in a word to undergo all that belongs to the
flesh[2], let it be said, as is congruous, in each case 'Christ then
hungering and thirsting "for us in the flesh;"' and saying He did not know,
and being buffeted, and toiling "for us in the flesh;"' and 'being exalted
too, and born, and growing "in the flesh;"' and 'fearing and hiding "in the
flesh;"' and 'saying, "If it be possible let this cup pass from Me[3]," and
being beaten, and receiving, "for us in the flesh;"' and in a word all such
things 'for us in the flesh.' For on this account has the Apostle himself
said, 'Christ then having suffered,' not in His Godhead, but 'for us in the
flesh,' that these affections may be acknowledged as, not proper to the
very Word by nature, but proper by nature to the very flesh.

   Let no one then stumble at what belongs to man, but rather let a man
know that in nature the Word Himself is impassible, and yet because of that
flesh which He put on, these things are ascribed to Him, since they are
proper to the flesh, and the body itself is proper to the Saviour. And
while He Himself, being impassible in nature, remains as He is, not
harmed[4] by these affections, but rather obliterating and destroying them,
men, their passions as if changed and abolished[5] in the Impassible,
henceforth become themselves also impassible and free[6] from them for
ever, as John taught, saying, 'And ye know that He was manifested to take
away our sins, and in Him is no sin[7].' And this being so, no heretic
shall object, 'Wherefore rises the flesh, being by nature mortal? and if it
rises, why not hunger too and thirst, and suffer, and remain mortal? for it
came from the earth, and how can its natural condition pass from it?' since
the flesh is able now to make answer to this so contentious heretic, 'I am
from earth, being by nature mortal, but afterwards I have become the Word's
flesh, and He 'carried' my affections, though He is without them; and so I
became free from them, being no more abandoned to their service because of
the Lord who has made me free from them. For if you object to my being rid
of that corruption which is by nature, see that you object not to God's
Word having taken my form of servitude; for as the Lord, putting on the
body, became man, so we men are deified by the Word as being taken to Him
through His flesh, and henceforward inherit life everlasting.'

   35. These points we have found it necessary first to examine, that,
when we see Him doing or saying aught divinely through the instrument[1] of
His own body, we may know that He so works, being God, and also, if we see
Him speaking or suffering humanly, we may not be ignorant that He bore
flesh and became man, and hence He so acts and so speaks. For if we
recognise what is proper to each, and see and understand that both these
things and those are done by One[2], we are fight in our faith, and shall
never stray. But if a man looking at what is done divinely by the Word,
deny the body, or looking at what is proper to the body, deny the Word's
presence in the flesh, or from what is human entertain low thoughts
concerning the Word, such a one, as a Jewish vintner[3], mixing water with
the wine, shall account the Cross an offence, or as a Gentile, will deem
the preaching folly. This then is what happens to God's enemies the Arians;
for looking at what is human in the Saviour, they have judged Him a
creature. Therefore they ought, looking also at the divine works of the
Word, to deny[4] the origination of His body, and henceforth to rank
themselves with Manichees[5]. But for them, learn they, however tardily,
that 'the Word became flesh;' and let us, retaining the general scope[6] of
the faith, acknowledge that what they interpret ill, has a right
interpretation[7].

CHAPTER XXVII: TEXTS EXPLAINED; TENTHLY, MATTHEW XI. 27: JOHN iii. 35, &C.

These texts intended to preclude the Sabellian notion of the Son; they fall
in with the Catholic doctrine concerning the Son; they are explained by
'so' in John v. 26. (Anticipation of the next chapter.) Again they are used
with reference to our Lord's human nature; for our sake, that we might
receive and not lose, as receiving in Him. And consistently with other
parts of Scripture, which shew that He had the power, &c., before He
received it. He was God and man, and His actions are often at once divine
and human.

   35 (continued). For, 'The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all
things into His hand;' and, 'All things were given unto Me of My Father;'
and, 'I can do nothing of Myself, but as I hear, I judge[8];' and the like
passages do not shew that the Son once had not these prerogatives--(for had
not He eternally what the Father has, who is the Only Word and Wisdom of
the Father in essence, who also says, 'All that the Father hath are
Mine[1],' and what are Mine, are the Father's? for if the things of the
Father are the Son's and the Father hath them ever, it is plain that what
the Son hath, being the Father's, were ever in the Son),--not then because
once He had them not, did He say this, but because, whereas the Son hath
eternally what He hath, yet He hath them from the Father.

   36. For lest a man, perceiving that the Son has all that the Father
hath, from the exact likeness and identity of that He hath, should wander
into the irreligion of Sabellius, considering Him to be the Father,
therefore He has said 'Was given unto Me,' and 'I received,' and 'Were
delivered to Me[2],' only to shew that He is not the Father, but the
Father's Word, and the Eternal Son, who because of His likeness to the
Father, has eternally what He has from Him, and because He is the Son, has
from the Father what He has eternally. Moreover that 'Was given' and 'Were
delivered,' and the like, do not impair[3] the Godhead of the Son, but
rather shew Him to be truly[4] Son, we may learn from the passages
themselves. For if all things are delivered unto Him, first, He is other
than that all which He has received; next, being Heir of all things, He
alone is the Son and proper according to the Essence of the Father. For if
He were one of all, then He were not 'heir of all[5],' but every one had
received according as the Father willed and gave. But now, as receiving all
things, He is other than them all, and alone proper to the Father. Moreover
that 'Was given' and 'Were delivered' do not shew that once He had them
not, we may conclude from a similar passage, and in like manner concerning
them all; for the Saviour Himself says, 'As the Father hath life in
Himself, so hath He given also to the Son to have life in Himself[6].' Now
from the words 'Hath given,' He signifies that He is not the Father; but in
saying 'so,' He shews the Son's natural likeness and propriety towards the
Father. If then once the Father had not, plainly the Son once had not; for
as the Father, 'so' also the Son has. But if this is irreligious to say,
and religious on the contrary to say that the Father had ever, is it not
unseemly in them when the Son says that, 'as' the Father has, 'so' also the
Son has, to say that He has not 'so[7],' but otherwise? Rather then is the
Word faithful, and all things which He says that He has received, He has
always, yet has from the Father; and the Father indeed not from any, but
the Son from the Father. For as in the instance of the radiance, if the
radiance itself should say, 'All places the light hath given me to
enlighten, and I do not enlighten from myself, but as the light wills,'
yet, in saying this, it does not imply that it once had not, but it means,
'I am proper to the light, and all things of the light are mine;' so, and
much more, must we understand in the instance of the Son. For the Father,
having given all things to the Son, in the Son still[8] hath all things;
and the Son having, still the Father hath them; for the Son's Godhead is
the Father's Godhead, and thus the Father in the Son exercises His
Providence[9] over all things.

   37. And while such is the sense of expressions like these, those which
speak humanly concerning the Saviour admit of a religious meaning also. For
with this end have we examined them beforehand, that, if we should hear Him
asking where Lazarus is laid[1], or when He asks on coming into the parts
of C'sarea, 'Whom do men say that I am?' or, 'How many loaves have ye?'
and, 'What will ye that I shall do unto you[2]?, we may know, from what has
been already said, the right[3] sense of the passages, and may not stumble
as Christ's enemies the Arians. First then we must put this question to the
irreligious, why they consider Him ignorant? for one who asks, does not for
certain ask from ignorance; but it is possible for one who knows, still to
ask concerning what He knows. Thus John was aware that Christ, when asking,
'How many loaves have ye?' was not ignorant, for he says, 'And this He said
to prove him, for He Himself knew what He would do[4].' But if He knew what
He was doing, therefore not in ignorance, but with knowledge did He ask.
From this instance we may understand similar ones; that, when the Lord
asks, He does not ask in ignorance, where Lazarus lies, nor again, whom men
do say that He is; but knowing the thing which He was asking, aware what He
was about to do. And thus with ease is their clever point exploded; but if
they still persist[5] on account of His asking, then they must be told that
in the Godhead indeed ignorance is not, but to the flesh ignorance is
proper, as has been said. And that this is really so, observe how the Lord
who inquired where Lazarus lay, Himself said, when He was not on the spot
but a great way off, 'Lazarus is dead[6],' and where he was dead; and how
that He who is considered by them as ignorant, is He Himself who foreknew
the reasonings of the disciples, and was aware of what was in the heart of
each, and of 'what was in man,' and, what is greater, alone knows the
Father and says, 'I in the Father and the Father in Me.[7]'

   38. Therefore this is plain to every one, that the flesh indeed is
ignorant, but the Word Himself, considered as the Word, knows all things
even before they come to be. For He did not, when He became man, cease to
be God[1]; nor, whereas He is God does He shrink from what is man's; perish
the thought; but rather, being God, He has taken to Him the flesh, and
being in the flesh deifies the flesh. For as He asked questions in it, so
also in it did He raise the dead; and He shewed to all that He who quickens
the dead and recalls the soul, much more discerns the secret of all. And He
knew where Lazarus lay, and yet He asked; for the All-holy Word of God, who
endured all things for our sakes, did this, that so carrying our ignorance,
He might vouchsafe to us the knowledge of His own only and true Father, and
of Himself, sent because of us for the salvation of all, than which no
grace could be greater.

