OF OUR HOLY FATHER CYRIL, ARCHBISHOP OF ALEXANDRIA, ON THE HOLY AND CONSUBSTANTIAL TRINITY. PREFACE TO THIS BOOK.
A The comprehension of divine things is very difficult, even for those who are highly exercised and well-prepared to be able to contemplate mysteries and things that surpass all intellect, even if it be, as the most wise Paul says, in a mirror and in an enigma. Indeed, the human mind is too coarse, and is not capable of accompanying the subtlety of these concepts. Wherefore there is much fear in speaking of things pertaining to God, and it would be very wise in these matters to choose silence; yet, for those who are commissioned to teach, it is not without penalty to do so. Knowing this, the divine Paul said: “For woe is me if I do not preach the gospel.” I have therefore arrived at the writing of this present book, and I have prepared for you again, most studious brother Nemesius, this discourse concerning the holy and consubstantial Trinity.
B Having brought together the concepts concerning each of the matters under investigation, whether by genus or by species, we have composed the entire body of the book into seven dialogues; and, because he is very learned and an assiduous inquirer into such matters, we have addressed this to the most gentle Hermias. The style of the discourse is indeed relaxed, but it proceeds through question and answer involving two persons; the first is marked by the letter A, the first of the alphabet, and the second by B. Since there is a great deal of subtlety in the matters under investigation, in order that the subject being examined may be established and refuted with precision through questions and answers, the introduction of these persons became necessary. One must, therefore, accurately observe the letters prefixed to them. For thus we shall preserve, in the most excellent order, the discovery of the concepts, and the arrangement and force of the entire book, in a manner clear and without confusion. I pray that you may fare well in the Lord, beloved.
SUMMARY OF THE CONTENTS OF THIS BOOK
1. That the Son is coeternal and consubstantial with God and the Father. 2. That the Son is also begotten of Him by nature. 3. That He is true God, just as the Father is. 4. That the Son is not a creature, nor a work. 5. That the properties of the Godhead, and the glory, exist naturally in the Son, just as in the Father. 6. That those things which are specific to the humanity, and which are not spoken of the Son with extreme theological propriety, would be more fittingly referred to the economy of the incarnation than to the nature of the Word Itself, insofar as He is understood and is God. 7. Concerning the Holy Spirit, that He is also God, and from God by nature.
OUR HOLY FATHER CYRIL TO HERMIAS THE PRESBYTER, BY QUESTION AND ANSWER, DIALOGUE I.
That the Son is consubstantial and coeternal with God and the Father.
A 385 SANCTI PATRIS NOSTRI CYRILLI AD HERMIAM PRESBYTERUM, DIALOGUS I.
Quod consubstantialis et coæternus Deo et Patri sit Filius. B
A. It has not been possible to see our holy Hermias yesterday or the day before; for I suppose he had decided neither to be in the market-place nor to go abroad, but was certainly warding off the cold at home: for that is how one had to act. But now at last, the clear and serene sky has granted him to our sight.
B. You speak the truth. For old age is always morose, and goes out of the house with great difficulty, especially when the weather is rainy. C
A. Therefore, not unskillfully, nor inappropriately, I might compare you to the sea fish, which, if the wind blows more vehemently...
A and raises a roar, and rushes down with a whistling sound, enter the crevices in the deep one by one or in shoals, and as if into a forest or a flowering thicket, they hide themselves to shield against the injury of the air. But after the radiance of the sun’s beam has shone upon the waters, and they perceive that the whole sea is, as it were, smiling, they leap up and swim back, and sport upon the crests of the waves, having cast off at once both fear and lethargy. B. Know well, my friend, that my own situation is exactly thus! A. You are, then, far removed from crowds and business, and your mind, I suppose, is at rest by your hearth. B. And what comes of that? A. A very great and holy-minded benefit. B For shall we not attribute something good to tranquility? B. Assuredly. A. Indeed, the song chanted by the Psalmist from God upon the lyre will demonstrate that this is entirely true. B. What song do you mean? A. "Be still, and know that I am God" (Ps. XLV, 11). For the physical eye, when free from dust and smoke and every other thing capable of clouding it, sends a subtle and unimpeded energy to those objects which it is accustomed to perceive. But if it is marred by any affection, it fixes its gaze upon objects less than it should, and without doubt it will sometimes deviate from strict precision. Now, the human mind, if it is quiet C and composed, and accustomed to avoid idle and loathsome fantasies, sees acutely and clearly, and receives within itself a knowledge of things free from error. But if it should be dulled by any of the passions, it will no longer perceive the Divine beauty itself, but will, as it were, brood over earthly things, not otherwise than birds whose wings are wet, which are prevented from soaring on high. B. You speak well. A. Do you think then, Hermias, that staying at leisure at home, it is fitting to remember this divine voice? And just as yesterday and the day before, you have holy books in your hands; and a most studious zeal is nurtured in your mind, sharpening you like one of the keenest hounds D toward the love of hunting whatever you need to learn. Or perhaps we shall attribute the reasons for your lack of industry in these matters to the fact that the years of your bodily age have faded, or will you offer some other, even less true, excuse? I would gladly reproach you, asserting that an old man is a liar, and wants his words to be most readily believed. B. I could indeed bring many accusations against the infirmity of the body—
for we have come to the very sunset of life—but I will put aside such things for now, as it is necessary to speak of what is essential. My mind is always somehow inclined toward useful learning, and yet it craves nothing else perhaps, except for this alone. But just as a noble and most swift-footed horse, even though it may very much desire to prove the speed of its feet, is compelled against its will by the roughness of the field to show that the ability to exert its strength has been taken from it, so too do I, captured by a certain vehement and excited zeal to search out the divine Scriptures, find myself restrained by arduous and inaccessible regions, which are not set forth by a level or easy approach, as it seems, and which are not A passable for those who wish to attain them. Wherefore, the difficulty of the places sometimes pushes the mind back toward sloth; but I am more dismayed by this than by all other things, especially that I should have to speak regarding the faith, even though it is the head of the hope that is in us.
A. Yes, indeed; for I would agree that you speak the truth. But that no one, I think, could attain any of the goods from above and from God without sweat, is surely plain to everyone. For those things which are set far above nature, and are endowed with the highest glory, are not trodden by everyone, but are difficult to seize, inaccessible, arduous—and what degree of difficulty and labor do they not possess in themselves?
B. What, then, should those do in whom there has arisen a desire and longing for these best and most excellent discoveries, but for whom it is most difficult to attain them?
A. What else, I ask, do you think they should do, than obey the voices of the saints, by whom it has assuredly been proclaimed: «If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all B simply and does not reproach, and it will be given to him»? For those things that are in need of light are surely illumined by the divine and intelligible light, and thus Wisdom imparts wisdom to those things that lack intellect and wisdom. And Christ is considered to be Light and Wisdom, «who shone in our hearts for the illumination of his knowledge.» For God and the Father, as the divine Paul certainly says, «delivered us from the power of darkness, and transferred us into the kingdom of the love of his Son» in the light. And furthermore, some one of the saints called Him the Splendor of the day, and Lucifer besides. For he says: «Until the day dawns, and Lucifer arises in your hearts»; by the splendor of the day and the rising Lucifer, I think he means the illumination by the Spirit through Christ.
B. But no one would doubt that Christ is light, and indeed the day itself, and Lucifer for those who are once enrolled in the number of the faithful. But if we were to ask you to explain to us as clearly as possible the firm doctrine of the faith, which is ignorant of error, will you refuse to speak, and assume your familiar sloth? For infinite things are circulated by many who, fawning upon the straight word of truth, pervert it with elegant interpretations to suit their own opinion, and in-
the manner of wild wasps, flying about they drone importunately over cities and regions alike, speaking things that are of their own hearts, and not from the mouth of the Lord, as it is written 88.
A A. How I admire your incomparable zeal for God, good sir, and I entreat you, never cease from a disposition so upright and most praiseworthy. Nevertheless, my friend, it is permitted to you to attain even very easily and abundantly the things you desire; I do not say to dig out some spiritual meaning, as if I were promising to offer and explain something better than what was said before us. B For the writings of the holy Fathers are sufficient for this, in which, if whoever wishes should converse attentively and apply himself with vigilance, his mind would be immediately bathed in divine light. For it was not they themselves who were speaking in themselves: "All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable 90." Is it not so?
B. Yes, and this is true. But if you yourself act the sluggard, and in no way assist us, but rather, keeping your tongue restrained within your teeth, you persuade us to inaction, building up for those who are studious of such matters a firm and unassailable excuse for cessation, namely, that the Fathers have already spoken to us about these things abundantly and sufficiently—truly, I would not praise you for having chosen to act in this way, and I ask that you answer me as I inquire.
A. For why do you inquire of me? Do not, I implore you, inveigh against my mediocrity, O noble man.
B. It is not my purpose to inveigh—far from it—but answer me truly, and do not cunningly lead me away from investigating the things I have a mind to ask you.
A. Ask, then, if you wish.
B. If one of us wished to graze sheep or goats in the fields, would you not think that he had need of a shepherd's crook and dogs, so that he himself might drive back the savage beasts, if any perchance should invade, while they, by their barking, striking fear into them, might prohibit the audacity of the assault and keep the flock unharmed?
A. You speak rightly.
B. But if, as time went on, it happened that some of the dogs died, and the shepherd brought in others in their place, would the barking and watchfulness of the second be in vain, seeing that it was to those before them that success in these matters was credited?
A. And how could that which is useful be considered in vain, or be called so?
B. C Then will you yourself remain silent without blame, urging us to attend only to the writings of the Fathers, while calling it a superfluous thing to wish to go along in similar God-contemplating studies, even while the savage heretics with unbridled and unbarred mouths are consuming the souls of the simpler ones?
A. Therefore, since a keen desire has entered into me—for I have been pricked not moderately, and sufficiently impelled to wish to labor by your words, O man,
A come then, let us bring into the midst those things accurately and examinedly defined in the holy and most celebrated synod gathered in its time in the city of the Nicaeans, and let us observe, if it pleases you, what it is that seems not faultless to those who have chosen to hold heterodox views. For whoever would wish to assert that the faith best and most divinely defined and set forth by that holy and great synod is the unshakable and firm foundation and support of our souls, will speak truly indeed, and will obtain praise from Christ, and will shine forth as a most faithful and true worshiper. Let us therefore record, word for word, the divine and most holy oracle of that holy synod, that is to say, the Symbol of faith, polished and wrought for every true conception, so that for those who wish to discuss it, no room at all may be found for our babbling—lest any argument be admitted as if we were leaping upon alien dogmas, or having abandoned the royal road, we were turning aside into another, following a private and singular opinion. For I myself would indeed consider this to be truly an intractable disease of the mind. “For wisdom that is without rebuke errs,” as it is written. B The exposition of the faith is as follows: We believe in one God, Father almighty, maker of all things visible and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, Only-begotten, that is, from the substance of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God; begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father, through whom all things were made, both those in heaven and those on earth; who for us men and for our salvation came down and was incarnate, and was made man, suffered, and rose again on the third day; who ascended into heaven, and is coming to judge the living and the dead; and in the Holy Spirit. And those who say, "There was a time when he was not," or "He was not before he was begotten," or "He was made from things that are not," or who affirm that the Son of God is of another hypostasis or substance, or is created, or mutable, or alterable—these the catholic and apostolic Church anathematizes.
C B. Oh, the accurate and consummate prudence! Boanerges, that is, sons of thunder, is what all those who set these things forth for us may surely be called. For they have uttered something great and supernatural.
A. I seem to myself, then, to have considered and acted in the best way. For to have nothing else in mind or on the tongue besides these things, but to follow the judgment and words which were conceived by the Spirit, believe me, I would account of the greatest consequence.
B. You speak rightly; but you will not persuade your adversaries to agree with you. For, just like calves that are separated and wanton, they are carried away at random wherever they please, and having abandoned the best and most excellent pasture, they rush into thorns and tri-
briars, being drawn away by the words of certain senseless false teachers, over whom perhaps even the Word of Wisdom itself has wept. For He says, A "Woe to you who have left the straight paths, to walk in the ways of darkness; who rejoice in evils, and delight in the perversity of evil, whose paths are crooked, and their ways winding."
A. You speak well. It would be most fitting for one to lament over them together with the prophet Jeremiah, saying, "Who will give to my head water, and to my eyes a fountain of tears, and I will weep for this people day and night?" For he who, when it was possible to choose the knowledge of the truth, has senselessy lapsed into deceit and corruption and into profane false doctrines, how is he not henceforth worthy to be mourned? B "And they went out from among us," as one of the holy disciples of the Savior has written, "but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would surely have remained with us." And on what ground, pray, have they decided to criticize a confession of faith so upright and most accurate, and which has nothing anywhere that requires correction, that is to say, C the confession of faith?
B. Yes, they say. For we will rightly censure the term "consubstantial," asserting that it is a new-fangled word and unwritten, that is to say, not contained in the God-inspired Scriptures.
A. Most foolishly would they say this, my friend. For the word does no harm at all where that which is signified by it is plainly true. You yourself would also grant, would you not, that what I say is true?
B. Most assuredly.
A. See then if we are not sometimes accustomed to apply other expressions of this kind to the nature of God, although they are unknown to the holy and divine Scriptures.
B. What kind do you refer to?
A. For if anyone were to call the Divine D incorporeal and without shape, and unquantified and without magnitude, would his discourse stray from what is fitting? And if he should further say that it is uncircumscribed and subject to no king, would anyone think that he was saying nothing relevant, even though he were thinking the truth?
B. Certainly, that would be drivel.
A. Why then must they rather, with a certain headlong audacity, childishly criticize the term "consubstantial," proscribing as foreign and unusual a term so highly significant and most philosophical, even though the fact is true and acknowledged among those who have wisely and learnedly examined the divine mysteries, namely that the Son is begotten for us from the very substance of God and the Father, and will not be degenerate, according to what they think proper, nor yet alien to the Begetter, but consubstantial with Him, and conformed, and of the same nature? For I shall not be at all ashamed to use any word that contributes to signifying what is true and correct. For God is altogether placed above genus and specific difference; but if...
we were to refuse those things by which one might be called A even to a slight knowledge of the essence that is above all things, we shall thereby be unbelieving and ignorant, indeed taught from nowhere who the God and Word truly is by nature, but oscillating and tossed about by every wind, as it is written. But if, having become terrified and putting them away, we were to reject this altogether—that we might at least see through a glass and in an enigma, and know in part—we shall all be in equal measure like to deaf and senseless stones, "an useless burden of the earth," as one of the Greek poets has said. B B. But, they say, where does Scripture use the word "consubstantial"? A. You compel our discourse to revolve upon the same point, my friend. For where did it title Him God of all, incorporeal, without figure, uncircumscribed, and subject to the authority of no one? Yet these things are so by nature, whether they wish it or not. If, therefore, we think rightly, those words which contribute to the knowledge of the truth ought not to be excluded. For would they suppose that God lied in what He said to Moses: "I am who I am"? "For this," He says, "is my name, and a memorial forever unto generations of generations." But I do not think they have fallen into such folly as to dare to conceive in their mind that God is not who He is. For it is truly, and that name suits Him alone properly and uniquely, even if it happens to be transferred to others by abuse of language. From this, indeed, we say that the ancients formed the word "essence" C as well, and that with the best of right, so that if someone should say the Son is of the same nature and consubstantial with the Father, we should not judge that he has coined an insolent word, but that he has used a term of the kind which holds the primary place, so to speak, in Holy Scripture. For derivative names do not hold fast in themselves as if in their own proper place, but are born from a first root, as it were, and a primitive source. Wherefore, if they contend that that word "consubstantial" is alien to sacred custom and usage, they sin against the true and legitimate mode of deriving language. For from "the Being" comes "essence," and "consubstantial." Moreover, laboring with such great ignorance, they also carry away with this word the others through which it is permitted to us to contemplate, via a glass and an enigma, to be sure, and to conceive subtle images of the Divinity in our mind. D B. But what if they say the Son is not "consubstantial" with the Father, but rather "like in essence"? A. They will not speak correctly, my good man; but first they will be caught dissenting among themselves, having maliciously rejected this word as though it did not exist in the Scriptures. For if they claim that the Son must be called "consubstantial," or if not this, then—according to their mind—"like in essence," whoever it may be
A that holds this opinion, the name of "essence" nonetheless creeps in for us through both terms. But they adulterate the word—I mean "consubstantial"—as spurious and erroneous, and discordant with the divine Scriptures; and yet, why do they not cry out against things like this, but rather receive it again, and inscribe it among the most approved terms? If, therefore, anyone allowed them to call the Son "like in essence" (homoiousios) to the Father, then what do such men seem to you to be doing?
B. They act with no small injustice, and they tremble at the power of the word, inasmuch as it demonstrates the truth—both generally and very clearly.
A. Do not suppose the matter is otherwise, B my good sir. For they are puffed up like youths in their own unbridled speech and in the impious dogmas of their own teachers; they rob the Son of his natural relation and affinity toward God and the Father, and, perhaps out of pity, they barely allow him a depiction and likeness, so that it might appear that he is the least bit different from those that are fashioned in the image, or at least formed in the quality of their ways toward the divine and incorrupt beauty.
B. How do you mean?
A. Do you not hear, my friend, Christ commanding and clearly saying: "Be merciful, just as your Father who is in heaven is"? (Luc. vi, 36).
B. I do.
A. Do you not understand, then, that the quality of our ways C shapes us, and, in a manner of speaking, the divine character is impressed upon us through the exercise of virtue? For the divine nature is a good thing, changelessly and substantially; and we ourselves, too, by imitation, might be seen as such, if we set our desire and zeal upon all excellent things by deliberate choice. For we would certainly not think—if we have a right mind—that those who have the divine image shining in their own souls by the quality of their morals possess a substantial and immutable likeness with Him, D and one that extends equally to all His natural properties; for if we admitted that, we would be granting that God is like us, with no distinction intervening. For we were created in His image and likeness (Gen. 1, 26). But the matter is not so: it is very far from it; for we are separated by an infinite interval. For we are not simple by nature; but God is simple, and composition does not fall into Him, but He has entire perfection in Himself, lacking nothing. Every corporeal nature is composed of certain parts, which concur to the completion of one whole. And we indeed are earth, as far as the flesh is concerned, corruptible and fading, similar to the grasses and lilies in the field. But God is placed above these. Add that the soul of man, owing to its lightness, takes on various changes from virtue to vice, and again from vice to virtue. But God is, as it were, fixed and stabilized in His own goods, and suffers no migration from one thing to another: and is
A of a substantial stability, not of will and reason. It is clear, therefore, that in created things there is not a natural likeness to God, but that it is discerned in action, in a certain manner, and in the quality of their habits.
B. B It is not said without reason, for since angels who did not keep their own principality fell away from the fellowship of God, and we likewise ourselves, yet we have suffered no loss in our nature. For we have not been utterly blotted out from the nature of things, but we still exist, though destitute of virtue. But as if deprived of the knowledge of a certain science or art, through our excessive facility and proclivity toward vice, we have been called back again to our pristine state through Christ, by whom we are reformed to that first and exemplary beauty. Nor indeed do we say that we attain such glory by His aid as if we were passing from human into another nature, but that we are transferred from evil habits to a better fruit and mind.
A. Therefore it is not obscure, C Hermias, that even though the characters of the divine image shine forth in us who strive with a ready mind to act well, just as you yourself have also just now confessed, we are not, however, one and the same in all respects with God because of a likeness to Him. For nothing would prevent us, if the matter were so, from being of the same nature as our Maker. For those things which are referred to one another, and have a natural likeness in every way between themselves, no reason, I think, would separate from a natural communion with one another. For is not an angel similar by nature to an angel, and man to another man?
B. Yes, indeed.
A. Therefore, this word "consubstantial," although it signifies primarily a natural identity, is cast aside as worthless by those who hold only twisted opinions; D yet they most willingly admit that which they themselves have devised, namely, that which they call "similar in essence," casting an external likeness upon the Word, and through extreme craftiness hiding their blasphemy. And they name Him God and Son, and also Savior and Redeemer, yet not believing Him to be Son by nature, nor God in truth, persuaded by certain wretched little reasonings which they collect from secular wisdom. They finally, as much as in them lies, enroll Him among men who are formed to the image of God by a likeness of purpose and will, and they wretchedly inscribe Him among creatures, saying that He is not consubstantial, but only "similar in essence." And yet, why on earth—and with good reason—might someone ask them, when they reject the term, and repudiate it as if it were foreign and insolent, do you not allow him who speaks it with you to go unpraised? I think they would be stuck at this. Indeed, it will not be difficult to understand, even if they stay silent, that they fear and adulterate the meaning of "consubstantial," not because it is derived from God, as they imagine and say,
A but because it is indicative of the truth, declaring the Son to be of no other nature than truly from the very nature of God and the Father.
B. You speak excellently.
A. For I think, as is likely, that those who have chosen to fight against God have forgotten the voice of the Savior, clearly and openly crying out that he is the fruit and offspring of the ineffable nature, and not of that which has been brought into being and has had its existence in time. For, he said, "I am not of this world; you are of this world." B And again: "You are from below; I am from above." And furthermore, the wise John writes concerning him: "He who comes from above is above all." For what else could "from above" mean, if not that he is entirely from the nature that is highest and excels all things? And what does "not being of the world" mean, if not that he is removed from any kinship with any of the things that have been generated, having as his sole source his own Father, God?
B. But if they should wish that "from above" not be understood as you have just stated, but that it means he is not from the lower and earthly human nature, but perhaps from heaven or some other nature that far excels ours, what should we then answer them?
A. What else but this? And what peculiar thing could one observe in the Son's nature and glory if they say he is such a Son as they have fashioned for themselves? C For is not every one of the holy angels also from above, and does he not come to us, that is, from heaven? And do not the Thrones, and Powers, and Dominations, and the Seraphim themselves vastly excel us according to the principles inherent in their nature? If, therefore, there is no preeminence in the Son, but he himself is seen to be constrained by these same natural measures, he will differ in nothing, I think, from the rational creatures who sometimes come to us from above, "ministering spirits sent forth for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation." But he would be endowed with the honor of deity as something added from outside, and he would falsely fable, saying: "I am the truth." For where or how will that which is not as it is named in the Holy Scriptures be the truth? And what, moreover, is that which they also D say, that the Son is not of this world?
B. I will explain. They say he is not consubstantial with God and the Father, but while they make him in some way lesser than the ineffable nature, they have kept for him an excellence beyond the creation. For they do not say he is of the same nature as created things, but that he holds a kind of middle place, or that he transcends the reasoning of nature, not being joined to the begetter proximately and substantially.
A And yet not [as if] he were entirely tending downwards, that is, into created things.
A. Therefore, if they would wish to explain the nature of the Son clearly and openly—without blushing, I should think—they might say that he is neither God by nature, nor yet begotten. For if he has gone forth from the substance of God and the Father, and yet transcends the nature of created things, he has certainly ceased to be true God, and I do not see how he could escape being numbered among created things.
B. You grasp it very well. And indeed, to confirm their opinion, they say that he has been named the mediator of God and men, for no other reason, I suspect, than this.
A. But what is more stupid than these men? Our enemies are foolish, as it is written. For how could they not be at the furthest remove from a wise and irreproachable mind, if they think that they can overcome the dogmas of the truth with their frigid inventions? For our holy and most wise Paul—or rather, the whole chorus of the saints—has established for us a twofold discourse regarding the Son, after he was united to the flesh, that is, after he became man according to complete likeness, except for sin alone. Wherefore, weaving for us a varied tradition of the mysteries, at one time they demonstrate the Only-Begotten as still naked, and alien to the conditions of a creature, and in no way entangled with our nature; at another time, however, as though shaded by the form of a servant, yet firmly clinging to the goods suitable to his nature, and immutably adorned with the dignity of the Godhead. For that man inspired by the Spirit B demonstrates that he is always the same, and knows nothing of the shadow of turning or of change, saying: "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today, and for ever."
B. What does this contribute to their opinion?
A. That although one ought to bring to the sacred Scriptures a mind that is neither sluggish nor remiss, they play in a certain way with such holy things, having turned aside I know not how from the straight path, and slipped and fallen into a crooked path. For what is commonly said, that one must walk the royal road, we would say to be nothing other than that one must deflect neither too far to the right nor to the left. Consider, in fact, how inconsiderately they are carried to whatever they please, not weighing or C examining which things in holy Scripture belong to the Word alone—that is, as he is understood to exist before the incarnation—and which things belong to him after he has already undergone our likeness. For if they think that no account is to be taken of these, and that whatever is written is to be accepted in this way, rashly and inconsiderately, let them tell me, I pray, what prevents them from—if it is said that he eats, and that he takes sleep, and that he cannot walk without labor, for he was wearied from the journey; D and what is even beyond these, that he died, I say, and that he needed food...
A and was subject to toil and infirmity, and was even a partaker of death, while yet confessing him to be the Word of God? Therefore, do they not say that the distinction of such things is most necessary for us, to divide and answer for each in the time that is fitting? B Most necessary: for how could it be otherwise? A Since, therefore, it has been demonstrated that it is altogether necessary and most useful to discern each of the things that have been delivered to us concerning Him in the divine oracles, hear now how Paul describes what is according to nature: C “Who, being,” he says, “the brightness of the glory of the Father, and the express image of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power.” And elsewhere, again: “For the Word of God is living, and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there is no creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” And this indeed is concerning the Only-Begotten, not yet conceived as being with flesh. But concerning the same, already born as we are and in the flesh: “Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared; though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered.” D Does it not indeed seem that, if the meaning of both be considered, the nature of the things fights against itself? The brightness of the glory of God and the Father, the character of the divine substance, he who bears all things by the word of his power, the living and active and most sharp Word, is said to offer up prayers and supplications, and that with tears, as if to ward off the approach of death? But “in the days,” he says, “of his flesh,” that is to say, when the Word, being God, became flesh, according to the Scriptures, and was not made in man as in the saints, in whom he truly dwells by participation of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, there is a two-fold discourse concerning the Son. We must, therefore, refer those things which are of God to him as to God, and those which are ours, that is to say, human things, to him as having become like us. We must very carefully reject that disorderly and indiscriminate confusion of things, which steals away the exact and accurate comprehension of meanings, and not a little mars the beauty of the truth. B You speak rightly. A When, therefore, he is called Mediator, one should not think that the name denotes the substance of the Only-Begotten; far from it; but rather, one should refer it to the obedience of Christ. For thus he will destroy foolish counsels, and every height that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and will bring into captivity every intellect
A into the obedience of God, as it is written.
B. You speak the truth. But of these things enough has been said, since they possess nothing of doubt within them. I would very much like, however, to inquire from you what we ought to consider the mode of the Son's mediation to be. For this will show the deceitful argument of the heterodox to be obsolete.
A. Come then, if you please, and let our discourse turn to this point as well. We must, first of all, investigate when Scripture assigned to the Son the role of mediator. Paul therefore said: "For there is one God, and one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a redemption for all," and I believe he indicates no other time for the Son's mediation than that final one, when, as he himself says, "being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God; but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant," though he was God and Lord, so that he might gain us for God the Father through himself and reconcile all things, as it is written, "making peace through the blood of his cross, both as to the things that are on earth, and the things that are in heaven," as mediator and man. And so, "we are ambassadors for Christ, be you reconciled to God," Paul again said under the person of Christ. B For since, in a manner of speaking, human nature could not approach to the bare and simple glory of the Godhead because of its own inherent weakness, the Only-Begotten profitably assumed our likeness, so that, by revealing the ineffable will of God and the Father, he might make us spiritual worshippers, no longer fixed to the shadows of types, and addicted to the Law which was able to perfect nothing, but that, because God is Spirit, we ourselves might exert ourselves to worship and serve him in spirit and in truth. For did not the most excellent Isaiah himself also say to us that a child has been born to us and a Son given, and that his name is called the Angel of the great counsel?
B. You have spoken excellently. But if, besides this, you wish to confirm these things more fully by bringing forward to demonstrate the mediation of Christ some ancient testimony, truly you will earn my great gratitude.
A. C Turning then to Moses himself, the priest of the sacred mysteries, and eager to erect, as it were, a manifest image of the mediation of Christ from the virtue of his deeds and words, we would rightly demonstrate our doctrine to be accurate in every respect. For to chide, I think, and always to rebuke our adversaries because they cling to their own opinions, even if they are contrary to the holy Scriptures, and meanwhile to strike against the same reef, I would certainly judge not to be devoid of the ultimate madness.
B. You speak rightly.
A. Since, therefore, the Israelites, having shaken off the D hard servitude... (of the Egyptian land)
and broken the yoke of slavery, had encamped at the mountain called Sinai, and since it seemed good to God to draft laws as instructors for their future actions, He commanded them to gather under the mountain and to wash their garments, so that thus purified they might then approach for an unusual vision of God. And when this was carried out, at the command of Moses, A “The Lord descended in the form of fire.” And there were globes of smoke swirling and rising, and a dark cloud, and flashes of fire, and darkness, and a storm, and everything productive of extreme terror, and a piercing sound of trumpets. And indeed, Moses led the people out to meet God at the foot of the mountain. For it is written thus. This event was, I think, a type of the mediation of Christ. For He says clearly: B “No one comes to the Father except through me.” For we do not approach God and the Father in any other way than through Him, having wiped away every old scar and having first cleansed every kind of defilement, and having clothed our mind, as it were, with the purity in Christ. “But put on the Lord Jesus Christ,” the divine word said to us. Therefore, the washing of the garments signified the power of spiritual purity. Do you not acknowledge that this too is true, being persuaded by probable reasoning?
B. Entirely.
A. Since, then, God had descended in the form of fire, although He displayed a sensible glory not overly unusual to those who watched, nevertheless the Israelites could by no means bear the sight of Him face to face; but, seized with fear and trembling, C they besought the leader of the people, I mean Moses, and even said: “Do you speak to us, and let not God speak to us, lest we die.” See then clearly how they were asking for one to mediate, since they were obviously unable to approach the pure glory of God. Come then, as if from a clear image of the things just said to us, let us move to the Only-Begotten, who, since it was not possible for Him to reach us with the naked divine glory, that He might teach the will of God and Father, became like us, a mediator of God and men. For “He Himself is our peace,” according to the Scriptures. Do not, however, think that I am telling a lie when I compare the ministry of Moses with the ministry of Christ. D But from this, as I believe, you will learn more easily. For summing up in what is called Deuteronomy the things concerning the assembly of the sons of Israel, He says thus: “You shall be perfect before the Lord your God. For these nations, whom you are dispossessing, they will listen to omens and divinations; but the Lord your God has not given you such things. The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet from among your brothers, like me; you shall hear Him. According to all that you asked of the Lord your God in Horeb, in the day of the assembly, saying, ‘We shall not add to hear the voice of the Lord our God, and we shall not see this great fire anymore, lest we die.’ And the Lord said to me, ‘Right is all that they have spoken. I will raise up a prophet for them from the midst of their brothers like you; and I will put my word in His mouth...
and He shall speak to them according to whatever I shall command Him. And the man who does not listen to the words of that prophet, whatever He shall speak in my name, I will take vengeance upon him.’ A Does not the frailty of human nature clearly demonstrate, as if in types and shadows, even in the case of Moses, the most absolute necessity for a mediator? Yet one must consider this.
B. In what way, you ask?
A. When the Israelites came to Moses, they said, ‘Speak you to us, and let not God speak to us, lest we die.’ And they asked this of Moses at Horeb when they had gathered there, at the time when God was in the appearance of fire upon Mount Sinai. But although the Creator praised their B statement as having been spoken and judged correctly, He was at the same time, as it were, prefiguring the truth itself for us in types and promising the mediation through Christ, saying: ‘Right is all that they have spoken. I will raise up a prophet for them from the midst of their brothers like you.’ A mediator, clearly, and one who would convey the divine words from above, and who would declare to the people the will of the ineffable and unspeakable Nature—something which it is easy to see was perfectly fulfilled through Christ Himself. For He cried out clearly: ‘I have not spoken of my own authority, but the Father who sent me, He gave me a commandment what I should say and what I should speak.’ And again: ‘The words that I speak are not mine, but His who sent me.’ The wise John also writes about Him: ‘He who has received His testimony has set his seal that God is true. For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God.’ Do you then, my dear friend, support the truth of what I am saying, or do you refuse to give your assent?
B. By no means.
A. Therefore, let this have been said by us concerning Moses. Do you wish C that we should speak of something else besides this, which might express to us in an ineffable way the mode of the Son’s mediation; or do you think, leaving that aside, that we should pursue another path?
B. But why, my dear friend, should we leave aside the subject at hand, from which we hope for much benefit, and turn to investigate other reasons, when it will be better to do this now at our leisure, with no one hindering us?
A. I shall then go where it pleases you, and indeed I am already beginning. For Korah, Dathan, and Abiron were indeed born of the tribe and lineage of Levi; but they were not included in the lot of those appointed to the priesthood, but were among those who performed the menial service D within the tabernacle of the testimony. These were Levites, and this was their allotted portion. Afterwards, because they foolishly desired the honor of the priesthood and, in their folly, could not grasp the measure of that divine honor, they defected and with singular audacity came forward, and they stirred up the congregation against Moses and Aaron, and with bitter words [against] the otherwise gentle...
penalties for their audacity before Him who judges righteously, and they perished with their entire household. For
and the death that consumes us, and crushes us with death: "Death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who did not sin in the likeness of the transgression of Adam." A And "hell also enlarged its soul," as the prophet Isaiah says, "and opened its mouth, so as not to cease." Although it had depopulated the whole earth, having spread an inescapable and impenetrable net, [it would have continued to,] had not the only-begotten Word of God, according to the good pleasure of God and the Father, descended and come to us from, as it were, the tabernacle above, and in the heavens. For he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, so that both having been named high priest, and as in the place of incense, offering himself for us to God and the Father, he might stop the destruction. For he stood, says the Scripture, "between the living and the dead, and the plague ceased." Is it not therefore easy for one to discern from these things also, that Jesus has become the mediator of God and men? B For when the battle had been dissolved as it were, and every ancient fortification had been torn down, those things which were once separated have come together, that is, God and humanity, with Christ mediating, and through himself binding the lower things to the higher. And thus the divine Paul said that "He himself is our peace, who made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of partition." And again: "Being justified therefore by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ."
B. Shall the Only-begotten be considered a mediator for this reason alone, that he drove away the sin which kept us from the love and intimacy of God, and restored us to our former state, having destroyed the enmity? Or, if there is some other reason, you will surely not begrudge telling one who is inquiring and desires to learn.
A. I shall do so, and not hesitantly. I will indeed say that he has undoubtedly destroyed that enmity in his flesh, as it is written, and having become, as it were, a reconciler and mediator for us, he has offered to God and the Father those who were separated as far as possible from the love of God on account of the love of worldly pleasure, and because we worshipped the creature rather than the Creator, and he has gained us, having justified us by faith; yet we do not assert that he is called mediator solely on account of this dispensation of the matter, but that another C secret and mystical reason for this matter also accrues to him, [which pertains] to the name and the reality of mediation.
B. In what way, then, do you say this?
A. And how could one [speak] otherwise than according to that which is written: "Let this mind be in each of you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and found in habit as a man"? D For he, being of God and the Father...
and God the Word in him, lowered himself into this state of emptying, not by being compelled to do so by anyone, A but by the good pleasure of the Father and according to his own will; and he became man, while fully and entirely preserving the dignity of his own nature inviolate and unadulterated within himself, yet assuming the human nature in accordance with the economy. And he is understood as one Son out of both, for the divine and human nature have concurred and united into one, inexpressibly and ineffably, and in a way that is beyond understanding, joined into a unity. And we do not, of course, say that God the Word has been transmuted into the nature of earthly flesh, or into the flesh of the Word himself—for I would attribute this to the malady of the most extreme insanity—but rather that, while each remains within its own proper definition and reason, the concurrence into a unity, which is lasting to the utmost and indivisible, is what the name of the so-called "concurrence" B indicates here. For the same one is God and man at once. And on the one hand, when you speak of God, you do not strip him of humanity after the union; nor, on the other hand, when you name him man, do you rob him of the dignities of divinity, if you have any care for thinking correctly. And he is the Only-Begotten and the Word, as having sprung forth and been begotten from God the Father; but he is also the Firstborn, when he became man and was among many brethren. Just as the name "Only-Begotten," being proper to the Word, is preserved even when he is united to flesh, so the name "Firstborn," though it would not properly be his, became his proper name with the flesh. He is therefore also fittingly understood as Mediator C, by showing that those things which are far separated in nature and have an immeasurable distance between them—namely, divinity and humanity—have been joined and united in himself, and by reuniting us through himself to God and the Father. For he is of the same nature as God, since he is from him and in him; and he is also of our same nature, for he is also from us and in us. For according to his humanity, he is not different from us, but is similar in all things, save only for sin, the Emmanuel.
B. You speak most correctly. But the discussion now necessarily brings us to this point: that we must also say that the Son is consubstantial with God and the Father.
A. Consubstantial, certainly: if indeed he is truly from him and in him, according to nature, and consubstantially. D For just as he would not be truly and precisely, nor even in the appropriate order, understood or called consubstantial with us unless he had become man, so he would not be from God and in God, unless he were bound into a unity with him by natural reasons. But neither would humanity be a participant in the divine nature in any other way, unless it had obtained this through the Mediator, the Son, having attained a certain natural mode, as it were, of conjunction. And it is permitted to hear the Son thus addressing the heavenly Father: "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 me
A hast sent. And the glory which thou gavest me, I have given them; that they may be one, as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one."
B. But if they should say that the unity of the Son with the Father is perhaps such as is understood of us ourselves, what then are we to think? For it is written: "And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul." For since there were very many souls in all of them, he said that theirs became one, B expressing the name and the reality of unity, not by determining it from the nature itself, but rather attributing it to the indivisible inclinations of the will, because they had one and the same purpose and volition. And since the Son is in all things of one mind and of the same will with the Father, for that reason He is one with Him. For these are the things those wretches sound everywhere.
A. But they will be found to have filled their own minds with extreme folly in this matter as well. For there is no thought so absurd, as it seems, and so weak and abject, that does not take possession of the minds of light-headed men, and that most easily. "For the fool will speak foolish things, and his heart will understand vanity, to practice error, and to speak against the Lord," as it is written. For how could anyone doubt that they are filled with the C ultimate folly and vanity, when they dare to assert and persist in the view that the union of the Son with the Father and God is not natural, but rather one of choice? For if the matter is so, it will in no way, I think, differ from those who are sons by adoption, and who have been admitted into the title of deity by the will of the Father, and who have acquired for themselves this so noble and illustrious glory by the splendor of their virtue. But let them tell me what further prevents each of the saints, who has a mind to feel and to do those things in which God delights, and who in some way makes the Lord's will his own, from using the supernatural voice of the Son, and addressing the Father with these words: "As I and thou are one." Let them show such a voice as having been uttered by some saint. But they will not do so: it is very far from it. For one may see the contrary, I think, in those who, having attained D the highest peak of piety, nevertheless proclaim themselves sinners in many ways, and are conscious of their own nature. And it would perhaps not be difficult to heap up countless voices collected from the holy Scriptures; but to leave a field of exercise for the studious, I would not consider to be beside the point. But I will turn to the things which they maintain (for that will be better in the end), and I will speak again of our own unity. For we have surely been gathered and brought together into unity through faith, yet we do not differ from one another by diversity of essence, although each one is in a way divided into his own hypostasis. For we are of the same species, and there is one rationale and definition of essence for all, which is predicated equally of all. However, we do not attain unity with God in mere and sole inclinations of the will, but other things for us
A unite in this, something ineffable and necessary. For as the divine Paul has initiated us, "We, being many, are one body, for we all partake of that one bread." For do you not know that the Gentiles are made concorporate with Christ, having attained unity with him through faith, and it is evident also through the mystical blessing? B
B. Assuredly so. A. Therefore, we shall examine that the unity in us, and in Christ, is at once natural and of the will. B. How do you mean? For I do not quite follow. A. But there is nothing difficult in these matters, my friend; but what I say, anyone who thinks and tastes aright will understand without trouble, if he considers in his mind, first, that we, as many as we are human, are bound together into mutual identity by natural law, but we are also united at the same time in another way. For though separated, as it were, into individual subsistence—I mean that according to which one man is Peter or John, another Thomas or Matthew—we have become concorporate in Christ, fed by the one flesh, and sealed to unity by the one holy Spirit; and since Christ is indivisible (for he is in no way divided), we are all one in him. And for this reason he said to the Father in heaven: "That they may be one, even as we are one." C See, therefore, how in Christ and the holy Spirit we are all one, both according to the body and according to the spirit. Therefore, those who choose to think otherwise are to be rebuked, as not even rightly understanding those things written concerning us.
B. Indeed, they are to be rebuked; for you have spoken rightly. Yet, being inquisitive no less, I will ask this: shall we admit that the Son is united to God and Father just as we are to one another, or shall we grant that there is some other unity among them beyond this? A. We say that the Son is united also to the Father, after our manner. For he is undoubtedly also coessential with the Begetter by all means, if indeed he is truly Son and from him. But since he exists in his own hypostasis, and is believed to exist in such a way—not as we are separated from one another, or by the law of bodies, by having any complete separation—I speak of diversity in the particulars, but he has a natural and ineffable unity, not a kind of confusion D of the hypostases that are affected mutually, as it pleases some, so that the same is Father and Son, but since each is and subsists, and is said to have his own hypostasis, the identity of essence constitutes the unity. B. Do you say, then, that the Son is in an own hypostasis, or in an essence other than that of the Father? A. Not in an essence other than that which is of God, but in the hypostasis which is of the Son.
A B. What then? Is essence one thing, and hypostasis another? A. Yes. For there is much discrimination and interval between them, since essence embraces individual things. B. In what way, do you say? For I am, as is evident, a little slow in such matters. A. Do you not know that it is not very worn or common for me to discourse on these things? Yet it is necessary that the sublimity of the divine excellence be summoned into an examination, albeit in a sense, as it were, in a cruder style. Thus, the significance of essence seems to pertain to something common, but the name of hypostasis is predicated and spoken of the singular things which underlie this universal: and consider this to be what I am now pointing out. B. Of what sort is that? A. We define man as a rational, mortal animal, assigning to him the definition that is appropriate to him; and we say that this definition of substance extends to all who subsist individually. Therefore, under this universal, namely man, or the definition of man, falls, I think, Thomas and Mark, or, if you like, Peter and Paul. And substance will indeed be signified in this way: yet the significance of those things which are understood individually will not yet be clear and manifest. For man, simply, is not yet Peter and Paul: but if you say Thomas or Peter, you will not remove from the definitions of substance that which is signified (for he is man nonetheless), but you will point out that he exists in such a species, and in his own particular hypostasis. Therefore, substance is indeed [predicated] of every man, especially since it brings forth the common reason of the kind: but hypostasis will be understood more conveniently of one, neither separating that which is signified from the commonality, nor, further, confounding and confusing by obscurity that which is finally singular and particular. B. I understand now; for it does not seem to me to have been explained unskillfully. B A. Because, therefore, we confess the Son to be consubstantial with God and the Father, we say that he is known in an own hypostasis, united both closely and yet distinctly, of necessity joining together extremely well, by the reasons of identity, the distinction of the persons or names, and the diversity of the hypostases, which, just as it is in the Father, so it is in the Son for this reason and this alone: that the all-embracing similarity of essence, and that identity and immutability in all things which is both in the Father and in the Son, may not in some way blot out the difference, and cause that which is singularly proper to each to be able to be distinguished only with great difficulty. For this one is the Father, and not the Son; and that one, in turn, is the Son, and not the Father. B. Therefore, if it pleases you, let us say that there are two essences: one, indeed, of the Father, and another of the Son. For thus the difference will be in a way more distinct and more manifest to everyone. A. Most certainly it will not. For beware lest you be carried away by their discourses into a reprobate sense, and C into a trivial...
