747 S. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM, ARCHBISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE 748 pigeat, and that you might frequently inform us of your health. For although separated from you by a long distance of space, we are solicitous about your affairs; and if by chance we should learn that you are free from every tumult and disturbance and are enjoying good health, we shall be filled with no little pleasure. Since these things are clear to you, notify us as often as possible concerning these matters which we desire to know, so that even we, living in the desert, may draw therefrom much consolation.
MONITION CONCERNING THE EPISTLE TO CÆSARIUS
The Epistle to Cæsarius is said to have been written by Chrysostom at the beginning and end of the time of his second exile. A Latin translation of it had once been transcribed from a certain Florentine manuscript by Peter Martyr Vermigli, who defected from the Catholic religion, and, taking it with him to England, deposited it in the library of Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury. But after the death of Cranmer, his library was plundered, and the epistle thereafter appeared nowhere. However, when it had been brought forward as testimony by those who denied transubstantiation, it was denied by the champions of that same transubstantiation that it had ever existed, since no copy could be produced. In the year 1680, however, that illustrious man Emericus Bigot published that Latin translation, which had been transcribed from the Florentine codex in the library of the Dominicans of St. Mark, after the book of Palladius on the life of Chrysostom. But a certain censor thought the epistle, already printed, should be suppressed, and indeed suppressed it along with Bigot’s notes. In the year 1685, however, Stephanus Le Moyne, in the book titled *Varia Sacra*, Volume One, published this epistle at the end as it is found in the manuscript, sprinkled with many errors and deformed in several places, so that hardly any sense can be elicited. The famous James Basnage also published it at Rotterdam in the year 1687, together with that part of Bigot’s preface which concerned this epistle and which had been expunged along with the Epistle to Cæsarius, adding also the Greek fragments which Bigot had collected. Other editions of this epistle also appeared among the heterodox. Finally, the learned man Jo. Hardouin of the Society of Jesus published it in the year 1689 and strenuously defended the Catholic cause against the heterodox, who were usurping this [epistle] to protect their own dogmas. Here we present it again, amended in certain places; however, we provide the Greek fragments, which had been taken from Anastasius the Presbyter, from John of Damascus, and from others, in a more complete form, thanks to the very learned and friendly Michael Lequien of the Order of Preachers, who gathered these more diligently from Anastasius and from John of Damascus.
Now, many things must be examined here: namely, whether this writer is John Chrysostom or someone else who falsely assumes his name; what is the scope of the epistle; and what is to be thought of that passage which gave an opening for so many controversies concerning transubstantiation. Regarding the first question, namely, whether this epistle is truly Chrysostom’s or not: it has been held as the offspring of Chrysostom by John of Damascus, by Anastasius the Presbyter, by Nicephorus, and by others who have disputed concerning the two natures; indeed, the very title declares John, Bishop of Constantinople—that is, Chrysostom—to be the author: for it reads thus: *Here begins the epistle of the blessed John, Bishop of Constantinople, to Cæsarius the monk, written during the time of his second exile*; which same [phrase] is repeated entirely at the end: *Here ends the epistle of John, etc.* It is no wonder, therefore, if the heterodox, thinking that they could borrow from here a very strong argument against the Catholic faith, [bring it forward as] the genuine offspring of Chrysostom, with no previous examination, produced it.