When then the Saviour uses the words which they allege in their defence,
'Power is given to Me,' and, 'Glorify Thy Son,' and Peter says, 'Power is
given unto Him,' we understand all these passages in the same sense, that
humanly because of the body He says all this. For though He had no need,
nevertheless He is said to have received what He received humanly, that on
the other hand, inasmuch as the Lord has received, and the grant is lodged
with Him, the grace may remain sure. For while mere man receives, he is
liable to lose again (as was shewn in the case of Adam, for he received and
he lost[2]), but that the grace may be irrevocable, and may be kept sure[3]
by men, therefore He Himself appropriates[4] the gift; and He says that He
has received power, as man, which He ever had as God, and He says, 'Glorify
Me,' who glorifies others, to shew that He hath a flesh which has need of
these things. Wherefore, when the flesh receives, since that which receives
is in Him, and by taking it He hath become man, therefore He is said
Himself to have received.

   39. If then (as has many times been said) the Word has not become man,
then ascribe to the Word, as you would have it, to receive, and to need
glory, and to be ignorant; but if He has become man (and He has become),
and it is man's to receive, and to need, and to be ignorant, wherefore do
we consider the Giver as receiver, and the Dispenser to others do we
suspect to be in need, and divide the Word from the Father as imperfect and
needy, while we strip human nature of grace? For if the Word Himself,
considered as Word, has received and been glorified for His own sake, and
if He according to His Godhead is He who is hallowed and has risen again,
what hope is there for men? for they remain as they were, naked, and
wretched, and dead, having no interest in the things given to the Son. Why
too did the Word come among us, and become flesh? if that He might receive
these things, which He says that He has received, He was without them
before that, and of necessity will rather owe thanks Himself to the
body[1], because, when He came into it, then He receives these things from
the Father, which He had not before His descent into the flesh. For on this
shewing He seems rather to be Himself promoted because of the body[2], than
the body promoted because of Him. But this notion is Judaic. But if that He
might redeem mankind[3], the Word did come among us; and that He might
hallow and deify them, the Word became flesh (and for this He did become),
who does not see that it follows, that what He says that He received, when
He became flesh, that He mentions, not for His own sake, but for the flesh?
for to it, in which He was speaking, pertained the gifts given through Him
from the Father. But let us see what He asked, and what the things
altogether were which He said that He had received, that in this way also
they may be brought to feeling. He asked then glory, yet He had said, 'All
things were delivered unto Me[4].' And after the resurrection, He says that
He has received all power; but even before that He had said, 'All things
were delivered unto Me,' He was Lord of all, for 'all things were made by
Him;' and 'there is One Lord by whom are all things[5].' And when He asked
glory, He was as He is, the Lord of glory; as Paul says, 'If they had known
it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory[6];' for He had that
glory which He asked when He said, 'the glory which I had with Thee before
the world was[7].'

   40. Also the power which He said He received after the resurrection,
that He had before He received it, and before the resurrection. For He of
Himself rebuked Satan, saying, 'Get thee behind Me, Satan[1];' and to the
disciples He gave the power against him, when on their return He said, 'I
beheld Satan, as lightning, fall from heaven[2].' And again, that what He
said that He had received, that He possessed before receiving it, appears
from His driving away the demons, and from His un-binding what Satan had
bound, as He did in the case of the daughter of Abraham; and from His
remitting sins, saying to the paralytic, and to the woman who washed His
feet, 'Thy sins be forgiven thee[3];' and from His both raising the dead,
and repairing the first nature of the blind, granting to him to see. And
all this He did, not waiting till He should receive, but being 'possessed
of power[4].' From all this it is plain that what He had as Word, that when
He had become man and was risen again, He says that He received humanly[5];
that for His sake men might henceforward upon earth have power against
demons, as having become partakers of a divine nature; and in heaven, as
being delivered from corruption, might reign everlastingly. Thus we must
acknowledge this once for all, that nothing which He says that He received,
did He receive as not possessing before; for the Word, as being God, had
them always; but in these passages He is said humanly to have received,
that, whereas the flesh received in Him, henceforth from it the gift might
abide[6] surely for us. For what is said by Peter, 'receiving from God
honour and glory, Angels being made subject unto Him[7],' has this meaning.
As He inquired humanly, and raised Lazarus divinely, so 'He received' is
spoken of Him humanly, but the subjection of the Angels marks the Word's
Godhead.

   41. Cease then, O abhorred of God[8], and degrade not the Word; nor
detract from His Godhead, which is the Father's[9], as though He needed or
were ignorant; lest ye be casting your own arguments against the Christ, as
the Jews who once stoned Him. For these belong not to the Word, as the
Word; but are proper to men and, as when He spat, and stretched forth the
hand, and called Lazarus, we did not say that the triumphs were human,
though they were done through the body, but were God's, so, on the other
hand, though human things are ascribed to the Saviour in the Gospel, let
us, considering the nature of what is said and that they are foreign to
God, not impute them to the Word's Godhead, but to His manhood. For though
'the Word became flesh,' yet to the flesh are the affections proper; and
though the flesh is possessed by God in the Word, yet to the Word belong
the grace and the power. He did then the Father's works through the flesh;
and as truly contrariwise were the affections of the flesh displayed in
Him; for instance, He inquired and He raised Lazarus, He chid[10] His
Mother, saying, 'My hour is not yet come,' and then at once He made the
water wine. For He was Very God in the flesh, and He was true flesh in the
Word. Therefore from His works He revealed both Himself as Son of God, and
His own Father, and from the affections of the flesh He shewed that He bore
a true body, and that it was His own.

CHAPTER XXVIII: TEXTS EXPLAINED; ELEVENTHLY, MARK xiii. 32 AND LUKE ii. 52.

Arian explanation of the former text is against the Regula Fidei; and
against the context. Our Lord said He was ignorant of the Day, by reason of
His human nature. If the Holy Spirit knows the Day, therefore the Son
knows; if the Son knows the Father, therefore He knows the Day; if He has
all that is the Father's, therefore knowledge of the Day if in the Father,
He knows the Day in the Father; if He created and upholds all things, He
knows when they will cease to be. He knows not as Man, argued from Matt.
xxiv. 42. As He asked about Lazarus's grave, &c., yet knew, so He knows; as
S. Paul says, 'whether in the body I know not,' &c., yet knew, so He knows.
He said He knew not for our profit, that we be not curious (as in Acts i.
7, where on the contrary He did not say He knew not). As the Almighty asks
of Adam and of Cain, yet knew, so the Son knows[as God]. Again, He advanced
in wisdom also as man, else He made Angels perfect before Himself. He
advanced, in that the Godhead was manifested in Him more fully as time went
on.

   42. These things being so, come let us now examine into 'But of that
day and that hour knoweth no man, neither the Angels of God, nor the
Son[1];' for being in great ignorance as regards these words, and being
stupefied[2] about them, they think they have in them an important argument
for their heresy. But I, when the heretics allege it and prepare themselves
with it, see in them the giants a again fighting against God. For the Lord
of heaven and earth, by whom all things were made, has to litigate before
them about day and hour; and the Word who knows all things is accused by
them of ignorance about a day; and the Son who knows the Father is said to
be ignorant of an hour of a day; now what can be spoken more contrary to
sense, or what madness can be likened to this? Through the Word all things
have been made, times and seasons and night and day and the whole creation;
and is the Framer of all said to be ignorant of His work? And the very
context of the lection shews that the Son of God knows that hour and that
day, though the Arians fall headlong in their ignorance. For after saying,
'nor- the Son,' He relates to the disciples what precedes the day, saying,
'This and that shall be, and then the end.' But He who speaks of what
precedes the day, knows certainly the day also, which shall be manifested
subsequently to the things foretold. But if He had not known the hour, He
had not signified the events before it, as not knowing when it should be.
And as any one, who, by way of pointing out a house or city to those who
were ignorant of it, gave an account of what comes before the house or
city, and having described all, said, 'Then immediately comes the city or
the house,' would know of course where the house or the city was (for had
he not known, he had not described what comes before lest from ignorance he
should throw his hearers far out of the way, or in speaking he should
unawares go beyond the object), so the Lord saying what precedes that day
and that hour, knows exactly, nor is ignorant, when the hour and the day
are at hand.