A damnable way, and allow yourself to be led through bypaths and inaccessible places. B. In what way? A. For if the Father’s nature is one thing, and the Son’s another, and different from it, is it not necessary for a reason to be devised that divides and separates two things of unequal nature from one another? For how can the same substance be conceived as being one thing and another? B It is not permitted, even with men who have obtained one and the same reason of consubstantiality, to call it one substance and another, and to assign to each thing a reason of community as if it were its own proper and peculiar one. For if we were to do this, and introduce into substances a kind of mode of necessary difference, so that they are some things and others, the universal will vanish into nothing. Or will not that difference produce and beget in these things diversity of substantial difference, and alteration in their natural definition? B. I think so. A. It will remain, therefore, even against their will, to say that the Son is no longer consubstantial with God the Father, but rather different and of a different nature, and alienated from the definitions of the deity, if he is set in a reason of his own, having departed from the essence of God the Father. B. For they contend that the Son exists C otherwise than as the Father is conceived to exist by nature. Therefore, leaving behind the declaration of consubstantiality, and attaching to it what is strange and unusual to it, they say that one must acknowledge him to be of like substance—having attached to him, as one of those things which are especially holy and most becoming, the name of mediator. A. What then? Are these things anything other than trifles and old wives' tales? For if they conceive a certain middle nature for him, and for this reason say most foolishly that he must be called a mediator, what indeed follows from this, or what kind of rationale of contemplation is brought forward, I for my part do not see; but do you yourself tell me, since I am most desirous of learning. B. What should I say to these things? A. Therefore ask and urge whether the mediator is begotten or unbegotten, truly God, or whether he is also numbered among creatures. For as to what he is, according to their opinion—neither purely God, nor clearly a creature—what place could he receive from them D among things which exist, or even, so to speak, in bare notions, even if I were willing to say it? B. I say that he is between the two, God namely and the creature; for this reason, they say, he is called a mediator. A. They will speak most obscurely and will show themselves to be most ignorant if they think so. For even if you turn your mind into every part and search more deeply into the whole nature of things, you will by no means find such a nature, perceptible by notion or reason, which is alienated from the boundaries of true deity, and exceeds the reasons of a created thing, and shows itself to be more excellent than if it had been brought into being.
Is there anything midway between the begotten and the unbegotten, things uncreated and creatures? B B. I would not concede it; for you speak rightly. A A. Therefore, we observe two natures in the universe: the one, of Him who is and remains always the same; and the other, of those whose lot it is to have been brought into existence by creation. And certainly, the nature of the Uncreated excels and surpasses all, and is eminent in every respect of excellence and sublimity; but this other is subject and, as it were, put under the feet of the Lord. You will understand this most clearly when Christ says to the crowds of Jews: "You are from below; I am from above." And that the Only-Begotten comes to us from above, the wise John also declared, saying: "He that comes from above is above all." For he thought it necessary to assign to God by nature, and to the Son who is by nature sprung from God, the highest excellence and the position which is topmost. For that "from above" is not indicative of local heights, but signifies the very substance of God and the Father—how is this not beyond dispute, when one of the holy disciples has clearly stated: "Every good giving and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change, nor shadow of alteration"? For whether one traverses the angels, or things superior to them, and everything intermediate, and reaches the Seraphim themselves and contemplates the supreme glories, one does not overleap the nature of created things. For either something is "from above," that is, from the Father of lights, and this is indeed God; and the Son alone is "from above"—or else something is conceived as "below" and "from below," that is, it is a creature and from creation; but there is nothing at all intermediate. And indeed, if someone should question and press the adversaries in this way: "What, finally, do you thrust upon us, friends? Is this Son and mediator of yours, as you wish, begotten, or is he unbegotten? For there seems to be nothing intermediate between these." What would they answer?
B B. I think they will be at a loss, and with good reason. A A. Indeed, they will be at a loss. For truth lives and prevails, as it is written. But let us, investigating the path that leads in both directions, come, let us discuss what is probable concerning this. For if they concede that he who is mediator in this way is uncreated, and attribute to him what is the property of the deity alone according to nature, they will signify that he has passed far beyond the boundaries of mediation, and that he holds a place of dignity greater than is appropriate. For that which is set above all things is God in glory and nature, to whom "uncreated" belongs as a proper good. Consequently, such a nature should not be reckoned in the place and order of created and corruptible things. But if, passing this over, they say he is created, how shall that which is of the same genus as the creature be deemed different from it? How, then, any longer is he a mediator, being lesser than God by nature, yet again greater than the glory and nature of a created thing?
A If by reason of being unbegotten he is borne up toward the glory of the Godhead, and rises far beyond the measures of mediation into the transcendent, yet by reason of having been begotten he proceeds toward the lower regions and will take up the place of such a mediation, being measured among things that have come into being—if indeed that which is begotten is of the same genus as every begotten thing, according to the principle of having come into existence—what is this nonsensical and most unwise sophistry, which introduces as something attainable what is unreachable, and fashions for us places in nature which, I suppose, no mind could ever reach? For the discourse is novel and obscure, and yet I say it is necessary that the demonstration offered for these matters be manifest. But one might see that their villainy is cleverly contrived for the sake of deception. For since they have acted most impiously and thought most irrationally, B having behaved insolently toward the Son, and, with reckless abandon, stealing away the [glory] of His consubstantiality with the Father, they somehow filch a small scrap of glory for Him from their own shamelessness, and quietly bring Him back from the pettiness of created things. Yet, as if debarring Him from the ascent to the heights—I shall say it—so that He might not be conceived as God by nature, they allot to Him a middle place, measuring out for Him as much as they might choose of glory, as if they themselves were established as the lawgivers and arbiters of such things, considering and defining in what measure the Son should be. For just as I suppose the makers of statues—having won the reputation for craftsmanship in this—having carved the form of human shape into wood or stone, afterward embellish it with deceptive elegancies, either by variegating it with gold or adorning it with other colors; and in this way, having bewitched the minds of those who look upon them, they do not suffer them to behold the internal and hidden materials by their art, but rather compel them, in a way, to be delighted by the fleeting and external brilliance of the ornaments: C just so, I think, these men, by skillfully shadowing forth the image of the Mediator, plunder the minds of the simpler folk, and lead away as captives those who are unable to scrutinize what has been maliciously instituted and wickedly invented by them. B. You speak rightly.
A. It behooved them, therefore, if they had any regard for thinking correctly and holding a reputation not maligned, not to imagine regarding Him things that cannot be understood, nor to attempt to fabricate what no reason can grasp—things that are utterly implausible and have expression only in bare thoughts—but rather to allow the Son simply to be conceived in the natural heights of the Godhead, calculating that, since He is begotten of the Father—that is, from His substance—He will therefore possess the exact and simple account of consubstantiality with Him, since God and Father has truly confessed the Son to be the Son, and no other besides Him, saying: [Matth. XVII, 5.] «This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.» And yet, why does He not rather seem to call out: This
is the mediator, if He knew Him to be a mediator according to them? Although, in very truth, he might have spoken well even thus. For He would have pointed to Him as having already become mediator by having become man, and God the Father might reasonably have uttered such a voice. But tell me also this clearly: have they slipped into such folly A that they do not even confess Him to be the Son at all?
B. They do say that He is the Son and that He has been begotten, being ashamed, as it seems to me, to withstand the holy Scriptures openly and with naked impudence, to speak in one word: nevertheless, they do not wish Him to proceed from the very substance of the Father, nor do they deem it right to accept and understand the event of the generation naturally.
A. They persuade themselves, then, that the name of sonship and generation is in some way fictitious, and they compel others to think likewise. For you see that they exclude Him from the essence of God and the Father, overturning the true mode of generation, and so they detract from the Only-Begotten being the Son by nature. But since they are sharp and subtle, as they persuade themselves, and are carried away by their own words, how did they overlook this too? For they do not perceive, as it seems, that here also they heap insult upon the very nature of God and the Father, if they deprive it of fecundity and despoil it of the power of begetting, the types of which the nature of created things has expressed in itself, both in parturition and in the bringing forth of fruits.
B. But perhaps they will say to this also, that if the term of generation is everywhere and in every way true of those of whom it is used and spoken, it is necessary to admit and conceive of infinite numbers as begotten of God and the Father. For it is said somewhere even of the Israelites: «I have begotten and exalted sons.»
A. We shall find them, according to that which blessed David sings in the Psalms, «making excuses for sins and declining into words of wickedness.» For if the Son were indeed something else by nature than what He is and is believed to be by us, and besides this, had obtained with us the title of sonship and generation, nothing would stand in the way of these terms being said and applied to Him C abusively. But since, by doing violence to the truth and, as much as in them lies, by transferring Him into another nature, they call Him a mediator, and are shown to have foolishly concocted a myth about Him, why do they not cease to exclude Him from His inborn and substantial pre-eminence, and why, wretched men, are they not burdened by insultingly mocking with, as it were, spurious honors Him who is truly of the Father? For the Only-Begotten has not been called to the glory of adoption in the same place and number as we are, nor yet in parity with created things, nor does this appellation procure for Him an D adventitious excellence; far from it. For He would be an adoptive son, and among sons according to grace, if it were thus…
A bounded by the measures of creation. But such things as these are mere trifling and importunate chatter, and nothing other than a vexatious heap of blasphemies. That the Only-Begotten, however, would not deign to rank Himself among adoptive sons, but recognized that He possesses a divine and ineffable excellence above all, and the true dignity of sonship, you might learn easily from what He says to the Jews concerning Moses and the holy prophets: "If He called them gods, to whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken; do you say, 'You blaspheme,' because I said, 'I am the Son of God'?" For if, because the word of God came to them, He showed them to be gods and sons, how would He not much more be Himself Son and God, better and more truly, the very One through whom they are gods and sons? Therefore, the name "Son" is not adventitious to the Only-Begotten, but it would be a name signifying that such is His existence, just as, indeed, the name "Father" belongs to God Himself and the Father. For the Father is Father because He has begotten the Son; and the Son, in turn, is Son because He has been begotten by the Father. For this reason, I suppose, although we explain the good things that inhere in the divine nature by very many and various terms, so that we may arrive at at least a moderate knowledge of it, I say, however, that the name of "sonship" and the name of "paternity" are not to be placed among those, even though other things are rightly and blamelessly said of both. B
B. What do you mean?
A. I shall most gladly tell you, since you are so eager to ask. In a twofold way, I think, we are accustomed to signify the prerogatives that inhere in the divine nature. For it is recognized by us either from those things which it is, or from those things which it is not. For when we say it is "Life," and name it "Light," we are speaking truly of things that it is believed to be. But when we say it is not "corruptible," nor "visible," we speak from those things which it is not. For the force of the words indicates to us that it is immune to corruption and not revealed to anyone's eyes; is it not so?
B. That is true.
A. If, therefore, anyone were to say that the Father and God is Life and Light, and moreover that He is also incorruptible and invisible, shall we not think that such a person is C acting rightly and in order, if, holding the right view, he attributes these things also to the nature of the Son, so that he may also distinguish the Word, God from the Father, with the very same titles?
B. Yes, indeed.
A. And if he were to call Him King, and wish to honor Him with all the glories by which the divine nature is revered, would we not say that the Son is also a partaker of them?
B. How could we not?
A. It is utterly foolish, then, even to doubt at all that the marks of divinity, and whatsoever belongs to the glory D
and pertain to his excellence, are common to both. Nor does the Truth, that is, Christ, lie, when He says to the Father who is in heaven: "All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I have been glorified in them." If, therefore, we say that these things are present in the order and station of dignity, just as are the other things—that to the Father belongs the title of Father, and to the Son the title of Son—tell me, what will hinder or forbid us from removing the difference between those names, and calling both Fathers and Sons, if they have obtained common and equal honors, and are equally crowned with the eminence of dignities? B. But that is entirely incredible to speak or to think. For the Father will not be otherwise than what He is, that is to say, Father; and the Son likewise; for the Son remains, and He will not be considered to be the Father. A. Most rightly and truly, Hermias. You will therefore agree and assent to one who clearly demonstrates that the name of paternity is not significant of dignity A (for I think we ought to speak thus, preferring the necessary signification of the thing to the ornament of language); and furthermore, that the appellation of sonship is not [merely such an ornament] for the Son, just as life, light, and other things of the same note are said of both; but that it is the proper name for each, which shows how each one stands. B. Entirely so. A. For the force and reason of the names in a way removes confusion, and seeks a stable seat in itself, B granting to each that it be unchangeably such. For the Father is Father, and not Son, because He has begotten; and the Son, on the other hand, is Son, and not Father, because He has been begotten. Come then, if you please, let us for a moment remove from the Father, in our intellect and thought, the name of Father, and likewise from the Son the appellation of Son, and let us weigh, I pray you, how the person of each might be signified separately. Shall we perhaps do so by saying "God," or "life," or "incorruptible," C or "invisible," or "king"? But that which is signified could not be sufficiently discerned from this. For how can that which is true of both clearly demonstrate what belongs peculiarly to one? The Father is solely and truly signified by the understanding that He has begotten; and the Son is solely and truly [signified] by the understanding that He has been begotten. Therefore, that which is His own and singular is proper to each, even though other things are said of both without distinction. For those things are numbered among the natural dignities, but these are not; D instead, they signify the one as begetter and the other as begotten.
DIALOGUS II. Quod coaeternus item sit Deo ac Patri, et quod ex ipso secundum naturam genitus sit Filius.
A A. Is it not true to say, Hermias, that the discourse of truth is simple, and that it has its seat most especially in simple hearts, and is far sweeter than the labor of bees? The divine David will persuade us that this is true, saying to God, the Savior of all: “How sweet are thy words to my throat, more than honey and the honeycomb to my mouth!”
B. Truly. I myself would agree that the discourse of truth is simple and sweeter than honeycombs; but what kind of simplicity should we understand here?
A. What else could show the discourse of truth to be simple, if not that it is free from convoluted arguments and from thoughts that see in a surly and cheerless manner, and that are B put together with malice, and that reveal the strength inherent in them, not for finding the truth, but for wearing out those who are weak in it? But, if you wish, you may clearly perceive—as if on a tablet—that my argument, which has not missed what is fitting, does not stray from the truth, if you contemplate the heresy of Arius and his followers; those of whom I believe it is right to say: “If the Ethiopian change his skin, and the leopard his spots, then you may also do good, having learned evil.” For I think that in mind, the adversaries differ in no way from the leopard. For the one is spotted in various ways and bears upon its back a gathering of mixed and multi-formed colors; but these men have a mind that is uneven and disjointed, and their tongue, according to the Scripture, only with difficulty wounds the word that issues from the heart, as it is written: “Deceitful are the words of their mouth. With his neighbor he speaks peace, but in his own heart he harbors enmity.”
C A. They pretend not to oppose the glory of the Only-begotten in any way; but they wound it, just as with a sharp dart, by letting fly from their tongue words that are treacherous and difficult to bear.
B. What words are these, do you say?
A. For while they quite rightly name the Word of God the Only-begotten Son, and do not refuse to acknowledge that he has been begotten, they do violence to the argument of truth, impiously turning the notion of him into the exact opposite, and transferring him into another nature, different from that which is understood in the Father, so that he is alien to His substance and of another nature, or rather, completely removed D
A from the natural relationship of the one who is said to beget, yet not, as they themselves would have it, having begotten. And I would say that for such folly as this, there is no other cause than that B which I shall mention. B. What is that, I pray? A. That they are puffed up with great pride, and are persuaded that they can think and speak more abstruse things than others; having been exercised in quibbles and nurtured in empty arts, they are able to overcome the unwary and simple with the subtleties of their arguments. Having placed a reed staff, as it were, in their own minds—namely, worldly wisdom—and gathering up chaff of adulterated concepts, they take no thought, I suppose, of deviating from the right reason of dogmas. For they do not perceive that the sacred pair, the sons of Aaron, were consumed because they had violated what was pleasing to God and had brought strange fire to the altar, nor do they deign to listen to the Law crying out: “And you shall not bring an abomination into your house, and you shall be anathema, just as it is. You shall utterly detest it, and you shall utterly abhor it, for it is anathema” (Deut. VII, 26). For a fire that is truly strange, and unpleasing to God, is a fervent impulse of the mind, full of diabolical wisdom, and not kindled by the Holy Scriptures. And an abomination, in turn, is a statue fashioned in the form of God. Such is the Son they fashion: resplendent indeed with honor and glorious light, and in a manner befitting God—but not true; rather, He is a statue fashioned into the likeness of God with spurious names and words befitting God. For to say that He is begotten, and to name Him Son, and yet not to judge that He is begotten and is Son by nature, what else is this but that? But to us, the treasure is in earthen vessels, and the truth is lovable, devoid of worldly wisdom and diabolical deceit. B. Truly lovable, and well said. But come now, apply yourself also to the examination of those things which they assert concerning the Father and the Son. For I would grant that this would be of great use to the hearers. A. It will indeed be of great use, I well know. And since this seems best to you to do, come, as the Greek poets say, having cast off the mooring-rope, and having left behind the shore and the harbor, as it were, let us send the ship of our D disputation out into the deep. B. Let us go, then. A. That the name and reality of "Father" is the proper belonging of God and Father, we have confirmed through what has already been discussed, and for no other reason than that He has begotten the Son from Himself. And that the name "Son" is the proper belonging of the Son, we have also provided the cause: that He is begotten of God and Father. This opinion seems to us to be placed far beyond all reproach. B. It certainly seems so; yet I will warn of this:
A for I am fearful and perturbed, when I consider whither that excursion of arguments might eventually lead us. For an opponent might surely say: "If 'Father' is the proper name and reality for God the Father, because He has begotten, and 'Son' is to be properly spoken and is the reality for the Son, because He has been begotten; and if it is true to say that the things signified do not admit of a transition of the one into the other (for the Father will always be Father, not being transformed into the Son; and indeed the Son also will be Son, not being transposed into the Father), then the 'unbegotten' will be proper to the Father, since the 'begotten' is proper to the Son." And since to be unbegotten is truly something different from being begotten, they will also have those attributes in a different way, and would certainly not be conceived as being unchanged in things that are same.
A. What else then would such men do but corrupt the beauty of the simplicity that is understood in Christ, just like those who debase gold coinage? For observe how they twist the straight word of truth, and exult in the inventions of a counterfeit wisdom; and speaking arrogant things, they think, like the boastful Goliath, that they will swallow up the congregation of the Lord.
B. It is indeed so. But know that this is what they will say, and they will be instructed by the things I just mentioned.
A. But it is certainly possible for anyone now to see that they are cast down from right reason and a sound mind, and that they ought to pity themselves in their own ignorance, if they shall contend that these things are right, and be like those who say: "We have made a lie our hope, and by falsehood we shall be protected." For they are ignorant, I suppose, first of all, B that "unbegotten" and "father" are not the same, nor do they carry the same meaning. For if something is a father, it does not immediately and in every respect imply that it is unbegotten; nor again, if something is unbegotten, is it for that reason a father. Or if this is not the case, then there are many unbegotten things, for there are many fathers. And as many as are the fathers, that many, the test of our thoughts would show us, are also the unbegotten things. C For if we should examine the nature of existing things, and discern as best we can the definition belonging to each, we would not see that all things have been brought into existence through generation. Although the discourse of the perverse is truly cold and powerless, since "unbegotten" does not signify any one thing strictly—for there are many unbegotten things, and they are elsewhere different in nature by specific differences. What, then, would they say if someone were to happen to ask: "What does the name 'Father' mean to signify? Is it the not having been begotten by anyone, or rather, that He has begotten?"
B. That He has begotten, I suppose.
A. Correct. If, then, the law of fatherhood has sought to exalt fathers in every way so that they are unbegotten, why do we not ourselves, having been proven to be fathers, also strive for that prerogative of being unbegotten? But if the law of nature does not tend toward that, but toward the bringing forth of offspring, and the reality cannot be otherwise: why, by corrupting the truth... D
do they say that the unbegotten is the peculiar property of God and the Father? Even though the appellation of "father," even among ourselves, can signify nothing else than the single fact that he has begotten.
**B.** But what do you think we ought to answer, should anyone ask whether God and the Father is begotten or unbegotten?
**A.** I would say, if we wish to think correctly, that he is indeed unbegotten; yet he is not unbegotten *because* he is father, but because he was not begotten by anyone; rather, he exists in an unbegotten manner, possessing in himself and from himself his own Son in a begotten manner. For it is on this account that he is called Father.
**B.** Be it so, they say; yet "to exist in an unbegotten manner" and "to exist in a begotten manner" will be different things, and would not be understood as the same. For if one thing is not different from another, but you think they are the same, let the distinction again vanish between the two, and let the property of the names be the same for the Father and the Son, just as is the case with "incorruptible," "invisible," and the rest.
A **A.** It is indeed certain and confessed by all that to exist in an unbegotten manner is different from that which is by generation; for we shall not overturn the order of what is proper and true. Yet in such cases, the difference of the names does not suggest a diversity in God, insofar as He is God, but only signifies that He is not such, that is to say, not begotten. What, then, will those who muddle and confuse everything together answer to this, even though they possess a keen mind regarding these things, and are, above all, supercilious and arrogant?
**B.** It has fallen to God and the Father, then, to be unbegotten.
**A.** Not in the least; for as soon as God is understood, all things that are His are also understood, and nothing can be conceived as an accident in Him. And do not be surprised, for even with us ourselves, this is seen to be the case quite easily by those who desire to look without toil. Even though we are brought into existence in time, we are born together B with all things that inhere substantially and are inseparably affixed to us. Therefore, nothing can rightly be considered as an accident in God. And if accidents, even those that naturally inhere in the substances of some things, do not strictly possess their own independent and determined existence—such as we understand in man or in any other thing—but are seen rather regarding the substances of things or in them: what place is to be thought the "unbegotten" has in God? C For if the unbegotten is something in itself, and exists in its own separate existence—and this, as they assert, is the property of God and the Father—it would be something other than the One Whose property it is. For that which belongs to someone, and exists independently, is certainly something other than that to whom it belongs. And thus, at last, that simple nature of the Father is doubled, being composed for us of Father and Unbegotten. One must attend, however, not to the persuasion of their empty wisdom, D but to the words of the Savior, who very accurately distinguishes both His own and the
A nature of Him who begat. For He by no means called Him Unbegotten, but He named Him Father to us.
B. “Milk the milk, and there shall be butter,” the oracle of Solomon sings to us, and wise, as it seems to me, is the revelation. For to incite one whose mind is drunken with secret contemplations and filled with divine teachings to bring forth something useful would be, in my judgment, nothing else than a desire for him to be fed, as it were, with milk, on words pertaining to piety. B Accordingly, if you will allow it, I will present myself as such a person, and I will often interrupt and urge you on, while my mind desires to know what should be opposed to our adversaries. Answer me, therefore, as I ask this as well: Does the Son, they say, know the Father to be Unbegotten?
A. Yes, for I will by no means deny it, nor would I ever be found contending against things that are evident. Yet He knows Him to be Unbegotten, just as He knows Him to be incorruptible, immortal, and invisible; but He made mention of none of these things, rather He named Him Father, saying: “Holy Father, keep them in thy truth.” And again: “I confess to thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth.” And furthermore: “I came forth from the Father and have come.” What then? When He established the law regarding holy baptism, C and laid the foundation of blameless faith for all nations under the sun, did He not pass over those other things—I mean the incorruptible, and the unbegotten, and the rest—and command us to baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit? In my judgment, He very prudently passed over those titles through which it was not necessary to declare the Holy Trinity to us, and He chose and preferred above the others those names which make clear to us the very distinct individual existence of each of the things signified. For those names which are attached to the highest essence are, so to speak, common to the whole Godhead; and if one should name the divine nature, he would at once show us the entire Holy Trinity as in one meaning—that which is understood in one Godhead—yet not yet D distinctly [showing] the person of each, individually and separately. But by saying Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, He makes the declaration not from those things by which the whole nature of the Godhead exists indistinguishably, but from those by which the identity of the Holy Trinity of essence is distinguished in individual hypostases, with the discourse assigning the fitting name to each thing apprehended, and placing in individual hypostases those things which are substantially united. For the highest root, beyond which there is absolutely nothing, you will conceive to be the Father; and that which has come forth from the highest root and has been begotten, you will acknowledge to be the Son—not produced in time, like created things, nor revealing the beauty of His own nature any less than the Father’s, but at once co-eternal, and in all respects equal to the Father, except for this one thing: that He begat—for this would belong to God and Father alone. And you will call the Holy Spirit the one who proceeds naturally from God the Father through the Son, and...
just as by the image of the breath from the mouth, signifying to us His own existence, so too will you adore the one and consubstantial nature of all, the Queen, while guarding the clear and unconfused peculiarity of the three hypostases in their proper existences. B B. You have spoken most excellently; for there is no way that these things could not be thus with us. But they say, nevertheless, that by that term "unbegotten," the nature of God and Father is defined uniquely, and so the Son is henceforth clearly revealed to be of a different, secondary nature, if the "begotten" is not the same as the "unbegotten."
A. Therefore, O good sirs—for so I would deservedly address them—if the "begotten" defines the nature of the Son, and for that reason you say that He is of a different nature and alien to the substance of the Father, what then follows from this? C The arguments of a frenzied mind are indeed most grave; but the blasphemous opinions boldly invade the substance of the Only-Begotten, casting down the Most High to inferior things, even though He says clearly to us, as to those who are created: "You are from below," but referring to His own hypostasis: "I am from above." But how He who is from above and of the things above will descend to that which is beneath and alien to Him, will be obvious to anyone who has examined it diligently. For will you not concede that, just as every unbegotten thing has a common definition with every unbegotten thing—in the fact, I mean, that it exists without generation—so too, by a certain consequence of the argument, is every begotten thing equal and similar to a begotten thing? D
B. How can that be in doubt? For the logic is one and the same in both cases.
A. Do you, then, Hermias, still say that this impiety is obscure, or that the deceit of the adversaries could remain hidden? It has a varnished appearance, adorned with expressions appropriate to God, which carries away the minds of the simple, but otherwise it brings forth a detestable blasphemy. For God has been brought down into a creature, and He in whom we live and move and have our being has finally been numbered among those things subject to generation and corruption. For if the name "begotten" is a definition of the Son, as they think, and we concede that the term signifies substance, then it will have the same rationale, insofar as it is understood as begotten, as every begotten thing. And these are innumerable, and beyond counting, and extending even to the most vile, I mean to a gnat and a fly and things even more shameful.
B. You speak rightly.
A. For what reason then do they call Him Son, or believe God to be Father, if He has not truly begotten the Son from His own substance? Therefore, let them no longer name Him Father, nor Son; for the truth is always dear to Christians. But against their vomit, is it not better to be silent? "Do not answer a fool according to his folly," says Solomon. But lest, as if in the exercise of speech provided as a defense, they should, as though having abandoned their surety, more intemperately and harshly fasten upon
A a certain argument, which I do not know how they have acquired, and which is supported by wretched syllogisms; come now, let us strike down, as well as we can, those who are armed with the panoply of lies and deceit—who are like naked and unarmed soldiers—by a refutation derived from common concepts, with Christ present and defending us, appropriately singing in harmony with the voice of David: "For I will not trust in my bow, and my sword shall not save me. For you have saved us from those who afflict us, and those who hate us and you, you have put to shame 1."
B. Proceed then boldly; for the Lord of all shall stand in the battle with us and shall take up arms along with us.
A. I will proceed indeed, and most willingly; for there is no reason to hesitate. But I think I must say this first of all.
B. What is that?
A. That they say in a most unlearned and most unskillful way that "the Unbegotten" is a definition of God. But I say that a definition is that which possesses the power of being a definition. Or is not the speech belonging to them of such a nature, and would they not be convicted of having arrived at such a point through impudence?
B. Indeed. For they fear nothing, and so they will speak, and will persist further.
A. You are not mistaken. For ignorance is a bold and most shameless thing, and fears nothing at all. C It does not even shrink from condemning the right and blameless opinion itself, if circumstances should cause it to do so; rather, it rashly seizes whatever pleases it, even if it appears most absurd. See, therefore, how they are entangled in this matter in the heavy snares of ignorance. For we shall find among philosophers that definitions of substances are not made by a single word or expression; and we shall find that this is rejected by those who are most distinguished by this very title and who investigate definitions accurately. Nor, furthermore, do they say that definitions are made in a single expression, but neither even if you employ two does it seem to be fully and completely manifested, but rather in three at least, or even more. For thus are the things defined most manifest.
B. Give an example.
A. If someone were perhaps asked to define what man is, and were to make the answer as brief as possible, as if in a single expression, and were to define him by saying, "animal," he would speak most obscurely. D For man is indeed an animal, without a doubt, but not solely and specifically, but synonymously with others. For there are very many other animals. For both the dog and the ox and the panther are animals. But if, adding a second word to the first, he were to define him as "a mortal animal," he will nonetheless fail in an accurate and complete demonstration of the thing, although he speaks the truth. For we say that animals are mortal, the dog and the ox and the rest. But if he were to proceed in order through
A all those things which belong to man substantially, both generally and specifically—calling him at once a rational animal, and also mortal, capable of intellect and knowledge—he would have brought forward a definition lacking nothing for the complete demonstration of the thing. Do you understand, therefore, finally, that our argument is correct and true? B. I understand; for how could it be otherwise? A. Since it is therefore repulsive and absurd, and foreign to the very art they profess, to circumscribe the power of a definition in a single word, what indeed would they have to say—even if they are puffed up in a wondrous way with the conviction of their own wisdom—if someone were to assert that the definition of the substance of God and the Father is "the Unbegotten"? Yet they seem to have slipped into such statements quite inconsiderately, although they are, as they persuade themselves, of a subtle and refined intellect. For this, I think, escapes even them. B. What is it that you say, or of what kind? A. For definitions of substances, if they are brought forward properly and as their nature demands, begin indeed from the genus, but along with the genus they introduce the substantial difference or differences of each of the things signified; but consider this to be what I wish to say again. B. Explain. For in this way I think we ought to discuss these matters. A. Indeed, if someone were to come up to you and ask what a dog is, and what an ox is, what would you say, Hermias? B B. I would say that they are animals. A. Then tell me, by saying this and only this, would you think that you had sufficiently explained the matter? B. Certainly not. For I would add, if I wished to speak plausibly, the natural differences appropriate to each. A. Most truly and correctly so. It is no longer obscure, therefore, but clear that in defining substances one must proceed first from the genus, and then through the specific difference appropriate to each. B. It cannot be otherwise. A. Consider therefore—or rather, let those who foolishly misapply "the Unbegotten" for the purpose of a definition explain to us—whether they wish that term to signify a genus or a difference. For if they say it is as a genus, it will signify nothing separate from others, lest we be caught assigning the power and function of the specific difference to the genus, and excluding it [the genus] from its own proper strength. But if, passing over this, they say it is a difference, let them further demonstrate to us whose difference it will be, if a definite genus is not posited in the statement? And how would a definition of a substance be sufficient for us, and be seen according to its own proper principle, if it consisted of a difference alone? C Will they not be worthy of laughter, if they insist that it is so? B. They will indeed be worthy of it, since this point has no doubt. A. If anyone, therefore, were to add that their dogma is altogether full of extreme calumny and appears utterly inept, would he not be speaking most truly? D
B. What proof do you provide? Tell me.
A. For as I said before, A a definition of any substance whatsoever can never be correctly made from a difference alone. For the genus is always conceived in some way before its own difference, from which the discourse, rushing forth as if from a starting gate and distinctly applying itself to the things that follow, makes a right and indubitable explanation of the matter. If, therefore, they foolishly contend that the word "ingenerate" fulfills the power of a definition, it will not be a difference—for it signifies to us that it is not begotten—but we shall not concede that the term has such power. Rather, as far as they are concerned, it would be taken as a genus, simply and without distinction, even if it is very alien to right reason to name a genus in regard to God, since nothing exists with Him or before Him. B However, let it be assumed that the ingenerate is a genus in Him, as they rashly think, yet that the genus signifies nothing to us at all, so that it may not hold the place and power of a difference. Since, therefore, the word "ingenerate" no longer brings in the signification of "not having been begotten," what difference between the Father and the Son could it show us? Or how could the Son be in any way inferior at all, even if He were thought to be begotten—I do not understand very clearly; but what do you say, Hermias?
B. What could I have to say in response to this?
A. And yet we have sufficiently and more than enough, I think, and clearly demonstrated that the "ingenerate" does not correctly and expertly contain the power of a definition. We were indeed unaccustomed to proceeding through such arguments, but were obeying necessity rather than our own will, and were, of necessity, touching upon things in the use and knowledge of which we are lacking. C And although it is not easy to add new reasons to those already discovered, I shall nevertheless endeavor, as far as I am able, to do so. Those, therefore, who are extremely clever and precise and professional in these matters say that what is called "conversion" belongs to every definition.
B. And what indeed is this? I would most gladly learn from you.
A. I shall thus return to the same arguments and, having recycled them, will speak. For we define man by such a formula as this: a mortal, rational animal; and again, a horse by this one: a whinnying animal. We shall, however, also make the signification of the subjects differently, and not by any means from the first terms, but from the last words, going backward to the beginnings of the definitions. D For if there is anyone who is a mortal and rational animal, you will understand this to be man; and conversely, if there is any whinnying animal, this will show the nature of a horse. If, then, the ingenerate is a definition, why does it not admit of conversion? For let them not hesitate to admit that if anything is ingenerate, this is also a definition and the substance of God and the Father. But this statement is not true. For there are countless such things, and they are beyond number, and it would be tiresome, I think, to recount them one by one. Do you understand, therefore, into what great absurdity their discourse slips?
B. Yes, a very great one indeed.
A. But there is also another reason on account of which the ingenerate
A cannot be a definition, if we consider it again in this way. For we define each of the things that exist from the things of which it is believed to be, and truly is, not from those of which it could by no means consist, and which it has merely happened to be deprived of. B. What do you mean? A. For if we wish to explain, for example, what fire or water may be, or indeed what their nature is, concerning fire we say that it is a body hot and dry; and concerning the other, again, that it is humid and cold. According to this, I think, it is fitting to define them from the things of which they consist. But if, while explaining the nature of fire, we were to say that it is neither cold nor humid, omitting to say that it is hot and dry; and concerning water, again, that it is neither hot nor dry, although we ought B to say that it is cold and humid, whence would we seem to you to be providing an explanation? B. From those things of which they are deprived and which they are admittedly not. A. Therefore, if anyone should decide to think and speak thus about any of the things that exist, would he have explained distinctly and without error what the truth is in each case? B. Not at all. A. If, therefore, in the case of God and Father, the "ingenerate" signifies to us only that He is not generated, how could it have the power of a definition, seeing that it does not signify what He is, but what He is not? B. You mean, presumably, that He is not generated? A. Exactly so; for that is what the force of the expression produces. But what, finally, will they devise if we add that the definitions of substances are not contrary to any thing at all, nor are they C reckoned among the things that are relative, of which if one names the one, it is absolutely necessary that he also make mention of the other? For the one brings with it the signification of the other at the same time. B. The things you say are not very clear to me. A. And yet there is nothing to prevent them from being understood by you clearly. For if one, for example, should name "father," he in a way leads the minds of those who hear to a thought of the "son," or at any rate of the "offspring." And it is true to say the reverse: along with the signification of the offspring, the begetter also comes to mind. In the same way, the "right" and the "left" behave: for as soon as one of these is named, the other also emerges. But he who, for example, brings forth the definition of the substance of a man, or of any other animal, has not joined to it anything separate D or necessarily opposed, just as, for instance, the left is to the right, or the son to the father, or, to speak simply, the generated to the begetter. For "man" is man, and "stone" is stone, having no opposition to anything, but these are their own and peculiar names. The word "ingenerate," however, while it signifies that one is not generated, also in a way suggests the "generated," the quality of which this word escapes, while it settles upon its own. How then could the word "ingenerate" be a definition, when it does not have a similarity to the "generated," as far as the signification of each is concerned?
B B. You do not say, then, that "ingenerate" is nothing when applied to God the Father? A. Far from it. On the contrary, I would say it must be attributed to Him alone, insofar as it signifies not being generated: nonetheless, that it ought not to be forced into the function of a definition. B. But, they say, if "ingenerate" is not to be set down in the capacity of a definition regarding God and Father, let it nonetheless be His substance; and if the "generated" is the opposite of the "ingenerate," the Son would not be the same as the Father in nature, since the quality of the names would very well establish for us an essential difference. A. How exceedingly sharp the argument is, and how easily it is embellished by the winding digressions of their thoughts from one thing to another! And it seems to me that the defenders of these impious dogmas have proposed for themselves something such as those whom they say are accustomed to doing in the art of painting and drawing. When they portray some animal in a color other than what its nature bears, because of a mistake in their conception and in their hand, they later cover it over with other dyes to correct the fault, hoping that at last they have achieved a skillfully painted board, and that nothing in it will seem faulty to the viewers. But they do not notice that the very things by which they think they will bring back praise will reveal their errors, and that the praise of the correction will be the shame of their ignorance. Or is what I said not true? C B. True indeed. But forgetting the intention with which they undertook those digressions, let us turn to them, lest we provide them with any handle for lifting their eyebrows against us if we seem to decline the contest. A. So be it, since you think it stands correctly thus. And indeed, since they ignorantly assert that "ingenerate" is the substance of God, someone, I think, having burst into laughter at this, will say: "If 'ingenerate' is the substance of God, and there are countless things in the world that are ingenerately, then everything that is ingenerate will be the substance of God, or at least will have 'ingenerate' in the capacity of a substance." Now, there are things without generation—the sun, for example; for it was created just as the moon, the stars, and the heavens: I pass over the Principalities and Thrones, and every creature that is above us, which were brought into existence not by generation, as we were. But not everything that is ingenerate is the substance of God, nor indeed is "ingenerate" D to be attributed to those things that are without generation as a definition of substance. Therefore, we shall not accept "ingenerate" for this purpose, if there remains in us any sound and uncorrupted mind. Moreover—for I think this too must be added—if "ingenerate" is substance, yet the name of substance, with neither genus, nor species, nor difference or differences brought forward, suggests nothing at all to the listeners except only that it is a substance, then "ingenerate" will signify nothing in God, nor indeed will it be thought to signify not being generated, but only this, namely that it is a substance, but of what sort is uncertain; for it is still lacking in genus, species, and difference. Let us speak thus also concerning the Son regarding the name of "generation," and let it be understood that...
A it is merely a substance, B still naked, and in no way defined. Since, therefore, both terms are uttered simply and indistinctly, and introduce the knowledge of nothing other than that it is a substance, what, then, will be the difference between the Father and the Son? For when substance is compared to substance, if nothing else is added, it will have neither, as they say, the greater nor the less, nor will there be any point at all by which they are distinguished from one another; but a similarity in every way of substance to substance will undoubtedly be present, if we philosophize correctly, as long as they are understood and spoken of merely as substances. Let those, therefore, who through their own ignorance take the "unbegotten" simply and indistinctly for the substance of God, and who do not obstruct the nature of the Son with that term as if with a certain rampart and fortification, but bark at the dogma of truth, blushing, be ashamed—those who thrust upon us as manifest a difference that presents itself in no way, if neither "the unbegotten" in God and the Father signifies, of course, "not to have been begotten," nor, in turn, does the other term signify "to have been begotten" in the Son, but both are substances, and that without distinction. For a little while ago we showed that there is nothing that separates substance from substance, in so far as they are said and considered to be substances. Do you think, therefore, that this doctrine is clear and sound, or will you correct it and change it for the better?
B. By no means. For it is correct.
A. But if they were to steal away from the very word "unbegotten" the declaration of "not having been begotten," and insist that it is simply a substance, what reasoning would move us—those of us who wish to take away generation from the "begotten" and record it in the order of substance, just as they do with "unbegotten"? Furthermore, how shall we then determine, and what C reasoning will distinguish for us the personal and hypostatic difference of the Father from the Son, or of the Son from the Father? For who exactly is the begetter, and who the begotten, will no longer be apparent. And so, all reasoning of our faith will be in vain and useless for us. For from whence and how do we believe in the Father and the Son any longer, as in begetter and begotten? For we shall certainly not admit a naked and corrupted meaning of names in these matters. Far from it. On the contrary, we acknowledge a precise and necessary one, if indeed we believe in the truth and have not fallen away from the true knowledge of God, having been baptized into the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
B. You speak rightly. But I discovered that they also boast of this, that the Father is so called D inasmuch as He is the Creator, and has appeared as a sort of principle and origin to those things that have been brought into existence from nothing. And for this reason, they say, we ourselves have also been taught to name God in this way, and to address Him in our prayers: "Our Father, who art in heaven."
A. Then, O good sirs (for so we shall address them), we might say to this—
whether are we commanded to call God "Father" because we are numbered among the class of created things, or because we have been crowned with the glory of adoption and have been accounted as children?
B. As created things, indeed, because of our nature, but as children because of grace?
A. But wherever He is named Father, and likewise Son, let not the "made" be introduced immediately, nor let the concept of "having been made" be surreptitiously slipped in for the moment. For the relationship of the Father to the Son, and of the Son back to the Father, is such that nothing stands between them—unlike, indeed, the relationship of a maker to what is made, and what is made to its maker. If, then, we should take away what is fitting for each, and, by simply disregarding the force of those things which are termed "relative," we are caught assigning the force and relative definition of a made thing toward the Father, and of the Son toward the maker—who would not rightly laugh at us for such supreme insanity?
B. B If we call God "Father" as children, I think it is an idle and superfluous thing to dwell upon such matters.
A. But He would not be "Father" in truth, nor "Son," unless there be understood a begetter and a begotten.
B. You speak rightly. Let God, therefore, be called "Father," they say, if you wish, in an improper sense.
A. From where, my good man, would He have obtained that name, if He is not himself Father by nature? Or will they perhaps say that He received it from us, who are fathers by nature and in truth?
B. Be well assured that they will say exactly that.
A. What then shall we make of the blessed Paul, who does not attribute the principle of fatherhood to us, nor indeed to any other creature, but rather consecrates and ascribes it in a certain way to the one, true God and first Father, and whom we may hear writing thus: "From whom every fatherhood in heaven and on earth is named" [Eph 3:15]? Answer me then, Hermias (for thus you will exercise us in this discussion), for I would be taught: was God made "unbegotten" in time, not being this in the beginning, or is He understood as God and as unbegotten at the same time?
B. He was unbegotten; for how would it not be utter folly to say anything else?
A. C Does the word "unbegotten" signify that He has not been begotten, or in what way?
B. Manifestly, that He has not been begotten.
A. But why at all was it necessary for God, who exists without beginning, to be viewed in such a way? Or what sort of distinction, or rather nature, would that term have created for Him, or against whom, if His nature is *the* unbegotten, when no created thing had yet come into being or co-existed, if indeed they say the Father is not the begetter of the Son? For toward what is He "unbegotten," when the substance of begotten things had not yet been introduced? D For they certainly will not say, lest they seem to be asserting that things are co-eternal and without beginning along with...
the unbegotten God, those things which have been created in a generated manner. And if it were true that God is always the Father, being unbegotten, it is A absolutely necessary to declare that He also exists, on whose account He was unbegotten; that is to say, the Son who is generated, whose image we have been enriched with; and having attained the form [of the Son] through the virtue of piety, we ourselves also call God "Father," having received the name according to the likeness of the highest and first Father. For archetypes are always more ancient than images.
B. And what hinders our adversaries from saying that God is "Father" only in an abusive sense, since we are plainly fathers by nature, whereas He, insofar as He is the author of created things, is called "Father," and possesses the "unbegotten" as a power and principle of substance?
A. Yet that truthful Paul has testified to us that the name of paternity flows from Him to every rational creature, clearly demonstrating according to the form and imitation of the First that which is even in us ourselves. He never said, however, that the entire nature of the "unbegotten" is from Him, in heaven and on earth, or else nothing at all should have been generated, so that the image of the Unbegotten might be impressed upon created things. For the likeness and conformity of the creature with Him who is supreme over all can contribute very much to its ornamentation.
B. Shall we therefore subvert the creature, by stripping away its generation, so that it might be fashioned according to that which is unbegotten?
A. I do not say this, but I thought it necessary to point out the absurdities that follow from thence, from which we must flee far away, as that wise word B primarily admonishes us with these words: "Keep yourself pure," and "Do not participate in the sins of others," it very well proclaims. For although it is our duty to cling firmly to the blameless opinion of the holy Fathers, why should we delight in what is foreign, and put on such a savage mind? For that mind is savage which barks at the glory of the Son and speaks injustice against God, as it is written. For it seemed, I think, and very rightly, to those celebrated, sagacious, and upright men, that "the unbegotten" is by no means the substance of God and Father, but is only a word which signifies to the hearers "not to have been begotten." Which we indeed also say is contained in the concept of the hypostasis of God and Father, not that it is the substance of God itself. C For it is allowed for anyone to see that of all things which are, or which we at least suspect to be, and which only show a pretense of existing: some are as if in their own seats, and thus they have obtained this which they are by a hypostatic principle of existence; others, however, are not so, in no way at all, but are rather foreign, and not stably rooted in their own natures, but flit about the substances of things, and from that which—for example—to this or to that, D [by]...