A The writer of the epistle held the very same manner of life that Cæsarius professed, namely, the monastic life. This could indeed be said of Chrysostom, who, when he was a youth, resided among monks and lived an ascetic life. But is it plausible that, if he had shared the monastic life with Cæsarius—who survived until Chrysostom's second exile and was accustomed to writing letters to him—there would never be any mention of him [738] either in the Epistles or in the Vita Chrysostomi? From this alone, I know not what suspicion arises. The style is remarkably different from Chrysostom's manner of speaking—a fact which is now more easily detected, since far more of his Greek works are published than before. Here, everything smells of a stranger, and not even the slightest detail is observed that would smack of Chrysostom; so that anyone comparing other writings and epistles of Chrysostom with this letter would think himself transported to another world. Who has seen in Chrysostom the phrase *tēlaugōs diagoreusai* [to declare clearly], or who has seen *tauta katēgoreitai* used in this sense, [to mean] "these things are preached"? Where was Chrysostom ever such a dry orator when the matter at hand concerned bringing a former companion and associate back to a sound mind? Chrysostom's style of argumentation shines forth in his orations *Against the Anomœans* and *Against the Jews*; compare these with this epistle, and you will immediately see how great is the difference between this and those. Having weighed these matters, I could never believe the epistle to Cæsarius to be Chrysostom's, but rather [that of] someone who has impersonated Chrysostom.
B Who that person is who ascribed this epistle to Chrysostom is entirely uncertain. The occasion for sending it, however, was—or is represented as being—that which is narrated at the beginning of the epistle: a book of Apollinarius had been offered to Cæsarius, and upon reading it, he was moved by his doctrine to such a degree that he gave thanks to those who had offered him the book and even proclaimed it to be excellent in that epistle which he pretended to have sent to John. There are not lacking learned men who think this epistle was not written against the Apollinarists, but against the Eutychians, and that it is only by conjecture that the book being discussed here is said to have been by Apollinarius; for they say that Apollinarius never said that out of two natures, one nature was made after the union. But there is certainly no doubt that this concerns the book of Apollinarius and that the doctrine of the Apollinarists is being attacked. For, to go through everything in detail, those things which are said at the beginning of the epistle to be proclaimed in the book of Apollinarius—*syndromēn ousiōdē kai mixin thespesian gegenesthai theotētos te kai sarkos, mian te entauthen apotelesthēnai physin* (a substantial concurrence and a divine mixing of divinity and flesh, and from this, one nature having been completed)—I say these are the very words of Apollinarius, as they are related by Eulogius in Photius, chap. CCXXX, p. 849, excerpted from Apollinarius' book *On the Incarnation*: *ō kainē ktisis, kai mixis thespesia; Theos kai sarx mian apetelesan physin* (O new creature and divine mixture! God and flesh finish one nature). The very same thing is related by Ephræmius of Antioch, in Photius' *Bibliotheca*, chap. CCXXIX, p. 787. Now, who could deny that Cæsarius' epistle concerns this book of Apollinarius?
Let us also review the other points: according to Apollinarius and the Apollinarists, as is said in this epistle, "after the union it was not right to speak of two natures." The Apollinarists also said, "The Lord's body is not a true body, because it was changed into divinity; they devised a Passion for the divinity." They also said, "The Lord Jesus was clothed in our flesh, but it was inanimate." These were the errors of Apollinarius and the Apollinarists, who were called *Synousiastæ*. These errors followed from the aforementioned passage of Apollinarius: for because, according to Apollinarius, through divine commixtion God and flesh made one nature, from this it followed that after the union one should not speak of two natures; that the divine body was not a true body because it was changed into divinity; that the divine nature itself, or divinity, was liable to passion; [and] that the flesh of Christ was void of a human soul, because God and flesh made one nature.
C These errors of the Apollinarists, or *synousiastai*, are also commemorated by Athanasius, Gregory Nazianzen, and Epiphanius; and the latter, as well as John Damascene in his *De Hæresibus* (p. 94), calls them *dimoiritas*. The reason for this appellation is revealed by Gregory Nazianzen in *Orat.* 46, p. 722, when he states that the body and soul in Christ are *to tritomorion*, the third part. The Apollinarists indeed asserted that one part of man, namely the mind (*nous*), was supplied by the Word in Christ, and that the Word alone, joined to the body and the soul (the sensitive one, as they claimed), constituted the whole of Christ. Wherefore, since…
the catholic opinion was that Christ consisted of three parts—the Word, that is to say, the human mind, and the animated body—those who removed one of these parts, namely the mind, from the two others that remained, were called A *dimoiritae* (two-part men): for *dimoiros* in Greek means "two parts of the whole," of which term's signification it is possible to find examples quite frequently in our *Analecta*, p. 519 et seqq.