   43. Now why it was that, though He knew, He did not tell His disciples
plainly at that time, no one may be curious[1] where He has been silent;
for 'Who hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been His
counsellor[2]?' but why, though He knew, He said, 'no, not the Son knows,'
this I think none of the faithful is ignorant, viz. that He made this as
those other declarations as man by reason of the flesh. For this as before
is not the Word's deficiency[3], but of that human nature[4] whose property
it is to be ignorant. And this again will be well seen by honestly
examining into the occasion, when and to whom the Saviour spoke thus. Not
then when the heaven was made by Him, nor when He was with the Father
Himself, the Word 'disposing all things[5],' nor before He became man did
He say it, but when 'the Word became flesh[6].' On this account it is
reasonable to ascribe to His manhood everything which, after He became man,
He speaks humanly. For it is proper to the Word to know what was made, nor
be ignorant either of the beginning or of the end of these (for the works
are His), and He knows how many things He wrought, and the limit of their
consistence. And knowing of each the beginning and the end, He knows surely
the general and common end of all. Certainly when He says in the Gospel
concerning Himself in His human character, 'Father, the hour is come,
glorify Thy Son[7],' it is plain that He knows also the hour of the end of
all things, as the Word, though as man He is ignorant of it, for ignorance
is proper to man[8], and especially ignorance of these things. Moreover
this is proper to the Saviour's love of man; for since He was made man, He
is not ashamed, because of the flesh which is ignorant[9], to say 'I know
not,' that He may shew that knowing as God, He is but ignorant according to
the flesh[10]. And therefore He said not, 'no, not the Son of God knows,'
test the Godhead should seem ignorant, but simply, 'no, not the Son,' that
the ignorance might be the Son's as born from among men.

   44. On this account, He alludes to the Angels, but He did not go
further and say, 'not the Holy Ghost;' but He was silent, with a double
intimation; first that if the Spirit knew, much more must the Word know,
considered as the Word, from whom the Spirit receives[1]; and next by His
silence about the Spirit, He made it clear, that He said of His human
ministry, 'no, not the Son.' And a proof of it is this; that, when He had
spoken humanly[2] 'No, not the Son knows,' He yet shews that divinely He
knew all things. For that Son whom He declares not to know the day, Him He
declares to know the Father; for 'No one,' He says, 'knoweth the Father
save the Son[3].' And all men but the Arians would join in confessing, that
He who knows the Father, much more knows the whole of the creation; and in
that whole, its end. And if already the day and the hour be determined by
the Father, it is plain that through the Son are they determined, and He
knows Himself what through Him has been determined[4], for there is nothing
but has come to be and has been determined through the Son. Therefore He,
being the Framer of the universe, knows of what nature, and of what
magnitude, and with what limits, the Father has willed it to be made; and
in the how much and how far is included its period. And again, if all that
is the Father's, is the Son's (and this He Himself bass said), and it is
the Father's attribute to know the day, it is plain that the Son too knows
it, having this proper to Him from the Father. And again, if the Son be in
the Father and the Father in the Son, and the Father knows the day and the
hour, it is clear that the Son, being in the Father and knowing the things
of the Father, knows Himself also the day and the hour. And if the Son is
also the Father's Very Image, and the Father knows the day and the hour, it
is plain that the Son has this likeness[6] also to the Father of knowing
them. And it is not wonderful if He, through whom all things were made, and
in whom the universe consists, Himself knows what has been brought to be,
and when the end will be of each and of all together; rather is it
wonderful that this audacity, suitable as it is to the madness of the
Ariomaniacs, should have forced us to have recourse to so long a defence.
For ranking the Son of God, the Eternal Word, among things originate, they
are not far from venturing to maintain that the Father Himself is second to
the creation; for if He who knows the Father knows not the day nor the
hour, I fear lest the knowledge of the creation, or rather of the lower
portion of it, be greater, as they in their madness would say, than
knowledge concerning the Father.

   45. But for them, when they thus blaspheme the Spirit, they must expect
no remission ever of such irreligion, as the Lord has said[1]; but let us,
who love Christ and bear Christ within us, know that the Word, not as
ignorant, considered as Word, has said 'I know not,' for He knows, but as
shewing His manhood[2], in that to be ignorant is proper to man, and that
He had put on flesh that was ignorant[3], being in which, He said according
to the flesh, 'I know not.' And for this reason, after saying, 'No not the
Son knows,' and mentioning the ignorance of the men in Noah's day,
immediately He added, 'Watch therefore, for ye know not in what hour your
Lord doth come,' and again, 'In such an hour as ye think not, the Son of
man cometh[4].' For I too, having become as you for you, said 'no, not the
Son.' For, had He been ignorant divinely, He must have said, 'Watch
therefore, for I know not,' and, 'In an hour when I think not;' but in fact
this hath He not said; but by saying 'Ye know not' and 'When ye think not,'
He has signified that it belongs to man to be ignorant; for whose sake He
too having a flesh like theirs and having become man, said 'No, not the Son
knows,' for He knew not in flesh, though knowing as Word. And again the
example from Noah exposes the shamelessness of Christ's enemies; for there
too He said not, 'I knew not,' but 'They knew not until the flood came(5).'
For men did not know, but He who brought the flood (and it was the Saviour
Himself) knew the day and the hour in which He opened the cataracts of
heaven and broke up the great deep, and said to Noah, 'Come thou and all
thy house into the ark(6).' For were He ignorant, He had not foretold to
Noah, 'Yet seven days and I will bring a flood upon the earth.' But if in
describing the day He makes use of the parallel of Noah's time, and He did
know the day of the flood, therefore He knows also the day of His own
coming.

   46. Moreover, after narrating the parable of the Virgins, again He
shews more clearly who they are who are ignorant of the day and the hour,
saying, 'Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour(1).' He
who said shortly before, 'No one knoweth, no not the Son,' now says not 'I
know not,' but 'ye know not.' In like manner then, when His disciples asked
about the end, suitably said He then, 'no, nor the Son,' according to the
flesh because of the body; that He might shew that, as man, He knows not;
for ignorance is proper to man(2). If however He is the Word, if it is He
who is to come, He to be Judge, He to be the Bridegroom, He knoweth when
and in what hour He cometh, and when He is to say, 'Awake, thou that
sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light(3).'
For as, on becoming man, He hungers and thirsts and suffers with men, so
with men as man He knows not; though divinely, being in the Father Word and
Wisdom, He knows, and there is nothing which He knows not In like manner
also about Lazarus(4) He asks humanly, who was on His way to raise him, and
knew whence He should recall Lazarus's soul; and it was a greater thing to
know where the soul was, than to know where the body lay; but He asked
humanly, that He might raise divinely. So too He asks of the disciples, on
coming into the parts of C'sarea, though knowing even before Peter made
answer. For if the Father revealed to Peter the answer to the Lord's
question, it is plain that through the Son  was the revelation, for 'No one
knoweth the Son,' saith He, 'save the Father, neither the Father save the
Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him(6).' But if through the
Son is revealed the knowledge both of the Father and the Son, there is no
room for doubting that the Lord who asked, having first revealed it to
Peter from the Father, next asked humanly; in order to shew, that asking
after the flesh, He knew divinely what Peter was about to say. The Son then
knew, as knowing all things, and knowing His own Father, than which
knowledge nothing can be greater or more perfect.