A they seem almost to exist together with those things by which they are received, and pretend that a foreign nature is their very own.
B. What do you mean?
A. Surely you do not forget our argument, which labored most on this point and, as far as it could, rightly demonstrated to everyone that things which are counted in the order of accidents, or even those counted as simply inherent, are not in the least B in themselves, but rather exist in others, and though they seem to be and to be called something in their own right, they have the nature of that which has received them as their own. For "begotten" and "unbegotten" are not something subsisting by themselves, since they signify only the fact of being begotten or, at any rate, of not being begotten.
B. You speak well.
A. Therefore, unbegottenness C must be credited to the account of the hypostasis of God and the Father, and must be posited as being of Him, but not as being Him. For consider the absurdity of this, if you will. For if they claim in truth that the unbegotten is a substance, while infinite things exist by generation, what further prevents them, in the same error of mind, from asserting that none of those things that exist truly subsist, even though they have been brought into being through generation, if each one has ceased to be a substance because it is not unbegotten?
B. It would surely cease; and why not?
A. But how does that kind of reasoning not suit them most especially? For if they hold D the unbegotten to be the substance of God and the Father—and He, being God above substance and above all things, has set this apart as a nature uniquely His own, having nothing naturally in common with that which is cut off from all others—then one must think that the rest exist by generation and reside in a nature of their own. For what ratio or what kind could there be between the begotten and the unbegotten, as far as quality is concerned—it being obvious that this refers to those things which are according to substance? And then, what would those who are prone to every kind of evil say when they see the properties of God and the Father also in the Offspring, that is, in the Son? For the Father is Life, and Light, and the true God; but the Son is these things also, not by participation, nor by the benefit of another, but substantially and in an equal manner. Do you perceive at last, then, that the properties and prerogatives of the Godhead would not be more appropriately attributed to the account and manner of unbegottenness—so that we might not say they belong to others, which appear to exist and subsist also without generation—but would fit more appropriately as belonging to the Father and God? For thus, I think, by the law of nature, identity of substance will flow eventually to the Son and from Him. Being unbegotten, therefore, is in no way the substance of God, but, as I said, it is only a signifier that the Father has not been begotten, and it does not subsist as a particular thing.
B. That is correct. But perhaps the adversaries will say: If you claim that the Son, who is begotten, is identical with and consubstantial to God and the Father, you will not hesitate, I suppose, to hold that He also always co-exists with the Father.
[...to] stand, nor can it be said, apart from passion and the flux which is said to attend generation, that it was generated, although every calculation compels us to believe that the cause of anything pre-exists its effect, and that whatever is generated harms the nature of the begetter in some way, for it comes forth as a part of it. Let that generation, therefore, which is so by nature and in truth, be dismissed, since it brings in upon the nature that is highest and exempt from all harm the necessity of suffering flux.
A A. Is this not, then, clearly what I said? For with whatever arguments they please, they induce a sort of coloration like a dye, and change them into different forms, and shift them easily this way and that, and differ nothing from reeds—when, on the other hand, they should be showing constancy, and not foolishly imitating infants. For while infants, lacking mind and reason as yet, are carried inconsiderately toward any movement, these men, endowed with a light intellect, rashly snatch at whatever teaching, and value even what is rotten and weak, which I think is a mark of one who is base and of a slumbering mind. But Paul says to us: "Brothers, do not become children in your thinking, but in malice be infants, while in thinking be mature." 76 For truly, to know less than one ought, 77 and less than is fitting for those who are already reckoned among men, and who are no longer underage and of feeble mind, but have reached the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ 78—this, for holy men, is certainly not fitting, and there is no doubt that it brings harm to those in whom it has firmly seated itself, which is very difficult to wash away.
B. Quite so: for you speak correctly.
A. Do you wish, then, to bid these things farewell, just as they are, and proceed to set the truth against their sophistries?
B. Certainly. For that will surely be better.
A. Therefore, since they seize upon and name "cause" and "caused," I know not from where (for they will not say they are drawn from the divine Scripture), what on earth do they intend by this?
B. Indeed, I have just heard you saying that the cause is always older than the caused, in concept and in reality; and that the begetter nowhere generates without passion and flux. And by distorting these things, they asserted that the Son is less than the Father, and that He is secondary, and in a way generated late: and so, impiously labeling the generation itself as untrue, they slander even the consubstantiality.
A. Let them, therefore, tell those who ask: Do they believe the Father to be the cause of the Son’s existence: is it as a creator, who led Him forth into being by creating, just as he did with creatures, or, if not in this way, will they agree with us that He was begotten in the true mode of generation—
that which proceeds from our own substance to that which is begotten?
B. As they speak of Him as Father, or rather as Creator. For since the Most High God exists as simple in substance, in the same way as He might be thought to create, so too does He beget. Therefore, they say, the similarity of His operation will establish that He is altogether simple.
A. A Indeed, this is to mix everything up and down, and to confound the distinct nature of things in a disorderly and confused way, and to bring together into a single confluence—as one of the sages of the Greeks once wrote—what a long and accurate account separates from the qualities of one another, just like the streams of rivers. For to create and to beget are different things, I think, as any reasonable account will make plain to us. But I think we ought not, by thoughtlessly attributing simplicity to the Father, to thrust the doctrine rightly and excellently founded concerning Him into absurd opinions. For if, as He creates, so He also begets, and both are thought to be the same, with nothing distinguishing them into a difference, and B if He does not have a different way of existing, I would not for a moment be afraid to say that of whatever things He is the Maker, of these He will also be the Father, and one might consider everything that has been made to be His offspring. Yet how many such things there are, and in what kinds and differences they are contained, is not easy to say; nevertheless, if anyone has the mind, he may reckon them up. For there is nothing among existing things that would reject the account of having been made. And who would deny that even the lowest and most cast-off things are at least to be numbered among existing things? Therefore, if things are of such a kind, God will be the Father of all things.
B. And how is this account not utterly full of absurdity?
A. Rather, you might say it is beyond the ultimate point of impiety, if you wish to speak the truth. For if, as they think, creating and begetting are truly indistinguishable in God and Father, and not different because of the simplicity of His essence—first, they make the Holy Scripture vain for us, which names the Son "only-begotten," He who—if what those on the contrary side say is true—is "the firstborn among many brethren," [Rom. VIII, 29] or rather one and the same with all things C that are believed to exist, perhaps either begotten or created. For to them both appear to be the same, and not to differ from one another. But that great teacher of ours, John, would have been mistaken, it seems, when he brought forth as an arcanum concerning the Son that He is the "only-begotten," whom indeed he says is "in the bosom of God and the Father," [John I, 18] not lying—I think—but also by this means indicating His generation. But the wise discourse has advanced to such a pitch of audacity that they dare to attack the Son Himself. For I would say that while it was permitted [for Him] to easily ward off the rash impulses of the Jews, He is found to be whetting them against Himself. For why did He not rather say: "I am a creature and work of God," rather than calling God His own Father, "making Himself equal to God"? D [John V, 18] Why
A was it not more necessary to proclaim in the synagogues: "He who believes in the Son is not judged," and not what it was natural and very easily possible to appease the untamed envy of the listeners: "He who believes in the creature is not judged"? For I think if anyone had heard Him proclaiming these things, they would not, I think, have deemed Him insufferable, nor would they have wished to stone Him, nor would they have foolishly resolved to cast Him headlong from the peak of the mountain, or attempted to drive Him down to senseless precipices. What then were the most wise disciples doing, having an opinion about Him, that He was the Son B by all means, and not a creature? For since He was walking upon the crest of a wave, and with ineffable power having spread out the liquid and fluid nature of the waters beneath His own feet, He was traversing the broad sea, He gave an unaccustomed spectacle to the holy apostles, and though He would scarce have ascended of His own will and sailed across in a boat with them, it was permitted, and it was easy, if only He willed, to walk upon the highest swell. But they, finally struck with awe and reflecting upon His invincible power in their minds, were worshipping, saying: "Truly You are the Son of God." Was it not therefore that they were confirming the matter with an oath, and because they truly described Him as the Son of God, they would be accused as liars and be caught and convicted of having strayed from the truth? For if He is not the Son, having sprung from the substance of the One who begot Him, but rather a creature, colored with the glory of sonship, and having obtained the title as far as appearance and name go, what cause had they received for which they should worship Him? But why did the teachers and heralds of the truth name Him the Son?
B. The discourse seems to us to proceed most excellently.
A. That divine and most sacred Paul, although called C by God a vessel of election, and an ordained priest to the Gentiles, and an accurate steward of the mysteries of our Savior, what would he wish to signify when he cries out concerning the Son Himself and the holy angels: "Who, being the brightness of His glory, and the image of His substance, and upholding all things by the word of His power, having made purification of our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become so much better than the angels, as He has inherited a more excellent name than they? For to which of the angels did He ever say: 'You are My Son, today I have begotten You'? And again: 'Sit at My right hand, until I make Your enemies your footstool'? Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth for service for the sake of those who shall inherit salvation?" And again: "For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just reward of retribution, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation?" How indeed could it be conceived at all by ourselves and by the holy angels, that the Son is the image of the ineffable glory D and, moreover, the brightness of the substance of God and the Father, if He does not possess the power of having been begotten in the truth of the thing, but is adorned with bare and mere words?
A And if He exists, having a nature that is different, and is ranked among the creatures, then nothing, it seems, will prevent the Father Himself from being placed in the number of creatures, and being considered as made, if indeed the Son is His character and brightness and happens to be made. But how has He inherited a name that is more excellent than the angels? For if, with God, to create is the same as to beget, it would be manifest, surely, that whatever is considered in the rank of a Son will be, without distinction, also a creature, and that which is truly numbered among the creatures is, no less, also a birth. Why, then, does God still delay, insofar as it is necessary, perhaps, even to say to each of the holy angels: "You are my Son, today I have begotten you"? For what the Apostles possess natively and essentially, why is He not seen to bestow it, or rather—for it will be said more vehemently—why does He withdraw it, and commit an injury against those who have already attained the glory of being begotten and being numbered among the sons? For since God is simple, there will be absolutely no difference for Him between generation and creation, as they foolishly think, but both are mixed into one meaning and converge upon the same reality, B and accept the convergence into identity.
B. Yes, for it seems that they think and speak in this way.
A. But we shall not say that the matter is so; far from it. For there is a very great difference for us both between the two names and between the things themselves. Answer me, if it pleases you, as I inquire.
B. Ask, then.
A. That most excellent and supreme teacher of divine things, John, wrote concerning the Son: C «He came into His own, and His own did not receive Him; but as many as received Him, He gave them the power to become children of God, to those who believe in His name.» D Shall we say, then, that the grace of adoption has been given to those who could not be placed in the glory of a son, or to those who would have no need to receive it from elsewhere, but possessed it within themselves and essentially, even if they had received it from no one?
B. To those who did not have it. For I think this is also true.
A. Then who in the nature of things will be found to be entirely lacking in it, if generation is nothing different from being created, or rather, if both are one and the same, with nothing at all intervening to create a difference? For we shall concede that everything that exists has been begotten, even if it has been brought into being by creation.
B. Did the Father, then, beget us from His own very nature?
A. God and Father has not begotten us from His own nature; otherwise, if whatever should be seen in us as absurd and impossible were seen, would that not immediately be opposed in the same manner to the Son who is according to nature? For we have indeed undeniably been created; but He has come forth from the substance of God and the Father, to whom we are also being conformed, and receiving the grace of goodness in the place of generation, we have been ranked among the sons of God, bringing back an external and acquired dignity.
A Adopted sons, however, will not exist at all, unless that natural Son existed before them, and the image of true generation first manifested the archetype within itself. If therefore the Father did not truly beget, because with Him to beget is the same thing as to create—and nothing else—the concept of the Son is taken away from us, and the nature of the Father is found to be sterile. B Vain also, in a way, is the hope of those who have embraced the faith. For where, after this, will sonship be at all? Where will that dignity flow from which can restore the creature to a better state, if the created thing is of the same logic and manner as the begotten thing, with creation and generation—as they wish—coinciding into one and the same thing? Would you not say that these are trifles, and filthier than all filth? B. Most certainly. A. If, however, He is also said to be an assessor, and is truly the Son to the Father, while true generation does not bring to Him—as to the nature of the Begetter—that He should be manifest in every way and in all things in likeness and equality with Him, will they not now at last clearly say that the glory which is due to and inherent in the author of the generation and birth of things pertains also to the nature of generated things themselves, and that the servant has put on the dignity of the master? And indeed the divine Paul writes: C "For to which of the angels has He ever said: You are my Son, today I have begotten you?" or, "Sit at my right hand?" For why did it seem good to God to assign to them the glory of standing by and ministering, while He alone is seen in the supreme thrones of the Godhead, and no assessor of equal nature is given to Him at all? A nod, as it seems, and the will, having entered into the power of the Father, placed the one in that place, and the others in the state in which they are, though they are by no means despised or neglected. For He decreed concerning them, namely, that they should stand blamelessly, be able to preserve their principality, and, ministering to God, run up and down. D Did God and Father therefore act unjustly, as it seems, by not allowing them to be adorned with equal glory? It is not so: not indeed (for we are not destitute of correct reason, as they wish). For an infinite space divides the begotten from the creature; and this One is the Son, and in as much as He is that, He sits on the same throne with the Father: but the others stand by, called into being through creation. Why then do they mix things that cannot be mixed, and absurdly attempt to bind into identity things that differ in their mutual identity of substance as much as the nature of things itself, being its own witness, would declare? But, as it seems, the sweat and goal for them is not to discern the truth, but to insult, and with their crafty inventions and unbridled insolence to impiously mock in a certain way. B. You are not mistaken indeed: for there is nothing useful in them
A for such men. Yet I suppose that I shall ask this: how can the Simple one bring forth for us different energies, and generate in one way while acting in another, yet neither act in a way other than He generates, nor destroy the concept of simplicity?
A. Indeed, this is nothing else, as I think, but to take a reed staff in one's hands, as the prophet Isaiah says. For what else is it to rely on such rotten and easily broken reasonings, and to think that one holds the firmness of right doctrine, but to foolishly choose to support one's own soul with a reed staff? You will see that that proposition, however sharp it may seem, is very easily overturned if you weigh the matter in this way and examine it with the exact eye of the mind. For there are countless natures of existing things, of which some, B having been brought to existence from the non-existent by the One who calls them, were not formed for mutual dissension and strife, but were rather distinguished for a peculiar lot, different from the others. But others not only attained this, but even destroy one another in their collisions and cannot bear a mutual concurrence; for the law of nature kindles enmity among them. Does your mind follow the path of what has been said?
B. Not entirely.
A. Understand then what I say, for I shall not hesitate to speak. Therefore, the angel and man, heaven likewise and earth, ox and horse, wood and stone, have been called to existence by the art and energy of God. Each of these is understood in its own and distinct nature, and is not C in every way and altogether identical in all things, or in those in which the others are. Yet they are not in opposition to the others. For a thing is not incompatible, nor otherwise unmixable—an angel to a man, or a man to an angel; for the natures are not in any way contrary to one another; and the existence of heaven, or rather the concept of its existence, does not contend with the others. For it will not hold apart in enmity earth from heaven, or the latter from the former, or the wood from the stone, since it has not acquired the concept of being from things that are opposing and cut off into a nature of contrariety. In addition to all this, we say that fire, which is characterized by burning, and water, which has the faculty of cooling, were made by the energy of God; but both are the works of One, the Simple One. If, then, these are the works of a simple energy, D even though they are separated by such great difference from one another, how can we still take away the simple substance by the variety of energy, having—I know not how—persuaded ourselves that the destruction of the truth is material for piety? But consider, if you please, still another thing besides these. For if, because God is simple, He will operate uniformly—and they will say that this is especially fitting for Him—why do they not also believe that the disposition in Him is simple?
B. What do you mean?
A. Does He not, I beseech you, abhor and laugh at the wicked
and treat the renegade as abominable, while He shows joy toward the holy and bestows honor and grace upon those who are virtuous A in their disposition? B. How could it be otherwise? A. Will you allow that the punishment meted out to those who transgress is a movement toward anger, while the honor and grace bestowed upon the saints is a fruit of gentleness? B. I concede it; for that is how it is. A. Therefore, since they say the divine nature is simple, and on that account take away from it the multiform nature of its activity, let them also assume that it is simple and does not possess a varied disposition within itself. Consequently, those whom He praises, He would, I suppose, also blame; and those whom He admires, He would surely also censure. And the result would be that the act of passion and anger would be the fruit of gentleness, and we would have to consider anger to be the same thing as gentleness. I would add this, moreover, to what has been said: the nature of the Godhead is one and simple. We say, however, that it is life, and power, and wisdom, and glory. For by life the thing that is quickened lives, and by power the thing that receives strength is strengthened, and by wisdom the thing that is made wise is rendered wise, and by glory the thing that is in need of glory—that is, the thing that is glorified—is glorified. Do I not seem to you to be speaking the truth? B. Indeed you do. B A. But how can a manifold mode of activity be a fruit of a simple substance, as they suppose? Yet God operates in a manifold way, even though His nature is simple. Would you, therefore, Hermias, admit that there is anything more absurd than this? For is it not much better, and does it not appear more consistent with right reason, to think of God as simple by nature, but to leave it to Him alone to know how He exists and how He operates in a diverse manner, and not to inquire more curiously? For God, and divine matters, clearly surpass all mind and speech. B. You have spoken well. A. We, therefore, shall not foolishly judge that that nature which is the procreator of all things is barren, nor that it lacks a fruit or offspring convenient and proper to it, to which all fruitful things are conformed, and on account of which they themselves are fruitful. B. That is certainly better, beyond comparison. But they will press C the point, as it seems: how is the Father to be understood to have begotten? Has something happened to Him of the sort that usually happens to those who beget—a division, for instance, or a flux? Or how does it come about that the cause is not in concept and reality older than that which is caused? A. It is a most difficult thing, Hermias, and well-nigh inextricable, and inaccessible to speech for even the most eloquent person—nay, even to the mind itself. For things that surpass the mind cannot be comprehended by the mind, nor is it possible to explain in speech things that are greater than language. For the faith has delivered to us that God is Father, and that He truly begat for us the Son from His own substance; the divinely inspired D
A Scripture is wont to name the Father and the generation everywhere. And I think that one ought not to examine further with bolder inquiries that which has been accepted by faith. For that which is sought is no longer faith. In the same way as—according to the voice of the most wise Paul—"Hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees?" [Rom. viii, 24], so truly, faith that is scrutinized and does not possess that which is beyond inquiry would not be faith, following the same reasoning as with hope. For that which is honored by faith is surely free from testing. I say, therefore, that just as one who approaches God must believe that He exists, and seek nothing further [Heb. xi, 6], so we must be disposed and think that God is Father, and that He has begotten; but to dig into "how," as it is unattainable, must be abandoned. For I believe there is no one at all who would mock those who have decided, well and wisely, that one must yield in matters that are beyond our mind. But the manner of the divine generation shall be considered superior to every mind. It is permissible, therefore, to hear clearly God and Father exclaiming to the Word who has proceeded from Him according to nature: "From the womb before the morning star I have begotten you" [Ps. cix, 4, LXX]. Now, that the offspring is genuine, and that the Son has been begotten from the very substance of the Father, would be very well demonstrated by that, "from the womb," B which is most useful when taken as a likeness to us. But the statement "before the morning star," to define the birth, perhaps signifies, in some way, that the manner of the generation was enclosed in obscurity and incomprehensibility, and as it were in deep darkness. For when the morning star suddenly leaps up from the eastern limits towards the heights, faint rays are scattered into the ether, and a light, thin and feeble, and a precursor of the sun’s brightness, shines forth at the same time, as the darkness of the night is already fading. But as long as it has not appeared in the sky, night still presses on, and a thick gloom is poured over the eyes—both of the blind and of those whose vision is unimpaired—and those who are not subject to the affliction. Since, then, you yourself might tell us, what is the divine miracle in the Son being begotten, even if it be understood as before the morning star?
B. The matter of the generation, my friend, is not without wonder. For its antiquity and most ancient nature one might learn through it being understood as before the morning star.
A. Then would it not be better to say [that He was begotten] before the sun and moon, or rather before heaven and earth? For these are older than the stars and the morning star. C But I would think it small and meager to say that the Son is before the earth and heaven and all creation absolutely; for He has shone forth from the Father who is without beginning, and the manner of His generation is altogether unspeakable and beyond all thought. Therefore, the celebrated Isaiah himself also says to us: "Who shall declare His generation? For His life is taken from the earth" [Isa. liii, 8]—calling, I suppose, the "generation" the birth, and the "life" the nature itself, which he well declares to be lifted up from all the earth—that is to say, to be raised and to transcend every mind of those upon the earth, and above D
the conceptions that dwell among us, untrodden and inaccessible to the measures of humanity, appears to me most true. And that A the Son has appeared to be both beyond all time and superior to such a beginning, no less than the Father, another of the holy prophets will convince us, crying out: "And thou, Bethlehem, house of Ephratha, art not the least that thou shouldst be among the thousands of Juda. For out of thee shall come forth unto me, that he may be a ruler in Israel, and his goings forth are from the beginning, from the days of eternity." By this he speaks of his existence from the Father, as a certain proper and peculiar "coming forth," according to which we understand him to have existed from the beginning—before which there is nothing—wholly with his own Begetter, not in an unbegotten way, but in a begotten way. How much laughter, therefore, do you think they deserve, who, I know not how, have persuaded themselves that they are able to attain to such sublime things by human and coarse cogitations? For how could you know the manner in which God begat, unless you had first learned what he is by nature?
B. But this cannot be; for "he made darkness his secret place," as it is written, "and round about him his tabernacle," signifying, I think, by the name of darkness and tabernacle, either obscurity or, rather, invisibility and incomprehensibility; entering as it were into which, he who fills all things is known only by himself and by his own offspring. For he said: "No one knows who the Son is, save the Father; and no one knows who the Father is, save the Son, and he to whom the Son shall reveal him."
C A. It is well spoken; you are to be commended for such a discourse. Therefore, if anyone should curiously inquire and boldly scrutinize things that cannot be comprehended by the mind nor explained by the power of words, we shall say that such a one is not a lover of learning but rather one who flounders in vain and superfluous labors. Indeed, it will not be beside the point to say of such a man: "He who leans upon lies, he shall feed the winds, and he himself shall pursue flying birds." For "he has left the ways of his own vineyard, and has wandered through the paths of his own field; he walks through a solitude void of water, and a land set in thirsty places, and he gathers barrenness with his hands." For, having as it were bidden farewell to useful things and those full of truth, they foolishly worship a lie, and embrace as useful that which lacks the fruit of piety. And to such a degree does the arrogance of their mind advance, that they perhaps think it a crime and a reproach that the divine nature is not known to them, and they are forced to confess that it is reserved for God alone—even though Holy Scripture, inspired by God, proclaims that the divine ways are altogether inexplicable, that is to say, the governance and administration of individual creatures. For the divine David sings and chants somewhere, saying: D "Thy way is in the sea, and thy paths in many waters, and thy footsteps shall not be known." For the track of a ship driven by favorable winds and carried into the deep does not appear. For when, like a plow, it [cuts] the sea...
the track is invisible; since, by the collision of the waves with one another, it immediately mingles that which appeared divided. Or is it not so?
B. It is indeed. Consider further how the generation for us might be without passion and without flux, and whether it is at all possible to say that the cause does not pre-exist its effect.
A. It does not pre-exist from anywhere, far from it; but neither would division and passion ever accompany it in time, if the matter should be understood concerning God, in whom passion cannot fall, nor temporal generation. For if we were speaking at present of bodies, to which it is fitting both to suffer, and, in that the nature longs for outflow, it is consequently circumscribed by time and has not an eternal beginning of generation, I would not undeservedly say that the things they imagine are perhaps not absurd. But since our discourse is about the nature that far exceeds every body that can be touched or seen, which is both the framer of the ages themselves and much older than all time, how would it not be entirely B senseless even to imagine that it suffered anything in begetting, and that what proceeds from it has a temporal generation, as something proper and existing within it? But to name "cause" and "effect" in Him is not even lawful, but it would rather be fitting to speak of God as Father, and of the begotten as Son.
B. But know that they would perhaps admit that the matter is thus, if you wish; yet they would inquire how the Father could have begotten from Himself after our manner, yet without there appearing to be any division or flux in Him into some other thing distinct from Himself, if indeed the Son is truly from Him according to substance in His own hypostasis? And how will the begetter not exist and be thought of as entirely prior to the begotten?
A. "The foolish man will speak foolish things, and his heart will understand vain things C," according to the voice of the prophet. For those things for which it would be fitting for them to blush the most, if they had any sanity of mind, with these I know not what stupidity they pride themselves, establishing divisions, and flux, and temporal generation in the divine nature itself. Then is it not better to think that it is unworthy either to conceive or to speak of generation in God as temporal or corporeal? For they would not be able to say that God the Father existed in time, but He was timelessly and without beginning that which He is, while that for which He is Father manifestly co-existed with Him. For D the Son shone forth in an incomprehensible manner from the substance of the Father, and in a way that no one can express, not through section or division of the Begetter, having His own existence as different, but existing in His own hypostasis, yet born in such a way as the incorporeal might bring forth, which is entirely devoid of section and division. For if the divine nature at all endures section and division, and what they say, let it also be thought of as a body; but if this is so, also in a place
A and in magnitude and quantity it will be. And since it is endowed with quantity, it will not avoid circumscription. This follows the host of other arguments attributing to it the properties of bodies, and is an unbearable absurdity of reasoning.
B. I also agree.
A. For indeed, O dear head, I would never fear to say this.
B. What is that?
A. Why, if the nature of God and the Father were also subject to the customs and laws of bodies, it would indeed bring forth, and not without passion, but would undergo division; and that which is begotten would certainly be in some seat and place of its own, especially since it would have proceeded from the quantity of the begetter: for thus are corporeal beings begotten. If, therefore, they think that God and the Father fills all things, where in the world will that which proceeds from Him reside, and what place of its own will it find?
B. You have rightly warned that a great multitude of impious reasonings would break forth from this. Therefore, they say, the very business of generation is to be spurned, and it must not be thought to be spoken truly of God. For thus the absurdity of their reasonings will perish together with it.
A. But this is nothing else than to reject B the accurate doctrine of the faith. For how would the divine and ineffable nature still possess identity in the Trinity, if we were to take away the true mode of generation? These are clever quibbles, I think, and the unlearned boldness of Jewish madness. We shall therefore be on an equal footing with those who suppose that there is indeed one God, the maker and Father of all things, but who do not yet acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ. And what, indeed, would prevent us from stoning Him as well, reproaching Him like the Jews: "For a good work we do not stone thee, but for blasphemy, because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God"? For if they impiously take away the true mode of generation, no one, I think, would descend to such lightness of mind as to suppose that the Son is God by nature, but that He has obtained the name of divinity only as an appellation and as something added, as if He had not sprung from the very substance of God and the Father. C But since, as they wish, He is no longer the Son, but is reckoned with us among creatures, we are in no way set free from the worship of the creature before the Creator, when we worship Him; but God will not justly affix the mark of impiety upon this account to us, nay, He will rather show Himself guilty of that crime, since in bringing the Firstborn into the world, He says: "And let all the angels of God worship Him." But He who is worshipped even by the holy angels themselves, and who has the glory proper and fitting to God and the Father as His own, how would He not also be by nature from the Father, and on account of this, God? Do you perceive, then, to what an end that opinion of theirs leads, D which deems it necessary to think that neither is there a true generation
of God, nor are they willing that He have any way of begetting, but rather—as if by some inevitable necessity—they cast upon Him divisions and flows, which are the peculiar sufferings of bodies?
B. I understand; but how, they say, could He beget, and yet not in every way and altogether be subject to suffering?
A. Because, as I have already said, it is pious to suppose that the incorporeal is not subject to the laws of bodies, and that just because a body begets with division and suffering, it does not follow that the incorporeal begets in the same way. But, just as it differs from the body in the account of its being, so too it will have a mode of generation entirely appropriate and peculiar to itself. And A since the body begets in time, the incorporeal will certainly not beget in the same way. For every one of existing things, I suppose, is subject not to the laws of another, but to its own. Existence is common to all things, yet nature distributes to each its own distinctness, prohibiting by its own laws that it should be in every respect the same as some other. Let the bodies, then, be subject to the habits and laws of bodies, and let them beget in their own way, and suffer divisions; but let the incorporeal be left to its own principles, and let it beget by itself, having a nature free from suffering and division. And if the mind might attain to being able to discern in what way a body begets, yet does not understand the generation of the incorporeal nature, why should it not rather accuse itself of ignorance? B But that which is greater and better than the body, and incomparably superior, is forced down into the place of the inferior; and he does not blush to attach to it sufferings that in no way belong to it. And if what we cannot understand, or what is impossible to know, do we therefore immediately do away with it entirely? Since, however, no one can grasp what the Father is according to nature (for every mind, I suppose, is less than such a One), is it not more shameless than the impious who say that He does not even exist, or at any rate—since no created thing is devoid of suffering—to contend that He too must suffer something in His own nature, and be subject to the laws of generated things, even though He is unbegotten? But, I suppose, no reason could ever bring God down to this; He remains entirely settled in the state in which He is believed to be.
B. He remains indeed, for the divine nature is altogether immovable. But if God has begotten, they say, He will necessarily be conceived as prior to the Son, and will exist before His own offspring.
A. I shall then say C again that if the incorporeal does not follow and is not subject to the laws of bodies, it will surely beget in its own way, and not according to the nature of a body. For, as for those things [i.e., bodies], a necessary and utterly irrefutable reason will show that they must pre-exist and be seen as prior to the things which are begotten, and that their origin must be considered more ancient, if it is a case of one from one, and as a second from a first; and they proceed in time, not being begotten without a beginning by those accustomed to beget, since they do not possess the very root of their own generation
But what exists without beginning, and knows no end—I mean, of course, God—how, I ask you, would it not be contrary to the laws of His own nature if He were to assign a beginning in time to the Son who is His own by nature? For in this way the Son would be of a different nature and kind, if He were to belie the nature of His Begetter; and the matter would be not far from a prodigy. For to assume that the Son is distinct from the Father by a natural difference would certainly not be lacking in monstrosity. Therefore, the incorporeal entity will beget according to its own nature, in such a way that the offspring does not have its generation in time, but is understood and subsists simultaneously with the nature of the Begetter, and is in no way posterior to Him, since it has proceeded from an eternal beginning, which is set even beyond the ages themselves.
B. You speak rightly; nevertheless, if the discourse were rendered clear and adapted to the nature of created things, it would certainly make plain what is being sought. For contemplations which far exceed the capacity of the hearers become clearer, at any rate, if they are conducted by way of manifest examples.
A. You say truly, my good friend; but if you consider the nature of things, can you say with certainty that the form of God is so absolute and, above all, so perfect that it can represent the likeness of any thing whatever, and exist in exactly the same way?
B. By no means, since there is nothing B in nature that is God among those things which are reckoned under the name of creatures.
A. Holy Paul must therefore be praised C when he says: "For now we see through a glass, and in a riddle." Indeed, also that: "Now I know in part," it would be the mark of a holy and wise man not to pass over without admiration.
B. Well said.
A. Let us hasten, therefore, with all speed to holy Scripture itself. Like bees flying about a pleasant meadow, variegated as it were with the flowers of the seasons, and settling on examples most fitting for this discussion, let us fashion the mode of the ineffable and incomprehensible generation; and just as those who direct the sharpness of their eyes toward smaller letters, D come, let us also, with our mind similarly intent, contemplate at least in part, and as if in riddles, what the divine nature is. Therefore, the Father, comparing the Son to a word, says: "My heart hath uttered a good word." Come then, my friend, and tell me, as I inquire earnestly, what kind of division or efflux could be conceived of in these things, or what mode or place? For the human mind indeed brings forth and puts forward a word from itself, and by a subtle birth utters whatever it wills, and as it bursts forth from the depths into the heights and outward, it gives us a hint of a substantial generation of the word. And it appears indeed to be different from that which is brought forth, but it is in no way divided; nor indeed is the mind more ancient
A than the word which has sprung up towards what is above. For the word is always from the mind and in the mind, and indeed the mind is in the word. Or if they were to say this, that it is not in the best state, the mind would be without a word, and the word without a mind; and whatever both are—which makes them be understood as they are—this would already be in a way spirit-like, vanishing and driving towards nothingness. For the mind is always the root and generation of the word, and the word, in turn, is the fruit and offspring of the mind. For the one is in no way without a word, even if it brings forth a word; and the other has received the quality and form of that which begets it, as if it were its own nature, and it proceeds forth, having in no way caused harm to that which begets it. But to venture to say, especially in these matters, that the begotten is in any way more ancient than the begetter, is, I think, completely foolish. For the word proceeds from the mind. But since the mind exists because it has a word, and the word, in turn, because it is filled with the mind, how could there ever be a mind without a word, or a word lacking a mind? For those things which have any of the items said to be held, require in their own case a definition of existence that is more ancient, and they have become gray, so to speak, even in the mere fantasies of concepts, no less than fathers would have in relation to their sons; but those things with which it is necessary to coexist B both everywhere and in every way, it is fitting to think of as existing mutually and simultaneously. And thus the being and the subsistence of something are determined if someone were to join the lesser factor in time and the more ancient, and not rather [the fact] that we say they would perish together, one along with the other, if the one were to appear and manifest itself before the other.
B. I am somewhat slow in being able to learn these things, and I do not fully grasp what you mean. Therefore, explain it, and do not charge me with laziness, nor punish me with silence, as if it were some kind of penalty.
A. But I am ready to say [more]; for there is no great hesitation in these matters that are so subtle, so long as the discourse flows for us with a favorable current. For to turn the difficulties of the contemplations up and down, and as if into a circle, causes no harm; rather, it will provide us no small benefit. Therefore, what I said will appear clearly and plainly, if you were to consider the nature of colors. For tell me this: whiteness, for example, or blackness, if it has not yet settled into those things that are accustomed to having them, will you think it is able to exist by itself?
B. By no means. For such things coincide rather with others; then, [and only] at that time, do they finally appear, just as what they are.
A. You speak correctly. Therefore, there would be some substances that are intellectually conceived beforehand and presupposed to the word/account, which have received whiteness and blackness; but these are among those things that are held. But if anyone, having made a division of that which has and, in turn, of that which is held, were to say that the one which has is more ancient, and were to think that the one which is held is later, into what place of substance will he put for us that which is by its nature [destined] to be white, if it is not yet white? Or how would whiteness be what it is said to be, if not through its happening to those things that are knowledgeable and naturally disposed to it, [since it is] white—
such that, if it did not receive the concurrence of those things that together form a constitution for any one thing, and which are not able to be otherwise, it would be comprehensible by thought, but would not yet have the existence pertaining to it, according to the principle befitting them.
B. But I myself, and others too, I believe, no less than I, shall agree that this is the state of the case and that it has been truly said. Yet, how will the account of either analogy apply for us to the Father and the Son?
A. That the outward movement from the mind, as well as the impassibility of the generation—and further, that that which is generated will not be divided, but will rather remain both in the mind that generated and will in every way have the mind that generated it within itself—will be shown most sufficiently and clearly; and moreover, that it possesses an existence that is concomitant and co-subsistent immediately, as in concepts. But to say that color necessarily inheres in certain things, and that in them one thing is not older than another, since they necessarily exist at the same time (for they concur equably to the beginning of one and the same time), I do not think will explain what is understood by us regarding the divine generation; but rather this: that if God is Father, this which He is, He has not found to be so in time. For He is always the same and in the same state, and is ignorant of vicissitude, for He is most perfect, and lacks nothing in the fullness of any good, nor is He subject to any evil. B Consequently, along with Him is understood the significance and nature of the Son, by no means posterior in time, nor any less in glory than the Begetter, for the reason that it is necessary in every way that in God the Son should always be thought of, and should always exist, with the Father, and conversely the Father with the Son, since the evidence of an origin ignorant of time is provided by Himself, even if He is generated, being, for example, from the Father according to nature. Moreover, that the divine Paul calls the Son the radiance of the glory of God and the Father, and also says that He is the character of His substance, will, I think, confirm the argument just now made by us, as it is composed most blamelessly and is saturated with proofs for rectitude and truth.
B. How did you say?
A. Imagine for me again that this is the proposed statement: that which has shone forth from something—for example (this, I believe, is light, which makes the substance from which it is emitted known to those outside, and always brings it to the senses of the eyes, or in some other way approaches bodies)—provides an understanding of what that root and origin is, by nature, which emitted the light and shines. Let the argument proceed in order, taking as an example the nature of the sun and the radiance poured forth from it. For what that is by nature, the beam that proceeds from it C
the nature of the sun does not know—not even in the slightest degree—division, or separation, or flow, or passion, although it pours forth light from itself copiously and substantially. Yet it is whole and entire in it; and even if it should perhaps be poured out, it possesses its own light within itself, not being uprooted in the spreading, and seeming in some way, through this, to run toward a separate distinctness. For the reason, separating the sun by itself and considering what its essence might be, distinguishes the light within it and pouring out from it—which is its own—distinctly, though it still divides it well enough into an indivisible distinctness which is contained merely within the mind's conceptions, precisely because of its outward procession from it. But that it would be utterly ridiculous to imagine the sun's generation to be older, and the power of the light-bearing energy inherent in it to be even a little bit later, I do not think any mind that is sane and sound would doubt at all. For it is the same as saying that the sun does not even exist, if it does not have, co-existing with it, that by which it is understood to be what it is. Therefore, if you take the power of sensible examples as a correctly fashioned representation, and apply it to the most high and divine generation in the mind's thoughts, you will not corrupt it by foolishly introducing into it divisions, or flows, or passion. For the generation of the B supreme essence of all is free from passion, and indeed the existence of the Offspring is substantial and free from division, running together with the Begetter and being inseparably united and co-inhering. For the fact that it is without beginning in time is testified to by the Son, and by the wise John, who said: “In the beginning was the Word” (Joan. I, I), and in addition to these: “Who is, and who was, and who is to come” (Apoc. I, 4).
B. You have argued this matter for us most excellently, my friend. But you believe, I suppose, that you are finished with the task, and that there is no need for anything else to demonstrate that the Father in no way pre-exists the Son, and to understand that he is of the same nature and exists simultaneously; yet those things do not yet proceed according to the mind, since they have paths that are truly difficult and an approach that is extremely arduous.
A. What sort of things do you mean?
B. Know that they will inquire—for they are sharp in argument—whether the God and Father begot the Son by will, or indeed without will.
A. Then, where the malice of their such terrible inventions might land, I would most gladly know.
B. For having added this, I think they will say that if the Son is involuntary to the Father, he did not beget him willingly, but was compelled to this by some thing, or, to put it another way, he will be caught by necessity or by some of the C involuntary passions. Having thus brought the argument to an absurdity, they will coerce [their opponents] into a confession that it is necessary thereafter to say that the Son was not begotten by the Father without will, and finishing, they will bring forth...
as they say, for the Father also, a will that is prior to the birth.
A A. How impious are the inventions that these perverse men have fashioned against us! Their speech insults the dogmas of the truth in such a way that, if anyone wished to surpass all absurdities, I think he would achieve it no differently than they have. But since they have snatched such an ignoble palm, and surpass the ignorance of others with the sole glory of their impiety, let them at last hear: "Has Sodom been justified by you?" Enough, enough of this bitterness, you wretches, and of your perverse thoughts! Come now, let us take the straight path of the truth, and let us say that the Father, who is eternal and lacks a beginning, cannot be understood without the Son who is in Him and co-exists with Him. B Truly, although the Father is not without the will of the Son, nevertheless the will does not exist before the Son, nor does it emerge first. For if the will was in the wisdom and Word of the Father (for they will not say that the divine will lacks wisdom and Word), and the Son is the wisdom and Word of God the Father, then He Himself is surely that in whom is all the will of the Father. Wherefore, such a three-pronged proposition is in a way overthrown, as well as that sharp argument which they had prepared against us. For nothing, it seems, would prevent us—having contemplated the absurdity of their reasonings—from asking whether the Father exists and is by will or the contrary. If He is not by will, then He is surely driven to existence by necessity. But if not by necessity, but by will, then the will will surely precede His existence. And since He has perfected the will, wisely indeed, and not without the Word—and the Son is indeed the wisdom and the Word—the Son will exist before the Father. C But the divine Scripture identifies the Son as the counsel and will of God and the Father. For the divine David sings in the Spirit, as if in the person of the believers: "You have held my right hand, and in your will you have guided us." And elsewhere: "Lord, in your will you provided strength to my beauty." For we have been guided in Christ to the will of the Father, and in Him we are formed into a transcendent beauty, being strengthened through Him for every good work. Therefore, if we follow these putrid little reasonings and the absurdity of their arguments, the Son will exist before the Father, since He Himself is the will; and that which is begotten will in a way appear before the begetter. See, therefore, how much evil they have accrued to themselves, who cast it very far away: "Test yourselves, if you are in the faith."
D B. Certainly.
A. One could also, without much sweat, overturn their...
another absurdity, if you tell them to be questioned on this. B. What is that? A. Whether God the Father is considered and called by us, and by the holy angels, a merciful and good Creator and King, or not. B. They would surely say that this is the case, I suppose. And why not? A. Let them answer further then: for I shall add to the question, are these things so without will, or by will? For if they answer that it is without will, they will be forced to admit that a lack of will has befallen Him, as a suffering arising from necessity. But if they should think it is not without will, yet that the will to be what He is preceded His existence, A then He was not always Creator by power, nor King, nor merciful, nor good from eternity; but perhaps some time preceded [His existence] in which God, not yet being these things, was considering that He ought to be them. Who, then, upon hearing such language, would not immediately weep vehemently for their vanity, and, having refuted them, would not investigate better than they the nature of things, and consider within himself that in actions to be done or not done, willing and not-willing hold sway, but in generation, this is not so? And as for those who speak of "unwillingness," in this instance, it is well to suggest what is sung by some. "Nature desired it," one to whom laws are of no concern, and I would add, who pays no heed, will you or nill you, to anything at all. Or would I not seem to you to think rightly if I were to declare that whatever God the Father is substantially, He does not have it from an advancement through will, having turned toward the better, nor will He have His being Father by way of will? B. How do you mean? A. Do you say that the Father is holy, and moreover good? B. Entirely so. B A. Are these two virtues, then, substantially inherent in Him, or were they added from elsewhere by will, as if they were such that they would pass away if—perchance—an unwillingness were to occur to Him? For this movement proceeds from the will. B. Substantially. For if anyone dared to say that it is not so, he would, I think, rightly be laughed at. A. Well done, my friend, and I admire your love of learning, Hermias. Since, then, how could God and Father be Father by will—or perhaps "unwillingly"—and not rather substantially, if He is in this way holy and good, and does not have His being what He is by mere acts of will? And furthermore, how is it that you do not see what heavily plagues and, so to speak, barks at the adversaries? B. I do not yet understand. A. But you shall know, for I will tell you, as you are most keen to learn. Understand what I am saying. For will they deem it necessary to confess that the Father is begetter by nature, and say that this fact is substantial to Him, or will they deny even this, holding most impious thoughts? For if they say that it is not substantially...
A genitorem, they will utterly destroy the very existence of the Son, who does not possess being as unbegotten, but who is and subsists from the Father, according to the faith of the Holy Scriptures. And if God the Father does not truly possess a generative nature, but has been moved by will to be able to beget, it is time to say somehow that he has perhaps wrought his own nature by declaring it generative, and has brought it to what it was not, and thus he would justly be considered older than himself, if, being and subsisting, he willed to be what he is, namely, Father. But may such things be cast into the mountains and the waves, being utterly full of intolerable absurdity. We, however, following right doctrine, assert that it is superfluous and foolish to think that the Father is a begetter either apart from will or from will, but rather by nature and substantially. For that which is natural is not outside of will, since the willing to be what it is accompanies his nature. B B. I also judge the matter to be thus. A. Furthermore, the danger of another absurdity threatens them, in that they think they must say that in God the Father, the will is older than the Son. For we must examine, if you please, whether God the Father has finally attained something consistent with his own dignity in that he has begotten, or whether we should find that lacking the power to beget is more appropriate to him. If, therefore, because he has begotten, nothing will be lost to the dignity of his nature, why do these wretches not blush to attribute to him some defect arising from sterility? But if it were better and more appropriate for him not to have begotten, what was the reason that he begot, being destined to be in a worse state if generation had befallen him? Wherefore, both he departs from right reason, and he has willfully taken upon himself something harmful to his own glory and nature, and some new and insolent accusation, as it seems, has sprouted up against the ineffable will of the Father. Are these things, therefore, not more loathsome than any vomit, and have they not C reached the ultimate summit of impiety and malice? B. Indeed. A. Come then, having left these things far behind, let us turn to that. B. What do you mean? A. I mean that we must lodge in our souls the best of all opinions concerning God, considering that nothing precedes the generation of the Son, nor does the will of the Begetter arise before the existence of the Begotten, but God was Father at once, and willed to be Father: for he is not what he is against his will, nor does he endure a necessity of willing in this, as, for instance, even if he were conceived as being holy and good. For at once and substantially he is holy and good, and wills to be what he is, and we must not think of the matter in God otherwise. For at the same time he is God, and at the same time Father, not having a generation posterior to his substance, but at once he is Father, D and subsists, and is understood. But for one endowed with such a nature, it must assuredly be granted that the generated thing, that is, the Son, coexists with him from eternity.