With this epistle, therefore, those things harmonize which Athanasius says in his epistle to Epictetus concerning the Apollinarists, though without mentioning them by name, which epistle Epiphanius reported in full in *Heresy 77*, where he acts against the Dimoiritae, or Apollinarists. "What hell," Athanasius asks, "eructated that the body born of Mary was consubstantial (*homoousion*) with the divinity of the Word?" Hence, moreover, they were called Apollinarists or B *Synusiastae*, because they mixed the substance of the Word with the flesh and made both into one. "Or," continues Athanasius, "was the Word changed into flesh, bones, and hair, and into the whole body, and did it fall away from its own nature?" Here you have that *theospesios* mixture, or divine mingling of Apollinaris, through which God and flesh made one nature. "But who," says Athanasius, "in the Church or among Christians has ever heard that the Lord possessed a body by position, not by nature—*thesei kai ou physei*?"
These matters are explained by that which is read in the Epistle to Caesarius: "For the Apollinarists said," C this writer says, "that the Lord's body is not a true body, because it had been converted into the deity." Athanasius continues: "Or who has progressed so far in impiety as to say and feel that the very deity, consubstantial with the Father, had been circumcised, had been imperfect, and had been made from a perfect state; and that what was affixed to the cross was not the body, but the very substance of Wisdom, the Maker of all things?" These points, again, consent with those we were saying a little before: that according to the Apollinarists, the Lord’s body was not a true body. From these statements, likewise, that which is mentioned more than once in the epistle is proven, namely, that according to the Apollinarists D the deity itself is passible, a point which Gregory Nazianzen explains in greater detail in *Homily 46*, where he says that according to Apollinaris, the only-begotten God suffered in his own divinity, and that in that three-day death of the body, the divinity also died along with the body, and thus was brought back from death to life again by the works of the Father. Athanasius also mentions and confutes that passibility of the deity according to the Apollinarists in his books *Against Apollinaris* (see p. 924), and a little before, in p. 923, he says that according to the Apollinarists, the Word assumed a body without a mind, which is the last error mentioned in the epistle to Caesarius, and this was, as it were, the badge of the Apollinarists. I think it certain, therefore, that in the epistle to Caesarius the argument is against the book of Apollinaris, and that it is the very book, as it seems, which he had written *On the Incarnation*, mentioned by Eulogius above.
Otherwise, the Apollinarists did not agree among themselves, but while one set of errors flowed from a single source, they argued for others, as can be seen in Athanasius’s epistle to Epictetus, and in the same Athanasius’s books *Against Apollinaris*; likewise in Epiphanius, *Heresy 77*. Yet it cannot be denied that it is entirely probable that this writer, who appears to have lived in the Eutychian century and to have been hostile to that heresy, in order that he might be able to ascribe this supposedly Chrysostomic epistle to Chrysostom, pretended that he was acting against the book of Apollinaris, which agreed with Eutyches in many things, since he could not introduce Chrysostom as speaking openly against Eutyches’s heresy, seeing as he had died long before it arose. That he here largely confutes the Eutychians alongside the Apollinarists is proven by those words and frequent modes of speaking which we mentioned above, which in the time of Chrysostom were scarcely known, and yet in this epistle are used everywhere in the same way as they were used later against the Eutychians.
It remains for us to discuss that clause concerning which many questions have been agitated; it is indeed this: "For just as before the bread is sanctified, we name it bread; but when the divine grace has sanctified it by means of the priest, it is indeed liberated from the appellation of bread; but it is deemed worthy of the appellation of the Lord’s body, even though the nature of bread has remained in it, and we do not preach two bodies, but one body of the Son: so too here, the divine nature indwelling in the body constitutes one Son, one person, both together, known without confusion, in an indivisible manner, not in one nature alone, but in two perfect ones." Hence, the heterodox, believing that they could borrow a very sharp weapon against the catholic faith, fight on the argument that, according to the mind of this writer, the Eucharist is not celebrated without any transformation of the substance of the bread; others, having progressed further, [attack] the appellation of bread...