   47. This is sufficient to confute them; but to shew still further that
they are hostile to the truth and Christ's enemies, I could wish to ask
them a question. The Apostle in the Second Epistle to the Corinthians
writes, 'I knew a man in Christ, above fourteen years ago, whether in the
body I do not know, or whether out of the body I do not know; God
knoweth(1).' What now say ye? Knew the Apostle what had happened to him in
the vision, though he says 'I know not,' or knew he not? If he knew not,
see to it, lest, being familiar with error, ye err in the trespass(2) of
the Phrygians(3), who say that the Prophets and the other ministers of the
Word know neither what they do nor concerning what they announce. But if he
knew when he said 'I know not,' for he had Christ within him revealing to
him all things, is not the heart of God's enemies indeed perverted and
'self-condemned?' for when the Apostle says, 'I know not,' they say that he
knows; but when the Lord says, 'I know not,' they say that He does not
know. For if since Christ was within him, Paul knew that of which he says,
'I know not,' does not much more Christ Himself know, though He say, 'I
know not?' The Apostle then, the Lord revealing it to him, knew what
happened to him; for on this account he says, 'I knew a man in Christ;' and
knowing the man, he knew also how the man was caught away. Thus Elisha, who
beheld Elijah, knew also how he was taken up; but though knowing, yet when
the sons of the Prophets thought that Elijah was cast upon one of the
mountains by the Spirit, he knowing from the first what he had seen, tried
to persuade them; but when they urged it, he was silent, and suffered them
to go after him. Did he then not know, because he was silent? he knew
indeed, but as if not knowing, he suffered them, that they being convinced,
might no more doubt about the taking up of Elijah. Therefore much more
Paul, himself being the person caught away, knew also how he was caught;
for Elijah knew; and had any one asked, he would have said how. And yet
Paul says 'I know not,' for these two reasons, as I think at least; one, as
he has said himself, lest because of the abundance of the revelations any
one should think of him beyond what he saw; the other, because, our Saviour
having said 'I know not,' it became him also to say 'I know not,' lest the
servant should appear above his Lord, and the disciple above his Master.

   48. Therefore He who gave to Paul to know, much rather knew Himself;
for since He spoke of the antecedents of the day, He also knew, as I said
before, when the Day and when the Hour, and yet though knowing, He says,
'No, not the Son knoweth.' Why then said He at that time 'I know not,' what
He as Lord(1), knew? as we may by searching conjecture, for our profit(2),
as I think at least, did He this; and may He grant to what we are now
proposing a true meaning! On both sides did the Saviour secure our
advantage; for He has made known what comes before the end, that, as He
said Himself, we might not be startled nor scared, when they happen, but
from them may expect the end after them. And concerning the day and the
hour He was not willing to say according to His divine nature, 'I know,'
but after the flesh, 'I know not,' for the sake of the flesh which was
ignorant(3), as I have said before; lest they should ask Him further, and
then either He should have to pain the disciples by not speaking, or by
speaking might act to the prejudice of them and us all. For whatever He
does, that altogether He does for our sakes, since also for us 'the Word
became flesh.' For us therefore He said 'No, not the Son knoweth;' and
neither was He untrue in thus saying (for He said humanly, as man, 'I know
not'), nor did He suffer the disciples to force Him to speak, for by saying
'I know not' He stopped their inquiries. And so in the Acts of the Apostles
it is written, when He went upon the Angels, ascending as man, and carrying
up to heaven the flesh which He bore, on the disciples seeing this, and
again asking, 'When shall the end be, and when wilt Thou be present?' He
said to them more clearly, 'It is not for you to know the times or the
seasons which the Father hath put in His own power(4).' And He did not then
say, 'No, not the Son,' as He said before humanly, but, 'It is not for you
to know.' For now the flesh had risen and put off its mortality and been
deified; and no longer did it become Him to answer after the flesh when He
was going into the heavens; but henceforth to teach after a divine manner,
'It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father hath put in
His own power; but ye shall receive Power(5).' And what is that Power of
the Father but the Son? for Christ is 'God's Power and God's Wisdom.'

   49. The Son then did know, as being the Word; for He implied this in
what He said,--'I know but it is not for you to know for it was for your
sakes that sitting also on the mount I said according to the flesh, 'No,
not the Son knoweth,' for the profit of you and all. For it is profitable
to you to hear so much both of the Angels and of the Son, because of the
deceivers which shall be afterwards; that though demons should be
transfigured as Angels, and should attempt to speak concerning the end, you
should not believe, since they are ignorant; and that, if Antichrist too,
disguising himself, should say, 'I am Christ,' and should try in his turn
to speak of that day and end, to deceive the hearers, ye, having these
words from Me, 'No, not the Son,' may disbelieve him also. And further, not
to know when the end is, or when the day of the end, is expedient for man,
lest knowing, they might become negligent of the time between, awaiting the
days near the end; for they will argue that then only must they attend to
themselves(1). Therefore also has He been silent of the time when each
shall die, lest men, being elated on the ground of knowledge, should
forthwith neglect themselves for the greater part of their time. Both then,
the end of all things and the limit of each of us hath the Word concealed
from us (for in the end of all is the end of each, and in the end of each
the end of all is comprehended), that, whereas it is uncertain and always
in prospect, we may advance day by day as if summoned, reaching forward to
the things before us and forgetting the things behind(2). For who, knowing
the day of the end, would not be dilatory with the interval? but, if
ignorant, would not be ready day by day? It was on this account that the
Saviour added, 'Watch therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth
come;' and, 'In such an hour as ye think not, the Son of man cometh(3).'
For the advantage then which comes of ignorance has He said this; for in
saying it, He wishes that we should always be prepared; 'for you,' He says,
'know not; but I, the Lord, know when I come, though the Arians do not waft
for Me, who am the Word of the Father.'

   50. The Lord then, knowing what is good for us beyond ourselves, thus
secured the disciples; and they, being thus taught, set right those of
Thessalonica(4) when likely on this point to run into error. However, since
Christ's enemies do not yield even to these considerations, I wish, though
knowing that they have a heart harder than Pharaoh, to ask them again
concerning this. In Paradise God asks, 'Adam, where art Thou(5)?' and He
inquires of Cain also, 'Where is Abel thy brother(6)?' What then say you to
this? for if you think Him ignorant and therefore to have asked, you are
already of the party of the Manichees, for this is their bold thought; but
if, fearing the open name, ye force yourselves to say, that He asks
knowing, what is there extravagant or strange in the doctrine, that ye
should thus fall, on finding that the Son, in whom God then inquired, that
same Son who now is clad in flesh, inquires of the disciples as man? unless
forsooth, having become Manichees, you are willing to blame(7) the question
then put to Adam and all that you may give full plays to your perverseness.
For being exposed on all sides, you still make a whispering(9) from the
words of Luke, which are rightly said, but ill understood by you. And what
this is, we must state, that so also their corrupt(10) meaning may be
shewn.

   51. Now Luke says, 'And Jesus advanced in wisdom and stature, and in
grace with God and man(1).' This then is the passage, and since they
stumble in it, we are compelled to ask them, like the Pharisees and the
Sadducees, of the person concerning whom Luke speaks. And the case stands
thus. Is Jesus Christ man, as all other men, or is He God bearing flesh? If
then He is an ordinary(2) man as the rest, then let Him, as a man, advance;
this however is the sentiment of the Samosatene, which virtually indeed you
entertain also, though in name you deny it because of men. But if He be God
bearing flesh, as He truly is, and 'the Word became flesh,' and being God
descended upon earth, what advance had He who existed equal to God? or how
had the Son increase, being ever in the Father? For if He who was ever in
the Father, advanced, what, I ask, is there beyond the Father from which
His advance might be made? Next it is suitable here to repeat what was said
upon the point of His receiving and being glorified. If He advanced(3) when
He became man, it is plain that, before He became man, He was imperfect;
and rather the flesh Became to Him a cause of perfection, than He to the
flesh. And again, if, as being the Word, He advances, what has He more to
become than Word and Wisdom and Son and God's Power? For the Word is all
these, of which if one can anyhow partake as it were one ray, such a man
becomes all perfect among men, and equal to Angels. For Angels, and
Archangels, and Dominions, and all the Powers, and Thrones, as partaking
the Word, behold always the face of His Father. How then does He who to
others supplies perfection, Himself advance later than they? For Angels
even ministered to His human birth, and the passage from Luke comes later
than the ministration of the Angels. How then at all can it even come into
thought of man? or how did Wisdom advance in wisdom? or how did He who to
others gives grace (as Paul says in every Epistle, knowing that through Him
grace is given, 'The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all'), how
did He advance in grace? for either let them say that the Apostle is
untrue, and presume to say that the Son is not Wisdom, or else if He is
Wisdom as Solomon said, and if Paul wrote, 'Christ God's Power and God's
Wisdom,' of what advance did Wisdom admit further?