B B. But let this be, if you so desire, they say, and let the Son be deemed to coexist with the Father. For God was always Father in potentiality; therefore He was only comprehensible by mere contemplation, and the Son was only in imagination before his generation, but was generated after this.
A. Therefore, let the generation be finally confessed to be true and truly from the Father. For the one whose nature it is to be Father in potentiality and in act does not receive from will that which decides between the two, but will rather follow the laws of nature, from which it would be conceived that He begets, nor would He become the Father of something alien, if indeed that which is begotten must be of the same nature as the begetter. But as for the foul mark they also attach to the Father Himself, as if He were changed—although the divine Scripture says: "With whom there is no variation, or shadow of turning" 1—from this it will be manifest. For what else, I ask, is B moving from potentiality to act, than a change, and a sort of gross vicissitude? For that which is thought to be anything by natural potentiality, yet has not yet received it in act, stands thus far in potentiality, as it has not yet received its movement to act, but still lingers in its first and primary state. But if by chance it were to receive the movement to act, it will pass, I think, to something other than what it was in the beginning, inasmuch as they do not assign one and the same place to that which is in potentiality and to that which is in act.
B. I do not think so.
A. If, therefore, they say there is no difference, but will bring them together and set them in one and the same place, then the Father is Father and God was without beginning in act. For nothing will now prevent us from saying this, if that which is in potentiality and that which is in act have coincided into the same thing. But if it is not so, but they differ from each other, and with no small difference, how have divine things not undergone change, since they no longer persist in that which is potentiality, but have in some way sustained the movement to act?
B. What you say is plausible; nevertheless, I think this also occurs to the minds of the adversaries, and they thus compel us: "Since the Father is creator by nature and without beginning, and yet did not make created things without time—for the creature is not co-eternal with Him, but He brought it forth in time from nothing—shall we concede that His immutable nature is changed and has suffered a shadow of turning? But who would dare to say this? Therefore, if he proceeds," they say, "to being said to beget from potentiality to act, this is not a change and move to variation, but rather an aptitude of nature which is set in this way for generation."
A. How very close you come to frivolity, if you think anything worth while has been devised by the heretics. For we must investigate with the utmost care the manner of movement in both cases, and what intervenes, and what difference exists between them, and thus you will then understand the old wives' fables of their ignorance. For that which from D
itself is said to have produced something, and has proceeded from potentiality to act, is stirred as it were in its own nature. A For it would undergo such movement [in actu] not in others, but in itself. But that which passes from not doing something to the necessity of working, we shall find to have the movement not in itself, but in others, both in having it and in exercising it.
B. You would grant me a favor no less than before, if you were to explain the matter to us more clearly.
A. Come then, let us bring forward the example of a human being. For he is endowed with the power of generation according to nature, and while he possesses this in potentiality at the beginning, he proceeds to the act in time. Now, possessing knowledge not without art, but rather an innate substantial power for making any artificial thing, he builds a merchant ship, and fashions figures from bronze, or produces some other similar thing. Does it therefore seem to you that he is moved in the same manner and reason as he who, that he might be Father, was brought from potentiality to act, and as he who arrives at the performance of things which belong to art?
B. I would by no means think so. B For the latter is not moved in himself, but rather exhibits the manifestation of the knowledge residing in him toward external things. But the former is substantially moved, as it were, in himself, and works a certain change and conversion regarding our very nature, or at least the act and potentiality of the nature which is in anything.
A. Indeed, this is what I was saying just now: C that one must diligently consider the difference of movement in both cases. Nothing, therefore, necessarily compels us to say that the nature of God has been changed, or has suffered movement in anything that is substantially in it, because it proceeded in time to create; but it would suffer movement in its substance if it were brought from the potentiality of generating to the act of generating in some way or other.
B. It is well said.
A. Furthermore, in another way—for I think we should imitate those keen-scented dogs who choose to track down discoveries from the truth—one may perceive the weak and insipid reasoning of our adversaries. D For no reason at all would prevent the divine and most exalted offspring from coexisting with its Begetter, since the Father is always and from eternity understood to be and is God. But since the creature is the act of the creative power, how and whence will it have the glory of coexisting with God and existing from eternity? For it is neither without a beginning in time, and it is moved from nothing to existence. Do you not say that it is necessary that the creative nature be understood prior in every way and exist prior to all created things?
B. I agree.
A. Therefore, while as yet the creature had not been brought into being, God was even then Creator; and he was not Father because he was Creator, but because he has begotten: and the Son, because he has been begotten. When, therefore, as regards the Creator and the creature, coexistence is not necessary...
A nor can it be that those who think rightly should deny coexistence in God—whether he be named Father or Son—how could one arise before the other, and the one appear in some way prior to the other, if both are what they are, in that they are understood to coexist and not to be lacking a mutual concurrence? For Father is related to Son, and vice versa. Does the argument seem to you to be twisted toward what is not right? B. Not at all. B A. But if it has seemed a good and noble thing to God and Father to beget from himself, and to be seen as Father of the Son according to nature, what or whence could there be any delay in begetting? What is that obstacle, or what is it that might usefully and necessarily persuade God not yet to be a Father? For that men are always fathers in potentiality, though not yet in actuality, is hidden from none of mortals; and the cause which stands readily at hand and acts as a hindrance is very clear. For when the age of the body has not yet reached puberty, it is meanwhile in a way hidden and rests in nature, and awaits the fitting time in which to manifest itself. But in God, who always possesses himself perfectly and is what he is—not by a progress toward something that is not yet present and necessarily revealed in time, but as it were from his own substance bringing forth the Son for us like a light, and having his own offspring substantially implanted in him in the order of a character—how could it be conceived that he does not always and simultaneously with his being beget in actuality, C but rather stands in potentiality and suffers a substantial change, passing over into that which he was not in the beginning? But we shall be involved in no small crime of impiety even against the Son himself, unless we beat back the opinion of our adversaries. For the Only-Begotten will no longer be the Maker of the ages, since time, I know not how, will have crept in, and that generation by which God and Father is said to beget in actuality will be believed to be more ancient, if indeed he proceeds from ingenerability—that is, from that which is potentiality—to actual generation not without time, even if that interval be conceived as very short and momentary. I, however, declare it shameful and utterly unbecoming to think that the sun and fire are not always what they are, yet that they did not remain in a state of potentiality alone, but came to actuality by a temporal motion and nature, and indeed that they received at the very beginning of their origin those things that were congenital and whatsoever was inherent in them; but to assert that God does not excel bodies, and so to think that he does not D follow the laws of his own nature in begetting, in so far as it is befitting to him alone, as if following the laws in the very fact of the need to beget, which...
A
DIALOGUE III
That the Son is true God, just as the Father.
A. I am well aware, Hermias, as you would likely agree yourself, that one ought to adorn oneself with the zeal for virtue, and to find delight especially in discourse that pertains to piety, such as those divine oracles. For this reason, Holy Scripture says: "And you shall speak of them, while sitting in your house, and walking by the way, and lying down, and rising up." For I believe that to keep the divine word constantly on one’s tongue is not without profit, and it could befit no others more than those who make it their concern to live in a way pleasing to God.
B. I agree; for nothing is more excellent than this. But since we have already discussed with sufficient abundance the divine and ineffable generation, and have proven that the Son did not shine forth from elsewhere, but from the very substance of God the Father (for so it was made manifest), what is it that still drives our adversaries to think that God the Father is one, natural, and true, and that absolutely no one is to be numbered with him, but that they must banish the very nature of the only and true Son far away from the true deity, together with all others? B
A. What drives them, since you choose to ask me, I would say regarding those who have reasoned thus, it is as it is said: "For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and their shoot from Gomorrah; their grape is a grape of gall, their cluster a cluster of bitterness; their wine is the poison of asps." Being intoxicated, as it were, by falsehoods found I know not where, they belch out evil things from the evil treasure of their heart. And since they let loose their tongue on blasphemies against the Son, and suffer from a godlessness that is the sister and neighbor of that of the Pharisees, let them hear with those same people: "Brood of vipers, how can you speak good things, being evil?" And yet, it surely behooved them, if they were to apply their minds to such holy and ineffable investigations, not at all to suppose that their own opinion was entirely exempt from reproach, but rather to turn their inner and hidden gaze in every direction, and running far and wide through infinite arguments, to flee far away from those things that have been fashioned out of inconsistency, and, having carefully tested what is profitable, and by right reasoning and sincere doctrine serving as guides to comprehension, to hold fast only to the dogmas of truth. For it is the part of a foolish and deranged person, I believe, to deny that the God who exists is the true and natural Son of
implies a lack in him, rather than a natural power. For is it not better to see, with an enlightened mind, that wherever there is generation according to nature, and not something falsely so-called, there must necessarily be found in the begotten a relationship to the begetter, which is not merely relative or falsely termed a relation, but is natural? For that which is truly begotten will be from the very substance of the begetter. How then, as they would have it, can that which is begotten from God not be God in truth?
B B. Truly, they might perhaps grant that he is God and from God, but in a different way and with a distinction.
A. But what that "different way" might be, I do not very well understand. Perhaps you could explain, if you happen to know, for it is very likely that you are informed about it.
B. I am informed. For they say that the Father is the true God, but the Son is not so, even if he is called God, and is from God. For they say, "All things are from God."
C A. But indeed, this is openly to proclaim that the Son is not God, but just like other things that are from God, brought into existence by way of creation, when he did not exist, and finally to be placed alongside the creature as his sister. For I think it is most useful and excellent to brush away the deceits of their malicious craft, and not to allow our adversaries to gild the nature of the Son with sophisticated words, when they hold no truth about him, but rather to compel them to declare openly and plainly what they believe him to be. For no argument will fail to assault their folly, I think. That the Son proceeds from God the Father signifies nothing else, to one who has an uncorrupted mind, than that he is begotten and has come forth from the very substance of the Father, as the discourse we just concluded demonstrated. Now I think we should sharpen our minds to investigate the other matter.
D B. Most gladly you shall do so, being spurred on to this. Now, that which they have resolved to oppose to our arguments is this: They say that only the Father is named the true God in the Old and New Testaments. For Moses said: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord thy God is one Lord" (Deut. vi, 4). And moreover, in the canticle he introduces God himself crying out: "See, see that I am, and there is no God beside me" (Deut. xxxii, 39). And again: "I am the first God, and I am after these things, and there is no one beside me" (Isa. xli, 4). And indeed the Son himself says to the Father: "This is eternal life, that they may know thee, the only true God" (John xvii, 3). Countless things of this kind they can gather without any trouble, but they will use them to confirm their own arguments, and so will not be far from
A they themselves strive to support with their words; and indeed, hope will not depart from them for long, that some should choose to agree that the Father is one and truly and by nature God, and that there is no other at all besides him.
A. What, I pray, compels them to labor in vain? For we have no need to labor in this matter, seeing that we most readily agree with them, and in our faith we accept one natural and true God the Father. For how or from where would anyone doubt? If, even if they were to add that there is absolutely no other God besides him, this will in no way weaken the nature of the Son. For he is outside all created things, nor is he among creatures, but coexists with his own Father, and always shines forth with him, and is comprised together with the Begetter in the one nature of the Godhead. Therefore, God is one, and he is the true one. For we have been redeemed from polytheism, and having washed away that stain, albeit late and with difficulty, we have at last come to recognize the one and true Master. But leaving these things aside for the present, let us proceed to the other matter, for so it seems to you that we should do. B
B. What is it that you mean?
A. The Son said that the Father alone is the true God.
B. He did indeed say so.
A. And what is more, the ancient oracle proclaimed to us that there is no other God besides him.
B. It is true.
A. We must therefore, O dear friend, go ourselves to the Holy Scripture and those books of the saints that diligently investigate these things. Come, then, let us see if anyone anywhere has called the Son the only God, and has furthermore named him true.
B. You speak rightly. C
A. Therefore, that wise John will immediately be with us, who is also surnamed the Son of Thunder, clearly crying out: "And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know the true God, and we are in the true God, in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life." And the great Baruch will also come to our aid, and will clearly declare the nature and glory of the Son, himself also shouting in this manner, and all but pointing with his finger: "This is our God, no other shall be reckoned against him. He found out every way of knowledge, and gave it to Jacob his servant, and to Israel whom he loved. Afterward he appeared on earth, and conversed with men." And indeed, I could say that the holy Paul told us of one Lord Jesus Christ. And David also sings in the Spirit: "Who is God besides the Lord? And who is God besides our God?" D Is it not, therefore, most clearly and most manifestly declared through the voices of the theologians that the Only-begotten is one and alone and true God?
B
B. It is true. A. Since, then, the Father is proclaimed to us as the sole and true God, and the Son in like manner and without variation is possessed of the same, for no one at all could be reckoned as another besides Him—where, then, would the mind of those who believe run, if both should be cast out by them, and they should not constantly maintain the divine glory, having obtained a nature that could be easily shaken and overturned? Or is it not true to say that, if we admit only the Father to be the true God, we immediately seal the character of "other-natured" upon the Son, and, excluding Him from the definitions of true divinity, we will behold Him as having become of some other nature? But if, attributing the name and reality of true divinity to the Son alone, we reckon no one at all alongside Him, shall we not be establishing things against the majesty of the Father which it is forbidden even to speak?
B. The force of the arguments tends indeed in this direction; yet it is likely that the adversaries will also say that we will certainly be led, if the Son is the true God, to say not one, but two gods.
A. They leave no absurdity untried, and they range widely into every kind of blasphemy. Our intention, however, is by no means to say this—in no way at all—but the argument compels us to acknowledge that we must understand the Son to spring from the substance of God and Father by true generation, true God from true God, not born into some alien nature of a different kind, but substantially existing as that which the Father is also understood to be, with this one exception: that He is the Father. For when the Holy Spirit is thus numbered together and concurs in the divinity, one true and natural deity is finally worshipped in the consubstantial Trinity.
B. But, they say, if we grant that there are three hypostases, the divinity would also be understood in a triplicity, as is probable.
A. But the reason of the true mystery has certainly not taught us that these things are so. For we have been baptized into Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit; yet we do not say that the faith is in three gods, but in one deity C to be worshipped in the Trinity. Why, then, do you use force, and attempt to subject to human reasonings things that surpass mind and word, which I believe ought to be honored by faith alone and without curiosity? For it is very impious, and holds the summit of wickedness, to question with excessive curiosity how, in the final analysis, the Trinity is, or what it is, and how the nature of the divinity subsists in itself. It is more pious, rather, to wish to contemplate correctly in what manner one nature of divinity is worshipped in the holy Trinity. Confess, therefore, Hermias, that we think and judge these things rightly, but that the adversaries act impiously, who senselessly and rashly investigate with the inventions of miserable reasonings things that transcend the mind.
B. You speak well. For I myself say that they do this. How then is God one among us, if both the Father and the Son D are understood to exist in their own proper hypostases?
A A. We shall necessarily adopt as an aid and assistance in this matter the mode of consubstantiality. For it is able, very effectively, to combine the duality in the hypostases into a certain unity, and to contract into a natural identity that which appears to be dispersed into a property singular and peculiar to each, so that neither may the duality be predicated by anyone of a nature precisely simple and incomposite, nor may we, fearing to appear as though we were violating the principle of simplicity, seem to do away with the duality in the hypostases. That the things said concerning consubstantiality are true, the testimonies concerning the Son brought forward to us from the holy Scriptures declare. For the Father, being nature and truly God, would not have admitted any other than the Son, being nature and truly God, to subsist in his own hypostasis and in a natural identity, unless he were himself from him and in him, and the Son conversely had in his own nature the Begetter, and for that reason they were considered to be spoken of and to be one. And certainly our good Philip was rebuked, because, though he was of keen intellect, he was not speaking with sufficient consideration. For although it was possible to contemplate the nature of God and the Father in the Son, he was entreating, saying: "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us." To which Christ: "Have I been so long with you, and you have not known me, Philip? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me? He who has seen me, has seen the Father. I and the Father are one." Which indeed is true. B For since the Son has shone forth from the substance of God and the Father, he himself exists in his own Father, but he manifests in himself, through natural identity, the substance of the Begetter as well. But the Father will not be understood otherwise than through the Son, and in the Son, since he is the character of his substance, shining forth in his own form the nature from which he proceeded. For I think we must also speak in our own way: therefore, whatever will be said concerning both will naturally have a place, even separately, in either, and will harm the glory of neither.
B. But how do you mean this also?
A. Do you not hear, friend, the blessed Paul crying out concerning God and the Father: "That God may be all in all"?
B. What then?
C A. Come, then, and consider in what way he attributes the equality of glory to the Son, and adorns the nature of the Only-begotten with the same things in which the Father himself also is indeed glorified. For he says somewhere concerning him: "The fullness of him who fills all in all."
B. He did say so.
D A. No one, therefore, will doubt, I suppose, if he has in this way brought into his mind how the matter stands. For since God and the Father fills all things and is in all things, and is considered to be in a manner befitting God, I do not see in what place that fullness of the Son would eventually be. Therefore, it is necessary to think that, unless each is substantially in both, that fullness is, as is evident, superfluous...
and not conferred in a fitting way, or else the fullness comes of the Son—even though the Father is most sufficient and quite capable of filling all things. But what could one point out as lacking, if all things have the fullness that comes from the Father? Shall we then, my friend, conclude that it will appear that the wise John has prattled in vain, A when he says concerning sacred things and the Son: “For from his fullness we have all received”? For in what are they still lacking, if they receive [what they have] from the fullness of the Son, even though God and Father is sufficiently capable of and in need of nothing else in things—B (or if we were to wish to argue through what the fullness given through each consists of, would it not then be clear to everyone that if the principle of essence in each is distinct, so as to be diverse according to the nature of each, in the same way he [the Son] will work the fullness in us)? B Rightly have you spoken.
A But if we truly wish to investigate what the fullness given through each is, would it not be clear to everyone that if the principle of essence is different in both, so that it is diverse according to the nature of each, in the same way it will work the fullness in us? B Necessarily. A And if the Father is the true God, then the operation will surely be divine; C however, if the Son lacked true deity—he being a separate entity—then his power of fullness would surely not be divine, but merely similar to it. We have therefore been made into a [state of] fullness in a twofold and dissimilar way. And if the divine fullness of the Father, being better than the other, was meant to be sufficient for those who are being worked upon for salvation, why did the Son also work within us, if he adds something inferior, as he would not work in the same way that he who is God by nature does? But if we have been enriched with the fullness through the Son as a useful and necessary provision for salvation, D it will surely remain for us to think and to say that the superior work was in need of the inferior, and that the lesser element was added to the greater to supply what was missing, if the fullness of God and Father did not once and for all suffice to save us. But I maintain that to think and to say these things is a cause for the utmost madness and a writing of folly. Therefore, let such foolishness be cast away as far as possible. Rather, let us maintain and believe that the operation and fullness in us through both is one. For the nature is one. For natures that have been led into a difference thought of according to otherness, and into an alienation completely diffused, would not have identity of operation and complete equality in any things; but where the principle of the mode by which they exist appears different to some, there they are entirely different, and what is by operation is dissimilar.
B It is so; but I would gladly ask of you how the fullness of the Father and the Son, being one and not diverse, is to be understood and [brought to] pass in us. A And yet, there is nothing in this that is at all difficult or hard to grasp
For how could it be otherwise than through the Holy Spirit, who fills us with divine graces by himself, and declares us participants in the ineffable nature? For A in this place the disciple of the Savior says: "In this we know that he is in us, because he has given us of his Spirit."
B. Then by the one Holy Spirit the fullness from both is wrought, and not separately?
A. Assuredly so, Hermias. But that which compels us to ask you, and presses you to understand thoroughly, is, I believe, this: how the operation from both, tending toward fullness, can come to pass through the one Spirit.
B. What do you mean by that?
A. You perceive, surely, as I surmise, that since they—as some think—have not attained a nature similar to each other (especially since the Son is substantially lesser, as I know not how they dream), if they were to work something in us, it might be thought that the works of their operation would not have been accomplished in an equal and utterly identical manner in every respect. Further, how will that fullness of both be in us through the one Holy Spirit—who does not, as it were, sign upon us the properties of the one or the other in a ministerial fashion, or fulfill the role of a minister in us, but rather holds within himself, as in his own nature, the fullness of both?
B. Most judiciously you speak. For this is precisely what revolves in my mind.
A. Let all the effort of this discussion, then, turn to this very point. I would say that whatever imparts participation in something to others through itself, would by no means depart from a natural conjunction with that thing, but will work in such a way as if it were perhaps that very thing itself. For things that are seen to possess one another’s operation as having identical power are necessarily, I believe, linked by a law of substantial identity.
B. Use examples, I pray: for I do not follow.
A. I proceed, then, and I now undertake it. The sun itself is understood to be and is something in its own right, and it traverses a sublime path, having obtained this lot by the nod of the Creator. Sending down its rays and grazing the lands, it infuses the sense of heat. But if we desire to inquire anxiously what kind of nature it has obtained, we shall accomplish this without labor. For that it is hot and fiery, anyone who has once had experience of it might easily grasp in his mind, taking as proof the hot ray which proceeds and pours forth from it.
B. You speak rightly. One will understand, indeed, since the matter itself lacks difficulty.
A. How then is it not manifest to men of sense?
B. What is it that you say?
A. That the nature which pours forth from it is not of a nature other than that of the sun.
and that it possesses the nature of the sun as a sort of root and mother of its own emission, so that from those things by which it is believed to exist, it might display in itself the whole quality of the substance of the one who emits it?
B. It could not be otherwise.
A. Let us arrive, then, at the nature of the Holy Spirit, A and let us consider it more closely, not by leaping away into extraneous arguments, but since the occasion urges us to matters most pertinent: whether, namely, the Spirit is to be numbered with the Father and the Son and inscribed in the one nature of the divinity, or not?
B. They say that the Father is the one true God, and they number no one else at all with Him.
A. Therefore, according to their opinion, the Spirit also will be excluded from the true divinity along with the Son, and will slip away into the multitude of created things, and according to them will be of the same nature as the Son, so far as the concept of being created is concerned, but will be most far removed from the substance of God the Father. Let them show, therefore, who it is that is God in us, if it is the Spirit that dwells and stays in those who are baptized. For concerning God the Father, they would say nothing, as I suppose. For no one would ever receive participation in the true and natural divinity through a created Spirit, since this would not be a natural participation in Him. B It remains, therefore, to say that only the Son is in us, although, according to them, He is called of a different nature and has departed from the substance of God the Father, and on that account is numbered with the creature. The creature, therefore, is in us, no longer God, and the creature is enriched with sanctification through a created Spirit, having nothing from God the Father. But if, passing over this, they should turn to a saner mind and say that the Son is God, let them explain whether there will be a duality of gods in us, with the Father and the Son dwelling in us, or one and only one? For Christ said: "If a man love me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him" (John xiv, 23).
B. I do not think that even they themselves would hold that there are two gods; but perhaps they will turn to the straight and blameless faith, and will confess that the one true and natural God is in us, but perhaps they will add, the Father alone.
A. Therefore it is necessary that even unwillingly they must dare to say that if the Father is the one and only God in us, the Son enters in with Him, no longer usefully, but rather superfluously, since He is not the true God, and His fullness will perhaps be an idle number in us. Moreover, that encounter will take place with less than proper and fitting order. For since we are temples of God, and not temples of gods, the Son must at length depart from the heart of all, as someone proclaims; nay, rather, why does He plainly declare at the beginning—
A if there is to be no one entering in, when God the Father is by nature, and quite sufficiently fills to the full the temple in which He happens to be? Therefore—for I shall again recall the argument on this point—not even God would be in us through the Spirit. For He will not accomplish the participation of the divine nature in us, because it is not from Him in their view. But the Son, who concurs with His own Father, would be—it seems—superfluous, and nothing would prevent one from calling the blessed Paul both a babbler and a vain talker, since he wrote clearly that Christ is in us as God through the Father, who calls us through Himself to the participation of the natural and true divinity.
B. These are trifles, and discourse leading to the peak of impiety.
A. We shall therefore posit that there is one nature of the divinity, which must necessarily be what it is and what it is called, and entirely and in every way follow from it; yet the Son is by no means, according to them, a creature alien to the Father, but as God existing from Him and in Him, He will be arrayed with the Generator in natural identity. B For thus, two gods would no longer be conceived as being in us, but one and only one, worshipped in the holy Trinity. Do you think there is anything to censure in this, or do you say that it is wrongly put?
B. By no means.
A. Consider then, if you please, even the most holy Moses himself, O dear friend, attributing a phrase not fitting to a simple person to the simple and uncompounded nature of God. For it is possible for those who examine it even from this to see without struggle the threefold in hypostasis within the one divinity.
B. Indeed, I would like to hear more of what it is that you say. Tell it to me therefore more clearly.
A. For did not Moses, when composing the first book of his history, immediately write down God as the creator and artificer of all things? And he says that He spoke concerning the creation of man alone (for He made the rest of the things without deliberation): "Let us make man according to our image, and according to likeness." C And having thrown in a small thing in between, he said: "And God made man; according to the image of God He made him."
B. I understand.
A. And when some once had determined, through the height of folly, to build a tower reaching to heaven: "Come," says the God of all, "and having descended, let us confound their language there." Who then is the one speaking, and to whom, the "Come, and having descended, let us confound"? For no one, I suppose, would say that He had any need of the hand of the holy angels, or generally of any alliance or concurrence of anything at all in existence, for God to be able to accomplish what He wished. D For the divine power is perhaps omnipotent, and has within itself the ability to accomplish easily whatever it might determine, and God Himself is the whole power of things. For just as we say that He is wisdom and life, and that He cannot anything
living or participate in goods, without having the supply gushing forth from Him as from a fountain, in the same way, I suppose, nothing among existing things would have the strength, nor would it ever advance to the point of being able to accomplish anything, unless it were brought to this by the power of all things. A It will therefore be permissible to say, without reproach, that God did not say that, "Come, and let us descend and confuse their tongues," to angels or to certain other rational powers, but that the holy Trinity, as if in a simple motion of one nature, stirred Itself in a way to perform something—since it was the work of a creative power alone—to change the harmonious motion of the tongue at will, and to lead the nature of the daily and familiar speech, from the simple language which men were then using, into the multiform and multisonous diversions of languages, such that He made the minds of the perverse to set out on an unknown and untrodden path. In order, therefore, that we might be able to understand that it was not an angelic work, but rather a work of divine B power, It says, "Come," the holy and consubstantial Trinity itself to Itself.
B. It is rightly held.
A. But how, I ask, could they suppose the nature of man to have been formed after the likeness of God? Whose image will they say is imprinted upon those on earth?
B. What if they were to say it is that of God and Father?
A. But if they were to say it is only of God and Father, they will fall into the extreme stupidity of mind.
B. In what way?
A. First, because the phrase, "Let us make," and furthermore, "after our image," would not be fitting for one person, but rather for those who are more than one or two. Moreover, we say this, pondering the following: Does not that which is being reformed, when it has departed from the exemplar and bears deformity in itself, C justifiably return to that which it was in the beginning, and, having cast off the damage of the corrupt form, leap back again to the unblemished vision of its nature?
B. How do you mean?
A. You shall hear, and that most clearly; for I will explain it as well as I can. If some most excellent artisan, say a coppersmith, should craft a statue, having impressed upon it his own form, but it should be knocked down from its base by the envy of those who are jealous, and having fallen, it should be mutilated and thus changed into the D unlovely; then the craftsman, perhaps indignant, should determine to consume with a fiercer flame—as with a rot—the envy of him by whom it was mutilated, and surely, having removed the damage, remake his own work into its original form: will it seem to you that he is acting rightly if, having abandoned its proper form, he remakes it entirely into the form of someone else?
B. Not at all.
A. But if he should bestow upon it the form it had in the beginning, has he truly reformed it, and again impressed upon it its own image?
A Since the argument stands thus for us, what must we say the Father and God has done, if, wanting to reform man—who had been made to the image and likeness of Him and Him alone (for this, I suppose, you say your opponents believe)—having slipped and suffered ruin, He did not restore him to his pristine form—that is, to His own likeness—but rather endowed him with a different form and figure? For the Son is by nature someone other than He, toward whom we have been fashioned. For thus the most wise Paul writes to some: "My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ is formed in you." And again: "For whom He foreknew, and He also predestined" (it is manifest, of course, that this is God) to be "conformed to the image of His Son, these He also called." For Christ forms us through the Spirit into His own image, and in an intelligible and mysterious way imprints the beauty of His own nature upon the souls of the pious. We have been formed, therefore, I suppose, toward God, but no longer toward the true One; instead, the form of the creature shines out in us. And certainly that which was chanted of old by the voice of the Psalmist: "Thy youth shall be renewed as the eagle's," would already fall into nothingness, shown to be, as it seems, in vain. For if "renewal" (as the Scriptures intend) is not that, but rather a "re-formation," we would be those to whom it is not permitted to return to the pristine state, nor to recur to that which we were in the beginning, but we would have been driven by some force to a worse state than before, and possessing much deformity. C Furthermore, that prior creation would incomparably surpass the renewal through Christ, if indeed that one granted us to shine in the form of the only and true God, but this one refashions us into another and different form, transforming us into the image of the Son. What then, in the end, have we gained through Christ, if we have been, as it seems, despoiled of the likeness with God, and already stripped entirely of that glory of nature—if indeed our whole blessedness consists in being made to the likeness of God? But these are, I think, trifles, and objects of laughter, and old wives' fables. For we are reformed to that former image, so that we may be in that state, sealed with a certain seal, that is to say, by the Son, who is also the character and likeness of the Father, and not other than Him in respect to substantial identity, being sealed by the Son, to have it thus, who is another besides Him, according to what is identical in essence. For Christ forms us through the Spirit into His own image, D and B truly, the beauty of His nature is imprinted intelligibly and ineffably upon the souls of the pious. We have been formed, I suppose, toward God, but no longer [toward] the true nature, but a form of the creature becomes us. B You have spoken most accurately. A. For see into what absurdity their argument would slide, if they intended to censure those who choose to think and believe thus. For if the Father alone is the true God, and they should assert out of madness that it is so, it would be gathered from thence necessarily that the Son is not God according to nature. B. By necessity. A. But he will be altogether of a plainly worse condition than the Father, since He who is supreme of all is God by nature and truly.
B B. For the argument leads at last into this.
A. Observe then, Hermias, that we are in danger, according to their foolish opinion, even though the Son is lessened, of being obliged to think Him already in some way better and superior, and that He is even to be reckoned as God and Father, if we judge that we must obey the voices of the saints without hesitation.
B. And truly the matter is not ambiguous.
A. Will you then hear the divine Paul crying out thus, how he was a Pharisee according to the law, pursuing the Church according to zeal, having been blameless according to the righteousness that is in the law, "But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord"? C
B. He said so indeed; but what would he mean by this?
A. Does not the law proclaim to the ancients that there is one God and Lord?
B. Yes.
A. And they say that this is the Father, evidently.
B. They say so.
A. But he who declares himself to us a steward of the mysteries of Christ, the guide of the world, what had he learned, or what was he considering, when he set the knowledge of Christ incomparably above the older and legal training, and calls it surpassing, and considers those things in the law as dung, but cherished and greatly loved the evangelical and saving proclamation? Or is it not necessary for us to consider and think that, of those things whose knowledge would be greater, to these there must immediately follow the appropriateness of being placed above those with which they are compared?
B. I think so.
A. Then how could our mind fall into such folly and ignorance as to say, or even to suppose, that the Son is better than the Father, He who has the Begetter as, so to speak, root and fountain? For we would altogether bring insult upon the fruit with the tree, and upon the shoot with the root, and upon the stream with the fountain from which it flows—and which is not foreign to it—and upon the light with the radiance that shines and flashes forth from it.
B. We would bring insult; for how could we not? D
A. Shall we therefore necessarily admit the reasoning which binds the Son to the Father in natural identity, and introduces Him together into the natural and true Godhead?
B. Necessarily, certainly: for these things are so. But, I ask you, how will the knowledge of Christ excel and be superior to the ancient and legal training, when He has been assumed into natural identity with the Father and true God, and has been proclaimed by the ancient Scriptures?
A. It will excel by far, and will surpass that former one.
A For it possesses a clearer proclamation, and extends itself to a knowledge unaccustomed to the Law. Hence, the sacred minister Moses himself used to pray, and that frequently, so that he might receive a certain and shadowless knowledge of Him who is, and therefore he called upon God himself, the Savior of all, saying: "Show me yourself, that I may see you clearly." Moreover, He commanded him to pierce the rock, and to gaze through a very narrow aperture, if he wished; by which, I suppose, God enigmatically signifies to us that the Law radiates a meager knowledge of God to those being instructed, and introduces that light as if through an aperture. For He wished them to believe that there is only one God, calling them away from imaginary gods; but how the divine and ineffable nature exists in itself, He did not clearly demonstrate, as does that saving proclamation through Christ. For when we have known the Son, we believe that He has been begotten and has proceeded from the Father as from a root, and the glory of the offspring, by recording the nature of the Begetter as on a tablet, has prepared the eye of the mind to reach things superior to thought and speech. Therefore, He also said to the Father and God who is in the heavens: "I have manifested your name to men"; and to the Jews: "Neither me do you know, nor my Father; if you had known me, you would have known my Father also." But to know that something is, yet not how it exists, anyone would say is far less than to know both that a thing is and how it is. The evangelical proclamations, therefore, far excel the legal instruction, which indeed proclaimed to the ancients that there is only one God, but did not at all extend the nature of the Deity into the Trinity according to hypostasis, B and gather it back into a natural unity. For this the new Scripture has taught us. Therefore, if natural unity and identity in God the Father and the Son are not admitted (for I shall insist upon the matters proposed at the beginning), there will be confusion and disturbance, and in the faith of the sacred Scriptures there will now be nothing, I think, certain and stable.
B. In what way, then?
A. For since the divine Scripture proclaims to us that there is one God by nature and truly, shall we exclude the Son from this glory and honor, unless he admits in some way the identity and immutability of substance together with God and the Father? Have you not heard the saints crying out concerning God, sometimes indeed that He is the one legislator and judge, C at other times, however, that He alone has immortality? Whom, therefore, must we think to be the only legislator and judge, and the only one to have immortality?
B. The Father, to be sure; for I do not suppose they would say that anyone else is meant by this.
A. I know indeed that they will say so; for the recklessness of their folly aims exactly at this. We shall think, therefore, that [the Son] is not the legislator and judge, and that he does not possess D
immortality, and has life derived from some external source in himself? And what follows from this? He will be subject to law and judgment, even against his will, and will be numbered among mortals, so far as the condition of his own nature is concerned. Furthermore, how would that divine proclamation—I mean the Gospel—not be deceit and imposture, and something even more shameful than these, if it forces us to establish the truth of the Son's words? For he said, "I am the life," even though, according to their opinion, he does not possess immortality, since the Father alone is immortal. But that he was declared to be a judge and legislator, you will understand, I think, without any labor. For have you not heard him saying, on the one hand: "It was said: 'You shall not commit adultery,' but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with the intent to covet her has already committed adultery with her in his heart"; B and on the other hand: "For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son"?
B. I have heard. But tell me, I ask, do you wish for us to test our argument against these opposing objections, or shall we leave it, as it were, deserted and without examples to counter the arguments of our adversaries?
A. Indeed, proceed with a noble spirit. For the matter will sharpen the mind to oppose our adversaries with something more vehement than before, and to beat back more forcefully the arguments of those who seem to oppose us.
B. Therefore, let us now state each point separately and clearly.
A. State what you wish. For I shall not think that it is your own opinion, but rather the opinion of the adversaries.
B. "There is one legislator and judge, God and Father." For it is fitting only for the nature that is queen of all things to enact laws and to judge. However, the Son has also attained to this degree of glory, by the Father and God having granted it to him by his nod.
A. And to whom among those of sound mind is it not manifest, my friend, that you would be drawing upon empty words for us, and would be heaping up a cold and useless crowd of arguments, if you did not show us the writings of the saints that are consonant with your words? For we shall not follow those who wish and are accustomed to belch out [only] the thoughts of their own minds, but those who speak from the mouth of the Lord, as it is written. C
B. You speak rightly. Therefore, the divine David sang, they say (he uttered the words as if to God the Father, concerning the calling of the nations): "Appoint, O Lord, a legislator over them; let the nations know that they are men." And that this was already accomplished most clearly in himself, the Son himself also explains to us, saying: "But I was appointed king by him over Sion, his holy mountain, proclaiming the command of the Lord." Now, he who possesses as a gift from the will of another [the power] of reigning and enacting laws, how could he not have a derived and by no means natural [authority]...?
A A. "Awake, you that are drunk with your wine," 51 someone might shout at the heretics, and with good reason. For the Son, being in the form and complete equality of the Father, endured a voluntary emptying, lowering himself into our form; and he became man, to whom the power to reign and to enact laws is in no way other than a bestowed one. Since, however, he shared in poverty with us and, for the sake of the economy, underwent a condition befitting a servant, he acknowledges that what is his by nature is something bestowed, and he conforms himself very well to the deeds and words of the emptying. And, I think, there will be no harm to those who believe in him from this, if they should perceive the time proper to the words. For when did Christ enact laws for the nations, and when did he arrive announcing in Sion the command of the Lord? Is it not when he became man? Yet one could see very clearly in the Mosaic writings that the Son was sent to announce the command of the Lord to those from Israel at no other time than when he donned our poverty, and he who is the Lord of the prophets was called a prophet, and the Word who was in the bosom of the Father was numbered among men. For God said somewhere, verifying this very fact to the most holy Moses: "I will raise up for them a prophet from among their brethren, like you. And I will put my word in his mouth, and he shall speak to them according to what I command him." 53 Therefore, O friend, before the Word had union with flesh and was joined to human nature in a way beyond mind and ineffably, would he be thought a brother B of those from Israel, and did he grow up from those earth-born ones? Or is that which you say better and truer: that he was called a brother, and took the place of Moses—as a pedagogue, 54 clearly, and one appointed to the necessity of enacting laws—and fulfilled a certain servile ministry, when, casting aside the preeminence of his innate glory, he lowered himself into a voluntary emptying as time and necessity required?
B. Indeed, you have spoken brilliantly, and know that I have grasped your meaning.
A. If, therefore, they wished to divide rightly what is appropriate to each time, they would not, I think, fall into such mental stupor and a perverse heart, but would finally be able to recognize the straight doctrine of the truth. Moreover, I would add to what we have said, that if to anyone it seems small and counts for nothing to adapt to each point of what is contained in the divinely inspired Scripture its proper and most fitting time, what stops us from saying—even if the only-begotten Word of God is not yet thought to have been made man—that he died, endured the cross and the sufferings of the cross, and before the meeting and union with this earthly flesh, that the Jews wickedly insulted him, and did and said the things which befit none other than their own audacity and fury, since D
Christ himself says, as if he had already suffered: “I gave my back to the scourging, and my cheeks to the buffetings, and I did not turn away my face from the shame of spitting.” B Is it not, then, reasonably a matter of madness and laughter to think that the Son endured these things not at the appropriate time—that is, the time of the incarnation? B. It is true. A. But let us leave the argument concerning this point, and, if you please, let us move to the present matter. B. What is it? A. I mean to subject it to examination and to learn precisely, and to ask the adversaries, whether, in the case of his being established as king and legislator, this state of being is according to substance, or if this way of being is perhaps the Son’s. B. They would not say that, in being established as king and legislator, he is in that state—for instance, or otherwise—as the Son (for I do not suppose they would fall into such folly, although they rave beyond measure, that they would dare to say that this establishment is a definition of substance). But they will perhaps say that C it signifies the nature of him who is established. For they say that he did not receive from another what is naturally in him. A. Therefore, O worthy man, it will be said by us again, that you will be found to be by no means sensible and lovers of dogmatic correctness, but rather very prone to error and deceit. For you have quickly forgotten that what is written must be assigned to the appropriate times, and that things not very becoming to God—even if they might be said of the Only-Begotten—must be granted to the times of the incarnation. Since, however, you do not completely swerve from reasoning that tends toward correctness, as you say that being established is not a substance predicated of the Son, but is indicative of a fact, what prevents one from thinking and saying that God and Father willed that the Son, who is king and legislator substantially, should appear as such to those on earth? And I do not mean that he began to rule, but that he consented in some way to perform the duties of a legislator, and to bring under his own kingdom those who had slipped away from the rule and power bestowed upon them, D through the error of polytheism. It is absolutely absurd, I think, to suppose that the Word of the Father, if he might choose to instruct some in wisdom, is called for the first time to the office of legislator by the will of the Begetter, but not to think that he is a legislator by nature as God. For if, into a dark and hazy cell, the light of a solar ray did not penetrate for some time, the entrance being blocked, and soon that entrance were opened, and the light rushed in, and the darkness was driven away, and an unusual light shone upon those places—a light which, if it could speak, would perhaps recount to those astonished by the event that it had been set by the parent sun to be poured forth to that place and to cheer forever that which was shrouded in darkness—would anyone, I say, admit that the light itself was only then first brought into its nature when it first penetrated?
those things held by darkness; one might grant, then, that it was first brought into the nature of light at the moment it first entered in? B. Not at all, as it seems; for there was always light. A
A. Why then do they oppose to us, as an impregnable rampart, the claim that the Son is constituted legislator or king by God the Father, even though God and Father does not declare that the Son began to possess the glory of a legislator, but commands, approves, and consents to his bringing even the flocks of the Gentiles under his laws, although in other, past times Israel alone had been subjugated and had submitted its neck to divine laws? B
B. But if they wish to show clearly that the Son is a legislator, how or whence could this be done by us?
A. I think it will suffice, for those who are a little sharper, to use what we just said. For since God says clearly regarding the law and those things provided divinely to the ancients C that one must neither add to them nor subtract from them (for to enact laws, and to add and subtract what one wills, belongs solely to the nature that is the queen of all things), the Son has enacted a law, and set aside the old commandment as useless, but brought in a new one, namely the evangelical one, and this as a legislator, not with contracted power, but with divine authority. The wise Paul will seal this argument, writing in this way: "I became to the Jews as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, not being myself under the law, that I might gain them that were under the law; to them that are without law, as without law, not being without law to God, but under the law to Christ, that I might gain them that are without law." Observe how, in rejecting being "without law" to God, he says he is "in the law to Christ," attributing to him the glory of both, and referring the power of enacting laws—as to God by nature—to him as an extraordinary and peculiar [attribute]. Since, therefore, according to the voice of the holy man, one who is in the law of Christ would not be "without law" to God, what argument remains to prevent the Son from being both legislator and God? D
B. None, as I think.
A. To those things which have been said, you might also add this.
B. What is that?
A. That no one, I think, could show that the Father and God gave laws to the ancients or to their descendants separately and alone, but anyone will notice without any effort that he did it together with the Son and through the Son. For where or to whom did the Father give laws, with the Son being neither present nor mentioned?
B. Indeed, the wise Paul writes that God once spoke to the fathers in the prophets. Moses indeed again said somewhere to the Israelites: "The Lord our God spoke to us in Horeb."