[753'] A ...and of the Lord's body, claiming it is not worthy of being present. They consider it as something certain and fully explored, that this letter is truly by John Chrysostom. But since it has been abundantly proven above that this letter is not by Chrysostom, even if something were to emerge from the words of this unknown writer in their favor—which is, however, far from the case—they could borrow no authority from this source, since it cannot be detected who this writer was, nor whether he was a Catholic or a heterodox heretic; indeed, from what he said regarding the passibility of the Deity, a measure of adverse suspicion arises. B But whoever he may be, let us now examine the passage and scrutinize first the artifice by which they distort such a passage to deny the presence of Christ in the Eucharist. "Here," they say, "the bread is said to have been deemed worthy of the appellation of the Lord's body": whence it follows that the bread is called the Lord's body in the Eucharist by name alone; for why would he say the bread was deemed worthy of the appellation of the Lord's body if the Lord's body were truly present? But why such circumlocutions, when this writer clearly says that the nature of the bread and the Lord's body are not preached as two bodies, but as one body of the Son? Does it not follow entirely from this that the Son's body is truly held to be in the Eucharist? Would that comparison of the unity of the nature of the bread and the Lord's body with the divine and human nature, C producing one Son and one Person, not be altogether futile if the body of Christ were not truly in the Eucharist? They brandish another weapon, pressing more heavily, and argue that transubstantiation is openly attacked here. For, they say, it is stated clearly here that the bread remains in the Eucharist after sanctification, and this is declared by these words: "Even though the nature of the bread has remained in it, and we do not preach two bodies, but one body of the Son." Truly, as Hardouin proves with many examples, the *nature* and *substance* of any given thing often signify among the Fathers the natural properties of that same thing; but here all the natural properties of the bread remain, and whatever moves the sense in the bread, namely, appearance, touch, and taste; for we perceive this alone in the nature of any sensible thing. So that the nature of the bread is understood here in its entirety, although its material and substance have been changed into the body of Christ. D The author of this letter, whoever he may be, surely must have understood the nature of the bread in this way: for it was commonly said at that time in the Greek Church that the bread is changed into the body of Christ; with which change effected, the substance of the bread was no longer in the Eucharist. That the writer is to be explained in this way is proven by John of Damascus, who read this letter and considered it a production of John Chrysostom, and who quoted no small part of it. For John of Damascus himself, in the fourth book *On the Orthodox Faith*, p. 270, has it thus: "Just as naturally bread through eating, and wine and water through drinking, are changed into the body and blood of the one eating and drinking, and they do not become another body beside his previous body, so the bread of the prothesis, and wine and water, through the invocation and advent of the Holy Spirit, are supernaturally changed into the body and blood of Christ, and there are not two, but one and the same." John of Damascus, who seems to have had in mind the passage in question here when he wrote this. If he had not said that the bread and wine are supernaturally changed into the body and blood of Christ, the heterodox would undoubtedly infer from what follows, "there are not two, but one and the same": if bread and wine are one and the same concurrently with the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist, therefore after sanctification bread and wine remain; but since he previously said that bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ, what he adds thereafter, "there are not two, but one and the same," is not to be understood in such a way that the substance itself of the bread and wine remains, and is one with the body of Christ; otherwise it would not have been changed into the body and blood of Christ; but that all those properties which alone are perceived by the sense in bread and wine remain, and together with the body and blood of Christ form one sacrament—and this is how the author of the letter to Cæsarius, whom John of Damascus then had before his eyes, is to be explained: for what he says, "Even though the nature of the bread has remained," is to be understood only concerning the species and properties of the bread. Nor did he intend to deny the change of the bread and...