   52. For men, creatures as they are, are capable in a certain way of
reaching forward and advancing in virtue(1). Enoch, for instance, was thus
translated, and Moses increased and was perfected; and Isaac 'by advancing
became great(2);' and the Apostle said that he 'reached forth(3)' day by
day to what was before him. For each had room for advancing, looking to the
step before him. But the Son of God, who is One and Only, what room had He
for reaching forward? for all things advance by looking at Him; and He,
being One and Only, is in the Only Father, from whom again He does not
reach forward, but in Him abideth ever(3a). To men then belongs advance;
but the Son of God, since He could not advance, being perfect in the
Father, humbled Himself for us, that in His humbling we on the other hand
might be able to increase. And our increase is no other than the renouncing
things sensible, and coming to the Word Himself; since His humbling is
nothing else than His taking our flesh. It was not then the Word,
considered as the Word, who advanced; who is perfect from the perfect
Father(4), who needs nothing, nay brings forward others to an advance; but
humanly is He here also said to advance, since advance belongs to man(5).
Hence the Evangelist, speaking with cautious exactness(6), has mentioned
stature in the advance; but being Word and God He is not measured by
stature, which belongs to bodies. Of the body then is the advance; for, it
advancing, in it advanced also the manifestation(7) of the Godhead to those
who saw it. And, as the Godhead was more and more revealed, by so much more
did His grace as man increase before all men. For as a child He was carried
to the Temple; and when He became a boy, He remained there, and questioned
the priests about the Law. And by degrees His body increasing, and the Word
manifesting Himself(8) in it, He is confessed henceforth by Peter first,
then also by all, 'Truly this is the Son of God(9);' however wilfully the
Jews, both the ancient and these modern(10), shut fast their eyes, lest
they see that to advance in wisdom is not the advance of Wisdom Itself, but
rather the manhood's advance in It. For 'Jesus advanced in wisdom and
grace;' and, if we may speak what is explanatory as well as true, He
advanced in Himself; for 'Wisdom builded herself an house,' and in herself
she gave the house advancement.

   53. (What moreover is this advance that is spoken of, but, as I said
before, the deifying and grace imparted from Wisdom to men, sin being
obliterated in them and their inward corruption, according to their
likeness and relationship to the flesh of the Word?) For thus, the body
increasing in stature, there developed in it the manifestation of the
Godhead also, and to all was it displayed that the body was God's
Temple(1), and that God was in the body. And if they urge, that 'The Word
become flesh' is called Jesus, and refer to Him the term 'advanced,' they
must be told that neither does this impair(2) the Father's Light(3), which
is the Son, but that it still shews that the Word has become man, and bore
true flesh. And as we said(4) that He suffered in the flesh, and hungered
in the flesh, and was fatigued in the flesh, so also reasonably may He be
said to have advanced in the flesh; for neither did the advance, such as we
have described it, take place with the Word external to the flesh, for in
Him was the flesh which advanced and His is it called, and that as before,
that man's advance might abide  and fail not, because of the Word which is
with it. Neither then was the advance the Word's, nor was the flesh Wisdom,
but the flesh became the body of Wisdom(6). Therefore, as we have already
said, not Wisdom, as Wisdom, advanced in respect of Itself; but the manhood
advanced in Wisdom, transcending by degrees human nature, and being
deified, and becoming and appearing to all as the organ(7) of Wisdom for
the operation and the shining forth(8) of the Godhead. Wherefore neither
said he, 'The Word advanced,' but Jesus, by which Name the Lord was called
when He became man; so that the advance is of the human nature in such wise
as we explained above.

CHAPTER XXIX: TEXTS EXPLAINED; TWELFTHLY, MATTHEW xxvi. 39; JOHN xii. 27,
&c.

Arian inferences are against the Regula Fidei, as before. He wept and the
like, as man. Other texts prove Him God. God could not fear. He feared
because His flesh feared.

   54. THEREFORE as, when the flesh advanced, He is said to have advanced,
because the body was His own, so also what is said at the season of His
death, that He was troubled, that He wept, must be taken in the same
sense(1). For they, going up and down(2), as if thereby recommending their
heresy anew, allege; "Behold, 'He wept,' and said, 'Now is My soul
troubled,' and He besought that the cup might pass away; how then, if He so
spoke, is He God, and Word of the Father?" Yea, it is written that He wept,
O God's enemies, and that He said, 'I am troubled,' and on the Cross He
said, 'Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani,' that is, 'My God, My God, why hast
Thou forsaken Me?' and He besought that the cup might pass away(3). Thus
certainly it is written; but again I would ask you (for the same rejoinder
must of necessity be made to each of your objections 4), If the speaker is
mere man, let him weep and fear death, as being man; but if He is the Word
in flesh(5) (for one must not be reluctant to repeat), whom had He to fear
being God? or wherefore should He fear death, who was Himself Life, and was
rescuing others from death? or how, whereas He said, 'Fear not him that
kills the body(6),' should He Himself fear? And how should He who said to
Abraham, 'Fear not, for I am with thee,' and encouraged Moses against
Pharaoh, and said to the son of Nun, 'Be strong, and of a good courage(7),'
Himself feel terror before Herod and Pilate? Further, He who succours
others against fear (for 'the Lord,' says Scripture, 'is on my side, I will
not fear what man shall do unto me(8)'), did He fear governors, mortal men?
did He who Himself was come against death, feel terror of death? Is it not
both unseemly and irreligious to say that He was terrified at death or
hades, whom the keepers of the gates of hades(9) saw and shuddered? But if,
as you would hold, the Word was in terror wherefore, when He spoke long
before of the conspiracy of the Jews, did He not flee, nay said when
actually sought, 'I am He?' for He could have avoided death, as He said, 'I
have power to lay down My life, and I have power to take it again;' and 'No
one taketh it from Me(10).'

   55. But these affections were not proper to the nature of the Word, as
far as He was Word; but in the flesh which was thus affected was the Word,
O Christ's enemies and unthankful Jews! For He said not all this prior to
the flesh; but when the 'Word became flesh,' and has become man, then is it
written that He said this, that is, humanly. Surely He of whom this is
written was He who raised Lazarus from the dead, and made the water wine,
and vouchsafed sight to the man born blind, and said, 'I and My Father are
one(1).' If then they make His human attributes a ground for low thoughts
concerning the Son of God, nay consider Him altogether man from the earth,
and not(2) from heaven, wherefore not from His divine works recognise the
Word who is in the Father, and henceforward renounce their self-willed(3)
irreligion? For they are given to see, how He who did the works is the same
as He who shewed that His body was passible by His permitting(4) it to weep
and hunger, and to shew other properties of a body. For while by means of
such He made it known that, though God impassible, He had taken a passible
flesh; yet from the works He shewed Himself the Word of God, who had
afterwards become man, saying, Though ye believe not Me, beholding Me clad
in a human body, yet believe the works, that ye may know that "I am in the
Father, and the Father in Me(5)" ' And Christ's enemies seem to me to shew
plain shamelessness and blasphemy; for, when they hear 'I and the Father
are one(6),' they violently distort the sense, and separate the unity of
the Father and the Son; but reading of His tears or sweat or sufferings,
they do not advert to His body, but on account of these rank in the
creation Him by whom the creation was made. What then is left for them to
differ from the Jews in? for as the Jews blasphemously ascribed God's works
to Beelzebub, so also will these, ranking with the creatures the Lord who
wrought those works, undergo the same condemnation as theirs without mercy.

   56. But they ought, when they hear 'I and the Father are one,' to see
in Him the oneness of the Godhead and the propriety of the Father's
Essence; and again when they hear, 'He wept' and the like, to say that
these are proper to the body; especially since on each side they have an
intelligible ground, viz. that this is written as of God and that with
reference to His manhood. For in the incorporeal, the properties of body
had not been, unless He had taken a body corruptible and mortal(1); for
mortal was Holy Mary, from whom was His body. Wherefore of necessity when
He was in a body suffering, and weeping, and toiling, these things which
are proper to the flesh, are ascribed to Him together with the body. If
then He wept and was troubled, it was not the Word, considered as the Word,
who wept and was troubled, but it was proper to the flesh; and if too He
besought that the cup might pass away, it was not the Godhead that was in
terror, but this affection too was proper to the manhood. And that the
words 'Why hast Thou forsaken Me?' are His, according to the foregoing
explanations (though He suffered nothing, for the Word was impossible), is
notwithstanding declared by the Evangelists; since the Lord became man, and
these things are done and said as from a man, that He might Himself
lighten(2) these very sufferings of the flesh, and free it from them(3).
Whence neither can the Lord be forsaken by the Father, who is ever in the
Father, both before He spoke, and when He uttered this cry. Nor is it
lawful to say that the Lord was in terror, at whom the keepers of hell's
gates shuddered(4) and set open hell, and the graves did gape, and many
bodies of the saints arose and appeared to their own people(5). Therefore
be every heretic dumb, nor dare to ascribe terror to the Lord whom death,
as a serpent, flees, at whom demons tremble, and the sea is in alarm; for
whom the heavens are rent and all the powers are shaken. For behold when He
says, 'Why hast Thou forsaken Me?' the Father shewed that He was ever and
even then in Him; for the earth knowing its Lord  who spoke, straightway
trembled, and the vail was rent, and the sun was hidden, and the rocks were
torn asunder, and the graves, as I have said, did gape, and the dead in
them arose; and, what is wonderful, they who were then present and had
before denied Him, then seeing these signs, confessed that 'truly He was
the Son of God(7).'