A A. Well done, O dear friend. For since the saints, as you say, assign that ancient and shadowy oracle to the person of God and Father, come, let me show you that these are the proper words of the Son who uttered them. For He has come, by no means to destroy, and least of all to overturn the oracles of the prophets, but rather to fulfill both the prophets and the law: "For I say to you," He says, "that one iota or one serif will by no means pass away from the law, until all things happen. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will by no means pass away." Do you understand, then, how, having said that the law must in everything and in every way be brought to completion according to the truth, He called His own words the law? And one might see Him also elsewhere, through one of the holy prophets, clearly crying out: "I, who speak, am here." I have become human, and I have appeared in the form of you who are of the earth, I who spoke of old, even though it was God and Father who spoke the oracles through the holy prophets. But that to him who once possesses the glory of the Lawgiver, the need also to be a judge will naturally and in every way follow—inflicting sharp penalties on those who trample upon what has been determined and deviate toward what seems good to them—is in no way a matter of dispute. B B. Entirely so. A. Just as, therefore, even if the Father might be called the one Lawgiver and the one Judge, the Son would in no way fall short of the glory and truth of both, since nothing separates Him from the natural identity with God the Father; so in the same way, I think, even if God and Father be said to have immortality alone, that dignity will be essential also in the Son, and He will be altogether acknowledged as immortal, or rather, as immortality itself by nature, and being illustrious with the sublimities of His Begetter, He will be worshiped both by us and by the holy angels. But if they should say that these things are not so, and bring against us—even though we are worshipers of the truth—the accusation of lying, let them tell me this. C B. What, then? A. First, if that which lacks life and immortality, and does not have this of itself, will be absolutely mortal, and has life assigned to it as if handed down from another? B. For that which is not immortal by nature will obviously be potentially mortal. A. And in addition to these things, let them answer further, what might be conceived as the operation of life toward those things which lack life? B. Vivification, of course, just as, for example, it is the work of light to illuminate. A. You speak rightly. But if anyone were to think that life itself is vivified by another, and that light itself is illuminated, would it seem to you that he is reasoning correctly? B. Not at all, but rather that he is devoid of sound reason. For that which is being vivified by another is no longer life. D A. When, therefore, the Only-Begotten comes into our midst crying aloud: "I am the resurrection and the life," does He...
have to be thought of as destitute of immortality, or otherwise? B B. Not destitute, surely. For life is, by nature, immortality.
A. Since, then, only God and Father—as I say—possesses immortality (for so, I believe, the divine oracle has declared to us), how could the Son possess it? But I believe certainly that the matter of unity would demonstrate in both, and very easily, that life is substantial and immortality is innate, not an acquired good. But if, through madness, they should think that they must say that the Son is alien to God and Father, and that He has carved out for Himself another, peculiar nature, and that He is not truly God, although He is by nature immortal and, more than that, life itself; would they not also attribute to someone who is reckoned in the number of creatures—as these men foolishly dream—the properties that belong only to the divine and ineffable nature, and because of which we, with the holy angels, rightly revere it, and say that these things are present in him, and that he subsists thereby, and is finally perfected among the creatures, according to what they foolishly think? C B. In what way?
A. That it is appropriate—I believe—for the God who is truly God by nature and in truth that He has the power to vivify and to be life, they themselves also, I know, would say. If, therefore, the Father is this substantially, but the Son, as they will have it, has slipped away from the natural identity with Him, and has descended to such smallness—and yet says that He is life Himself, and arrogates to His own nature what is excellent in the Father's substance, how is it not true what I have asserted? For that which is proper to the ineffable nature has already been transferred to that which is not of it, but has been summoned into generation along with other things as if it were one of them. For among those things that are believed to exist, God is understood in the first place, and after this, the creature. And there is absolutely nothing intermediate. Or is what I said not true? B. True.
A. If, therefore, the Son is of another substance, and not in those things in which they say the Father exists, how could there be understood one and the same natural operation of those who differ so much in the account of the mode by which they exist? "For just as," He says, "the Father vivifies whom He wills, so also the Son vivifies whom He wills." D B. But yes, they say: The Son indeed is life; nevertheless, He said: "As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father." Therefore, He is life because of the Father.
A. Are we, then, O sirs, to suppose that the Son Himself is also vivified by God and Father along with the rest, and must this life be numbered among those who have an external and adventitious life? Let the Son be ranked, then, with those who die; for what is added is alienable, and if one should choose to possess such things, one might forfeit their possession, if circumstances should happen to bring it about, since they are not preserved by natural laws in a firm and unshaken state. B. How then is He to be considered to be life ...
if He Himself is also life by nature? A A. And yet, this is a proof of the nobility that He has from God and the Father, and a precise indication of the identity according to nature. B. How do you distinguish that? A. For He said, not simply that He is vivified by the Father, but that He lives "because of the Father" (John 6:57). B. What then is the meaning of this? A. Insofar as for one who possesses a nature devoid of immortality and life—and who acquires this quality as an adventitious gift from another—it would be fitting and, I think, quite correct to say: "The Father has given me life." But for One who knows that He has proceeded as Life from Life, and that He possesses immortality as the fruit of His substance, it is fitting for one who acts according to the divinity to say: "I live because of the Father." For if the son of a human, B being rational and born of a rational father, were to say: "I am rational because of my father," or similarly, if the heat streaming outward from a fire, were it to have a voice, should say: "I possess hot force because of the fire from which I have proceeded"—would it not seem to anyone of sound mind that such things have obtained the properties of the natures from which they consist rather in themselves, than that they have received the faculty of existence in this way as something borrowed and in the order of things granted? B. It is like that. A. Therefore, the Son lives because of the Father. For Life proceeded from the Life of the Father, being true God just as He who begat Him. I will take as a supporter of my words the most wise John, who wrote about Him in this way: "And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us a good understanding, that we may know the true God, and may be in the true Jesus Christ His Son. This is the true God, and eternal life" (1 John 5:20). C Would there ever again be anything to you more manifest, or more robust for refuting that opinion by which it is thought that the Son exists otherwise than the Father exists according to nature? B. Nothing, I suppose, when the voice of the Theologian opposes an unassailable testimony to the adversaries. Yet, if the Son be called true God, they immediately dissolve in laughter, and say that He is not truly God in the proper sense, but that the name was granted to Him according to the will of the Father. For somewhere, they say, the divine Paul has said: "God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name" (Phil. 2:9). A. That the name which is above every name was bestowed D upon Him, know that I too would say. For to wish to foolishly resist the words of the theologians is, I believe, not the effort of a sound mind, but rather of one deranged and stupefied. However, I am astonished at the inclination of the adversaries toward error, who do not even wish to take into their minds the reason why it was given, but rather greedily snatch and seize from the syllables and words anything whatsoever that appears contrary to the honor and glory of the Son, considering nothing better, even though the divinely inspired Scripture does not define the time when it was given as anything other than that
according to which: “Being in the form of God, the Only-begotten did not think it robbery to be equal to God,” as it is written, “but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. For then indeed God also highly exalted Him, and gave Him a name which is above every name, that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” A
B. What, then, does this mean?
A. The path is open and plain for those who wish to think rightly, leading toward the truth. Attend, therefore, my friend. To receive by grace the name that is above every name—this is what is called the emptying and the economic descent of the Word to us. But if this "receiving" is found within the measures of the emptying, then it is seen that He is altogether exempt from the necessity of receiving what He possessed before the emptying, for the reason that He possessed naturally what He was, that is, the being in the form of God and the Father. B And if He humbled Himself, having come down from a supreme and surpassing state to a lesser one, He will certainly rise again to what He was, not seeking after foreign honor and glory, but his own and original ones. But if they consider it highly important to insist that the Son arrived at an unaccustomed honor and glory when He received the name that is above every name as something given by the Father, there is nothing, I think, to prevent us from taking the mystery of the Incarnation by an opposite method, and for the matter to be turned entirely into its contrary. I will say how. For if for the Son "to receive" is not an emptying, but rather it is an acquisition of things that in no way belonged to Him essentially, which happened to Him when He was emptied, then the emptying—if we wish to estimate it truly—would be that time which preceded the emptying, and that time would be one of preeminence and glory, in which He is said, I know not how, to have been emptied, even though He possesses things that exceed His nature and measure, C and suddenly invades those things that incomparably surpass the prior state in which He was. It is clear, therefore, from your opinion and that of those who think rightly, that the name which is above every name must be thought to have been given to the Son at that time when, having also assumed our form as one of us, He was inscribed as a Son of God, adopted with us and for our sake—He who is the true and genuine Son—so that we also, through Him, might be participants in a supernatural glory as sons. Do you not think that the argument proceeds for us straight to what is appropriate?
B. Truly, it proceeds.
A. Yet, since we have proposed to think better than the foolish temerity of those men, we shall keep the glory of the Only-begotten unharmed, D and we shall destroy their counsels and every height that exalts itself, as it is written, and we shall bring every thought into captivity to the obedience
A of Him. B But if we do not endure to act thus, but yield to the necessity of overcoming by their calumnies, and we cast away the fact that the Only-Begotten is truly God, we shall say that in this manner He possesses nothing more than we do.
B. In what way will you explain this, I wonder, and will you not hesitate to speak?
A. Indeed, I will speak readily, for I would not hesitate at all in these matters. For is it not true to say that if the name which is above every name has been granted to Him, and the title of God has been given to Him, as it were, by a bestowal, He might be cast down from it whenever the opportunity arises? For what is given is not altogether firm. Moreover, the Father Himself, as far as we can follow it with our reason, would be involved in things that are wrong to utter. For He would be less than the Son, and he who is, according to them, lesser—or rather, he who possesses the glory of deity as a mere counterfeit, and who barely prides himself on spurious honors—would surpass the nature of Him who begat him, B if He is truly God merely and solely by the appellation.
B. What grievous absurdities you bring before us!
A. They are grievous indeed, in truth, yet they need to be brought forward. For sometimes that which is not thought to be correct drives us to inquire more zealously after that which tends toward the truth. If, therefore, as they think, the Son has received wages, and has brought back from God and the Father that name as a sort of compensation for the emptying [kenosis], then surely it would be supposed that He lacked even that before the time of the emptying, if He is seen to have become enriched in time with this acquired and easily lost grace. Furthermore, how was He in the form and equality of God and the Father, not yet having undergone the voluntary emptying, but also not having deigned to take the form and state of a servant? For He did not count it a prize to be equal to God, although it was His to have this. If, therefore, we say that the Son was—even before the time of the emptying—in the form and equality of the Father, but was honored when He was emptied, and has returned to the measure of the glory belonging to Him, and if that which exceeds it has perhaps even surpassed the Father Himself...
B. How sharp the argument is!
A. And yet it is true, as far as reason goes. And if the Son has gained anything better by receiving the name which is above every name, He will surely prevail altogether in those things which are His own, and will exceed the nature of God and the Father. For this is what that sharp argument recently demonstrated to us. But if He does not appear any more excellent than He was, even if it is understood that He has received it, and the grace adds nothing at all, would they not be foolish and mendacious who do not refuse to advance to such a pitch of audacity as to now dare to say that a creature would be superior—I will not say by a little, but not at all—to the ineffable nature of the deity? Moreover, it would be of no avail at all to elevate anything to a more noble state, even if one were to attribute to it one's own things. But to think in this way is foolish; for the things of God are worthy of belief, and lead to the consummation...
and God the Father will be seen to be better and the bestower of better things than those in which He exists. B
B. In what way?
A. For since He gave the Son a name—He who was in the form and equality with Him, even before the time of the emptying, and who in no way was inferior to the glory innate to Him—He set Him above and on high, giving Him the name which is above every name. Is not this, then, already a heap of dross, and a ferocity of blasphemies, and an absurdity of thoughts, smelling of the utmost ignorance? C
B. Certainly it is.
A. There is also another reason by which one might, I think, most justly condemn their absurdity, if one considers this: If the Son knows Himself to possess only the usufruct of the name of divinity, and that this is not a fruit of nature for Him, what is it that urges Him to cry out openly: "I am the truth"? For that which is counterfeit is not true; and that which through external and added-on embellishments appears to be what it is not by nature, indeed forces its way in and audaciously breaks into the opinion of truth while in reality not being such, and its absurdity is exposed by the investigation of reasons. Why, indeed, did He not think He should count Himself among the gods by adoption, He who is by nature God, but, separating Himself from the crowd of the saints, retired into a place effectively peculiar to Himself and accessible to no others, saying: "If He called them gods, to whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken; whom the Father hath sanctified and sent into the world, do you say: You blaspheme, because I said: I am the Son of God?" For if those, He says, are called gods, having received the word of God and admitted it into their soul, how shall He not be God, by whom they are gods? For the Word was God, according to the voice of John. But "was" does not attribute a more recent glory to Him, but one older than any time indeed. For where, pray, would that "was" end, or to what end would it arrive, when it always proceeds further and is carried along at an irrevocable course, and knows not how to yield priority to time, and in a way has already meditated how to outrun every thought beyond time? D
B. You speak rightly; for that "was" is indeed always better than time.
A. Moreover, the divine Paul does not know the Son to be rendered illustrious by spurious dignities, but rather acknowledges Him to be God by nature, joining Him in essential and natural unity with the Father and God.
B. In what way?
A. For thus he writes: "For although there are those who are called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, yet to us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things." If, therefore, he knew that it were fitting for Him to be numbered among those who are gods by grace, why did he not place Him indiscriminately with the rest, and show Him to us as one and only...
A revealing God and Lord as the Father, yet, as it were, putting each separately, did he judge that the name of deity should be assigned to the Father, and that of lordship to the Son? But I suspect, one might deem it wise and necessary that we should neither despoil the glory of being able to rule and have lordship over all things from the natural and true deity, nor should we wish to alienate the nature of the deity from the true lordship; but rather, that both should belong to both, even if they seem to be set forth separately. For an evident proof of a single nature is that each is, so to speak, perfectly crowned with the natural properties which are in both; and that this equality of nature in both throughout all things, and its unassailable identity, will not admit anything at all that is alien.
B. But how could that be?
A. But if anyone should ask whether you attribute a substantial and natural sonship to the Son, or one placed solely in the will of the Father, just as, indeed, one might concede it to be in our own case, what would you answer, Hermias?
B. I would certainly call it substantial; but I would not seem to those of the contrary opinion to be speaking the truth.
A. Certainly you would. But they would add that we are raving, and have turned aside from the straight path of reason. For who, I ask, B if he does not wish to assent to sentiments of this kind, would escape the mockery of those who are so enraged with madness, and have arrived at such a degree of intemperance, that they think the Son must be considered as superadded and placed in the order of others, even though they blush at their own fabrications, and, as if practicing sorcery upon the truth which they have ill-treated, they attribute to Him an extraordinary glory, inaccessible to others, and devise for Him as much splendor as they wish to attribute to Him at their own discretion? But I would gladly ask them what the manner of that sonship might be which is conceived in both cases, or in what way they say it has come to pass. For we have been called to be sons, but we shall not say how; rather, Paul will instruct us as he writes: "And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying: Abba, Father" (Galat. IV, 6). Therefore, since the Son has, in an ineffable manner, taken up His abode within us through His own Spirit, we say that we have been called to C spiritual sonship. Or will you not confess that this has been brought to pass in this way?
B. Most certainly. For I shall also remember that which the most wise John proclaims to us concerning God: "But as many as received Him, He gave them power to become the children of God" (Joan. I, 12).
A. Observe then, my friend, where our discourse concerning the Only-Begotten will finally end, if He is to be ranked equally among the number of those who have been called to sonship. For that which has been made will not obtain the place of sonship in any other way than through the Son in the Spirit. And this will be made manifest by the testimony of Paul, who says: "And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying: Abba, Father." D In what, then, is He to be a Son...
A also? For they would not, I think, say that He is in Himself and through Himself, although He is numbered among those who are sons by adoption, if indeed He were to depart, according to them, from that which is by nature and in truth.
B. But if they say that we, indeed, receive the Son, but He Himself receives the Father within Him, what answer could you give to this?
A. I will certainly say this: if they define the divine nature for us according to their own judgment, and rashly impose upon it whatever laws they wish, the discourse of those who have once entered into this [way of thinking] will prove to be very slight, or rather, altogether non-existent, B since they belch out things from their own heart, but speak nothing from the mouth of the Lord. But if they think they must define the way of pure knowledge of God, they ought to confirm what they know to conceive with arguments sealed by the voices of divine Scripture.
B. So be it, they say. For the Son said to Philip: "Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me?"
A. Does the Father, then, sanctify the Son by existing in Him?
B. They will surely concede this.
A. Is He holy according to nature, and does He have from Himself both the sanctification and the power to sanctify those in whom He might happen to be, or has He obtained this property from another?
B. Being holy, evidently, according to nature Himself.
A. C Therefore, O miserable men, and inclined to every absurdity, the Son is deprived of natural holiness, and has not obtained a nature free or altogether immune from sinning, at least as far as that nature is concerned. If, therefore, they should concede that it is helped in some way by the fact that it has been sanctified by the Father, and that it has received the stability and glory of those things for which we worship Him, while nothing has been added to the Son from the fact that He has been sanctified, it is vain, I think, to say that God and Father dwells and abides in Him. But what the reason for this may be, or how the matter stands, we shall best examine in this way. For the Son, as these men alone perhaps most impiously think, receives the Father within Himself, as if in need of sanctification. D But what would the Father be considered to have obtained, having the Son in Himself? If, therefore, they say that this is the manner of sanctifying that which is naturally fashioned to be sanctified, why have we not also, by receiving the Spirit, crossed over into Him, so that He indeed dwells in us, and we in turn dwell in Him? But if this excessive absurdity troubles them (for the Spirit is in us, and we are not in Him according to nature), how can they not be wandering in vain reasonings, not thinking that what is in the Father as the Son, and the Father in turn inscribed in the Son, must be attributed to the identity of substance, but rather contend and believe that the Begetter dwells in the Son like some external and accidental good? Otherwise
I suppose, it will be necessary to say: do we not through the spiritual unity working in those who desire it with the Son, become conformed to sonship, while the Son refashions us to His own glory, as it were, and impresses the characters of His own form, and in a way inscribes them upon the souls of those who receive Him? A B. Certainly. A. Would it not, then, be laid down that the power to make sons is a natural operation for the Son, and that it has its being, in my opinion, correctly and blamelessly for no other reason than that He is the Son? B. Be it so. What follows from this? A. That we shall not concede the inhabitation of the Father, if we wish to reason correctly and accurately, to be the work of another, but rather that it is accomplished in such a way as it might be understood to be also in the Son, that which is fulfilled through Him. For the Father would surely demonstrate Him to be Father, and not Son, in whom He might choose to dwell, and whom He might fashion into His own image. B B. Tell me, then, shall we concede that the divine image within us, which the nature of man is said to be enriched with (for it has been made in the image and likeness of God), is toward the likeness of the Son alone, or shall we admit the Father along with the Son in this, and say that we have been fashioned according to the whole divine nature, even though we are named sons and are ranked among children? A. Then, O dear friend, do you not think one ought to consider that the whole argument of our faith in this matter looks toward one nature of the Godhead, which exists in three individual hypostases, which are conformed and uniform to one another, and run together into one supreme beauty, toward which we too were fashioned, according to the Scriptures, and were sealed for sonship through the Son in the Spirit? For the image of the Son would be sonship, and that of the Father would be fatherhood; therefore, we are sons through sonship, but we are the image and likeness of God, having been fashioned in the beginning toward the whole nature, and it is evident that this means the supreme one. C B. You speak rightly. A. It is therefore foolish and vain to spend all one's effort in investigating things that are most absurd. But it would be advisable, I think, to despise those things and seek those which necessarily have utility conjoined to them. B. Indeed, entirely so. A. Let the talk of those men, then, be considered trifles, and let it be cast far away, as having come to the very end of evils. As for us, let us by no means suppose that God is illegitimate, and the Son recently brought into being, and that He is sanctified, or that He has been called into sonship by God, and has received acquired glory along with us, but rather that He has attained what He is by the law of nature. Nor can He have been adopted into sonship through His own Spirit. For that the Spirit is the Son’s own, just as it is, naturally, the Father’s also, anyone might learn, and that quite D easily, from His...
words: "If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask Him?" A And again: "For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you." And Paul, writing to the believers in the same manner, says: "But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness." The Spirit, then, who adorns us mortals with the glory of sonship, since He belongs to the Son, will effect adoption in others, but will He be entirely inactive in Him whose own He is—not brought in, nor introduced from the outside, but being substantially His, and poured out through Him, by the will of the Father, upon those found worthy of Him? Does it not seem to you that these things are rightly said and reasoned? B. Entirely so. A. And when John, the minister of the divine mysteries, comes into the midst, crying out concerning God and us: "By this we know that He abides in us, because He has given us of His Spirit," is it not easily manifest to all that He is the true God, and that the Son has proceeded from the substance of God and the Father, if indeed the Spirit that dwells in us is His? And in addition to this, I ask: if the Spirit of God and the Father, in whom He vivifies and sanctifies the nature of created things, is also proper to the Son, who would ever come into such a disturbance of mind C as to think or say that He is stripped of the consubstantiality with God the Father, and to reckon Him among the number of creatures, and that He does not bestow upon the creation those things which are proper and excellent to the divine nature, moved beyond its own boundaries—so that there would now be no distinction, but the creature would be just as illustrious as that nature which holds dominion over all things? B. A slippery matter, indeed. How could it not be? A. Therefore, since it is possible to see the Only-Begotten, as manifested in the holy Scriptures, with the properties of the Father, come then, let us by other gathered reasons overthrow the weak and senseless opinion of our adversaries, and bring into the midst those things through which it may appear that He acts equally and possesses power equally with God and the Father—inasmuch as He is God, not being numbered among those who come to this through grace, nor being conspicuous by honors received from the outside, but being rather true [God], and one who in no least degree is inferior to the excellence of the Begetter, which surpasses every creature. B. Most certainly, my good fellow, or rather, I would say, this is of the greatest importance. A. Do you think, then, my friend, that it is permitted to any...
A creature to easily perform what the nature that is mistress of the universe alone could accomplish? B. To none. A. You have spoken rightly. Now, the most holy Paul attributes, as something supernatural and exceptional, and—I imagine—surpassing the bounds of everything created, the power to make the dead live to God and the Father. For he speaks as follows: "For where there is no law, there is no transgression. Therefore it is of faith, that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, as it is written: 'I have made you a father of many nations,' in the presence of Him whom he believed, God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did." Come then, if you will, to the glory of the Son Himself. For you shall see Him again, far from being inferior to the Father, but rather crowned with an equal capacity for working. For the same Paul told us: "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive." For He is life, and is not otherwise in regard to Himself than as the Father Himself would be. For you heard Him somewhere saying: "For as the Father raises the dead and gives life, even so the Son gives life to whom He wills." Therefore, He was giving a clear manifestation of B His own nature and glory in divine fashion, by saying: "If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works." For did He not claim by these things to be recognized as God by nature? Indeed, if anyone were found to possess the power to work as God does, he would in every way be equal in glory and would be nothing other than God. For reason leads us to this, I think. B. It seems so. For He would not have thought it right to boast of works equal to those of the Father, unless He were laying claim to the same glory. A. But since holy Scripture calls out to us: "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning," from where, then, would you suppose that that distribution C of divine gifts is made to us? B. From God the Father, evidently. A. And yet Christ gave to the holy apostles authority and power against unclean spirits, so that they might cast them out and heal every disease and every infirmity among the people. And, what is even more superior to these things, He commanded them to be able to overcome death itself, speaking with the greatest divine authority: "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons." And our divine John has confessed to us most clearly, saying: "That of His fullness we have all received."
A And will this good gift and perfect offering be anything else, in your judgment, than participation in the Holy Spirit? B. By no means. A. Observe, therefore, from this as well, my friend, that the Son pours forth from His own fullness His own Holy Spirit—inseparable and naturally inherent to Him—through whom comes every good gift. For when He had risen again, having destroyed corruption and having bidden the bonds of death to be strong no more, in order to restore us to holiness and to implant in the apostles, as in the first-fruits of the human race, the ancient beauty of our nature, He breathed into their faces, saying: "Receive the Holy Spirit." B But if every perfect gift is from above and from the Father, and if the Son dispenses these things not in a ministerial manner, but rather with an authority befitting God, by what logic, then, would He cease to be, according to nature, what He who begat Him is—namely, true God—and not one who is merely painted over with artificial honors, as if on a wooden tablet? B. By no path, as I think. A. Furthermore, will not the argument of faith suffice to demonstrate most perfectly that the Son is God by nature? B. What do you mean by that? A. That we who believe in Christ draw near in this way to God, who is natural and true, and we have been delivered from the error of polytheism, having cast aside the worship of the creature, and being loosed from that crime. And indeed, for those called by grace to the acknowledgment of the truth, the wise Paul writes, in one place saying: C "Wherefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision in the flesh made by hands, that at that time you were without Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world." And elsewhere he says again: "But then, indeed, not knowing God, you served those who by nature are not gods; but now, having known God, or rather having been known by God, how do you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you wish to be in bondage again?" D If, then, those who were without Christ were without God, and have at last acknowledged God by having embraced faith and having assented to the Son who says: "He who believes in the Son is not judged, because he has believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God," how would He not be understood to be God—He who is honored not by feigned and external praises from us ourselves and from the angels, but is believed to exist substantially as that which He is, truly God, clearly, and from God by nature? For what, I pray, would you concede that Paul intended when he writes concerning Him and says: "That God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. We therefore are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were exhorting through
us: we beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. A Since, therefore, when someone comes to Christ for reconciliation, he is reconciled to God, and in Christ the world has its treaty with God—would not he be laughed at, and very deservedly, who thinks that the Word, born of Him and in Him, has slipped away from the substance of the Father? B. Entirely so. A. But as regards the necessity of ruling over all things, and the excellence B of being in superiority over every creature called into existence—to whom would you attribute this most of all among existing things, and not be mistaken in your sense of what is appropriate? B. To God, clearly. For David sings somewhere: "For all things serve thee." And further: "Come, let us worship and fall down before Him, for He Himself made us, and we did not make ourselves. We are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand." C A. Well done, my friend! For God is indeed the one being loudly and openly praised here. It is not permitted, therefore, to any creature to claim for itself, or to call created things its own, and to dare subject them to its own authority; or if someone were to do this while not crowned with the glory of the kingdom, would we not say he is liable to accusation and indictment? B. Such is the case. A. Then with what understanding did the Son—when He could have said "the Father's"—call those who believed in Him *His own* sheep? "For my sheep," He says, "hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me; and I give them eternal life, and they shall not perish forever, and no one shall snatch them out of my hand." D Moreover, the theologian John tells us that He came into "His own [things]," speaking of his humanity on earth and, as I think, everything that has been created as his own. He operates in us also the Father’s operation—not in any inferior way—and does not appear to possess the glory of lordship as if it were alien; rather, He makes it His own and intends to have it in this way. For, conversing somewhere with the disciples who were accompanying and following Him, He said: "The harvest is indeed plentiful, but the laborers are few. Pray therefore to the Lord of the harvest, that He may send laborers into His harvest." But while He referred the designation of the reapers to the Father, He immediately declared Himself the Lord of the harvest, granting the authority of teaching to the holy apostles as His own special prerogative. Furthermore, the wise John also confirmed that the threshing floor is His, saying: "Whose winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly cleanse His threshing floor, and He will gather the wheat into His barn." And in addition to these, Paul enrolls those who have believed in Him as to a Lord and God, saying: "Those who are Christ’s...
have crucified the flesh along with its passions and desires." A And again at another time: "But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, this person is not His"; even though someone—or rather, the Holy Spirit—says to God: "I am Yours; save me, for I have sought out Your justifications." Are these, therefore, in the same way in which they might be understood as distinctively the Father’s, also the Son’s, unless the substance of both is bound together into a unity?
B. Certainly not. For God is one over us, and the Lord is one. And each permeates the other substantially.
A. You speak truly. For the Father is full of lordship and, as God, is filled with His glory; and so too is the Son God, as He is Lord. B And yet, neither would the Father be God, lacking lordship, nor would the Son be truly Lord, if He were stripped of His natural and true deity. Therefore, the divine Paul, as if mingling those things which belong to both in an indivisible communion, calls the Gospel now God the Father’s, and now Christ’s. Do you wish us to explain the matter, drawing from the holy Scriptures for confirmation?
B. I would very much like that.
A. He said, therefore: "Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, a called apostle, set apart for the Gospel of God." But transferring in a way the glory of God to the Son, who is understood as being out of Him, and in Him, and with Him, he said again: "But we have not used this authority, so that we might not give any hindrance to the Gospel of Christ." C And binding together the significance of both names into one on account of the identity of substance, he says: "But I have written to you more boldly in part, as if reminding you, because of the grace that was given to me by God, that I should be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles, performing the priestly service of the Gospel of God, so that the offering of the Gentiles might be acceptable, sanctified in the Holy Spirit." The Gospel of Christ and of God is, therefore, one; and whatever would be stated regarding God as the Word, the same would also be fitting for the Son. But if anything that distinguishes the begotten from the Begetter and introduces inequality should seem to appear, then the discourse concerning both would no longer be the same. Or do you not say that this is true, Hermias?
B. I do indeed.
A. D Then those things which are set forth concerning each will differ and diverge, and what one might rightly think to hold true regarding God and the Father, it would not be fitting to understand to be the same regarding the Son. How, then, could the Gospel of both be one, and how could one and the same thing be narrated of them, unless the Son is God by nature, rather than being a fraud to him who is being instructed, and an obstacle in the knowledge of the truth?
B. Absolutely.
A. But he who [is] the mystery of God, that is, the faith in
Him, revealing to those not yet learned how he might be called a minister of Christ, and preach Christ, seeking the glory for God, and calling himself a servant of God? "For in everything," he said, "commending ourselves as servants of God." And elsewhere concerning some: "Are they servants of Christ? I am speaking as a fool, I am more." Is there, then, any word here that sets the Son apart from God and the Father in terms of created-like, physical difference? B. I cannot conceive of one. A. But it is another kind of absurdity not to think that the Son is God by nature, when the Holy Scriptures cry out that the Church is God’s, but again that it is Christ’s. For the divine Paul wrote thus to some: "Be without offense both to Jews, and to Gentiles, and to the Church of God." And again, he asserted that Christ presented the Church to Himself, B immaculate and without wrinkle. And furthermore, when God says through one of the prophets that He will dwell and walk about in us, Christ dwells [in us], and, according to what was foretold of old, He works as God. "For Moses was faithful in all His house as a servant, according to what is written, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken; but Christ as a Son, over His own house, whose house we are." B. Therefore, nothing at all prevents us from thinking and truly believing that, since the Son proceeded from the very essence of God and the Father, He should not be understood as other than Him, in so far as it pertains to physical identity. A. Well done, my friend; for it seemed right to think this way, and [it seemed so] to the blessed Paul. "For if God is for us," he says, "who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not also with Him freely give us all things?" If, then, C the Son is truly the proper [Son] of God and the Father, would He then depart into a difference of nature, and would there be devised any true and blameless reasoning that might cut [Him] into difference, and make alien that which is proper to someone, from Him whose proper [Son] He is considered and called? B. I do not think so. A. What then? Do we not say that there are ten thousand who have been called to sonship under God? B. Indeed, very many. For it is written: "I said: You are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most High." A. Would any man, then, after taking one or two from such an infinite multitude, dare to call them "proper sons" of God and the Father, and not pay the penalty which one would inflict upon those who wish to adulterate the beauty of the truth? B. I would say so; for you speak correctly. D A. But if I should wish to learn again why, while ten thousand are called gods and sons, the "proper" [sonship] belongs to only one, strictly and truly, what would you yourself say?
B. I would say that those have been adopted into sonship, having obtained this appellation and gift of heavenly munificence; but that He is not so, but is in very truth proper to God and the Father, inasmuch as He possesses with Him the supreme nature of all things. A
A. Is that which is proper to God by nature, therefore, not God, but rather a created thing, or who then is it?
B. Certainly there is no doubt in this. For deity is essentially the property of God, just as, for sure, a created thing is the property of a creature.
A. But if anyone thinks that a created thing or a creature is proper to God by nature, I believe it is safe to follow the reverse line of reasoning. For to say that deity is proper to a creature is not evil; but to think this, is a sin. Since, therefore, the absurdity of the arguments urges us together toward the correct view, the Son will at length be proper to God and the Father, not numbered among the adopted, but as God from God. And since those things which are joined together immutably into one genus and species do not have a reason for their existence that is different or discrepant in natural diversity (for there is one reason and definition significant of substance for all mankind), therefore God is not of a different nature from Him of whom the Son was born, but is rather true God; for1 He has been called proper to the natural and true God, differing from the adopted multitude, and tending to the glory of the one and true God. B
B. You speak rightly.
A. Therefore, holy Scripture again tells us that that substantial unity with the Father must be preserved for the Son. For it has it thus: “For the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God” (1 Cor. xi, 3); by these words signifying, I think, the truth and genuineness of the substance, and that the Son has proceeded from it in very truth.
B. What do you mean?
A. Do you think that the reason for this matter should be explained to us? I ask you to tell me what is arduous and creates difficulty.
B. They say, indeed, that this will cast the Son down from the identity with God the Father.
A. Can you tell me in what way? C
B. Entirely. For if the man is the head of the woman, they say, it is because he is of the same nature and substance with her, although he may be thought to be of a perhaps more excellent condition (for the head in the body is the most excellent part of all); but Christ is called the head of the man, since a natural relation calls Him to an affinity with creatures, just as in the case of the man and the woman: how then will He be called God and true, or how will He be able to have a natural identity with God the Father, if He is numbered among creatures and is regarded in the place of a head? For they say the Son will surpass the condition of the creature by the pre-eminence of glory. D
A O what a great inclination towards the most absurd things! How headlong the cunning and false speech of the adversaries is carried away! For they impiously and irreligiously proclaim the Son, who proceeds from God the Father, a creature. But we shall discuss this, reserving that debate for an opportune time, with mind and tongue at leisure and intent upon it. But this strikes me with the greatest wonder: that, as it seems, they who are prone to every ignorance are wandering no less far from right reason now than they were of old. For Christ is called the head of the man on account of the natural conjunction of the relation; for I shall not deny what has been rightly and truly said. But since God has been set as the head of Christ, what stands in the way, O noble sirs, might one say to them, or what prevents us from understanding that, if the Son is of the same genus as creatures, since He is called the head of the man, you are driving even the Father Himself into the order of creatures? For He is set as head to the Son, even though He is created and, according to you, existing as a product. For these things seem to our madmen to be well and blamelessly stated: but I think that the weight of impiety will bring torpor upon them, even if they have become hardened and indulge in fantasies in such necessary matters. Come, therefore; having cast these aside and sent them off to the mountain or thrown them into the waves, let us devise something more benign. For we say the man is the head of the woman, since she proceeded from him in the beginning and was fashioned in the image of man, who has God as his archetype. For so it has been made, as the Scriptures will have it; but we define Christ to be the head of the man, as the second root of the race and the first-fruits of humanity, which returns to immortality through sanctification in the Spirit. And the name "second Adam" is given to Christ, B and for no other reason than this alone. Furthermore, we shall hold and believe the Father to be the head of Christ, as consubstantial with Him and naturally joined, in so much as He is understood and is God, even if He has appeared in the flesh and has become like us. Christ is, as it were, a borderland of divinity and humanity, having in one, as it were, a conjunction of both, and a concourse into identity of things dissenting in nature, according to the unity brought about by the incarnation, which can neither be grasped by the mind nor expressed by tongue or speech. For Christ is at once God and man, having the Father, who is in heaven, as the source and root of His own subsistence—co-beginningless and co-eternal, and not prior in time, since it is necessary that he who is called a head subsist together with the head; but He is also endowed with a natural relation to us according to the flesh. When, therefore, God is understood and is the head of Christ without falsehood, how shall He not be the true God—He who has the true divinity as His root, and substantially contains the Father within Himself? For it is necessary that the head be regarded as of the same nature as the rest of the body. But if they think that the Word born of God the Father must be cast down from the borders of divinity and dragged down to the condition of creatures, let them listen clearly: "Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the
tree rotten, and its fruit rotten." A
B. You have spoken excellently.
A. For it is a manifest sign of the highest stupidity and extreme madness to admire a tree, as if it were of the most excellent and noble kind, yet to attribute to it fruit of a somehow different nature. For God surely begets God; would you not say that this is so?
B. I would indeed.
A. For how could He not be God, and that truly, in whom and in whom alone you would recognize God to be by nature, and truly the Father? For thus Paul writes to the believers: "But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ Jesus, and manifests the odor of his knowledge through us in every place, that we are the good odor of Christ to God." B Since therefore the odor of God and Father has appeared in Christ, and is known in Him, how then must one suppose that this is brought about? For in meadows and gardens, at certain seasons of the year, fruits and lilies grow. Would there, tell me, my friend, be naturally implanted in an apple perhaps the odor of a lily, or will a lily conversely provide its own to an apple, so that in both there will be clearly distinguished precisely what belongs to each?
B. By no means; for each will surely put forth what is its own.
A. How then could Christ be the good odor of the true knowledge of God and Father, unless He is believed to proceed from the true divinity? For it has been shown that each person, so to speak, gives forth the scent of its own nature. But how could the odor of the divineness that exists by nature come to be through a creature and a nature of a different kind, or as God has it? For just as no one would think, if he has any sense, that the odor of divinity belongs to the nature of created things—for that is a matter of the utmost foolishness—so too, no one would attribute to the unbegotten and all-surpassing divinity a Son who is of a different kind and nature, as if poured forth from it in the manner of an odor. C For the Only-Begotten has been born in an ineffable way from the substance of God and Father, revealing to us in Himself the whole fragrance of the nature of the Begetter. Wherefore the Church gathered from the nations, as in the person of the bride, addresses Him with these words: "Your name is oil poured out; therefore the maidens have loved you, they have drawn you." For through Him and in Him we have received the fragrance of the knowledge of the Father, and have been enriched by it.
B. I agree. For you seem to have spoken and discussed these things rightly.
A. There is also another way by which it is not obscure that the Son truly is God and has proceeded from God, if we consider the reason for this matter in this way. D
B. In what way, I pray?
A. Tell me, I ask, does it befit any thing to be able to bestow those things which the divine and only nature might bestow?
A B. By no means. A. Would he, then, not be in the highest eminences and in those things which reach the end of divine glory, and quite reasonably so, for whom it might be seen that the ability to accomplish these things is inherent? B. How could it be otherwise?
A. Peace, then, is a good gift from God, and a stranger from heaven, and one which has reached us exclusively from divine beckonings. We shall make the prophet Isaiah a witness for the argument, crying out and saying: “O Lord our God, give us peace; for thou hast given to us all things. O Lord, besides thee we know no other; we call upon thy name.” B It is, I suppose, because in having obtained peace, one can enjoy every good thing, at least in the opinion of those who have altogether embraced [or "chosen"] it. B. For it is indeed shared.
A. Peace is, therefore, a fruit of the power from above, and truly a gift, as I said just now, not from any created being, but from God alone, who is so by nature. Therefore, he said that He alone was known as the giver of it, and no one besides Him. B. It is true.
A. Consider, therefore, the grantor and at the same time the steward of those things which God the Father might bestow upon us, the Word having appeared from Him. C For He said somewhere to the holy disciples: “My peace I give to you, my peace I leave to you.” He says that peace is His own good, for it is a thing bestowed by God, and [it is] not otherwise. And in addition to this, the divine Paul says: “Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.” But He who is the co-grantor and giver with God and the Father, and who proceeds with the same, undistinguished generosity and magnificence at once, how, tell me, could He fall short of divine glory, and not rather be situated in every respect as equal and similar to the One who begat Him? B. That is correct.
A. But come, let us move on to that other point. B. To what do you refer? D A. Do you not acknowledge that, if we agree with the opinions of the saints, the truth will be made plain to us, and it will lead us back to what is pleasing to God, and to what has been inspired concerning the Son through the Holy Spirit? B. And what is that?
A. That the Son is truly and by nature God. For the wise Paul said, concerning God and the Father: “The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, he who is blessed for ever, knows that I do not lie.” Then, immediately, he does not fear to weave a crown of equal honor and glory for the Son, since he knew that He was God by nature and in truth; he writes concerning Him, spinning out the account regarding the rejection of the Jews: “For I could wish myself to be anathema from Christ for my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over
everything God blessed for ever. Amen. A Shall we then place the God who is over all beneath God along with all creatures, if he is not truly God, and is placed among those adopted by grace—even though he has obtained that great and God-befitting dignity of being above all, that is to say, of being blessed, and that to be eternally and unceasingly sealed by the word Amen? Do you think the adversaries understood these things with a sound mind? B. By no means; but he rather has a sound mind who confesses that the Son is true God and has shone forth from true God, through whom and with whom is glory to God and the Father, with the Holy Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.
DIALOGUE IV
That the Son is neither a creature, nor a thing made.
B A. Whoever, therefore, strips of the glory of being the natural Son the God who has shone forth from God by an ineffable generation, and contends that he is a creature and made, is he not guilty of the punishment which C we say hangs over those who cavil against the divine glory, the divinely inspired Scripture thus setting its vote: "A man, whoever shall curse his God, shall receive sin: he that names the name of the Lord, let him die the death; let all the congregation of Israel stone him; whether he be a proselyte or a native, when he names the name of the Lord, let him die"? B. I do not think he can escape being judged in every way and by all means liable to the punishments fitting for him. A. It is best, therefore, Hermias, not to embrace the petulance of others, since it drives us into a reprobate sense, but to regard the utterances of the theologians as the straight and unperverted rule of faith. For it is better not to applaud others than to say to them themselves: "It is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaks in you." B. You have spoken most rightly. A. Therefore, they by no means think that the Only-begotten Word of God is to be worshipped as one made or created, but they say that he is the fruit, or offspring, co-existent and co-eternal with the substance of his Begetter, and they name him both Son and true God and eternal life. And indeed, our divine interpreter of divine mysteries, John, says: "And we know that the Son of God has come, and has
A given us an understanding, so that we may know the true God, and we are in the true God, in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life. A But if the Son, O good sir, is both true God and eternal life, and yet he has not escaped being a creature and a work, although he is endowed with such a glorious nature, will not that designation now be—in some way—an insult to the very substance of God the Father, with no one to prevent it?
B. In what way?
A. For is not he himself also named true God, and does he not give life to all things, being life by nature? "For in him we live and move and have our being," as the wise word also says somewhere.
B. True.
A. Let the argument of blasphemy, then, go quite to him, and let him be termed a created thing; for the unlimited—and I suppose nothing stands in the way—the true divinity having once suffered in the Son, the being numbered among created things, and the eternal life having, I know not how, been mocked of being life and, mingled with the other creatures as if by necessity, having received an existence defined by time. For that which is created is not without beginning, nor is it older than all time.
B. How terrible a matter this is, my friend, and truly an unavoidable charge of impiety!
A. It can, however, be avoided. For it is easy, if you wish, to flee the images and the deadly and pestilential doctrine of the adversaries, if you piously assign the prior roles to the opinions of the saints. For they by no means proclaimed God as the Maker of the Only-Begotten, but rather as Father in the way of generation, who have also been set as the light of the world by him who did not ignore his own nature, namely Christ. For he said to them somewhere: "You are the light of the world." Moreover, declaring them true teachers of the mysteries, C he said: "Go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." But where there is truly Father, and generation, and indeed Son, not possessing the glory of sonship by adoption but essentially and from the Father, what place will that slander about his being made have?
B. None, as I suppose.
A. For let no one at all who is concerned for orthodoxy come to such perverse reasoning as to think that we ought to remove the generation—or rather, the reality of the generation—far from the substance of God the Father, blushing in ignorance, lest it should perhaps suffer some of the things that are involuntary to itself, and having been brought low, might labor under the necessities of bodies. For some of the senseless attribute to it D divisions, and the much-talked-of flowing—who are unaware that they are casting themselves into the pits of destruction—who suppose that the ineffable nature of God, which is beyond all mind, when it appears to be begetting, also suffers something of this kind, being entirely ignorant of what an incorporeal nature is.
A For an incorporeal thing is entirely incapable of division, or of flowing away, or of being cut; but this is perhaps more fitting for a tangible and dense nature, which is liable to be caught by such things. If, therefore, the word "beget" is said of God, let every suspicion of passion be cast aside, and let reason prevail, attributing to the nature of God what is more becoming. For He will not beget as we do, but as He Himself knows and as is fitting for Him. Therefore, the fables of the heretics are trifles and old women's tales. For those who pretend to fear that the nature of the Father might perhaps suffer something in begetting, deprive it of the most manifest honors. For all right reason compels us to believe that the Father is the Genitor of the Only-Begotten rather than His Maker. For thus it will have adorned Him with greater glory, and will justly establish concerning Him what is owed to the most excellent natures; since even among us, beyond all comparison, that which is born of us far exceeds and surpasses that which is created. But if God is to be a maker, and endowed with the power of creating, yet is no longer a genitor, I shudder even to utter anything blasphemous or absurd, B yet I will say it, though I wish I did not: that the nature of God has fallen from the most excellent and supreme state of all, and that a creature which is capable of making and creating works from various arts, and at the same time is capable of begetting, which is clearly more brilliant than the other, is somehow of greater glory. B. You speak rightly. A. Therefore, He is our Son, Hermias, and truly a substantial generation, not a discovery of wisdom or a fruit of art; for we say that the whole of creation is this. B. It is so. A. Therefore, our wise John will confirm that we are not lying in the least, saying openly: "Many other signs truly Jesus did in the sight of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written, that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God." And he adorns with the highest rewards of virtue him who has believed thus. For he writes again: "Who is it that overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?" C And in addition to these, O friend, the Son Himself has set forth not a little the love of God and the Father toward us. "For God so loved the world," He says, "that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him might not perish, but have eternal life." Yet why, finally, did he place for us a kind of finishing touch and summit of his own writings, that one must believe that the Word become man is truly God, if He is indeed not the Son? And how will he have overcome the whole world, who has not believed that He is not a creature and a thing made, receiving a worthy recompense for so right an opinion, because he has overcome the world? D For if it can be said that... (the text breaks off)
A it is not dangerous to say that God honors and accepts those who think perversely, and crowns some of created beings with divine gifts, I would say for my part, and very reasonably, that they are worthy of all honor and rewards, who have foolishly supposed that the Only-Begotten is not the Son, but is a creature and a thing made, even if he be said to have been begotten, and to be named Son by the Father himself and the Holy Spirit. But if it is not lawful to speak thus, and impious to think it, the contrary is surely true. For he crowns only the lovers of the truth, and those who have therefore believed in the Son truly, and not as a work of craft; for this, indeed, is a terrible malady and a madness. In this way, the divine word said that blessed among the holy Apostles was the chosen Peter. For since the Savior was inquiring in the parts of Caesarea which is called Philippi, what men say the Son of man is, and what report concerning him has spread through the country of the Jews, or the cities bordering on Judea, leaving aside the childish and absurd opinions of the common herd, he cried out B most wisely and intelligently, saying: "Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God." And the recompense for the true judgment concerning him, he did not long delay, Christ saying: "Blessed art thou, Simon Bar Jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." And I say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. By "rock," I suppose, speaking derivatively, he means nothing else than the unshaken and most firm faith of the disciple, upon which the Church of Christ is also firmly fixed and established without falling, and remains forever unassailable even by the gates of hell itself. And the faith of Peter regarding the Son was not rashly improvised, nor did it bubble up from human thoughts, but from an ineffable initiation from above, God and Father clearly pointing out his own Son, and infusing the assurance concerning this into the souls of the sincere. For Christ would least of all prove false in saying, "For flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." If then the blessed Peter is deemed worthy of such exceeding rewards, having confessed him to be the Son of the living God, how are they not most wretched and castaways, who drag down what is thought to be, and is in truth C the fruit of the essence of God and Father, to the level of a creature, and most foolishly record the life-giving vine in the number of those who have received life from elsewhere? Are such men not altogether ignorant? B. Indeed they are. A. Furthermore, since they have formed such a lowly and petty opinion concerning the Son, they also overturn that great and exceeding wonder which surpasses all admiration, the charity of God and Father; nay, they will be found to sharpen their unbridled tongues even against the divine dignities D themselves, truly possessing as they do most readily, and insulting those who have the life-giving sprout as co-eternal, when they have it as adventitious.
A B. I pray you, tell me how: for I do not follow. A. Most gladly; for there is no difficulty in it. Did the Father give His own Son for the life of the world? B. Certainly. A. It is surely better, as everyone would agree, to offer what is begotten, rather than what one might fashion with art, if indeed the former is from us and is the fruit of the begetter’s subsistence, while the latter is a discovery of industry and a work of art, not a sprout of substance.
B. What of this, then? A. Do you not realize that there would be less cause to admire the love of God the Father, who might have sent forth to redeem the whole creation the Son—if He be a creature—as being a part of creation; and that it would be more worthy of admiration were you to hear that He had given the Son, and had not spared His own fruit, and—insofar as He became flesh and seemed to die—thirsted rather for the world’s persistence in well-being?
B. I understand. A. For my part, I think (and let no one be angry if, kindled by divine love, I speak with a little more boldness) that Christ would not be equal to the whole of creation, nor could He suffice to redeem the life of the world, nor would He have deposited His own soul in return for it, nor shed His precious blood for us, if He is not truly the Son and God from God, but a creature and a part of creation. B
B. You speak rightly.
A. I would add further that creation would have been saved without having been taken up at all by God, and without standing in need of help from above. For how or whence, if it has its redemption and firm salvation of itself and from itself? For the Son, being a part of creation, has, as they say, saved the whole creation. Why, then, do we offer hymns of thanksgiving to God? And why, indeed, instead of omitting this as superfluous, do we not pursue creation with hymns, and approach it rather with supplications, saying what is said of the Lord of all, God: "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his rewards: who propitiates all your iniquities: who heals all your infirmities: who redeems your life from destruction?" By doing this, we should without doubt display our own insanity and offend God; whereas, if we attribute the praise and glory of these things to Him, we shall be wise and true worshipers. How, then, will He be a creature together with us, He who is one and worth all, as God from God and truly Son? Or is this not the case? C
B. How could it be otherwise?
A. Come then, if you please, let us add this to what has been said, and let us say that relative names imply one another, with the one mutually producing the knowledge of the other. D
A Since then, it is easier—if indeed one has learned what is on the right—to know what is on the left, and everyone, surely, would agree that the converse is also true. The name "Father," therefore, is relative, and in the same way, the name "Son." To what, then, is this reference directed, and whither does this mutual relationship tend, in such a way that they do not transgress the logic proper to them?
B. And to whom is this obscure? For a father is understood and spoken of in relation to a son, and, indeed, a son in relation to a father.
A. Then what have those people learned, who have B distorted and corrupted their minds, that they name God "Father" for us, but insist that the Son is a creature? Is it not entirely ignorant and incongruous to say that a created thing is set alongside the Father, and yet the Father, in turn, is set alongside the created thing, according to the logic of relations?
B. Entirely so, lest we call the Father himself a creature, already having acquired a natural relative relationship to some created things, as far as logic allows.
A. Therefore, let them hear Christ himself crying out: "You know neither me, nor my Father; if you had known me, you would have known my Father also." But to those asking the reason for this rebuke, he answers, saying: "He who denies the Father, denies also the Son; and he who denies the Son, has not the Father." And this is right, indeed, and very true. For if one is not a Father, because he has naturally begotten, no one would grant that a Son exists either. For he is a Son, because he has been begotten; and if he is not a Son as one begotten, there would not be a Father either, if we reason according to the logic that is fitting and follows from these concepts—a Father, in that he has begotten. Therefore, it is true that both subsist together and perish together C reciprocally, and if one exists, that for which it is named and is what it is, surely exists as well. But what of Christ saying to the stiff-necked and rebellious crowd of the Jews: "I have come in my Father's name, and you do not receive me"? Although Christ did not at all name himself Father, but Son, and from the Father. How then does he say that he has eventually come to us in the name of the Father? Is it not manifest that "in the name" must be understood as "in the glory and praise" of the Father? For the divine Scripture sometimes calls a clear-sounding praise and that which is notable in honor a "name," D just as, for instance, that which is celebrated in the book of Proverbs: "A good name is more desirable than great riches." Has the discourse of the Savior, therefore, failed in being wise and true, when he openly and clearly declares that he has come to us in the name of the Father?
B. Indeed, it can rightly be said that the truth does not stray from the true.
A. If, therefore, the statement is true, either God and Father must be brought down into the number of creatures, lest he appear
to surpass the Son in glory, or the Son must at last be recalled to that dignity which is worthy of God, and to the nature of sonship, understood substantially. For he would not be in the least inferior to God and the Father in any way A if things were so. The wise John will support us in this, saying: "He who comes from above is above all." And that "from above" signifies an exalted and supreme nature, the disciple of the Savior will demonstrate by saying: "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights." The Son therefore comes to us from the Father, as from a fountain, and as one having blossomed forth from the supreme root, he manifests in himself the radiance from which he sprang, and has obtained being "above all," just as, indeed, the Father also has. But we say that he is above all in this respect especially: not that he surpasses the creation in glory alone, or in B excellences of nobility, but that he is exalted above and transcends all things together with the Father who begat him, by the supreme eminence of his substance. If he is above all things, how will he be numbered among all things? For if he is truly a creature, he will be ranked with other creatures. How then is he "other than all" and "above all," unless he naturally avoids being numbered with all? Otherwise, by assigning the incorporeal nature of the Son to local elevations, would we not be triflers and in error? B. What do you mean? A. Do you wish us to interpret "from above" in terms of place, as being the opposite of "below," and defined by intervals of space? B. And then what shall we do with the Son, if he is in a place of such a kind? For that is the C property of bodies. A. We say, therefore, quite rightly, that "from above" signifies "from the Father." And for that reason he is known by the Father alone, and he alone knows his own Father and God. For it is an incomprehensible thing, and known to none of those who exist, what the supreme nature is in and of itself. Indeed, we believe that God exists and is, but it is absurd to inquire into what he is according to nature, since he cannot be grasped. For the nature of God surpasses every mind. How then, if he is created and made, would he alone know the Father, and he alone in turn be known by the Father alone? D For no created thing can clearly know the nature of God; but to know what a created thing is does not exceed the capacity of every intellect, even if it transcends the human condition to some degree. If, therefore, he alone knows the Father, and in turn is known by the Father alone, it follows that he should not be thought or argued to be a created thing. For only the supreme and ineffable nature knows itself, and it is entirely untrodden by things brought into being. B. Untrodden indeed and inaccessible, since God surpasses every mind by far. A. But how, then, could the Son be called "created" by us at all, although the most wise
A Paul A cries out: "I say, however, that as long as the heir is a child, he differs nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all, but is under tutors and stewards until the time appointed by the father: even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world; but when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons." Thus, since we were still laboring under ignorance and held guilty of the crimes of ancient insanity, we were subject to the elements of the world, serving the creature, when worship should have been referred to the true and only God by nature. But after the Son shone upon us, then indeed, then, with childish ignorance vanquished and overcome, and having been brought to the light of the truth, we were set free, B in my judgment—nor will you deny it, I know—from that subjection and subjection to the elements of the world. For this the holy discourse B showed us a little while ago, which those who care for what is right will confess to be both wise and true; for he speaks of the mysteries in Christ.
B. They will indeed confess it.
A. Is it then, Hermias, the case that everything which we say has been brought into existence by the nod of the Creator is to be numbered among the elements of the world, or will it be placed as a part of the world together with the universe?
B. Certainly.
A. And have we been set free, having been brought to the perfection of mind and understanding, and as if rejecting the spurious desire to be subject to the elements of the world?
B. So I think.
A. Is it by receiving faith in the Son, as in a Son truly, or how?
B. In that way.
A. Therefore, the Only-Begotten will not be a created being, C so that He might not even appear to be numbered among other elements as a creature, while we are children, and devoid of the perfect gifts of the mind, and deluded by vain thoughts rather than being enriched with firm hope and knowledge of the Son. For what, in sum, would the Only-Begotten have benefited us, even though He became man for our sake, unless we had been released from the worship of the creature? But by embracing faith in Him as in a Son, tell me, have we not been disappointed in vain?
B. It seems so, if He is indeed begotten.
A. What then? Is not the education through Christ much better than that of Moses, if faith is truly in something created? But I would say that the saints speak vanity, who always D postpone the old commandment to the evangelical oracles. How indeed did the law bring nothing to perfection, but the just shall live by faith? For while that faith in the Son indeed destroys those who have received it, the law [benefited] those of old...
A if we were to accept the words of the perverted. B. Explain how, if you can. A. Most readily and eagerly. Suppose that these things were set before me to be spoken. B. What is it that you say? A. For those among the ancients, the law, through the all-wise Moses, proclaimed: "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord." 48 And furthermore: "You shall not make for yourself an idol, nor any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath." 49 And, further, calling them to better fruit, and leading them away even from the very elements of the world, it says: "Take heed to yourself, lest, looking up to heaven and seeing the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and all the host of heaven, you be led astray and worship them." 50 The law therefore called them to the one truly and naturally existing God, leading them entirely away from error and evil; for it decreed that the creature should in no wise be worshipped above the Creator, and it confirmed those who were called to this by [the threat of] capital punishment for those who despised it. But that law [is past]; let us further relate in what state we ourselves stand. The law, which was proclaimed in shadows and figures, has indeed passed away, and the light of truth has shone forth, since we have accepted faith in the Son, even if—as they would have it—He is a created and made thing. Are we not truly most miserable, even though we seem to have obtained a better lot, while those who were taught by the law to worship the one and natural God are far superior? And what is more absurd is that they, not yet endowed with the light of truth, acknowledged the true and natural God; while we, empty—who boast that we have received the truth which was not given to our ancestors—have fallen into error through it, and we miserable ones continue to live, having been darkened by the divine light B rather than illuminated. B. How sharp the argument is! A. If you were to learn that, I think you would marvel even more. B. What is that? A. "The law was a paidagogos for us unto Christ." 51 For you have surely heard that the blessed Paul wrote thus. B. I have heard it. A. We must therefore examine for what reason and in what manner the law was a paidagogos leading us to Christ—that is, to the doctrine and knowledge of Christ. Or was it as to a superior [state] and one that excelled that which was in the law, which was still buried in types, or was it toward one that was more abject and lowly? B. Toward a superior and more brilliant [state]. A. Well said, my dear fellow; for any sensible and wise man would agree and say that it is so. Therefore, if the law was a paidagogos, while proclaiming one and natural God, it did not [lead us] to the mystery of Christ as to...
in Christ; the Son would rather be uncreated, so that the law might not be seen to have wronged us, nor indeed, by positing the knowledge of a creature as more excellent than the knowledge of God, might it be found to be a snare and a devilish trap, even though it was spoken through angels and given to us as an aid. For as one of the saints said, He gave the law for an aid. And if Christ is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets, how could the word of the divinely-inspired Scripture be sacred? For the conclusion thereof would end, as it were, in the deception of the entire body of knowledge, locking us into a created and not an uncreated nature. B
B. You have spoken most correctly. Nevertheless, I think an adversary would ask something of this sort: what would the name "firstborn" wish to signify?
A. For one brother among others to take precedence, and to have entered into this light before the rest.
B. But how then, they say, is the Son named the "firstborn of all creation," unless he has creation as a sister, as it were, as being congeneric and connate with it?
A. Then, so it seems, that name "Son" will finally appear empty and entirely useless in His case, and the generation a deception, and the discourse concerning the Father which has come to us a vain rumor.
B. By no means, they say. For He has been called Father of the Son abusively—just as it is also said concerning the sons of Israel: "I have begotten and exalted sons." C
A. Is it then the case, if the Only-Begotten is a creature for the sake of adoption along with us, and the generation is only an inclination of the will, that the truth in His case is that He has been made?
B. That is so, they say.
A. Yet why on earth do they abandon the truth as if it were of no profit, hurrying to look past it, and almost speak that prophetic word: "We have made a lie our hope, and with a lie we shall be protected"? For since it was said when and in what respects the Word became firstborn, I think it is necessary to learn this, and that too before all other things, and only then at last to hasten to direct the heart toward the uprightness of concepts which is most becoming to the mysteries. For times and the differences of persons would show very easily that the discourse of the Holy Scriptures is free from error and fraud, and that it proceeds straightforwardly. D Or, if what I say is not true, and the times and moments are not to be examined—those in which the Word of God was still without flesh and [those in which He was] incarnate—let no one be terrified, even if all things are perhaps spoken of Him indiscriminately, and let the crime of blasphemy be excluded. And if anyone truly thought that He had died, although the Word, who is from the Father, is life by nature, let him bid us to applaud him and arrogate to himself the praises of truth; but whoever says that He Himself died in the flesh, he certainly lies wrongly. For already in some way everything concerning Him appears indiscriminate.
B. That would be correct, if the matter were thought of in this way: yet it is not free from scandal and blame.
A A. Not at all, Hermia; and indeed our disputation would surely push them into another absurdity. B. To what do you refer? A. Some collect tribute, in accordance with the commandment of the Mosaic law, requiring one didrachmon for two heads. They come to Peter to ask whether Christ Himself also should be reckoned among the number of others, and whether tribute should be exacted from Him, or whether He Himself would deny that He was bound by it. The divine disciple immediately went to the Lord, wishing to know what was to be done in this matter: but Jesus, forestalling him, said: "The kings of the earth, from whom do they receive tribute or tax? From their sons, or from strangers?" And when Peter said, "From strangers," He added: "Therefore the sons are free. But lest we cause them to stumble, go to the sea, cast a hook, and take the fish that first comes up; and when you have opened its mouth, you will find a stater; take that, and give it to them for Me and for you." B Do you understand, therefore, that by that testimony He confirmed the freedom of His nature? But this surpasses the creature. For everything that has been produced serves the Creator. Thus also our divine David cried out to the Lord of all, to God: "All things serve You." Therefore the Son is in no way of servile condition, nor is He counted among the subjects, but is in the divine and supreme nature, which transcends all creatures. B. It is absolutely so. C A. Shall we, therefore, O Hermia, subject Him who is conspicuous in such august majesty to the yoke of servitude, even if He is said to have descended in the form of a servant? But how would that not be inept? For if He was made in the form of a servant, it follows, I think, that before the form of a servant He lived certainly in a free and untrammeled nature. For He would not be what He was, but if He cast aside those things in which He was, He would have rightly and deservedly migrated to something else. Therefore, the Son came to us, not from servants into a servant, but from a free nature into the form of a servant. But if there is no distinction, if time is nothing, if the discussion of persons helps nothing here, and if the Word should be understood as naked and still without flesh, then He should not indeed be called free, but a servant, and be numbered among the subjects. D B. But how can it be that those things should not teem with every kind of absurdity? A. Therefore let the adversaries hear: Since you do not allow the times and persons to be scrutinized, where are you heading? What are you doing, O you who are oppressed and driven by every evil spirit? Why do you mix what cannot be mixed, having rejected the time, the persons, and the reasons, by which the contemplation of those things which are spoken concerning the Son might be clear and very distinct? For where the Word of God, begotten of the Father, was not yet incarnate, there consider the divine majesty, the still unmixed, sincere, and unconfused glory, the supreme freedom, equal with
A the Father in power. For through him all things that at one time were not, were brought into existence. Moreover, the communion of will, the equality in working, and the all-embracing likeness are recorded by Moses. For he introduced God saying—clearly, of course, to the Word who co-exists in him and with him—"Let us make man in our image and after our likeness." For the "Let us make," being not of one, would better befit those who are more than one or two.
Since, however, out of pity and love for us, moved as it were by his innate and God-befitting gentleness, B "being in the form of God and the Father, he did not count equality with God a prize to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself"—what argument will persuade us (who are concerned to think rightly about him) to presume to censure and demean the state of his emptying, that is, him who for our sake and on our behalf laid aside his own supremacy unto emptiness? For it is then that the Only-Begotten began to be called the firstborn, and is reckoned among many brethren, the one and only [Son] as Son from the Father. For he descended to humiliation, and appeared as we are, not that he might suffer any of the things commonly associated with wrongdoing—by casting aside his being God and truly Son—but that he might transfer what is by nature servile and created, namely ourselves, to the glory that resides in him and the Lord alone, having rendered us sons of God.
When, therefore, he is ranked with us by being called "firstborn," we shall not go so far as to force him into a condition contrary to his nature—far from it. Rather, he himself shall lift us up, so that we are forced into a condition above our nature. For to say that he has been enslaved to the creature, how is this not altogether senseless? Thus, having become as we are, he will not happen to be as we are in any respect by having cast aside what is his own; rather, we, through him, are raised above ourselves, by the grace of him who honors us, beyond the condition of our own nature, and translated to a higher and surpassing state.
B. How do you mean? A. For are we not called born of the Spirit and children of God? B. Yes. A. Therefore we are also commanded to call no one on earth father, but to assign our service to God as to a Father, because of the firstborn who was born among us, and for no other reason than that we also, through him, might be sons. For in this way the goal of the incarnate economy will be sound. For where would the mystery of Christ still be wise, if, before all others, he had injured his own nature while bringing no benefit to our condition? For he descended into being "firstborn" in order that he might be ranked with many, C even though he possesses no common ground with those among whom he might be ranked, according to their way of thinking, as if he were another and inferior by nature.
B. But he is called the firstborn of all creation,
A and by incomparable excellences surpasses those things which are joined [to creation].
A. And where is that "incomparable in glory," or what will be the magnitude of the excellence, as long as it is said that he, along with all other things, was created in a like manner with him? But our discourse for the present does not busy itself with what it is that surpasses or is surpassed in rank and glory, but rather with what is by nature created and produced, and what is above and beyond this, and whether the Only-Begotten possesses a nature distinct from others, which leaves behind it by a long interval all that is believed to have been created. For if anyone, desiring to learn what the sun is by nature, or what a horse is, were to ask, "Are these things generated and created from things that were not, or is there something else besides this?" what would you yourself say?
B. I would say that they are created.
A. But if he were further to inquire and press the matter by saying, "What then is to be preferred over the other in both of these, as regards glory?" would he not provoke our laughter by bringing into question a matter so easy to state and so manifest, and ready to be answered by those who wish?
B. Indeed, very much so.
A. Such things are nonsense, I believe. For how or whence could a horse compete in glory with the sun? It is distant by an immense interval; but if by chance anyone were to weigh the rationale of the essence in both, and consider what each of these things is, they will not differ from one another in the aspect of being created, although the sun excels it so much in glory. When, therefore, the argument is tested concerning the Son, and it is set before us to contemplate what he is by nature, it is truly a cold and hollow boast to think he should be preferred and excel others in glory if he is inscribed into the number of creatures and is reckoned among us as one who is created. For some adorn him with external prerogatives, while in the meantime they strike him with a kind of lethal wound, and pretend to embellish with the splendor of certain petty glories and praises the foulness of the blasphemy which they pour forth against him. For whoever is ranked substantially among creatures and exists among generated things, he will not surely be God by nature, nor indeed the true Son and Lord, but in a certain way, he is one who is distinguished among servants and is conspicuous only by a bare and naked glory among those who are subject to the yoke.
B. You speak rightly.
A. But this, too, suddenly comes to me to wonder at.
B. What is that?
A. Since they are unwilling to acknowledge and believe that the Only-Begotten is always, they talk nonsense, setting up that term "firstborn" against simpler people. And yet, how would it not be a truthful statement if anyone were to choose to say this: "If the name 'firstborn' assigns the Son to the order of creatures, as if among many brothers, and for this reason he is 'firstborn,' then the term 'only-begotten' will entirely show him to be of neither the same order nor the same nature." For as if there were no other besides him by nature, so would he be only-begotten. But if he is to be not "firstborn" because he is "only-begotten," yet neither, on the other hand, can he be "only-begotten" because of
A that which is firstborn, it follows that one should think that the Son does not exist at all. For they are opposed to each other, and in a way they perish together in their mutual collision, and by the force and reason of the things signified, "firstborn" and "only-begotten" are contrary to one another. For how could both be predicated of one and the same person, and both be understood as true?
B. He could not be, I suppose, unless the dispensation of the incarnation is admitted at the same time.
A. Yet know that you think nothing other than what has seemed right to the holy and God-speaking Fathers, who both handed down to us and explained the doctrine concerning these things. For the divine John called the Word from God both only-begotten and God, and furthermore also testified to his having no beginning in time, as being God. But our Paul, who also abounds in Christ and is full of the Holy Spirit, that most excellent interpreter of mysteries: "When, however," he says, "he introduces the Firstborn into the world, he says: And let all the angels of God worship him," B assigning the time, I suppose, that is suitable for the firstborn, that of the incarnation. For thus he was brought into the world, although he was in it of old and always, and was not recognized by it. And thus he has been shown at last as the mediator of God and men, possessing as his own and peculiar the fact that he was only-begotten. For he was God from God, one from one, and ineffably begotten. But when he became man like us, then indeed, then he is also ranked among brothers by being called firstborn. For where is that emptying, if it is not in the fact that he was made firstborn from being only-begotten, and in the fact that he is among creatures with us as a man, he who surpasses all creation? And where at all did he become poor, being rich, if he is not seen to have assumed what was alien, through which he also became poor? But if it is only in being emptied, and in the time of his humiliation, that he is found to be a generated being and ranked among creatures; would it not be most unbecoming for the generated one [who is not emptied] not to be emptied, but to surpass creation and to run beyond the glory of having been made?
B. Certainly it would be.
A. And if the term "firstborn" is very aptly introduced in view of his choosing to suffer for our sake that proverbial poverty, for he became poor with us, being rich, it would be firm and true, I suppose, to think that when he was not suffering poverty, he was only-begotten. For I think it necessary by all means that there should be no falsehood attributed to him in either of the names. And in the same one is both only-begotten and firstborn, as Son in truth, and not a creature.
B. But, they say, the name "Son" is applied even to those who are confessedly creatures: "For I have said," he says, "You are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most High."
A. Then what, I ask, would injure the glory of the true and natural God and Son, who has appeared from the very substance of God and the Father, or indeed the very reason by which he is understood to exist, if we ourselves also, although of earthly nature...
have been called sons and gods by adoption? Or rather, would not the consideration of our own case be of some moderate benefit to those who are more teachable in matters concerning the Son B. In what way? A. A I would say, my good friend, that the power of terms used catachrestically—that is, improperly—neither drags down into a lower state those that have been allotted a supreme and sublime nature, nor, on the other hand, does it raise what is lesser and inferior to their splendor into a supernatural state, merely by being adorned with, as it were, hyperbolic names. Do you understand what I am saying, and do you grasp it clearly? B. Not altogether. A. Listen then. Since there is one God above us who is worshipped by nature, we ourselves have also been called gods by grace, and furthermore, we have been enriched with the glory of sonship. But is this not what you were just pointing out to us? B. Yes. A. What then, my dear friend? Since we have been called gods and sons, is it possible that we ourselves should be gods by nature, and truly sons of the One who is set above and rises above all things, not having an acquired splendor in this regard, but being believed to be the fruits of the supreme nature? B. By no means. For how could that which is created by nature be God by nature? A. Well said, my friend; for each thing remains in its own nature, not being raised up by the inflation of a word, nor indeed being brought low and subsiding through the humility of speech, even if some of the more lowly terms C are used concerning it. Therefore, come now, let us say that if the term "firstborn" is used of the Son, as being created for our sake when he appeared as we are, he would not lose his being God and Son by nature and in truth. For just as the fact that we have been called gods did not raise us to a supernatural state, so I think he would in no way be brought down to a state contrary to nature by being ranked among creatures on account of his human state.
But if some should refuse to accept that locutions in the divinely inspired Scriptures are used freely and improperly, I think both we and they would be bereft of every argument, if someone were to inquire more curiously and press as to why the divinely inspired Scriptures reduce the nature that surpasses all things—the nature that is above body and form, that is without quantity and magnitude, that cannot be touched, and that lacks matter—to bodily forms, by naming for us the face of the Lord, and his hands, and his feet? D Yet we should most easily and vigorously refute their objections by acutely answering that this license of words, which is necessarily devised for the benefit of those who hear, does nothing to hinder that which is superior to body from being what it is. Does this reasoning not seem probable and correct to you? B. Certainly. A. But since, puffed up by an excessive persuasion of their own wisdom, they foolishly maintain that the term "firstborn" is an unassailable argument against the Only-Begotten, saying...
A that he must needs be numbered among the creatures, as having been allotted a nature that is sister and kin to all other things, according to the principle of being created; are you willing that we bring forward something else that is not useless for the sake of benefit?
B. You will be saying it most gladly, as far as I am concerned.
A. Have we not, through the Son, been called to adoption, we who have received faith in him, and have been formed unto him, as images unto an archetype?
B. We have indeed been called and formed unto the Son. For it is written that, "As many as received him, to them he gave the power to become children of God, to those who believe in his name."
A. You have spoken most excellently. But then, regarding what is necessary in this matter, I know that you could also state it very correctly. We have been called to B adoption; but is it substantial and natural? And if it is not, does it follow that the brotherhood and kinship we have been allotted has not happened, or how is it?
B. It is not substantial in any way, but adventitious and by grace.
A. How then is the Word still a creature through being the "firstborn"? And in what way will he be ranked substantially among brethren because of the similarity with them, when the brotherhood with him is not something we possess naturally, but rather something external and defined by time, and not for those who preceded the advent in the flesh, but for those [who lived] when he became as we are? For they would not say, I think, even if they are accustomed to talking utter nonsense, C that the ancients were called into brotherhood with the Son by the legal Scripture. For there was in that, a spirit of slavery. Whence it is very clear that the Word of God is not among us as a slave, since he did not take upon himself the servile state in order to attain brotherhood. But now, we must proceed wisely and undistractedly to that point.
B. What is that?
A. That which belongs by nature to some existing things, Hermias, could not be sharable through the passage of time, nor could it be assumed from elsewhere as if it were something foreign, but it is always seen to be inherent, and it accompanies the very existence [of the thing]. For example, a human being is rational from the beginning and by nature, but he is nonetheless not necessarily wealthy. Will he therefore receive D wealth as something adventitious and external? Yet he relies upon natural laws to be and to be called rational. Is it not true, then, that no one, I think, would be considered to receive, in the course of time, that which he possesses from the very moment that he progresses into being?
B. It is true.
A. If, therefore, the Son was always a brother and numbered among the creatures, as being of the same nature as they, and was for this reason the "firstborn," why did he bestow as a gift what is naturally inherent in us, I mean brotherhood, as if we did not possess it? And why did he give it only to those who have believed, even though it belongs to all, even if they have not yet believed? For what is it that still intervenes and separates in their union, according to the principle of being created, the thing created from the thing created; does...?
facto? Do you now perceive where the reasoning of the adversaries is heading? B. I do. A. Therefore, setting aside these foolish reasonings, let us pass on, I pray, to that which is beyond reproach, rightly holding that He is the Firstborn for our sake, when He became like unto us, and in turn the Only-begotten, as being reckoned among no others, since He alone was begotten from the very substance of God and the Father. B B. But if they also should see fit to say that He is the Only-begotten, inasmuch as He alone was begotten from the Father alone, what could you say to this? A. I would surely think, and not unjustly, that they are devoid of sense and have fallen away from the noble and vigorous contemplation of things. Furthermore, I would say that they fall quite short of an accurate knowledge of words, passing over their true meaning and inconsiderately distorting it according to their own whim and caprice. For "Only-begotten" signifies that which is by nature begotten from something, not that which is crafted by art; or certainly let them come forward to answer where they have read that term applied to any artificial object. We will not indeed concede to their madness those things they want to establish, by perverting the force of the things signified into something depraved. For if a carpenter should build one ship and only one, will it be called his "only-begotten," given that it is a construct and a work of art? Is that not ridiculous? Or does it seem wise to you? C B. Not at all. A. But the fact that the adversaries argue in such a vain and most foolish manner—namely, that the Son is begotten from the Father alone, and that therefore He has obtained a highly exalted nature and has reached the highest pinnacle of glory—will show them to be sinning in two ways and acting like fools. B. Tell me how. A. First, because by a necessary and inevitable logical consequence, they will ascribe to the Father a cessation upon the Son being begotten, and they will be forced, even against their will, to acknowledge that that Nature which is moved with perennial motion has ceased from Its own works and desisted from creation, and after Him has touched nothing at all, but has in some way handed over to the power and nature of the Son those things that were to be achieved and done, through which alone the Supreme Nature can be recognized. D And while the fruits of the begotten substance are those things proper to the Godhead, God and Father, it seems, will boast in one and only one creature, namely the Son; whereas the latter [the Son] will surely boast in so many more, and will think more highly of Himself, being rendered equal to Him in power, from the fact that He possesses the power of creating and of bringing into existence things that never were; and He will be superior, I imagine, in goodness, if indeed it is the mark of the good to lead from non-existence to existence, and to bring it about that things which have not yet received the grace of existence should be. Therefore to the absurd
A the discourse slips, rendering idle the ever-moving nature, to which alone it would be fitting to distribute existence to things that are not; for do the wretches not stop the very source and generation of kindness at the creation of the Son, according to their own imaginings, having leaped down into their own reasonings as they pleased? And yet why did the blessed Moses, although God and the Father chose to remain idle and inactive in other respects, compose for us words and empty deceits, or accordingly, as they would have it, record them by saying, "And God said: Let us make man after our image and likeness"? For the word "Let us make," while indicating that He is not in the least reluctant to create, but rather is prepared to work with the Son and the Spirit in forming, and has indeed functioned, he has clearly made known. "For God created," he says, "man; in the image of God He created him." But the divine Moses, being an interpreter of divine things and well crowned by a decree from above, would not be seen as a liar. And the Word, who has shone forth from the Father, will further persuade us, proclaiming the nature of the Father to be ever-moving and active. For Christ said somewhere, rebuking the Jews—for some seemed to be stirred to anger if He did anything on the Sabbath—"My Father works until now, and I work." And elsewhere: "The words that I speak to you, I do not speak from myself; but the Father who remains in me, He does the works." Is it not absurd, Hermias, I would say, and most dangerous, for us to oppose the words of the Savior, and when the divinely inspired Scripture shows the Father as being, together with the Son, the Creator of the universe, to dare to say that He nonetheless remains idle regarding creation?
B. Most dangerous.
A. I think it is also very foolish.
B. What is that?
A. For if the Son obtained an exceptional manner of creation, and one far more excellent for this one and only reason, that He alone was begotten from the Father alone, let them tell me—as I wish to learn—whether the Father envies the creatures that are posterior to the Son and made through Him, by not allowing them to arrive at the fullness of happiness in that He is unwilling to create them Himself? Or will they say that He is free from all envy and idleness?
B. They will say so, as I suppose.
A. Thinking correctly, my friend, at least in this regard. For they will not appear worse than the wise men among the Greeks, one of whom spoke B concerning God—this was Plato—"He was good, and there is no envy regarding anything in the good." Since, therefore, the Father is good, or rather is goodness itself, and since the creatures have it to attain to a most happy state through his will and operation alone, why should the matter not be in common, without envy, to all as something proposed, so that He is praised as good, but...
A he handed over the task of creation to another, depriving the creature of the one who incomparably excels?
B. But, they say, the Father does not cease altogether; for He works together with the Son, and together with Him constitutes the rest.
A. What, then, is the contribution the Son has in this regard? Is it that His operation is better than His own, and for that reason is usefully, or rather necessarily, adopted for His movements? Or is it that it is lesser and inferior, and was not necessarily accepted? If, indeed, it is as better and useful, this is empty talk, or rather, it is already a blasphemy. For the Son will surely surpass Him from whom He has come forth, and will excel the nature of God and the Father, filling His place, and perfecting that which is better. But if it is because it is inferior and not necessarily adopted, but makes the creation in a way baser, what is it, I ask, that compels Him to work together with the Son? Or will not someone immediately say that the Father, I know not how, has neglected the better part and snatched at the worse, having rejected or certainly neglected the crafting of the creature, by which alone and only it could have been branded with pure beauty, but having adopted the Son, so that it might not happily obtain a pure creation, free from the inferior, and a production?
B. But, they say, the created nature was not capable of that simple act of creating; C and it is not credible that such a supernatural and supreme majesty should have descended even to the meanest things.
A. Certainly these are the dregs of an adulterous and nefarious mind. For is it reasonable for a wise man to think that, if the created and produced nature could scarcely, or rather could not at all obtain that it be created by the Father Himself, this should be easy and obvious to the Son alone, even though, as they wish, He has been allotted a nature equal to the creatures? For that which does not fall at all upon created things, could not have fallen upon even one of them, although it may seem to excel and to be far superior to the rest. But to assert rashly that it does not befit the Father’s majesty to descend to those meanest things holds a double blasphemy. For they will D injure the Son, and they will vilify the Father Himself, although they think they are honoring Him.
B. What, by thinking or saying this?
A. For while they lower the Son from the preeminence that is understood in the Father, yet, I suppose, they would not take away from Him the reaching of the highest summit of preeminence and glory, even if some should be of the most discordant sort. Is it then, since the Son is possessed of such a nature, and has reached such a height of honor and majesty, that it would befit Him, I ask, to create Principalities and Thrones and Dominions, and things even superior to these, and yet a small sparrow, and that which is still viler than another
we should attribute to the powers of some other A being? Would we find ourselves to be in our right minds if we thought this?
B. By no means. "For all things were made by Him, and without Him was made nothing," as it is written.
A. But how would it not be something mean and lowly for the nature of the Son to have fashioned a sparrow? And why, when He is the image and likeness of God and the Father, did He not also preserve this likeness in Himself? I mean, by refusing to grant to things so ignoble the life-giving and productive power that brings them into being? Or, as some, while marveling at the supreme majesty of God and the Father, say that the creation of angels is a small thing for Him, might they not also aptly say, while measuring the Son as well, that the production of a reptile, the coming into being of a sparrow, and the variegated diversity of the wildflowers of the fields, would fall far short of the dignity befitting Him? Yet why, then, does the Psalmist adorn the Maker of these very things with praises greater than any speech, saying: B "He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of men"? Either, then, they must introduce to us other makers who correspond in some proportion to the nature of created things, or they will quite obviously cast disgrace upon the Only-Begotten, by establishing Him as the author of such highly trifling things.
B. No small danger hangs over them from this argument.
A. And how could they not compose a tapestry of arrogance and ignorance regarding the Father, if they say that He deigns C to be the God of those whom He would be, and is, the God of, while yet claiming that He disdains to create them? And yet I hear Christ speaking, and marveling at the providence of God and the Father: "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing, and one of them shall not fall upon the ground without your Father who is in heaven?" He who extends the scope of His own providence even to a sparrow, how would He disdain to create angels, and to establish the heaven, and to fix the earth, and to produce the sun and moon and stars, for which He is also admired by the holy angels, who praise Him as a master workman? For He said: "When the stars were made, all my angels praised me with a loud voice." Do I not seem to you to have reasoned the likely conclusion and to speak correctly?
B. Perfectly so.
A. Tell me, would you say that whatever is created, whether it be small or great, is not the work of divine power?
B. By no means.
A. Then how is it not ignorant and stupid to call those things which were made through the Son "divine works," and yet not to believe that He is God Himself, but rather to enroll Him among created things, as if He were of the same nature as them? For that which is created is not God; but neither would created things manifest the substantial D eminence of the Creator unless they were inferior.
A
B. What then if they say that the divinity and eternal power of the Father are manifested through the magnificence of created things?
A. They will be accusing their own doctrine, and they will quite easily be shown to be in conflict with their own set opinions.
B. How do you mean?
A. That measuring and defining the creative operation of the Father by the production of the Son, they say that He is perceived from the creation of the world, although Holy Scripture attributes the creation of the world to the Son. For it is written: “By the word of the Lord the heavens were established, and all the power of them by the spirit of his mouth.” B Therefore the world proclaims to us the Word as Creator, and displays His power and divinity as manifest. For when we perceive the creature, we do not admire the Word, the Maker of the creature, as a creature; but with a far more sublime thought we piously worship Him, believing the Only-Begotten to be God by nature, and to have shone forth from God. For thus, freed from the charge of error, we may avert from our own head the punishments which the divine Paul has also denounced to us in these words: “For this cause God gave them up into the lusts of their own hearts, unto uncleanness, to dishonour their own bodies C between themselves: who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.” Therefore, if some teach that the truth has been falsified by a lie and most impiously adulterated, as they serve created things before God by nature, surely a reprobate mind is in us also, and we have in some way been cast into error, and we wander with the impious, worshipping a created nature—to wit, the Son (for He has been "made" according to their opinion), otherwise that which is created is not that which is made.
B. Why not?
A. See then, Hermias, into what great folly their minds are falling. For the divine and sacred D Scriptures say somewhere that the nations have acknowledged the living and true God, having been brought by faith to the acknowledgment of the Son; but these miserable ones come to such a pitch of madness that they do not
throw upon Him the littleness that comes from having been created. And yet it is written [1 Thess. 1, 9] regarding those who had been chosen to be holy apostles: "For they themselves," he says, "report of us what manner of entry we had unto you, and how ye turned unto God from idols, to serve a living and true God." If then it is a disgrace of Hellenic worship to offer adoration to the creature, but the nations were turned unto the living and true God, having acknowledged Christ as Lord, and have been brought unto the adoration of the Son—which is, after all, joined with the Father—how could He still be thought of as created? And is there not a necessity to think that faith is empty, and the opinion concerning God among us ourselves is false, even though we are said to have escaped the blame of our ancient error according to the scripture?
B. Yes, they say: for the nations were turned unto the living and true God, the Father, clearly.
A. And what would be the standard of our conversion to God? Or how could any, very rightly and without error, proceed unto the living and true Lord, having cast off as stale the worship of the creature?
B. By faith, I suppose. For this is "the interrogation of a good conscience toward God" [1 Pet. 3, 21].
A. The saying is true; but answer this: is faith not in the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit?
B. I agree.
A. But those who have determined to preserve their faith unshaken B and blameless, and free from every stain, would they believe in God and at the same time in a creature, or rather, simply in God, introducing the Son as of one nature with the Father?
B. Into one God, clearly, or into one nature of divinity; or assuredly let them know that they will not keep their foot from the crime of binding the natural God to the creature.
A. It is established, therefore, that faith is also in the Son, as in the living and true God. And this will be made clear to you without difficulty if you hear the Son saying: "Ye believe in God, believe also in me" [John 14, 1]—not as into a creature and God, far be it! But rather, because of the identity of substance C and changeless equality, into one nature of divinity. And so He said again: "He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me" [John 12, 44]. For believing in the Son does not estrange one from the Father, but brings back the true and genuine adorer to the begetting Father through the begotten. And that the multitude of those who once worshipped idols acknowledged and worshipped Christ as the true God, you may learn more easily from Paul saying thus: "Wherefore remember, that once ye, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by that which is called circumcision in the flesh, made by hands, that ye were at that time separate from Christ, D alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in
A the world. You understand, therefore, that while they were separate from Christ, the nations were also distant from God by nature and were alienated from the truth; for they were indeed without God in the world. But when they acknowledged the Son through faith, they appeared within the sphere of a good hope, and both fled from and washed away the disgrace of impiety. B. You speak rightly. A. The Son, therefore, is truly God. For in this way, that which we have believed to be renewed in ourselves through holy baptism remains unassailed and unadulterated. B. But what is that? For I do not sufficiently understand. A. Is it not, O dear soul, that we have been born by a spiritual generation into the Son, being configured and conformed through the Spirit to His divine and super-mundane beauty, and are rendered partakers of the divine nature, having obtained a participation in the Son, as God? B B. Entirely so. A. How then will He be created? Furthermore, will that mystery which is in us be a fraud, and an empty hope, and as it seems, one possessing (if one may say) only a reputation in mere words and a deception in truth and a mere appearance, if He is not that which we have been persuaded He is? For being partakers of the divine nature, how or whence are we, or what sort of character of God is imprinted upon us, if we have been conformed to the Son, inasmuch as He is not God, as though He were made? It is time to think of the Father also as not being unbegotten... the character. But answer this: I will ask you: since you have considered what the divine nature is, will you not say that the thing is completely incomparable and not to be compared to a creature, and that it is in no way similar to any created thing? C B. Assuredly so. For how will the nature of God not surpass everything that has been made? A. Therefore, no one who is of sounder mind would admit the uncreated and unbegotten nature to be the archetype of a created thing; for one would not perceive in that which is always and in the same way, the nature which at one time was not and came into being. B. That is how it is. A. But I think the converse is also true. For we would not behold that which is always and in the same way, in that which at one time was not. B. It is true. A. What, then, is there in us worthy of admiration, from the fact that we have been conformed to the Son? Where has the divine beauty shone into the hearts of the believers as something D unusual and external, when for every created thing toward a created thing, insofar as they are understood as created, the identity of form is not a thing added, but rather the law of nature imprints it? Therefore, if the rest of creation is, as they claim, always conformed to the Son, what sort of beauty is being imprinted upon our souls through the Spirit?