   57. And as to His saying, 'If it be possible, let the cup pass,'
observe how, though He thus spake, He rebuked(1) Peter, saying, 'Thou
savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.' For He
willed(2) what He deprecated, for therefore had He come; but His was the
willing (for for it He came), but the terror belonged to the flesh.
Wherefore as man He utters this speech also, and yet both were said by the
Same, to shew that He was God, willing in Himself, but when He had become
man, having a flesh that was in terror. For the sake of this flesh He
combined His own will with human weakness(3), that destroying this
affection He might in turn make man undaunted in face of death. hold then a
thing strange indeed! He to whom Christ's enemies impute words of terror,
He by that so-called(4) tenor renders men undaunted and fearless. And so
the Blessed Apostles after Him from such words of His conceived so great a
contempt of death, as not even to care for those who questioned them, but
to answer, 'We ought to obey God rather than men(5).' And the other Holy
Martyrs were so bold, as to think that they were rather passing to life
than undergoing death. Is it not extravagant then, to admire the courage of
the servants of the Word, yet to say that the Word Himself was in terror,
through whom they despised death? But from that most enduring purpose and
courage of the Holy Martyrs is shewn, that the Godhead was not in terror,
but the Saviour took away our terror. For as He abolished death by death,
and by human means all human evils, so by this so-called terror did He
remove our terror, and brought about that never more should men fear death.
His word and deed go together. For human were the sayings, Let the cup
pass,' and 'Why hast Thou forsaken Me?' and divine the act whereby the Same
did cause the sun to fail and the dead to rise. Again He said humanly, 'Now
is My soul troubled;' and He said divinely, 'I have power to lay down My
life, and power to take it again(6).' For to be troubled was proper to the
flesh, and to have power to lay down His life(7) and take it again, when He
will, was no property of men but of the Word's power. For man dies, not by
his own power, but by necessity of nature and against his will; but the
Lord, being Himself immortal, but having a mortal flesh, had power, as God,
to become separate from the body and to take it again, when He would.
Concerning this too speaks David in the Psalm, 'Thou shalt not leave My
soul in hades, neither shalt Thou suffer Thy Holy One to see
corruption(8).' For it beseemed that the flesh, corruptible as it was,
should no longer after its own nature remain mortal, but because of the
Word who had put it on, should abide incorruptible. For as He, having come
in our body, was conformed to our condition, so we, receiving Him, partake
of the immortality that is from Him.

   58. Idle then is the excuse for stumbling, and petty the notions
concerning the Word, of these Ario-maniacs, because it is written, 'He was
troubled,' and 'He wept.' For they seem not even to have human feeling, if
they are thus ignorant of man's nature and properties; which do but make it
the greater wonder, that the Word should be in such a suffering flesh, and
neither prevented those who were conspiring against Him, nor took vengeance
of those who were putting Him to death, though He was able, He who hindered
some from dying, and raised others from the dead. And He let His own body
suffer, for therefore did He come, as I said before, that in the flesh He
might suffer, and thenceforth the flesh might be made impassible and
immortal(9), and that, as we have many times said, contumely and other
troubles might determine upon Him and come short of others after Him, being
by Him annulled utterly; and that henceforth men might for ever abide(10)
incorruptible, as a temple of the Word(11). Had Christ's enemies thus dwelt
on these thoughts, and recognised the ecclesiastical scope as an anchor for
the faith, they would not have made shipwreck of the faith, nor been so
shameless as to resist those who would fain recover them from their fall,
and to deem those as enemies who are admonishing them to be religious.

CHAPTER XXX: OBJECTIONS CONTINUED, AS IN CHAPTERS vii.-x.

Whether the Son is begotten of the Father's will? This virtually the same
as whether once He was not? and used by the Arians to introduce the latter
question. The Regula Fidei answers it at once in the negative by contrary
texts. The Arians follow the Valentinians in maintaining a precedent will;
which really is only exercised by God towards creatures. Instances from
Scripture. Inconsistency of Asterius. If the Son by will, there must be
another Word before Him. If God is good, or exist, by His will, then is the
Son by His will. If He willed to have reason or wisdom, then is His Word
and Wisdom at His will. The Son is the Living Will, and has all titles
which denote connaturality. That will which the Father has to the Son, the
Son has to the Father. The Father wills the Son and the Son wills the
Father.

   58. (continued). BUT(1), as it seems, a heretic is a wicked thing in
truth, and in every respect his heart is depraved(2) and irreligious. For
behold, though convicted on all points, and shewn to be utterly bereft of
understanding, they feel no shame; but as the hydra of Gentile fable, when
its former serpents were destroyed, gave birth to fresh ones, contending
against the slayer of the old by the production of new, so also they,
hostile(3) and hateful to God(4), as hydras(5), losing their life in the
objections which they advance, invent for themselves other questions Judaic
and foolish, and new expedients, as if Truth were their enemy, thereby to
shew the rather that they are Christ's opponents in all things.

   59. After so many proofs against them, at which even the devil who is
their father(6) had himself been abashed and gone back, again as from their
perverse heart they mutter forth other expedients, sometimes in whispers,
sometimes with the drone(7) of gnats; 'Be it so,' say they; 'interpret
these places thus, and gain the victory in reasonings and proofs; still you
must say that the Son has received being from the Father at His will and
pleasure;' for thus they deceive many, putting forward the will and the
pleasure of God. Now if any of those who believe aright(8) were to say this
in simplicity, there would be no cause to be suspicious of the expression,
the right intention(9) prevailing over that somewhat simple use of
words(10). But since the phrase is from the heretics(11) and the words of
heretics are suspicious, and, as it is written, 'The wicked are deceitful,'
and 'The words of the wicked are deceit(12),' even though they but make
signs(13), for their heart is depraved, come let us examine this phrase
also, lest, though convicted on all sides, still, as hydras, they invent a
fresh word, and by such clever language and specious evasion, they sow
again that irreligion of theirs in another way. For he who says, 'The Son
came to be at the Divine will,' has the same meaning as another who says,
'Once He was not,' and 'The Son came to be out of nothing,' and 'He is a
creature.' But since they are now ashamed of these phrases, these crafty
ones have endeavoured to convey their meaning in another way, putting forth
the word 'will,' as cuttlefish their blackness, thereby to blind the
simple(14), and to keep in mind their peculiar heresy. For whence(15) bring
they 'by will and pleasure?' or from what Scripture? let them say, who are
so suspicious in their words and so inventive of irreligion. For the Father
who revealed from heaven His own Word, declared, 'This is My beloved Son;'
and by David He said, 'My heart uttered a good Word;' and John He bade say,
'In the beginning was the Word;' and David says in the Psalm, 'With Thee is
the well of life, and in Thy light shall we see light;' and the Apostle
writes, 'Who being the Radiance of Glory,' and again, 'Who being in the
form of God,' and, 'Who is the Image of the invisible God(16).'