A vain and superfluous claim, as it seems, will thus appear, since it adds in vain that which, even if one were unwilling, nature happens to attain, and possesses of itself, not having received it from another. But, I think, any man endowed with a right and unerring mind would mock these people. For we who believe are partakers of the divine nature through the relation to the Son by the Spirit, not in mere opinion, but in truth; and we have been conformed to God, being refashioned toward the beauty that is above creation. For Christ is formed in us ineffably, not as a created being among created beings, but as uncreated and as God in a created and made nature, transforming it into His own image through the Spirit, and transferring B the creature—that is, us—to a dignity superior to creation.
B. There is nothing, therefore, that repels or excludes the Only-Begotten from true sonship; nay, we will rather concede it to be begotten, not made.
A. It is so, provided that we truly receive Him as God, and believe that He must be honored with the adoration due from us and from the holy angels, and grant that He be crowned with the prerogatives and glories of the Godhead, lest, passing by the Creator and overleaping the nature that is truly queen of all, we worship the creature, and by bestowing the glory of the Unbegotten upon the begotten, we justly hear the words: "Behold, a foolish and heartless people."
B. For indeed even they would not say that He is both Son and God.
A. And how is it not utterly senseless and ridiculous, while painting Him C as with colors in an image and a picture with mere names and superior titles, to despoil Him of divine glory by placing Him among created things? Or is it not very unseemly to say that He was made, if He is God—as He is, and worthy of adoration?
B. You speak rightly.
A. If, therefore, they cast aside those benign words with which they charm us, and push the Son as far as possible from the true Godhead, let them speak this with open voice and blaspheme publicly. For they will immediately hear from us and from the holy angels in opposition: "Walk in the light of your fire, and in the flame which you have kindled." For we shall D turn to the straight path, believing that to be true God—the Word who has come forth from God by ineffable generation. But if, applying a mind that is not overly unteachable or stupid, they will not indeed deny it, suppressing, I suppose, the blasphemy, but while resolving with themselves to confess Him to be God, yet make Him inferior to the substance of God the Father, and say that He is in some way more excellent than the creature, setting Him as it were in a middle ground between the unbegotten and the generated nature—let them hear how the nature of the Godhead can be understood as different; for God compared to God cannot differ in respect to His being God, just as in our own case anyone can observe. For we say that there is one
A nature of humanity, and the definition of substance is one in all, and not different in individuals. Either, therefore, let those who believe that God exists exempt Him altogether from the number of creatures; or if they are unwilling to be of this opinion, let them not even confess that God exists at all. For we shall then break out into laughter and say: "Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by its fruit" (Matt. XII, 33). For, my friend, would we not clearly and unerringly know what each of the things that exist is as to its nature, from those things which it is truly believed to be? B. Certainly. A. Come then, let us examine what the nature of the Son finally is, considering this in addition: if He is not God by nature, but is rather created and brought into existence with us, as those who are intoxicated and delirious imagine, how, then, did the world slip away from Him, and how was the creature separated? By intervals of place and distances? But is this not mere quibbling? For where, or how, will an incorporeal thing be at a distance, and what kind of place will encompass it? Indeed, the blessed John has testified, saying, "He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him" (John I, 10). Shall we, therefore, Hermias, if we hold the right view, B grant that there is no other mode of interval and interjected space than this, that the world did not recognize the Creator who was perpetually with it? B. For who can deny it? A. The world, therefore, was a fugitive when it shunned His fellowship, not recognizing the Creator as superior to the creature, and casting away that spiritual relation by turning toward vice. For at the same time that human nature was brought into existence by the ineffable nods of the Artificer, it was adorned by its connection with the Spirit. For He "breathed into his face the breath of life" (Gen. II, 7), since, I believe, the living being would not have the splendor of sanctification and familiarity with God perpetually in any other way than by being adorned with the participation of the Holy Spirit. Wherefore, when the Only-Begotten found human nature stripped of that ancient and primitive blessing, He set out to reform it again into its pristine state, as if pouring from the fountain of His own fullness C and saying: "Receive the Holy Spirit" (John XX, 22), D clearly sketching the nature of the Spirit by means of a bodily and external breath. For to be renewed to the pristine state will be the same as to be produced in the beginning; and the nature of the created being endured that mode of separation, not by intervals of places—far from it—but rather by a repulse from God, and by being displaced from its spiritual connection with Him. Whence, if it wishes, it recurs to its first state, having obtained spiritual reformation and having been called to the participation of His divine nature through the Spirit. If, therefore, the Son is to be counted among creatures, as they wish: by what means, then, has the creature fallen away from Him and been separated
For that which is akin is always attractive A to its own kind, and a created being would not be separated from a created being, at least insofar as both are created. For alienation is usually perceived in things that are of a different genus or species, and not in those that have been allotted one and the same definition of nature. How, then, does He indwell the creature through the Spirit? What does He add or bestow, or to what spiritual height does He translate it, or what better thing does He imprint upon it? And how, if He did not excel us (for He was made with us, as they at least claim), is He said to have emptied Himself, or what sort of condescension was needed so that, lowering Himself as from those heights above the creature, He might be joined to the world and become a part of the world, unless He is above the world and the creature? B. I believe they will be at a loss to answer this. A. But why is He alone free and a liberator, although the whole creation submits its neck as a slave to God? We would be most foolish and delirious, my friend, if we were to place the Son, who is from God by nature and coeternal with God and the Father, in the rank of those who are sons by grace. For where, or of what kind, would our archetype be B if He Himself, toward whom we have been fashioned, should lower Himself with us to that which is by adoption and imitation? B. You seem to have discoursed on this matter to us most clearly and very plainly. However, I think that the adversaries will say: "But have not the holy scriptures long ago sung that the Son is a creature, and has not the divine and great chorus of the apostles acknowledged this?" For Solomon indeed says, depicting the person of the Son in foreshadowing: "The Lord created me as the beginning of his ways for his works." And Peter, who is preeminent among the others: "Therefore let all the house of Israel know most certainly that God has made Him both Lord and Christ." What, then, shall we answer if they attack us again with such words? A. And what, I pray, other than what is true to say: "But our enemies are foolish"? For a mind not illuminated by the wisdom that flows down from the Father of lights C is obscure and dark, and is not able to escape the mist of ignorance. It seems to me that the divine David, having cast off such a baneful disease from himself, prayed to God in this way: "Lighten my eyes, lest I ever sleep in death." Come then, with a keen and sober mind, let us examine the knowledge of the things set before us, and like dogs that have a keen sense of smell, let us track down the truth, which is as yet hidden and not grasped by many. For the Son indeed confesses that He was created; yet He does not say that this happened to Him without cause, but rather for His works, and as the beginning of His ways, which means the ways of God and the Father. Therefore, "to create" in these passages does not signify to produce from nothing those things which do not exist, but rather to lead Him who is and subsists to the doing of such things: just as indeed D of the heights that are above the creature, He might be joined to the world and
A to things destined to happen. Just as, for instance, an overseer of works, by a mere nod, compels a weaver, or perhaps a blacksmith, whether they are standing idle or busy, to do those things which are incumbent upon each by his craft, even though it would not enter anyone’s mind to say that he brought them into being. If, therefore, the Son had said nothing more than, “The Lord created me,” it would have been not altogether improbable for one to suspect that which they preach. But since He does not say that He is created simply or without addition, but “for works and as the beginning of His ways,” why, letting go of the absurd, do they not seize upon what is right, calling to mind that it is written concerning God: “And the Lord became my refuge”? B Would you then concede that God is a created thing, if it be signaled to anyone that He became a refuge? B. By no means. A. What then, tell me: why do these perverted ones hold a mind that is changeable and wayward, and, equipped with various deceptions as if with some sort of armor, do they shock the mind, when they ought above all things to direct it toward the truth, even regarding that which does not seem to be said in a manner highly worthy of God, on account of the humanity of the Son and that likeness which He has with us? Otherwise, since He says He is created (for I believe this too must be said), He also adds that He is begotten. “Before all the hills, He begets me,” C He says. Therefore, we must either do away with the begetting because He says He is created, or, putting aside the creation, we must acknowledge that He is begotten. For these expressions are set against each other in their meanings, yet the word of God has truth in both. Thus, the same One is indeed begotten of the Father as God, but He is created according to the flesh. And the sacred word persuades us of this: “Behold,” it says, “the Virgin shall have in her womb, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which is translated, God with us.” For how would the Word, being God, be with us? Is it by proximity and a local habit, and the law of bodies? But how is this not absurd? Therefore, when He accepted the condition of forming D Himself according to us, and the lowliness of servitude, and He who is uncreated descended to be with us among created beings, then He became with us, even though He is as far removed and exalted as the nature of the divinity is judged to be when compared to a creature and a thing made. Wherefore the divine David also called the Only-Begotten who came forth from God, who is exalted above us by infinite and incomparable types of eminence and endowed with ineffable glory, to accept our likeness, chanting and saying: “Why, O Lord, have you stood afar off, and do you despise us in times of opportunity, in tribulations?” For He who is separated by the law of nature, and has obtained an identity and eminence unlike and inaccessible to all other things, became with us when He underwent for our sake the voluntary emptying. But if they say it is not thus, I think nothing thereafter will prevent us from asserting firmly that the Scripture has gossiped in vain
A of the Son, saying he was "made" when he became man. For when was he not with us, if he is indeed created?
B. You speak well.
A. But if he be said to have been made Christ and Lord, you will reflect that he emptied himself, having submitted to the rank of a servant on account of the likeness to us. And it was, I suppose, wise and necessary, that the divine nature should not be overcome by our conditions, nor by the ignominy of the flesh, as though it possessed the accusation of servitude as something ineffaceable, and an acquired ignominy, but rather that the smallness of status arising from servitude should yield to the glory of the Godhead. Since, therefore, he has been reckoned among servants for our sake, but has returned again to the lordship that resides in him and cannot be removed, and which is established by the laws of nature, he is said to be called Lord, and to have been made with us on account of his humanity. But if we, neglecting true contemplation, intend to attribute to the Word all the things of the flesh, or the things done and said on account of the flesh, we shall offend B not a little. For he was "under the law," and indeed visible and tangible, and "a little lower than the angels," and "was numbered with the transgressors," and "as a sheep he was led to the slaughter," and he endured such a miserable death. Must we then attribute to the nature of the Word—even if he be understood as without flesh—even these most vile things, and those joined with much ignominy? What follows from this? The beloved and the co-assessor with the Father would surely lose everything, I think, that raises him to divine glory, or rather, even that which makes him equal to the holy angels. Why then C is he honored here in divine seats, and sits with the Father, while they stand around in a circle, not disdaining the measure of servitude under him? And he is, and is called, Lord Sabaoth, while they celebrate him with praises of lordship, and say heaven and earth are full of his glory? Is it not, therefore, a disease of a vain and foolish mind, and one utterly cold and delirious, to say that he—so marveled at and possessing the summit of glory—was made?
B. Entirely so; for my argument bears in this direction. But they say, nevertheless, that the Son was set forth for the works of the Father, not only when he underwent our form, but from the moment he shone forth, so that through him he might perform D all things, attributing to him an instrumental ministry in the creatures, as if he brought his own motion into them.
A. Oh, the so terrible and unadulterated insolence! For what words would they still spare, who dare to chatter such follies even against God the Father himself, saying that he is a vain creator, and not possessing sufficient creative power to accomplish anything, but at the same time is both departing from what is fitting and thus deprived of the highest power?
B. In what way?
A. Do you not reflect, firstly, that if it were better for the creator God and Father to be provided with an instrumental [agency] for his own motions...
and for him to be considered a creator and by nature disposed in this way, and [to expect] whatever he might wish to accomplish—or rather, not to escape censure—that [it is] written, if he who acts toward works in another manner has not wronged the Son, by not bringing [things] into existence through an instrument and the mediation of another, but by bestowing upon Him, naked and alone, the ministry of His own power? And while other creatures, which they say are lesser than the glory of the Son, have been allotted the most excellent and superior mode of creation, yet He, although adorned with such superior prerogatives, [was given] a meaner and more ignoble one. But, perhaps some will say, it was better that He should be created by the Maker Himself, and the Son was allotted this mode. But what, I ask, compelled that most sublime and altogether marvelous will of the Father so that B He did not prefer the better mode to the worse in creating, but deviated from that which was most fitting, while without cause He showed Himself negligent in performing what was required?
B. Was it then necessary, they say, for the Father of all to set about creating things immediately?
A. Why not, my friend? Was it not better for Him [the Son] to receive instrumental and ministerial aid? For from this, a great crowd of absurd arguments will arise and emerge for us. For what need is there of a helper for God and the Father, and what use is there of an instrument and mediator, I do not see. For if in truth He knows the concurrence of a co-creator to be necessary for Himself, and for this purpose usefully employed Him who is called Son—and yet He is counted among creatures, as they wish—how will He have C the perfect power to create, since through an instrument He barely collects in Himself the perfect faculty of doing that for which He is said to be naturally adapted—not to mention anything else blasphemous! For the plenitude of divinity has appeared as a created thing, and has been taken in place of a ministry [as] a most useful aid to the creative power of the Father. But how, I pray you, did He suffice for creating the Son immediately, since He is created, albeit by far and incomparably superior? With such deceptive honors they cunningly beguile Him, [while] blushing, I think, at the foulness of their blasphemy. But He who, having employed no one's help, sufficed alone for such an excellent and supereminent thing, how would He have grown weak in crafting inferior things while destitute of a helper? Are those who do not fear to even consider such D things not to be mourned?
B. Why surely? But hear something further. For they say that it is a small thing for God and the Father that He Himself creates all things by Himself.
A. Away with such blasphemy, O man! But you would speak rightly, having kept your own soul as far as possible from a crime of this sort: "Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth, and a door for my lips, that my heart may not incline to words of evil, to seek excuses in sins, with men"
A working iniquity. For he who says that it is a small thing for God and Father to create all things by Himself, claims that He is not free from vanity and arrogance, and assigns this pair of the most loathsome and detestable passions to Him. He would be ignorant in another way too, not even considering where his argument is heading. I would, however, like to ask you. B. What is that? A. Do they not say that the Son is created? B. Yes, but what of it? A. If, then, we were to look, as far as is possible for us, at whatever the nature that governs all things is, would not everything made by it appear small? B. Small, undoubtedly. A. Did He then wish the Son B to create alone and uniquely; but being, as it were, ashamed of the fact, does He immediately abandon it and assign to the power of another the bringing of things that were once non-existent into being? And yet the most excellent and supreme portion of divine glory and praise is the ability to create, since through it, who and how great God is becomes known to us. "For from the greatness and beauty of created things, their creator is proportionally seen," as it is written. But if He considers those things through which He is known to be small and worthless, He disgraces His own nature, acknowledging it, as is likely, to be utilizing a most lowly condition. And yet it is highly glorious for every man and for every angel to possess perfectly those things through which each is seen to be what he is by nature, and no one would be ashamed of his lot if he wished to be known as what he is by nature. Why then would God be ashamed of His own works, or deem it a reproach to Himself that things exist through which He is understood to be God? But if it is small and not worthy of notice to Him to have made the Seraphim C and to have brought forth the angels, when He weighs the magnitude and the most excellent superiority of His own nature, would it not in the same way be small to wish to be worshipped and glorified by them? For of whom He does not deem Himself the creator, how could He wish to be considered God? Yet why does He demand honor and worship from us, if He does not even deem us worthy of being brought into existence? And how would He not be damaging His own glory if He considers that through which He is glorified to be small? B. How then, they say, did the Father create all things through the Son? A. As through the Word, and wisdom, and the power that resides in Him. For the Son is all these things to the Father. But let us examine this in such a way, walking on the royal road and keeping to the straight path of truth. For would you not agree, and very readily, that if we say the Father is the creator, it will necessarily follow that one must understand that He does not create without power and wisdom, nor indeed without the Word? B. It will certainly follow. For the Psalmist indeed says: "Thou hast made all things in wisdom." But the D...
prophet Jeremiah, explaining more clearly the creation of the universe, cried out saying: "The Lord who made the earth in his power, who established the world in his wisdom, and in his understanding stretched out the heaven." A A. What then? Does not Jeremiah clearly write to us that all things were created with the wisdom, power, and prudence of God? And the wise John says that all things were made through the Son: "For all things," he said, "were made through him, and without him was nothing made." B. Yes. What then does this portend? A. It implies, of course, that the Son, since he is the wisdom and power of the Father, has been made manifest to us. B. How, indeed, or whence is this a matter of dispute? A. Come then, tell me: shall we assume that the Son was brought into existence in the wisdom, understanding, and power of the Father, or that he was brought into existence without wisdom, without understanding, and without strength? For they say he is a created being. B. That is clearly altogether ignorant. For there has never been a time when the Father was without wisdom and power. A. You speak rightly. I shall commend you, for you have chosen to think what is right and just. But what would those who count the Son among the number of created things say to this? For if he did not always exist, but was brought into existence in time by the law of creation—even though he is the wisdom, power, and understanding of the Father—they will have to confess that the Father was without power, wisdom, and understanding before him; and they would be forced to concede that the Son was made without wisdom and power, C although he is surrounded by wondrous gifts, and is placed not in the condition of a creature, but in incomparable superiority. But if, every man of sound mind finding them ridiculous, they thrust away this putrid blasphemy and think that he too was produced in the wisdom and power of the Father, it must necessarily be confessed that he is older than himself, and further, that he is his own creator. For the Son founded himself, if indeed, being himself the whole wisdom and power of the Father, he was made in his own power and wisdom. Do you understand, therefore, how the argument in every way collapses into the absurd? B. Most certainly. A. It will also be shown, without much exertion, that their doctrine is most foolish in another way. For come, my friend, let us analyze, as far as our mind can grasp, the nature of God—that is, what it is, how great it is, and what befits it. Do we believe that God creates by granting to created things the cause of their coming into existence, merely willing that they should be, and by this nod alone causing things that once were not to exist, and thus permeating the whole of creation; or [is it] by having an instrumental ministry and taking, as if a necessary subsidy, the help of a mediator, just as if one were to say that stones are at hand for a stonemason, through which he is able to carve stones and work from his own art? B. But who, I ask you, would deny that he creates solely
A by his nod, as though carrying much of the divine majesty?
A. You have spoken most rightly. For the divine Moses showed God creating for us in this way, and no other. "For He said," he remarks, "God: Let there be a firmament, and it was so." For the perfection of the works exists simultaneously with the utterance of the words, and there is no delay such as would show the mediator and minister—as they desire—to be working and moving instrumentally. For the Word was as it were the subsistence of the work, and the bare nod was the fixing of that which had no existence, and the generation of things that were being made consisted in the mere willing. Since, therefore, it is most excellent and most becoming to God and the Father to create in this way, why do they—I know not how, or rather, foolishly—bestow upon Him an invented aid of a mediator and minister, saying that the Son was made most useful so that He [the Father] might use His ministry for the rest of the creatures? For they are ignorant, as it seems, that although they assert Him to be made, and count the Son among the number of creatures, they prove Him to be more excellent and B more worthy than the Father.
B. In what way?
A. If the Father necessarily acts through a mediator, while the Son accomplishes whatever He wishes by mere will and nods—saying to a leper with authority, "I will, be thou clean," raising those already held by death to life, and bestowing the desired and unusual light upon the blind—would one not then gaze upon the mediator and minister, or rather the natural Creator, being endowed with such illustrious glory, and would the instrument not thus surpass the craftsman?
B. It certainly would.
A. But why at all do they treat the intention and will to think rightly as something stale and reject them, and rashly rush toward the worse, and obey only their own impulse, not even taking into their mind that the work of a man would surely not perform those things of which he himself is the maker, nor would that which is crafted by anyone’s art possess in itself, in the same exact way, that which is proper to the craftsman?
B. For who can deny this? Since the reverse is also true. For a builder, or, let us say, a coppersmith, would never become the works of the art, that is to say, of the coppersmith’s or the builder’s craft.
A. You speak rightly; and I admire you and praise you for your very great keenness of mind. In what way then, if the Son is created, will He work identically C with God and the Father? And, having obtained in His own nature that which is proper and singular to the highest substance of all, does He call those things that are not as though they were, and bring them forth to existence with such great strength and without labor, so that the creation is completed in the mere willing? Or would the Father not have created in this way, when He has His own nature sufficient for this, and D
A entirely without need of support from the energy of created things?
B. It is so.
A. Just as things made by the hand and art of man cannot do and perform the things that are man’s, in the same manner and by the same reasoning, I think, the works of the divine hand could not perform the things of God. Since, however, the Son has created and performed, He will not be a handiwork of divine hand mixed in with all other things, nor is He an artificer produced from non-existence, but rather has He obtained the reality substantially, and no less than the Father Himself has.
B. But since He is an effect from the Father, they say, He performs those things which relate to the creation. For He Himself once said somewhere: “The words that I speak unto you, I speak not from myself; but the Father abiding in me, He does the works.” And again: “The works that I do are not mine, but His who sent me.”
A. These things, I know, our adversaries will urge against us; for they will never cease to adulterate the truth, and to corrupt B by the greatest impiety those things through which the right sense would be provided to them if they were to turn toward the dispensation of the incarnation. If then, being childishly neglectful and altogether rejecting the mystery of Christ, they were to push aside the dispensation of the Word’s incarnation, they would fabricate whatever words they wished to satisfy their own caprice. But if they agree with those who think rightly—namely, that the Word, being God, became flesh and was called man—why do they take offense at the wise disposition of the incarnation, and adapt expressions most appropriate to it to their own caprice, and as much as in them lies, push them toward a sense C contrary to the nature and glory of the Only-Begotten? For the unhappy Jews, when they ought to have admired and followed with praises Christ—shining more brightly than the legal institutions and Mosaic narrowness, and further, with miracles greater than any speech can express—and to have glorified Him as God, they did not do this; but they flared up into rage, and out of envy, like those pulling at a rope, they lapsed impiously into calumny. And so they used to say, sometimes: “This man does not cast out demons except by Beelzebul the prince of the demons”; and at other times: D “Whence has this man this wisdom and these powers?” Yet it would have been somewhat harsh, and most alien to that wise counsel, for Him to speak openly and clearly to men thus disposed, saying that He is indeed truly God from God, and that He has appeared for our sake like us and has been made man—namely: “I am indeed the wisdom of the good, and the virtue; I am the performer of wonderful works, possessed not of an acquired power, nor shining with alien honors, but with my own, properly and peculiarly.” For they would not have endured these things being said by Him, they who gnashed their teeth even at such moderate words, and like dogs rushing in, dared to bark at anything human.
A in excess of measure was uttered. B Therefore, retrenching much of their folly, and bringing them by degrees to a better consideration, and wittily turning them away from the opinion that the Lord and God of all worked in Beelzebul, he attributed the brilliance of the deeds to the ineffable power of the Father, and ascribed them to the divine nature, to which they are most fitting. But as he himself exists in the Father, and has his own Begetter within himself, by reason of the unchangeable and substantial identity, he said that the Father remaining in him performs the works. For surely no one of sound mind, if he has any sense, would think that the work which is becoming to God and is specifically His own, is a work of flesh or of humanity, if it be conceived as something alone and by itself. B And I do not think that what we have said is devoid of truth and necessary meaning. B. By no means; for it stands correctly. A. I would say that they also fight against their own arguments if they think the Word acts as something brought into existence, and furthermore that they would be sinning impiously against the Father Himself. B. Tell me how; for I do not understand. A. Is it not the case, my friend, that what is given to anyone by someone can also be taken away, even if it perhaps is not taken away, since no one has yet thought to take away from him who has the power to do it? But that which is not established by the laws of nature, but is adventitious and external, can it not depart from some, in that it can suffer loss, even if perhaps it has not suffered it? B. By all means. A. See, therefore, how great this impiety is against the Only-Begotten. For if He acts because He is acted upon, and the power to create has been given to Him by the Father, what then would prevent Him from saying with us: "By the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace which was in me did not prove vain;" C and, "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ," how could the most wise Paul still proclaim this, if he chose not to speak falsely? For how could he who possesses grace in himself be a co-bestower of grace with the Father? And it would not be at all alien to true and right reason, I think, if one were to consider that the power of creating is something superfluous for the Only-Begotten and Son, and were to say that He will cease from it, if the Father should wish to take back what was given and to remove the operation from the nature of the Son, by which, according to them, being moved, He has been shown to be a maker. For that which is moved by something would cease, if it were not perchance moved, since motion is by no means for it a product of its own nature. B. It is true. A. And in addition to this, that terrible and bitter sophistry of theirs will prove to be stale. B. Which one, I pray? A. Did you not just now hear them speaking grandly to us about the Father, and D elevating their speech, as they thought, above mere simple and lowly discourse?
A For they claimed that the Son was brought into existence usefully and necessarily, so that, since it is unbecoming for the Father to create all things by Himself—as He is the unadorned [cause] directed toward the whole—the One who is in some way subordinate to Him, that is, the Son, might accomplish the rest. B. I heard it. A. Where, then, does their wise fabrication go, if the Father has altogether performed the work of creation through the Son? For to work through the intervention of something that possesses no movement of its own—neither spontaneous nor specialized—but which stands in the place of an instrument, I would certainly say is, beyond any doubt, to work by Himself. Furthermore, it is foolish to say that what is unworthy of God and the Father to attend to because it is "small," is not likewise unworthy of the Son. For what is there among created things that is not small when compared to the nature of God? Otherwise, let them acknowledge that they are measuring the immense nature, while they define certain things as "small" if referred to B it, while they babble that this [the Son] is "great" and "supernatural," and not very far removed from it. B. You have spoken most excellently. A. Let us, then, leave aside, Hermias, these empty arguments and magnificent trifles, and move on to the truth itself, pure and simple, and let us confess that there is a God, and that the Only-Begotten has shone forth from God the Father according to nature. And if the nature that is without beginning, most ancient, and uncreated truly exists, then let calumny and deception be cast aside. For how could we ever accept that the Word of God, who truly is, was late-born and made, and would not any sane person, I think, say that we have lapsed from the best reasoning? Or tell me this (for I will ask you): will you not confess that what I say is true? If someone names the "Son of God," he does not, I think, understand "another"—even though there are countless numbers who have been adopted into sonship—but the minds of the hearers are carried with a swift and certain course C to that one who is truly and naturally [the Son]. Or does this matter not seem true to you? B. It does. A. As, therefore, when there is in us one natural and true God, if someone were to name God simply, we would not, indeed, embrace in our mind the signification of any other, even though so many have obtained the name of "god" both in heaven and on earth, as it is written; so, too, will the mind of the pious most sharply discern that one who is truly the Son, if someone simply names the "Son of God," and adds this to what has already been said. B. What is it that you say? A. Would you not, my good man, concede that that which is D truly existent is one thing, and not many? And this is God, or rather the nature of God. B. I would indeed concede it.
A A. Are then the things that have been made and produced through Him beings? B. They are indeed; for why not? Yet they subsist only by imitating the truly Being. A. I agree with you, as you judge the truth most excellently. For that which imitates the truly Being somehow furtively borrows the appearance of being by nature. The truly Being, therefore, is one. In the same manner, I think, even if many are called gods and sons, there is yet one natural and true Son and God, having as it were a root of His ineffable generation, the nature of the Father. And accordingly, He would be rightly confessed by us and by the holy angels as coeternal, and not as having been produced creatively along with the creatures, as it seemed right to think to those B who are perverted, who have ignored the true Truth, that is to say Christ, through whom and with whom to God and Father be glory, with the holy Spirit, unto the ages of ages. Amen.
DIALOGUE V.
That the things proper to the Godhead and the glory are naturally in the Son as they are in the Father.
A. Well; from all this, as it seems, it will follow from a persuasive and necessary argument that the Son is not, indeed, late-begotten, and does not bear in Himself the mark of having been created, but that one must admit He was instead born from the very substance of the Father, true God of true God, possessed of a high and supernatural glory, and by C incomparable eminences transcending the nature of every originated thing, surpassing it just as much as the Father Himself is considered to do. B. I agree; for you think correctly. But, if you like, I will say something again. A. And indeed, friend, I would be most pleased and eager to resist with manly spirit those arguments by which the truth is assailed. For let him who is meek be also a fighter, as the sacred word has proclaimed to us; but you, proceed with what you intend, keeping in mind what is written: "Milk the milk, and it shall be butter." B. Know then, that if they should hear you naming the Son true God and consubstantial with the Father, they will immediately ask you, my good man, saying: How is it proper D for one who is of such a kind, as you wish, to boast rather of his own goods, than to shine with external ones? For God is
A truly of himself complete, perfect, and, I think, entirely lacking nothing of the things naturally inherent in such a nature.
A. What are you saying? How audacious the argument is, and how it has rushed headlong toward insult! Tell me, however, openly in what way that rude swarm of wicked blasphemies has concocted such a rash multitude.
B. If, they say, the Son is true God and consubstantial with the Father, he should have from himself the things through which he is God, and should boast rather in his own prerogatives than in those from the Father. For what he is seen to possess is from the Father and divinely given. For he said that he lives through the Father; and he is glorified and sanctified by him; and on the third day he rose again by the power of the Father; and he possesses the very name of divinity by participation; and he worships with us and is subjected to the Father; and he receives a kingdom and power: for the holy and divine Scriptures have handed these things down to us.
A. Oh, Hermias! What a vast and terrible B array of blasphemies encompasses the truth and barks at it impiously! But it is time, it seems, for us to wrap ourselves in the armor of God and to draw forth manfully the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, fearing nothing, even if they attack us with still more filthy and savage words. However, if the discussion proceeds for us promiscuously and without order, our discourse will easily leap from this to that, and back again from that to this, rendering the knowledge dim and deformed. But truth and sincerity will certainly be made manifest C if one examines each blasphemy distinctly and separately. Come, therefore, let us speak distinctly, one by one, and in order. But first I would like to ask you this: do they consider the sentences of the theologians to be true and correct, or do they most foolishly reject them and hold them for nothing?
B. They will say they are true, I suppose.
A. The most holy and most excellent Paul, therefore, writes regarding the Only-Begotten: "Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, D though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
B. What of this, then? Speak.
A. For does he not distribute the narrative into two times, my friend? For he establishes one time, namely, that first and original one, in which the Word was in the form and equality
A of the Father: and a second and later one, wherein, as if he had laid aside being in the form and equality of the Father, he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant and undergoing even the death of the cross. For then indeed, even that which he possessed by nature and substantially, he was thought to have received from another source as a matter of grace and gift, namely, the name which is above every name, and the being adored both by us ourselves and by the holy angels.
B. It is so.
A. The entire expression, then, of inspired Scripture looks to both. For at one time, it teaches that the Son has not yet come to the emptying, but is in the sublimity of the Godhead and in the glory of the Father; at another time, however, it clearly demonstrates that he, by his own spontaneous movement and our mercy, was confined within the emptying and descended from heaven into the ignobility of flesh. Tell me, then, should they be considered wise and sharp-witted who admit a twofold and double reasoning in these matters, and who assign the explanation of the mysteries to their proper times, or those who seem to introduce a certain confusion and mixing of things and times together, so that they assign indiscriminately those things which are of the flesh, and those which are because of the flesh, to the Word born of the Father, and refer those things which are proper and peculiar to the Begotten One to the flesh and the time of the incarnation? B
B. And how could there be any doubt that it is surely better to confess Christ as one and the Son, according to the Scriptures, yet—as regards the mode of conceiving and speaking—that so long as the Begotten One was not united with the flesh, he was conspicuous with the honors of the Godhead as his own and natural ones; but after he was united to the flesh and became man, then indeed, then he received also those things which are joined with the emptying? C
A. That twofold reasoning is therefore necessary, if one is to examine what is appropriate to each time.
B. Indeed it is.
A. But to allow both to be confused and mixed is utter foolishness. For obscurity and disorder will snatch away right knowledge.
B. That is true.
A. That being so, sometimes as Word and Begotten from the Father, and sometimes as man, and that this one is the firstborn and among many brothers—does he not most appropriately and skillfully adopt both modes of discourse, both that which moves toward the highest majesty, and that which lowers itself and settles down to the lower things and to us, if indeed it was his will and purpose to persuade those on earth that he is truly God from God, and that he descended to our level for our sake, and that he does not disdain the condition of emptying; or else will he not condemn himself of lack of wisdom and of not having taken counsel well, in that he does not shrink from becoming like us, yet is ashamed of the terminology by which the condition of humanity, on the contrary, would in no way blush? D For what need was there, I ask,
and very reasonably so, to descend to a nature whose ignobility and lowliness it was burdensome and intolerable for God—to speak once for all—begotten of God, to undergo? And if it was necessary and fitting to reject the words that befit us, in order to be able to preserve the beauty of divinity uninjured and incorrupt, how much more was it not also necessary, before that [rejection], to be united to flesh, and to endure such an extremely unsightly humiliation? But I do not think anyone would ever reach such a pitch of folly as not to admire exceedingly the Only-Begotten, who, for our sake, did not snatch at that supreme and exceptional glory which is in the form and equality of the Father, but chose to suffer the emptying in the flesh, and with it the words that befit it and are akin to it, and to count the matter as nothing, provided that we are restored to safety, our nature returned to its original state, and renewed in Him unto newness of life, through sanctification in the Spirit. B Paul therefore explains the cause of the incarnation, saying that the Word of God in no way took hold of angels, but of the seed of Abraham, "whence He ought to be made like His brothers in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest before God." And again: "Since therefore the children shared in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise partook of the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil." And why do I say this? For anyone who wishes may hear Christ openly crying out to the Father God who is in the heavens: "Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire: burnt offerings and sin offerings Thou didst not require, then I said, Behold I come, O God, to do Thy will." And what then was that wise and saving will of the Father toward us? To abolish death in the death of Christ, and furthermore, to abolish sin and the author and first artificer of sin, and to redeem everyone through the blood of Christ. C And so the divine Paul writes again in this manner concerning the Son: "And for this reason He is the mediator of the New Testament, that by death interceding for the redemption of those transgressions which were under the first [testament], those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. For a testament is confirmed upon the dead, otherwise it has no validity while the testator lives." If then it was necessary for the Son to die for the fulfillment of the economy, and it was not useless to undergo death, how was it not also necessary and useful for Him to descend even to the nature that was capable of death, the very terminology of which—however humble and abject—should not have been rejected by Him who had once determined to suffer it? Do you think that what we have said has in it any rashness or vanity or impudence?
B. Not at all.
A. For the Word was and is, even when incarnate, whatever He was before the flesh: but those things which He is seen to have assumed on account of the flesh were not in the beginning.
A B. Tell me what that might be; for the matter is sublime and not easily grasped.
A. Is it not so, my friend, that the Word was God, and the Word was with God? And was He not the true light, which lightens every man coming into the world? And was He not the Only-Begotten, and in the bosom of the Father? Does He not come from above and is He not over all things? And does He not say of Himself: "I am not of this world?"
B. Yes, for you set before us what the divine Scripture also says.
A. Do you then think that the emptying B brought to the Word a loss of those things that were natural and proper to Him from the beginning, so that He came to experience a turning and a change into what is injurious?
B. I would by no means think so. For we know and believe the Son to be void of change, since Paul wrote to us: "Jesus Christ, yesterday and today, the same, and forever."
A. Rightly, my friend, and very clearly. For if He were to admit into His own glory and nature that which is injurious and wrongful through a turning, how could we still conceive of Him as the same? It must be established that the Only-Begotten remains perpetually in His own inherent goodness, even though He became flesh and dwelt among us.
B. It must needs be so.
C A. We must proceed, therefore, to those things that pertain to the flesh, or rather, that are on account of the flesh. He who cannot be handled became handleable; and because of this, Thomas, applying his hand and fingers to the marks of the nails, said: "My Lord and my God." He who cannot be seen became visible, and concerning this the divine David uttered a tuneful song, saying: "The God of gods, the Lord, has spoken and called the earth. From the rising of the sun to the setting thereof, out of Zion is the beauty of His comeliness: God shall come manifestly, our God, and shall not keep silence." For when or where, and in what manner, has God come to us manifestly—He who has called the whole earth—if not when the Only-Begotten became man? He who is seen by none of the creatures was manifested because of the flesh, and He grew weary from the journey when He was passing through the city of the Samaritans, and He stood in need of bodily food, although He gives strength to those who are hungry, D according to the voice of the prophet? He in whom we live, and move, and are, is said to be with us, and in the death of the flesh. Would you then, my friend, ascribe these things to the Only-Begotten even before the flesh, and would you not foolishly destroy the sound and pious doctrine concerning Him?
B. We are in danger of doing so.
A. Let us therefore strip away the charge of impiety and the accusations of irreverence, assigning to the Son, on the one hand, whatever is more fitting to the divinity and surpasses our nature, [attributing them to Him] not yet made man; and on the other hand, turning those things which have a more lowly and human interpretation toward the economy, and, according to the Scriptures, taking captive every thought into the obedience...
of Christ. A For we certainly do not dream of anything alien to mind and reason when Christ says: "And no one has ascended into heaven, but he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man," that we should thence deduce the flesh itself to be from heaven, even though the prophet clearly shows us the holy Virgin and openly cries out: "Behold, the virgin shall have in the womb, and shall bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel." Nor, again, shall we think that the Word of God, who is from God, had the beginning and foundation of his existence in a corporeal womb, since Paul calls him the brightness of his glory and the image of his substance, signifying to us in concepts surpassing reason an incorporeal and ineffable generation. B. Quite so. A. Therefore, one must understand together with the sacred Scriptures those things that are appropriate to both. For in this way we shall follow the straight path of truth; we shall neither turn the sublimity of the Word to something inglorious because of the flesh and its properties, B nor, because of the incarnation, take away from his humanity those things that are of the flesh and because of the flesh; but rather, preserving immutability for the Only-Begotten, we shall recognize him to be the same, both before he was united to flesh and when he became flesh, even if some things that are very lowly and humble are said about him because of his humanity. B. But if, they say, you wish to transfer everything according to your own judgment to the incarnation, by what means then shall we discover what the nature of the Word is? A. Truly, good sir, I would answer you in turn: if you wish to transfer everything to explaining what the nature of the Word is, how or whence will you know that he became man? For you will not attain knowledge of human things through the properties of divinity. But that which is incomparably superior, and is believed without doubt to be distant in its whole nature, how, I ask you, would it impart knowledge of such infinite things? To recognize and very clearly perceive that the Word is God, yet not that he also became man, does not bring sufficient utility; but if to the first there is added faith in the second, nothing will be lacking to the understanding of those who believe. Whence the wise and God-inspired John says: D "Who is it who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?" For that name, Jesus, is a new name for the Word, and it accompanies the birth of the flesh. A prophetic oracle will again support us, saying: "And they shall call his name new, which the Lord shall name it." For did not, O dear head, Gabriel declare to the Virgin the will of God and the Father in this matter, saying: "Do not fear, Mary, for behold, you shall conceive in the womb, and shall call his name Jesus"?
B. It is true.
A. Why then (for I would gladly hear from you) should we abandon the right path and, having rejected the wise and learned knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, slip easily like those on slippery planks into that which always casts us down, when the blessed Paul has cried out in such a way: “My brethren, be steadfast and immovable”? For God is mightily indignant with those who are very fickle and dissolute, and punishes such a malady with aversion. For he said thus concerning some: “They loved to move their feet, and did not spare, and God was not well pleased with them.” For that which is firmly and unswervingly established is safe and inviolate for every purpose of profit. B
B. How then, pray, should we refute the words of those men, if they assert that the things which befit God are in the Son by participation?
A. Not without effort, my good friend; for the matter is difficult to explain, yet through necessary lines of reasoning it will be very possible to track down the truth. For first, if they have decided to think in this way, they surely strip from Him, even before all other things, the glory of divinity, and they would confess Him to be many [other] things rather than the Son, imitating the headstrong Jews and once again stoning Him in their utter impiety. And if one were to inquire the reasons for such a precipitous and grave fury, and say: “Many good works I have shown you from my Father; for which of them do you stone me?”—would they not, with no regard for God, cry out: “For a good work we do not stone you, but for blasphemy, and because you, being a creature, make yourself the Son of God”? But we must pay heed, not to those who have fallen into such a state of C of stupefaction, nor to those whose spirit is so sickly and weak and whose mind is corrupt and whose reason wasted, but to those in whom Christ Himself dwells through the Spirit, pouring in the sincere knowledge of the mystery. The God-inspired Paul called the Only-Begotten the Son to us, and indeed the image and likeness of the Father, and receives Him in the order of a "character," perhaps, I think, because of the absolute beauty and the most exact and precise resemblance. But what sort of conformity can there be of the corporeal to the incorporeal, and how, pray, is this same likeness to be conceived—is it not worth our while to consider? For that which lacks a body does not take on shapes and forms; how could it receive the properties of bodies? Just as, in what seems to me a correct judgment, you would never find the properties of incorporeal things in bodies that are touched and perceived by the senses, so too would the things that happen to sensible bodies be entirely incapable of being received by those that lack sensation and are of an incorporeal nature. Or can you yourself think of or say anything else beyond this?
B. I could not; for how could that be?
A A. Come then, since the Father is incorporeal, by means of concepts that transcend the creature, let us delineate as best we can his ineffable and most perfect nature, and let us accurately weigh the opinions of the ancients. For it will not be difficult in this way to eventually arrive at his own image, which is similar in all respects—I speak, of course, of the Son. B. Let us proceed; for you have spoken rightly.
B A. Therefore, he did indeed descend in the form of fire onto Mount Sinai to instruct the Jews first, and with the shrill and massive sound of trumpets raised on high, he struck intolerable fear into those who heard. But since they thought of God in a rather coarse way, and measure heaven with a span, and comprehend the glory of God only through typical representations, they thought within themselves that they had seen the very nature of God, as if it were nothing else than fire, and that they had taken into their ears his voice, specifically an organic one. And so, because they also thought highly of Moses, they judged that Christ’s teaching was to be mocked, and they said: "That divine Moses showed us the divine nature through the senses of the eyes, and granted us to hear the voice from on high; how then does Christ convict us of being ignorant and straying far from the straight and true path?" "Amen, amen, I say to you," he says, "you have neither heard his voice at any time, nor have you seen his form, and you do not have his word abiding in you, because whom he sent, him you do not believe." For although it was possible to contemplate the nature of the Father in the Son of God, the wretches did not do this, but dared to attribute the form of the Godhead to fire, and darkness, and smoke. Therefore, gradually instructing them toward a better state of mind, and joining that which is human with that which befits the divine majesty, the Savior said: "He who believes in me, does not believe in me, but in him who sent me. And he who sees me, sees him who sent me." For he shows that faith is not simply in a man, but in the nature of God, even though the Word was in flesh, from the fact that faith is not directed at him. But that he is the same as God and the Father, by natural likeness and identity of substance, he declared by saying: "He who sees me, sees him who sent me."
C Since, however, the Father is seen and known clearly and incommutably in the Son, all things are in a way common to them—or rather, those things which are in both are rightly considered proper to the one Godhead. And for that reason, he said to his own Father and God: "All things that are mine are yours, and yours are mine." For between the image and the true archetype, and conversely, between the archetype and the most similar image, there is no difference, at least insofar as it relates to likeness and identity of form. D Whence, when Philip, one of the disciples, asked not with sufficient consideration: "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us," rebuking the question, he said: "Have I been so long with you, and have you not known me, Philip? He who sees me, sees also the Father. Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me? I and the Father are one."
A For that the Son is, as it were, the countenance of God and Father, the Psalmist might easily instruct us, at one time saying: "Whither shall I go from your Spirit, and whither shall I flee from your countenance?" and at another, as if from the person of those who have believed in him: "The light of your countenance, O Lord, has been marked upon us." For we have been sealed by the Holy Spirit unto the effigy and likeness of the countenance of the Father, that is to say, of the Son. And Paul will bear witness, writing: "But we all with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord."
B. But, they say, even if the Son were called by us the countenance, image, and likeness of the Father, this will not in the least harm the arguments presented by us. For we do not say that he is the image and likeness of the substance of the Father, but of his will. Therefore, if anyone should see the Son from the fact that he is the same in will, he has already, in a sense, beheld the Father.
A. How exceedingly foolish, and filled with the utmost absurdity, is this line of reasoning of theirs; and it is effortless to see that they utter this in a puerile manner. For do they say that the Father is will, and that whatever will may happen to be, this is what they insist he must be conceived as; or do they place him in his own proper existence, and then, onto that, add to him his will?
B. But how, they say, would the Divinity be simple, if it were understood as being in existence, and separately in will? For it would finally be composite, C as if from parts that had run together into one perfect whole.