   60. All everywhere tell us of the being of the Word, but none of His
being 'by will,' nor at all of His making; but they, where, I ask, did they
find will or pleasure 'precedent(1)' to the Word of God, unless forsooth,
leaving the Scriptures, they simulate the perverseness of Valentinus? For
Ptolemy the Valentinian said that the Unoriginate had a pair of attributes,
Thought and Will, and first He thought and then He willed; and what He
thought, He could not put forth(2), unless when the power of the Will was
added. Thence the Arians taking a lesson, wish will and pleasure to precede
the Word. For them then, let them rival the doctrine of Valentinus; but we,
when we read the divine discourses, found 'He was' applied to the Son, but
of Him only did we hear as being in the Father and the Father's Image;
while in the case of things originate only, since also by nature these
things once were not, but afterwards came to be(3), did we recognise a
precedent will and pleasure, David saying in the hundred and thirteenth
Psalm, 'As for our God He is in heaven, He hath done whatsoever pleased
Him,' and in the hundred and tenth, 'The works of the Lord are great,
sought out unto all His good pleasure;' and again, in the hundred and
thirty-fourth, 'Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did He in heaven, and in
earth, and in the sea, and in all deep places(4).' If then He be work and
thing made, and one among others, let Him, as others, be said 'by will' to
have come to be, and Scripture shews that these are thus brought into
being. And Asterius, the advocate(5) for the heresy, acquiesces, when he
thus writes, 'For if it be unworthy of the Framer of all, to make at
pleasure, let His being pleased be removed equally in the case of all, that
His Majesty be preserved unimpaired. Or if it be befitting God to will,
then let this better way obtain in the case of the first Offspring. For it
is not possible that it should be fitting for one and the same God to  make
things at His pleasure, and not at His will also. In spite of the Sophist
having introduced abundant irreligion in his words, namely, that the
Offspring and the thing made are the same, and that the Son is one
offspring out of all offsprings that are, He ends with the conclusion that
it is fitting to say that the works are by will and pleasure.

   61. Therefore if He be other than all things, as has been above
shewn(1), and through Him the works rather came to be, let not 'by will' be
applied to Him, or He has similarly come to be as the things consist which
through Him come to be. For Paul, whereas he was not before, became
afterwards an Apostle 'by the will of God(2);' and our own calling, as
itself once not being, but now taking place afterwards, is preceded by
will, and, as Paul himself says again, has been made 'according to the good
pleasure of His will(3).' And what Moses relates, 'Let there be light,' and
'Let the earth appear,' and 'Let Us make man,' is, I think, according to
what has gone before(3a), significant of the will of the Agent. For things
which once were not but happened afterwards from external causes, these the
Framer counsels to make; but His own Word begotten from Him by nature,
concerning Him He did not counsel beforehand; for in Him the Father makes,
in Him frames, other things whatever He counsels; as also James the Apostle
teaches, saying, 'Of His own will begat He us with the Word of truth(4).'
Therefore the Will of God concerning all things, whether they be begotten
again or are brought into being at the first, is in His Word, in whom He
both makes and begets again what seems right to Him; as the Apostles again
signifies, writing to Thessalonica; 'for this is the will of God in Christ
Jesus concerning you.' But if, in whom He makes, in Him also is the will,
and in Christ is the pleasure of the Father, how can He, as others, come
into being by will and pleasure? For if He too came to be as you maintain,
by will, it follows that the will concerning Him consists in some other
Word, through whom He in turn comes to be; for it has been shewn that God's
will is not in the things which He brings into being, but in Him through
whom and in whom all things made are brought to be. Next, since it is all
one to say 'By will' and Once He was not,' let them make up their minds to
say, Once He was not,' that, perceiving with shame that times are signified
by the latter, they may understand that to say 'by will' is to place times
before the Son; for counselling goes before things which once were not, as
in the case of all creatures. But if the Word is the Framer of the
creatures, and He coexists with the Father, how can to counsel precede the
Everlasting as if He were not? for if counsel precedes, how through Him are
all things? For rather He too, as one among others is by will begotten to
be a Son, as we too were made sons by the Word of Truth; and it rests, as
was said, to seek another Word, through whom He too has come to be, and was
begotten together with all things, which were according to God's pleasure.

   62. If then there is another Word of God, then be the Son originated by
a word; but if there be not, as is the case, but all things by Him have
come to be, which the Father has willed, does not this expose the many-
headed(1) craftiness of these men? that feeling shame at saying 'work,' and
'creature,' and 'God's Word was not before His generation,' yet in another
way they assert that He is a creature, putting forward 'will,' and saying,
Unless He has by will come to be, therefore God had a Son by necessity and
against His good pleasure.' And who is it then who imposes necessity on
Him, O men most wicked, who draw everything to the purpose of your heresy?
for what is contrary to will they see; but what is greater and transcends
it has escaped their perception. For as what is beside purpose is contrary
to will, so what is according to nature transcends and precedes
counselling(2). A man by counsel builds a house, but by nature he begets a
son; and what is in building began to come into being at will, and is
external to the maker; but the son is proper offspring of the father's
essence, and is not external to him; wherefore neither does he counsel
concerning him, lest he appear to counsel about himself. As far then as the
Son transcends the creature, by so much does what is by nature transcend
the will(3). And they, on hearing of Him, ought not to measure by will what
is by nature; forgetting however that they are hearing about God's Son,
they dare to apply human contrarieties in the instance of God, 'necessity'
and 'beside purpose,' to be able thereby to deny that there is a true Son
of God. For let them tell us themselves,--that God is good and merciful,
does this attach to Him by will or not? if by will, we must consider that
He began to be good, and that His not being good is possible; for to
counsel and choose implies an inclination two ways, and is incidental to a
rational nature. But if it be too unseemly that He should be called good
and merciful upon will, then what they have said themselves must be
retorted on them,--'therefore by necessity and not at His pleasure He is
good;' and, 'who is it that imposes this necessity on Him?' But if it be
unseemly to speak of necessity in the case of God, and therefore it is by
nature that He is good, much more is He, and more truly, Father of the Son
by nature and not by will.

   63. Moreover let them answer us this:--(for against their shamelessness
I wish to urge a further question, bold indeed, but with a religious
intent; be propitious, O Lord(1)!)--the Father Himself, does He exist,
first having counselled, then being pleased, or before counselling? For
since they are so bold in the instance of the Word, they must receive the
like answer, that they may know that this their presumption reaches even to
the Father Himself. If then they shall themselves take counsel about will,
and say that even He is from will, what then was He before He counselled,
or what gained He, as ye consider, after counselling? But if such a
question be unseemly and self-destructive, and shocking even to ask (for it
is enough only to hear God's Name for us to know and understand that He is
He that Is), will it not also be against reason to have parallel thoughts
concerning the Word of God, and to make pretences of will and pleasure? for
it is enough in like manner only to hear the Name of the Word, to know and
understand that He who is God not by will, has not by will but by nature
His own Word. And does it not surpass all conceivable madness, to entertain
the thought only, that God Himself counsels and considers and chooses and
proceeds to have a good pleasure, that He be not without Word and without
Wisdom, but have both? for He seems to be considering about Himself, who
counsels about what is proper to His Essence. There being then much
blasphemy in such a thought, it will be religious to say that things
originate have come to be 'by favour and will,' but the Son is not a work
of will, nor has come after(2), as the creation, but is by nature the own
Offspring of God's Essence. For being the own Word of the Father, He allows
us not to account(3) of will as before Himself, since He is Himself the
Father's Living Counsel(4), and Power, and Framer of the things which
seemed good to the Father. And this is what He says of Himself in the
Proverbs; 'Counsel is mine and security, mine is understanding, and mine
strength(5).' For as, although Himself the 'Understanding,' in which He
prepared the heavens, and Himself 'Strength and Power' (for Christ is
'God's Power and God's Wisdom(6)), He here has altered the terms and said,
'Mine is understanding' and 'Mine strength,' so while He says, 'Mine is
counsel,' He must Himself be the Living(7) Counsel of the Father; as we
have learned from the Prophet also, that He becomes 'the Angel of great
Counsel(8),' and was called the good pleasure of the Father; for thus we
must refute them, using human illustrations(9) concerning God.

   64. Therefore if the works subsist 'by will and favour,' and the whole
creature is made 'at God's good pleasure,' and Paul was called to be an
Apostle 'by the will of God,' and our calling has come about 'by His good
pleasure and will,' and all things have come into being through the Word,
He is external to the things which have come to be by will, but rather is
Himself the Living Counsel of the Father, by which all these things have
come to be; by which David also gives thanks in the seventy-second Psalm.
'Thou hast holden me by my right hand Thou shall guide me with Thy
Counsel(1).' How then can the Word, being the Counsel and Good Pleasure of
the Father, come into being Himself 'by good pleasure and will,' like every
one else? unless, as I said before, in their madness they repeat that He
has come into being through Himself, or through some other(2). Who then is
it through whom He has come to be? let them fashion another Word; and let
them name another Christ, rivalling the doctrine of Valentinus(3); for
Scripture it is not. And though they fashion another, yet assuredly he too
comes into being through some one; and so, while we are thus reckoning up
and investigating the succession of them, the many-headed(4) heresy of the
Atheists(5) is discovered to issue in polytheism(6) and madness unlimited;
in the which, wishing the Son to be a creature and from nothing, they imply
the same thing in other words by pretending the words will and pleasure,
which rightly belong to things originate and creatures. Is it not
irreligious then to impute the characteristics of things originate to the
Framer of all? and is it not blasphemous to say that will was in the Father
before the Word? for if will precedes in the Father, the Son's words are
not true, 'I in the Father;' or even if He is in the Father, yet He will
hold but a second place, and it became Him not to say 'I in the Father,'
since will was before Him, in which all things were brought into being and
He Himself subsisted, as you hold. For though He excel in glory, He is not
the less one of the things which by will come into being. And, as we have
said before, if it be so, how is He Lord and they servants(7)? but He is
Lord of all, because He is one with the Father's Lordship; and the creation
is all in bondage, since it is external to the Oneness of the Father, and,
whereas it once was not, was brought to be.

   65. Moreover, if they say that the Son is by will, they should say also
that He came to be by understanding; for I consider understanding and will
to be the same. For what a man counsels, about that also he has
understanding; and what he has in understanding, that also he counsels.
Certainly the Saviour Himself has made them correspond, as being cognate,
when He says, 'Counsel is mine and security; mine is understanding, and
mine strength(1).' For as strength and security are the same (for they mean
one attribute), so we may say that Understanding and Counsel are the same,
which is the Lord. But these irreligious men are unwilling that the Son
should be Word and Living Counsel; but they fable that there is with
God(2), as if a habits(3), coming and going(4), after the manner of men,
understanding, counsel, wisdom; and they leave nothing undone, and they put
forward the 'Thought' and 'Will' of Valentinus, so that they may but
separate the Son from the Father, and may call Him a creature instead of
the proper Word of the Father. To them then must be said what was said to
Simon Magus; 'the irreligion of Valentinus perish with you(5);' and let
every one rather trust to Solomon, who says, that the Word is Wisdom and
Understanding. For he says, 'The Lord by Wisdom founded the earth, by
Understanding He established the heavens.' And as here by Understanding, so
in the Psalms, By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made.' And as by
the Word the heavens, so 'He hath done whatsoever pleased Him.' And as the
Apostle writes to Thessalonians, 'the will of God is in Christ Jesus(6).'
The Son of God then, He is the 'Word' and the 'Wisdom;' He the
'Understanding' and the Living 'Counsel;' and in Him is the 'Good Pleasure
of the Father;' He is 'Truth' and 'Light' and 'Power' of the Father. But if
the Will of God is Wisdom and Understanding, and the Son is Wisdom, he who
says that the Son is 'by will,' says virtually that Wisdom has come into
being in wisdom, and the Son is made in a son, and the Word created through
the Word(7); which is incompatible with God and is opposed to His
Scriptures. For the Apostle proclaims the Son to be the own Radiance and
Expression, not of the Father's will(8), but of His Essence(9) Itself,
saying, 'Who being the Radiance of His glory and the Expression of His
Subsistence(10).' But if, as we have said before, the Father's Essence and
Subsistence be not from will, neither, as is very plain, is what is proper
to the Father's Subsistence from will; for such as, and so as, that Blessed
Subsistence, must also be the proper Offspring from It. And accordingly the
Father Himself said not, 'This is the Son originated at My will,' nor 'the
Son whom I have by My favour,' but simply 'My Son,' and more than that, 'in
whom I am well pleased;' meaning by this, This is the Son by nature; and
'in Him is lodged My will about what pleases Me.'

   66. Since then the Son is by nature and not by will, is He without the
pleasure of the Father and not with the Father's will? No, verily; but the
Son is with the pleasure of the Father, and, as He says Himself, 'The
Father loveth the Son, and sheweth Him all things(1).' For as not 'from
will' did He begin to be good, nor yet is good without will and
pleasure(for what He is, that also is His pleasure), so also that the Son
should be, though it came not 'from will,' yet it is not without His
pleasure or against His purpose. For as His own Subsistence is by His
pleasure, so also the Son, being proper to His Essence, is not without His
pleasure. Be then the Son the object of the Father's pleasure and love; and
thus let every one religiously account of(2) the pleasure and the not-
unwillingness of God. For by that good pleasure wherewith the Son is the
object of the Father's pleasure, is the Father the object of the Son's
love, pleasure, and honour; and one is the good pleasure which is from
Father in Son, so that here too we may contemplate the Son in the Father
and the Father in the Son. Let no one then, with Valentinus, introduce a
precedent will; nor let any one, by this pretence of 'counsel,' intrude
between the Only Father and the Only Word; for it were madness to place
will and consideration between them. For it is one thing to say, 'Of will
He came to be,' and another, that the Father has love and good pleasure
towards His Son who is His own by nature. For to say, 'Of will He came to
be,' in the first place implies that once He was not; and next it implies
an inclination two ways, as has been said, so that one might suppose that
the Father could even not will the Son. But to say of the Son, 'He might
not have been,' is an irreligious presumption reaching even to the Essence
of the Father, as if what is His own might not have been. For it is the
same as saying, 'The Father might not have been good.' And as the Father is
always good by nature, so He is always generative(3) by nature; and to say,
'The Father's good pleasure is the Son,' and 'The Word's good pleasure is
the Father,' implies, not a precedent will, but genuineness of nature, and
propriety and likeness of Essence. For as in the case of the radiance and
light one might say, that there is no will preceding radiance in the light,
but it is its natural offspring, at the pleasure of the light which begat
it, not by will and consideration, but in nature and truth, so also in the
instance of the Father and the Son, one might rightly say, that the Father
has love and good pleasure towards the Son, and the Son has love and good
pleasure towards the Father.

   67. Therefore call not the Son a work of good pleasure; nor bring in
the doctrine of Valentinus into the Church; but be He the Living Counsel,
and Offspring in truth and nature, as the Radiance from the Light. For thus
has the Father spoken, 'My heart uttered a good Word;' and the Son
conformably, 'I in the Father and the Father in Me(4).' But if the Word be
in the heart, where is will? and if the Son in the Father, where is good
pleasure? and if He be Will Himself, how is counsel in Will? it is
unseemly; lest the Word come into being in a word, and the Son in a son,
and Wisdom in a wisdom, as has been repeatedly(5) said. For the Son is the
Father's All; and nothing was in the Father before the Word; but in the
Word is will also, and through Him the objects of will are carried into
effect, as holy Scriptures have shewn. And I could wish that the
irreligious men, having fallen into such want of reason(6) as to be
considering about will, would now ask their childbearing women no more,
whom they used to ask, 'Hadst thou a son before conceiving him(7)?' but the
father, 'Do ye become fathers by counsel, or by the natural law of your
will?' or 'Are your children like your nature and essence(8)?' that, even
from fathers they may learn shame, from whom they assumed this
proposition(9) about birth, and from whom they hoped to gain knowledge in
point. For they will reply to them, 'What we beget, is like, not our good
pleasure(10), but like ourselves; nor become we parents by previous
counsel, but to beget is proper to our nature; since we too are images of
our fathers.' Either then let them condemn themselves(11), and cease asking
women about the Son of God, or let them learn from them, that the Son is
begotten not by will, but in nature and truth. Becoming and suitable to
them is a refutation from human instances(12), since the perverse-minded
men dispute in a human way concerning the Godhead. Why then are Christ's
enemies still mad? for this, as well as their other pretences, is shewn and
proved to be mere fantasy and fable; and on this account, they ought,
however late, contemplating the precipice of folly down which they have
fallen, to rise again from the depth and to flee the snare of the devil, as
we admonish them. For Truth is loving unto men and cries continually, 'If
because of My clothing of the body ye believe Me not, yet believe the
works, that ye may know that. "I am in the Father and the Father in Me,"
and "I and the Father are one," and "He that hath seen Me hath seen the
Father(13)."' But the Lord according to His wont is loving to man, and
would fain 'help them that are fallen,' as the praise of David(14) says;
but the irreligious men, not desirous to hear the Lord's voice, nor bearing
to see Him acknowledged by all as God and God's Son, go about, miserable
men, as beetles, seeking with their father the devil pretexts for
irreligion. What pretexts then, and whence will they be able next to find?
unless they borrow blasphemies of Jews and Caiaphas, and take atheism from
Gentiles? for the divine Scriptures are closed to them, and from every part
of them they are refuted as insensate and Christ's enemies.


Taken from "The Early Church Fathers and Other Works" originally published
by Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. in English in Edinburgh, Scotland, beginning in
1867. (LNPF II/IV, Schaff and Wace). The digital version is by The
Electronic Bible Society, P.O. Box 701356, Dallas, TX 75370, 214-407-WORD.

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