A. Therefore, since the Divinity is simple, and you deem it better than to be composite (and you deem rightly), his will can be nothing other than himself. Yet if one should speak of "the will," he has signified the very nature of God and Father.
B. So it is indeed.
A. But will is in a subject, just as the ideas of artisans are. For to will something, or not, does it cling to the will itself, or rather to another in whom the will resides, or how is it?
B. Absolutely.
A. Therefore, the being of the Father is in another, and to exist has happened to him as an accident; and he is composed for you now in a manner more coarse and more unsightly than before. For he is what he is in another, not in himself, since my will is mine, but the will of someone else belongs to him and is in him.
B. How, then, could things among simple and incomposite beings be other than the [beings] themselves?
A. Just as, for instance, if a will were conceived as being from a mind, having as its source the mind that wells up, and as a root, as it were, lying underneath, the [mind] in which it revolves intellectually.
A For the mind is the starting point of the movements and concepts within it; but the quality of the movements, and the will in each and every case—being something manifold—is colored, as it were, by the qualities and differences of things, moving at one time in one way and at another time in a different way, and sometimes even in a way contrary to the things it contains. For we do not desire evil with the same faculty with which we desire good; nor is the choice by which one wishes to be wise the very same as its contrary. I therefore deem it utterly senseless to say that the will is the existence of the Father. B. Indeed. B A. Therefore, if the will consists in such great variety within itself, and if no person of sound mind would imagine the nature of God to be such, then the Father is not the will. Rather, since He is understood in His own proper existence, He has His own Son as, so to speak, a connatural and coeternal will, not being composite—as those [critics] suppose—but subsisting in such a way as things are conceived to exist in a simple and wise nature. And let idle curiosity cease henceforth. For the Divinity is superior to every mind and word, my good sir. Is this not how matters stand? B. I heartily agree. But since you have named the Son of the Father as His purpose and will, can you also demonstrate this from the holy Scriptures? A. Why should I not? And I believe that David will be quite sufficient to persuade us of this, and provide us with enough assurance when he sings to God and the Father: "In thy will thou didst guide me." Furthermore, the truth will be made clear by other arguments. For were not all things made through the Son, and without him was made nothing, according to the voice of John? B. It is so. A. David sings somewhere, marveling at the Father and God, the Maker of all, and says: "How great are thy works, O Lord! In wisdom thou hast made them all," calling the Son wisdom, I imagine. B. What then does this signify? C A. That, my friend, if the will of the Father is not other than Himself, and is not without wisdom, and the Son is wisdom, how then would the Father be considered to exist in His own hypostasis? For He has already in a way passed over into the Son, and, as if having let go of being what He is, has become wisdom, since it is a will that is possessed of wisdom not by participation, but is the thing itself and wisdom in every respect. I would add that the Son has shone forth as the image and likeness of Him whose Son he is, if he himself is wisdom and will, and is also the image of the Father, even though the Father is named as will and wisdom. B. Away with such absurdity of reasoning! D A. It is truly abominable and very wicked. Therefore, let us acknowledge the Son to be the accurate image and likeness of the substance of God and the Father, and not merely attributing to him the identity of will, [but] as eminent above...
reckoning him to be in the most similar form of God and the Father, referring naturally to Him everything that belongs to Him. But if, because He is a fellow-willer, they say for this reason He exists as the image of the Father,—and [since] He is endowed with nature and measures in this way, He did not fear to say: "He who has seen me has seen the Father. I am in the Father, and the Father is in me. I and the Father are one,"—I do not think it is unreasonable, I suppose, to see that David might have assumed such a supernatural and truly high-sounding utterance, one fitting only for the Son, as a kind of crown, and to have boasted of himself, saying clearly: "I am in the Father, and the Father is in me. He who has seen me has seen the Father," and, "I and the Father are one." For would we not recognize that man as having become a fellow-willer with God? For He says somewhere concerning him to the blessed Samuel: "I have found David the son of Jesse, a man according to my heart, who will do all my will."
B. The argument is plausible, but not secure.
A. It is entirely implausible, my friend, and a demonstration of an absurd sophistry, the upholders of which I know not how they are not ashamed. For not even the fact of his fellow-willing alone and desiring the same things as the Father would produce His image and natural likeness; but this would be provided only by the likeness of nature, and the resemblance to His substance proceeding through all things. B
B. By the divine image, then, how could we ourselves be formed?
A. As having the Son dwelling in us, and having received and been enriched within ourselves with the divine character. For we have been formed through Him toward God. But that species which is above all things, and most supreme—namely, the Son—is imprinted upon our souls through the Spirit. And indeed, Paul writes to the Galatians, who had slipped from lightness toward something less seemly: "My little children, of whom I travail in birth again, until Christ is formed in you."
B. You have spoken most excellently.
A. It is also foolish and very thoughtless, in another way, to say that the Son is not the image of the substance of the Father, but of His deliberation and wills. For Philip, [saying] "Show us the Father," did not speak of the will of the Father. And the Son, presenting Himself as the image of the Father, says: "He who has seen me," not, he who has seen the will of the Father, but rather, "has seen the Father himself." C Yet, surely, He who is accustomed to truth, or rather, He who has no guile in His mouth, ought, according to their way of thinking, not to have said this, if He were not so. But He who alone knows the Father, and is known by the Father alone, declared Himself to be the image not of a bare and non-existent will, but rather the character of the substance of the One who begat Him, saying: "He who has seen me has seen the Father." D
B
B. But if, as you say, we are persuaded by reason and the very truth itself, we have indeed entered upon the right path; yet you should know that those same men will say: "What, my good sirs, is a 'character'? Surely it is not something that subsists in a hypostasis of its own, nor does it have its own existence; rather, it is thought to be in a subject and among the accidents, even if it happens to exist inseparably—just as, for instance, forms exist in bodies. Therefore, the Son does not exist hypostatically, if He is, as you hold, merely a character in the Father."
A. It is, I think, a vain and putrid thing to believe that one is following right and sound doctrine among such perverse men; for among them, stupidity is held in honor, and nothing is to be compared to their folly, while rectitude of soul is counted as a vice. Otherwise, would it not be better to consider that we are utterly incapable of comprehending in our minds what the nature of the Son is, and that it is far greater than can be expressed in words? For "the glory of the Lord conceals the discourse," as it is written. C By means of many contemplations, however, we gather knowledge as if in a mirror, not without sweat and difficulty; rather, contemplating it in our minds as in a riddle through very subtle and refined perceptions of thought, we obtain stability in faith. But since in creatures, and in whatsoever is subject to generation and corruption, nothing is formed accurately and absolutely in the likeness of that supreme nature and glory, we scarcely recognize it; we snatch helpfully from individual things whatever contributes to its demonstration, and as if measuring the heaven with a span, provided as we are with narrow minds, we do not fear to lift our eyes to things greater than any mind, and we call the Son light, and life, and wisdom, and other such things besides. For He is so named in the divinely inspired Scripture; but we do not shut up His ineffable nature within individual terms, nor do we say that He is composed of diverse parts and that He somehow coalesces into one perfect and absolute whole. For He is simple and uniform, but from the many things that substantially belong to Him, we attain, as it were, faint rays of contemplation and a vision accommodated to our minds. If, therefore, He is called the character of the substance of the Father, understand Him as coexisting inseparably and intimately, and as the form of the Begetter Himself. D When, however, He is also called the effulgence, conceive in your mind an emission, as it were, of a light that has gone forth and shone out from the Father, not entirely separated from the hypostasis whence it came, nor yet entirely contracted and contained within it, but extending itself, as it were, toward its own hypostasis and individual existence. For the Son dwells in the nature of the Father, having it almost as a root, and admitting no section whatsoever; yet He subsists individually, and He is the Son in truth, not a character lacking hypostatic existence, nor one added from elsewhere, nor an adventitious thing, as a form is in a body. For since He is life by nature, how could He be considered...
A not to subsist? Or have you not heard Him saying: "I am who I am; this is my name, and my eternal memorial unto generations of generations"?
B. You speak well. You rightly said that the Son is existing and is life, as being in every way the character and exact likeness of the Father who is and lives. But why then, they say, if this is so, does He receive life from the Father? For He Himself said: "For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has given to the Son to have life in Himself." And indeed elsewhere, having commenced with nothing, He says: "As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, and he who eats me, he also shall live because of me." And to us Paul says: "But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, and when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by whose grace you have been saved, and raised us up, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus." And altogether through the entire divine Scripture, so to speak, He is seen to be vivified by the Father and a partaker of life. In what manner, then, shall we oppose the truth to those who hold the contrary view? I would most gladly hear from you.
A. Indeed, I think you spoke well and not without purpose when you said that the Son is to be understood not as a character of the Father's will, but of His substance and hypostasis, and that this does not conflict with divine Scripture.
B
A is the image insulted, if it is not that of which it is the image? For it will happen, if things are not so, that as far as the Son is concerned—who is the image of the Father—He is no longer life, but rather in need of life, possessing it from another, and that the Father Himself is thereby somehow brought into suspicion. Or how could the thing brought to life be an exact image of the One who gives life, if the One who possesses life abundantly leaves in need the very thing that is, as it were, unable to suffice for others or even for its own nature?
B. You speak rightly.
A. But as for those who foolishly prattle that the Son is a participant in life and is not Himself life by nature, I cannot imagine where they could locate His nature so that it would be different from the life that is in Him. Or is it not necessary that a thing believed to be a participant in something should be of a different nature from that which it participates in, lest it be said and seen to be a participant in itself, if indeed it is of the same nature?
B. It is necessary.
A. Therefore, if the Son is not life by nature, He must certainly be in His own nature, as a participant in life—as if it were something different from Himself. Let those who support such perverse dogmas answer, then: under what genus shall He be placed by us? For the Word has already shown us that He is not created.
B. Life, they say, was made by the Father. For John says: "What was made in Him was life." Therefore, the Word is life.
A. Having therefore joined both together, and combined into one both the life and the Son, you say that it is not something other than the life that is in Him, so that by diverse names the nature of one subject is signified to us—whether it be called Son or whether it be called life?
B. I agree.
A. Then will they suppose that the life was made by the Father without branding themselves with the mark of madness and guilt? For otherwise, would they not, even against their will, be compelled to say that what was made was brought forth from non-existence, and that what began to be is not more ancient and prior to having received existence? But this is not life, my good sirs; it is very far from it. For life is not that which has been brought into life, but rather it is proper to it always to be, and to have an existence devoid of beginning and end. And if they think they are speaking considerately and wisely, while asserting that the Son is a participant in life even though He is considered to be life, let them hear that "life" is used to describe that which gives life, not that which is brought to life—just as, indeed, light, wisdom, and power are not what is in need of light and what has need of wisdom and craves the power of another, but rather that which illuminates, makes others wise, and strengthens others. Or does it not seem to you that I am pursuing a straight path, and one commended by the Law? "For you shall go by the royal road," it says.
B. Precisely so.
A. A But as for that which scarcely obtains its existence by a non-natural habit, and which is hardly even that which it is, how could it ever be on an equality with Him who grants it participation and deigns to let it share in the things believed to be proper to Himself? For I hear the Son saying: "For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom He wills." And most reasonably so. For the nature of the Father and the nature of the Son will work in equality, and not in any way differently. For the Father is Life, and the Son is Life, no less than the Father.
B. But they might say, I suppose: "You are lying, good man; your mind is in vain and strays from the right sense, while you adulterate and lower the superiority of the Father in that He is Life. For how or whence will He be equal to the Son, even if He is named Life?" B
A. When we have dwelt a little upon these points, we shall think it right to be silent. But those who support their own dogmas will proceed to try to persuade us that the Father who gives life is more excellent than the Son, and the Son is lesser than He, even though He is Life by nature. But this they will not be able to do, I know, but they will divine; and according to their own desire, they will easily establish whatever they wish against the Son, subjecting even the nature that is queen of all things to their own laws. And then they think they are honoring the Father, while they render the Son, who is begotten from Him by nature, inferior—not without wrong—even though He says clearly: "He who believes in me, does not believe in me, but in Him who sent me," and, "He who sees me, sees Him who sent me." For in what way could we behold the Father C as being Life by nature in the Son, if the Son is not also understood to be Life by nature? And why should we not also believe Him who says: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life"? By saying that He Himself is the Life singularly and solely, would He not exclude the Father and God from being Life, unless we grant that both are of one nature, and that the thing itself flows down to us equally through both, not indeed from two, but from one God who gives life to all things?
B. That is how it is.
A. D "Or is it not in Him that we live and move and have our being?"
B. Entirely so, if we have granted the most holy Paul to be truthful.
A. Truthful, indeed—for how could he not be? For Christ, who is the Truth, lives and speaks in him. Observe, then, my friend, how we live and move and have our being in God the Father. And the dispenser of being and life would be none other than the Son, who is begotten from Him, who is resplendent with the properties of the Father, and who, being the life-giving sprout of life by nature, bestows life as His own good upon those who are in need of it, and holds together all creation in its being. And so, speaking to the Jews, He says: "Amen, amen, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives..."
you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world." A Then, explaining His own nature to us: "Amen, amen," He says, "I say to you, he who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life." If, then, the Son is internally and without change active within us, in that He is life, and the Father is not less so, how would those who rightly think of Him and consider these things not place Him on an equal level of substance? B But, they say, we will follow what the Son Himself said. For He said openly: "Just as the Father has life in Himself, so He has given to the Son also to have life in Himself." A Add what is missing, or else know that you are doing an injustice to the truth. B What is that? A That which is necessarily and usefully subjoined to what you have cited: "And He gave Him authority also to execute judgment, because He is the Son of man." B You seem, I suppose, to want to show that the Son receives life from the Father, not inasmuch as He is understood to be and is God, but inasmuch as He has become man, possessing by nature not that which is life, but being instead a participant in the life that is from God. A But why do you rashly attribute these things to me rather than to yourself? For did you not hear from me that the Father gave to the Son to have life in Himself, and the authority to judge, because He is the Son of man? B I heard it; but the word "gave," they say, is placed only in regard to the judgment. For since the law attributes judgment as a peculiar office to God (for it says that the judgment is God’s), He received the office of God, as man. A But to give life, O good sirs, does it befit another more than God? For Paul, the most wise, writing to Timothy, says: "I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things." B Be it so: let this also befit God, they say: what then? A But that which befits God and is substantially attributed to Him, is it something given to human nature and adventitious? B That is also true. A But is Christ a man just like us, even if He is understood as God, inasmuch as He has manifested Himself from God? B Yes; for why not? A Was, therefore, a work proper and exceptional to the divine nature, namely life, a thing given, just as it is to man? B Certainly, the Father is said to have given life to the Son. A Add the time, and the question will be solved. For when He appeared as one of us, then He is also said to be made alive, although He Himself is life by nature, as being from God and life. And indeed, when the Father is said to have given life to the Son as though He did not have it, it is most easily apparent that the Son...
one would perceive, and that with the greatest ease, that he is the dispenser of life in himself; and we do not say this in the sense in which he is considered as God, nor where he has appeared as man, A to whom life is something given and introduced from without. For the blessed Paul said: “But if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit who dwells in you.” And our Lord Jesus Christ, bestowing the thing not by the powers of another, but by his own energies, says to the Jews concerning his own body: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”
B. How then did the Father work life in the Son, if Christ rose again by his own powers and energies?
A. Namely, that since the Father is life, the Son has truly and by nature proceeded from him as life, B expressing the substance of the one who begat him, and existing wholly in the Father, and again bearing the Father entirely in himself. For this reason we say that the work of the Father is also that of the Son, and whatever the Son might work, this is the work of the Father. And accordingly, showing that the operation which is from the Father is his own, and setting forth to the lovers of learning a manifest token of the consubstantiality which he has with him by his working in all things, he says: “If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works.” And again: “But the Father who dwells in me, he does the works.” For he was not thinking that things done in a God-befitting manner should be attributed to the measures of humanity, but he ascribed them to the ineffable and transcendent nature. C For this reason he says: “Even if you do not believe me, believe my works.” For things done in a God-befitting manner and above reason do not allow us to think that the glory and faith regarding him are contained within the measures of the kenosis, but he is raised up as it were on high, and he is known not as a mere man, but as God and from God. Or is what I say not true?
B. It is entirely true.
A. But this also nearly escaped me.
B. What do you mean?
A. The passage from Paul that I mentioned just now, in which the teaching was also very clear, how that through the holy Spirit the vivification from the Father is accomplished D both in Christ himself and in us. For he said: “But if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit who dwells in you.” Therefore, the Father is the life-giver through the Spirit, not as though he were vivifying the creation through a creature, but as one transforming into his own life that which does not have life in its own nature, by the participation of his own nature. For they would likely say, as I am well aware, that to live is something given to the creation.
B. Indeed they would say so; for we ourselves also say: “For what do you have that you did not receive?”
A. The holy Spirit, therefore, is life-giving, of whose deed
A of participation in the one and true God, as if it were life, we become partakers.
B. I assent. For you rightly judge, since the Spirit indeed fills the participation in God and the presence of God within us ourselves. For I shall remember John writing in this way: “By this we know that he is in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.”
A. Behold then, my friend, that the Son who has appeared from God is the bestower and giver of the divine and life-giving Spirit. For He breathed on His disciples, saying: “Receive the holy Spirit.” But would it not be most absurd for the one who is not life to be the bestower of life, as they, I know not how, think? For why, I pray you, if He is not life, does He send forth the Spirit as His own proper good, and by breathing upon them declare Himself the bestower of life? Therefore, when the Son is called a partaker of life, or that He is made alive by the Father, immediately think of the whole divine nature as understood in the Father, B in whom and from whom is the Son, and the Spirit who gives life, who have life inherently, and who work the life-giving effect, not as an instrument of the ineffable nature, but as in a way bestowing the whole quality of His nature through Himself upon creation, and transforming that which is by nature subject to corruption to long-lasting life. Being instructed by the contemplation of this thing, you will find the life-giving work in Christ performed in that alone which can by its nature be given life, that is, the human. For He who truly is from the Father and is the Only-begotten, through His own Spirit repelled the corruption of His own flesh, and rendered His own temple stronger than death. For inasmuch as He is God and proceeded from the natural life itself, that is, the Father, the divine John will be for us a rich and true witness that He is also life by nature. For thus he writes concerning Him: “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have touched concerning the Word of life, and the life was manifested, and we have seen, and we bear witness, and we announce to you the eternal life which was with the Father, and appeared to us.” And making clearer what that is which is called by Him life, he again says: “And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding, that we may know the true God, and may be in the true One, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and the eternal life.” For how could He be understood to exist in the beginning and to be the true God, unless He possessed existence and immutability prior to that advent of His into the world? For to be life according to nature is then, indeed, rightfully recognized. For it is fitting for the true God to be such, and the contrary would be repugnant, since His name is “He who is”: For “I am,” He said, “He who is; this is My name, and a memorial eternal for generations of generations.” C And He contends the reverse, and indeed [there is] a name for Him; a name, and an eternal memorial for generations of generations.
B. But if, he says, you grant the operation of the Father to the Son, and this without any difference, do you say that they are of equal strength, where does the lesser...
standing still remain for him, even though he says clearly: "My Father is greater than I"; and again: "I am going to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God"? For he knew that his Father was his God.
A A. Therefore, if they do not believe the Son to be truly and by nature God, he must be a creature, and nothing else besides this. But regarding those who have chosen to think in this way, I think it is fitting to say: "Who will give to my head water, and to my eyes a fountain of tears, and I will weep for this people day and night?" But let every lover of God and pious person cry out to them: "You have been alienated from B Christ, you have fallen from grace." And God is no longer a portion to you, and far from it; but your portion is some bastard and falsely so-called, having a feigned glory of divinity. They have truly worshipped the creature rather than the Creator, and therefore they have believed the Son to be in a lesser state or in conditions other than the Father, and to have a borrowed life, or rather, to be a creature that does not possess its own life. Then why have they decided to worship him, while at the same time they demean his greatness by binding him within the measures of the creation and disparaging his essential superiority over all things? Even though John says clearly: "He who comes from above is above all." For the Son will not possess being "above all" by comparisons; but since in saying "all" a manifestation of every created thing is introduced, he will soar above all things, not having it from any source to belong among creatures as his own; because he is not among all things, but is removed above all things, so that he arrives at the highest limit, beyond which there is absolutely nothing. Is not God the name that is above every name, as our divine Paul also said to us?
B. Certainly.
A. But this was the Son: "For in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."
B. What then shall we answer if they say that it is written concerning the Father that he gave him the name which is above every name?
A. But if they would add to us, Hermias, the desire to learn where and how the Son possesses his being God as a borrowed thing—even though he received by nature the dignity that accompanies his very being—at once, I think, they would cast away that spirit of contention, as if recovering from a stupor of the body, and they would cease slandering the ineffable substance of the Son, and I do not doubt that they would gladly embrace the correct opinion with us. But they, as is to be expected, will stand fast, maintaining their own opinion and fighting for a lie, and defending it stoutly, with no less ardor, I think, than some who arm themselves for war and battle for the sake of their children and wives. But for us, who have determined to argue precisely, it is worthwhile to read back the hidden things and
reveal the truth which is not A easy for the more unlearned to grasp.
B. You speak rightly.
A. The divine Paul therefore says to us concerning the Only-Begotten: “Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross; wherefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Was that time, then, of the Incarnation of the Word—if it were possible for it to speak—not also crying out openly and clearly to those who hold such opinions that the Word did not, insofar as He is understood to be God, but insofar as He appeared as man, return to the glory of His divinity; and that He is said to be exalted only then, when He was in the flesh, and when He emptied and humbled Himself? B But instruct me, I beseech you, for I desire to inquire of you.
B. What is it that you say?
A. The Only-Begotten emptied Himself, descending into the form of a servant, and endured the cross, despising the shame, and became obedient unto death. “Therefore,” they say, “God gave Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.” Was it then, in the order of things such as pertains to us, that He acquired the being called God and the necessity to be worshipped by the holy angels themselves, and by us who dwell on earth, and by those who have already departed from this life, as a reward for good deeds, as a gift for obedience, and as a crown for courage?
B. It would seem so.
A. Therefore (for I will say something regardless of how little it may seem to comport with present appearances, because necessity so demands), may the Only-Begotten have the greatest grace because of the falls of men and our sins. For one must know that the sins of humanity were the occasion for that deifying glory for Him. C For if we had not sinned, He would not have become like us; and if He had not become like us, He would not have endured the cross; and if He had not died, He would not have acquired the necessity to be worshipped by us ourselves and by the holy angels.
B. The statement is indeed bold, but it has plausibility.
A. But if He were also in the equality and form of the Father, being free from the condition of emptying, what glory would have been added to Him by receiving the name that is above every name at the time of the emptying? Do you understand to what point their argument would fall if it were examined more subtly?
B. I understand. D
A. Do you wish, therefore, having left aside for the present the excessively
long discourse we have already consumed on this matter, that we proceed to the point that the Only-Begotten was in the beginning, and in the form and equality of the Father? B. I certainly do. A. Therefore, through the voice of Isaiah, God and Father says: “I am the Lord God, from the beginning.” A One may also hear the holy fathers themselves crying out to Him: “Art Thou not from the beginning, O Lord our God, and we shall not die?” Behold, He is named God from the beginning, and He truly is God and Father. But the divine John, when he was speaking to us about the Son, said: “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life.” He addressed some, saying: “I write unto you, fathers, because ye have known Him who is from the beginning.” And who this is, he said again: “Thus saith He who is, and who was, and who is to come.” B B. But that He was before the creation, they too would admit; but that He was God, they say, is not yet clearly discerned. For He receives, as though He did not have it, naturally. A. Then is it not for that very reason appropriate that we, showing our indignation toward those who put forward this abominable argument, should reply: “Ye deaf, hear; and ye blind, look up to see”? For since the theologian and evangelist clearly wrote not that the Word was simply, but that the Word was God, they, behaving like drunkards and those intoxicated who rush headlong into any absurdity whatsoever, mock the truth. Let us then, come, and by other arguments recognize the Son as God by nature. For would it not be fitting for Him who is truly God by nature C to assign laws to each, and to crown with praises those who live according to the rule of the law, and have cultivated an honorable and glorious life, but to punish those who have sinned as arrogant and insolent, and those who easily insult the divine laws? B. It would indeed be fitting. A. And what of the ability to fill all things, and to pass through all, and to be in all—would you attribute this to any other nature than the divine? B. Not I; for how could that be? A. And in God to live and have one's being, and to glory in God—would you not say, friend, that this is most fitting for the saints? B. Certainly. A. Come then, tell me this. B. What? A. Is it not true that “every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights,” and that the word of wisdom is the most precious thing of all? B. I agree; for so the holy Scripture speaks. A. Consider therefore the distributor and dispenser of the good things that come down to us from above and from the Father, and
A know that the Son exists in this by authority and power. B For Paul said: "Unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ." And indeed, elsewhere, when God spoke to Moses, the most holy, saying: "Who hath given a mouth to man? Or who hath made the dumb and the deaf, the seeing and the blind? Have not I the Lord God? Now therefore go, and I will open thy mouth;" C again, our Lord Jesus Christ, addressing the holy apostles, says: "Settle it therefore in your hearts, not to meditate beforehand what ye shall answer: for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which all your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay nor resist." Now since the blessed David sings that God is judge, and it is certain that it belongs to Him to distribute to each one the rewards of those things they may have done, and whomsoever He wills to justify—"for it is God that justifieth: who is he that condemneth?" according as it is written—we shall see the Son bestowing both not in a ministerial manner, but with power befitting God. For He Himself said: "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his holy angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works." And He addressed one of those who were sick: "Son, thy sins be forgiven thee." By which those impious Pharisees, more maddened than can be said, dared to bind with the accusation of blasphemy Him who uttered that sentence with such majesty and liberty, and indeed were saying: "This man blasphemeth. Who can forgive sins, but God only?" He, therefore, who is Lord of the law and of justice, and the distributor of rewards, and the dispenser of righteousness, and who forgives sins—while it is permitted to no one of those who are enumerated among creatures to do this—how would He not be God by nature? Do I seem to you to reason these things aright? B. Most skillfully and seriously. D A. But since God is in all things, and departs from no one, but by divine virtue fills all things, and for this reason says to Israel: "Heaven is my throne, and earth is the footstool of my feet: what house will ye build me? saith the Lord: or what is the place of my rest?" referring the matter, and most rightly, to the Word who proceeded from God the Father, the divine Paul writes to us: "Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all." And again, in addition to these: "He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things." Is it then greater to fill all things, and to pervade everything, and to be in all, than the condition of a creature allows? B. Who would deny this?
A. A Since every saint lays aside the worldly and carnal life, and consecrates his own soul to God as it were, and has determined to glory in no one besides Him, Paul writes again: "For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God," it being manifest that he means to the Son, and through Him, to the Father. This will also be clear to you, and beyond dispute, if you listen to what he adds: "For one died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him who died for them and rose again." And furthermore, besides these: "But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ," although every saint may say: "I will rejoice in God my Savior; the Lord God is my strength."
B. B And yet, my noble friend, we have a wealth of such arguments. For we have shown by a long discourse that the Son is by no means God in name only, but is rather truly God. Therefore, leaving this aside, tell me, I pray, how one ought to understand that saying: "I go to my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God." And for what reason does He call the Father His God? Do not doubt at all that they will ask this as well.
A. A The knowledge of these questions is not at all difficult, nor hard to grasp, if one has a right and sound mind. For it is written: "All are plain to them that understand, and right to them that find knowledge." But if anyone should choose to leave the straight path and foolishly take up a crooked and devious way, and having forsaken the beaten path of doctrine, prefers to turn to another, he will fall into thorns and pits and all the obstacles that lie in the way. Whence I think the law, B enigmatically signifying this, says: "You shall go by the royal road, and you shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left." When, therefore, such things as are less than the glory of God, yet do not exceed the nature of a creature, are said concerning the Son, do not immediately think of the ineffable nature that is exclusively from the Father, but, to whatever point the object of your contemplation tends, direct your mind thither; neither ascribing the properties of the divinity to the condition of humanity, nor assigning the lowliness of humanity to the nature that is supreme over all things, as if it inherently belonged to it, but having determined to make a very precise and suitable distinction in each case. For thus, and in no other way, D can you attain the most certain knowledge.
B. Give an example.
A. The blessed Paul said of the Only-begotten that He is the brightness of the glory and the character of the substance of God and the Father. Pause here therefore, and permit your mind to be carried beyond all that has been made, and let it contemplate the divine beauty itself, and consider His ineffable generation, and beholding the mode of His existence as in a mirror, pursue it with praise and glory. But if he writes of Him: "Who in the days of His flesh, with strong crying and tears, offered up prayers and supplications unto Him who was able to save Him from death," along with…
A His petitions—go down a little and consider the measure of His humanity. For the express image of the Father would not have died. Since, however, the petition was made in the days of His flesh, it must be the fear of the flesh, and the dread of death in a peculiar sense belonging to the humanity. Therefore, even if it is said that He received the name which is above every name, do not thrust the Son away from the bounds of the Godhead, in so far as He is the Word, and has appeared from God the Father. For He was by nature and in truth God even before the times of the emptying. Will you not, I ask, confess this? B. Certainly. A. But since He has appeared as man, having brought Himself down into an emptying and into the form of a servant, He has become with us and under God, not having lost what He was, nor having cast off the condition of humanity. For He became poor with us, although He was rich, in that He is God. Wherefore He was reckoned both under the law, and indeed also among servants, and with the wicked, and He endured the very death of the flesh. But it was necessary for Him who is by nature and in truth God, and who does not have B any acquired glory regarding this, not to remain in the condition of the emptying, but to return to the glory that is above and from the beginning and which inherently belongs to Him, with the form that had been assumed. He hears, therefore, as man, although He is God by nature and the Son: "Today have I begotten Thee," and: "Sit Thou on My right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool." C For since He has altogether become man, and has brought Himself down into an emptying, and has thus also become under God, He very necessarily and becomingly conforms Himself to the measures of the emptying, and acknowledges God with us, whom He knows as His natural and true Father, but as our God. For this reason we ourselves also, although we are subject to God by natural servitude, call God Father, having this privilege through our conformity to the Son. For the Son indeed dwells and abides in us through His own Father, in whom and through whom we cry: "Abba, Father." D And that there is an evident argument and, as it were, a sign of divine adoption in us, the Spirit who is in us, through whom we have been conformed to the Son, will declare, as Paul writes: "And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." B. You speak rightly. A. I believe, indeed, that my opponents will be slower at last in refuting, and will cease from attacking the doctrine of the truth, as if it were a hateful thing. But if they do not do this, but persist, and further say that God is truly the Father of the Son, not having assumed the dispensation on account of which He called God His Father,
A is it not necessary to say that we should by no means accept them as legislators and definers of what they might choose to think or say, but that it would be more fitting for us to attribute the truth to the words of the Savior? He said, therefore: "I am going to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God." Let them argue, then, that we also are sons with Him by nature, if He is himself with us under God by nature. "I am going," He says, "to my Father and your Father." Now the name Son signifies that He is substantially begotten of the Father. Therefore, there are very many sons by nature—or rather, they are beyond number—and, to pass over the breadth of this blasphemy, if all are sons by nature, then they are also gods. But I suppose they will surely say, and that very quickly, that the name of sonship is a kindness of God that is strange to us; for being earth-born in our nature, we have not been born of God, at least not in the true manner of begetting, but the duty of calling God Father has been added to us from the outside. What then, might we also say to them—O you who venture everything so easily—why do you not steer yourselves by the same reasoning toward what is right and blameless, and why are you not B ashamed to talk such great nonsense? For how is it not better to consider wisely that, since He is by nature of God, that is, of the substance of the Father, it is unbecoming for Him to be numbered with creatures, and that it is more fitting that He be God? And since He has appeared as man, would it not be entirely appropriate for Him, along with the flesh and the measures of humanity, to be under God, as He who is from Him?
B. But if, they say, there is no difference in the Son, but He is God just as the Father is also thought to be God, you will surely say that He is equal and in no respect whatsoever inferior. Why then did He Himself say, "The Father is greater than I"?
A. But tell me, I beg you, if that [statement] is understood of God by God, both naturally and truly, what difference would anyone see, or what is it that intervenes in terms of them being otherwise? Since we have maintained that the Son is the character of the Father, fashioned—if I may say so—beyond all speech and thought into a natural likeness, how could He, if He were truly inferior to the Father and less perfect in the things in which the Father is, signify in Himself the One who is better and superior to Himself, according to them? For a thing to which C anything is lacking would certainly not be the image and true likeness of a perfect thing; nor could one God surpass another, or one be understood as inferior to the other in that which He is as God, since not even man differs from man according to the definition of humanity. For one man is sometimes said to differ from another in strength and prudence, in the glory of virtues, in the size and smallness of the body, and in deformity, beauty, and variety of color. But if anyone wishes to perceive clearly what the definition of substance may be for Peter and for Paul, he will find the same thing in both and entirely similar: to be [considered] less, however, is foolish...
I think, and no sound-minded person could think it out in this way. Since, therefore, they say the Father is greater, let them demonstrate what precisely it is that excels in Him and by which the "greater" has entered in. B. Has the Son then fallen short of the truth, saying: "For the Father is greater than I"? A. And how could He have lied, saying, "I am the truth"? But let it be passed over for the present [to consider] how the voice of the Savior ought to be understood. For it shall be said in its own time. But define what I am saying: is there one nature of the Godhead, the artificer of all things, and Creator of the universe, and is the Lord one, or is the law not true? B. It is true. A. And since the Divine is simple and uniform, is it believed and known in the holy Trinity—in the Father, I say, and in the Son and in the holy Spirit? Do you say anything different from this, or can you teach [otherwise]? B. Nothing at all. A. Therefore, by binding all the aforementioned things into one and the same nature, and joining them into an identity, with each subsisting hypostatically, we shall adore one God, and we shall worship one God of all. But if we divide and sever [them] into a natural diversity, and place each one separately in a certain proper nature, we shall—even if unwillingly—confess three gods. And what reason will have freed us from error if we determine matters in this way? Indeed, who would not be devoid of reason and sense who would proclaim to us three gods instead of one? But I think that, fearing to appear plainly and openly insane, they will say that the Father is indeed God and true, but pouring out upon the Son the blasphemy that is worthy of and habitual to them, they will assert that He is made and created, smearing upon Him, so to speak, a shadow of the glory of the Godhead, and believing that He is adorned with empty names, they will impudently cast Him down from the true and natural Godhead. C Now, who among those who propose to think correctly is so slow and dull that he would not vehemently reject the definitions of such adversaries, and laughing at their excessive quibbles, say: "If the Son is not God by nature, but this name is adventitious to Him, as you wish, what reason is there for you to compare Him to God and the Father, and to investigate 'less' and 'greater' in both? And yet, every wise and necessary argument, I think, assigns comparisons to be made by mutual reference, and therefore especially between those things which are of the same nature and seem to be the same according to substance, or at any rate do not differ in any way. For an angel and a man are both rational beings: yet there is a certain difference in both, and they do not in every respect agree with one another. When, therefore, you approach the task of weighing the nobility and excellence of angels, an angel is to be compared to an angel, to see whether, for instance,
this one excels that one; and Peter, in turn, someone else among people of his own kind. But God, who is of all and over all, a thing incomparable and excelling beyond measure, since He is supreme over all things and reaches the very pinnacle, being unapproachable and inaccessible to created beings—what could there be that is akin to Him, close at hand, nearby, and in any way approaching Him, so as to dare to contend with Him, or for it to remain a matter of doubt which is the lesser? Does it not seem to you worthy of laughter, and the mark of one bereft of sound mind, if any of those counted among creatures should dare to say: "The God and Father of all is greater than I"? To which of existing things, I ask you, could you apply such a bold and perilous utterance? To Angels, then, and Archangels, A or Powers, Thrones, and Dominions? For how, or whence, could that which is made contend with its own Creator? Most ignorantly, therefore, do they compare a thing that is totally and utterly distinct by nature—if they imagine that the Son is not in truth God, but rather was produced out of nothing into existence by the Creator—to the Father, and weigh equality or inferiority between the two. B
B. It seems so. They say, then, that the Son is a lesser God, and the Father a greater one.
A. Then where would we discern the "greater" in the Father and, furthermore, the "lesser" in the Son, if we were to contemplate the nature of God, whatever it may be? Or will they not say that the Divine is something incorporeal and intangible, without dimensive quantity and without increase, prior to all time, eternally existing, and holding itself in the same way, being in itself and from itself completely perfect? C
B. I think so.
A. In what way, then, would God surpass and transcend God? Is it not necessary that that which is in any way at all inferior should fall away from the definition of Godhead, if it neither reaches the summit of the goods of the Godhead, and is found to have fallen into a dearth of absolute perfection?
B. Necessary.
A. For they would not, I suppose, say that the "greater" in the Father exists by reason of measurable quantity; for an incorporeal being is devoid of quantity. D Nor, again, that the Son is posterior to the One who begat Him. For, since the Father always is, and there is nothing that summons Him to change or alteration into anything else, that which is from Him, being by all means eternally with Him, co-eternal and co-existent with the substance of the Begetter, is the God who always is and who holds Himself in the same way.
B. The Son, they say, is "lesser," not by a quantity of body—for how could that be?—but because He is not possessed of the same things as the Father.
A. Come then, let us diligently weigh the attributes of the Godhead, and strive to see if these things are appropriate to the Father alone, yet by no means to the Son in the same manner, or as if, forsooth, they were also [appropriate] to the Father Himself. But first of all [this] I ask: if the Father excels and surpasses the nature of the Son, does it not follow that he who...
holds the superior position must necessarily possess pre-eminence, not in one way only, but in every single respect that is proper to the Godhead? B B. Most certainly.
A. But if the Son were seen to be equal in all things, would he not ward off quite effectively the slander of being in any way in a state of inferiority? For let it be granted that even that which is transcendent may, of its own will, sometimes lower its own glory to the humility of subordinate things; yet how could that which is minor and inferior transcend its own nature and be lifted up beyond the condition of its own nature, and contend in glory with that which is far superior?
B. You speak rightly.
A. How, therefore, does the Son of God, setting Himself before us as a sort of most perfect type and image of the substance of the Father, and, in order to demonstrate His begetter, clearly bringing forward His own nature, say: "He who has seen me has seen the Father. I and the Father are one"? If, therefore, He is not possessed of the same things as the Father, what reason is there for Him to depict Himself in His own nature, and claim that He is one with the Most Perfect, while He is [actually] less and inferior?
B. Such is not the case, in my judgment.
A. Therefore (for I will turn to the task of contemplating, as far as is permitted, those things which adorn the divine and most high nature), come now, let us examine whether the beauty of the Godhead is more conspicuous in the Father, or whether it is less so in the Son, less than is proper?
B. You seem to me to have examined these matters most excellently.
A. The divine Psalmist, therefore, makes everything that is reckoned in the number of creatures subject to the scepters of the Godhead and binds them with the yoke of servitude, doing so very piously and most rightly. For he says somewhere to the Creator and Parent of all things: "In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; and they will all grow old like a garment, and like a mantle you will roll them up, and they will be changed; but you are the same, and your years will not end, for all things serve you." Moreover, he commands the very heavens of heavens to praise Him, as well as the sun and the moon, and the stars, and the water that is above the heavens. And to men he says: "Come, let us worship and fall down before Him, and let us weep before the Lord who made us, for He is our Lord God, and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand." And of the angels and those who have a more eminent ministry: "Bless the Lord, all you His angels, you ministers of His who do His will. Bless the Lord, all His works." Do you understand, therefore, how, by binding all things under the yoke of servitude, He named men the sheep of His hand, while He presents the angels as singers and ministers ready at hand?
A B. I understand.
A. Observe, then, that the Son says the sheep belong to the hand of God and the Father, and that He lays upon us the yoke of servitude. For He said: "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me; and I give to them eternal life, and they shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the Father are one." We are, therefore, the sheep of God and the Father, yet we are nonetheless also called and are the sheep of the Son. Furthermore, you may easily learn from the holy Scriptures that the angels also minister to Him. For the wise Matthew said that when Satan, who had tempted the fasting Christ, had fled and departed in vain, "Behold, angels came and ministered to him." B Indeed, the Seraphim also stand around His sublime and exalted throne, glorifying Him, and calling Him holy, and, what is more, naming Him the Lord of hosts, and saying that heaven and earth are full of His glory. If, then, He who rules equally over all things is endued with the same hand and power as the Father, and has no less glory (for all things are full of His glory), and since He declares that He possesses a natural identity with the Lord of all—how then would He not possess equality? Or can you conceive or express anything by which the glory of the Father would transcend, while that of the Son would fall short, being unable to attain it and refusing to be borne together with it, because of a lack of equality?
B. I would not be able to conceive of it.
A. What, then, does the hand of the Father signify to us—whether the power that produces all things, or strength? For whatever is said of God surely transcends human sense.
B. Both can fittingly be said, I think, for nothing stands in the way.
A. You speak rightly; but if it be believed that what is less—or, so to say, inferior—is that which excels, how, then, could it ever be considered and called endowed with an equal operation and the same power? How, C indeed, would the Son have glory equal to the Father, and be the image of unity with Him, expressed by the most perfect likeness? For He says, "I and the Father are one," even though He has testified that He Himself holds the highest summit. For He said, "My Father is greater than all."
B. He would not have it, of course; it is far from it. For if He is less, even in some part at least, all His possessions would be submitted along with Him.
A. Therefore, the Son would in no way attain to the majesty of the Father if He were less, and not equal, nor, in my opinion, would He have said to Him with confidence, "All things that are mine are thine, and thine are mine." Come then, if you please, let us grant that pre-eminence must be attributed to the Father, and let us say that the Son is lesser; what great skill, I pray, D would all—
A of these things show, which would attribute to the Son all things belonging to the Father, and in turn to the Father those things belonging to the Son, yet suppose that in everything said to be in the Father, there is a certain being above and being superior? Then how will this be proper to the Son, although he has received the lesser? And if the lesser is proper to the Son, how could it also belong to the Father, who has received the superior? I am at a loss, but you should demonstrate to us how this could be. B. I could not. For the matter of this thought is truly difficult to escape. A. Let the discourse then flow on a second course, and let it take the path before us; I will ask something also necessary: "Will it not lie in the power of the Father alone to set free from faults, and to wipe away our B heavy sin?" B. I say it is. A. And how is it not very dangerous to dare to restrain the Son, since he shines forth with equal works, and to say recklessly that he is in a lesser state or place than the Father? For if he wills, he himself also relaxes sins. Advancing, therefore, the exhortation to accept the oblivion of injuries, and teaching that one ought to be set free from it, he says: "For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly C Father will also forgive you." But attributing to the Father the ability to forgive sins by authority whomever he might choose, he claims for himself the realization of this same thing, saying: "But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins (then, he says, to the paralytic): Arise, take up your bed, and go into your house." That which is therefore equal in power and the same in operation, how could it be inferior, and yet placed in the second rank? B. It could not be; for the reasoning is clear. A. The divine Paul, witnessing to us, would also testify to the things said, exclaiming: "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies: who is he that condemns?" Then, transferring the magnificence of this deed to the Son, and assigning to him also the power of justifying those who have believed, he writes again thus: "Being justified therefore by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." For faith D joins us to God and Father, and sets us near through the Son; but he justifies us, as we are truly and soundly taught, not separately indeed and God and Father alone, nor separately and the Son alone, but the justification which is thought to be from the Father is itself also of the Son, and that which the Son bestows, this must be confessed to be of the Father. For just as the things which were brought into being were produced by him through whom all things exist, and have no other maker than him through whom they were brought into the light: so through him are preserved those things which fell from that first happiness, and receive their previous state, and return to the primitive beauty of each of their natures.
A
B. I agree.
A. For this reason the divine Moses said that Israel obtained mercy from heaven and from the Father, however intractable and stubborn he was. For he writes: "As an eagle covers her young, so she spread her wings, took them, and bore them on her shoulders." D The Son himself confirms that he performed this very act, saying: "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! See, your house is left to you desolate." And indeed, we shall not be so foolish as to reject the Father as if he were idle, nor to say that the Son arrogates to himself alone the glory of this deed. But because in both there is total equality and substantial identity, and because God is uniform and simple, he has ordered us to understand that the Father is the agent through the Son, with all thought of a ministering subjection being far removed, and with nothing preventing the Word, who proceeded from God the Father, from being endowed with equal glory with the Father. For the Father works, using the Son as his own power—which is indeed living and not diverse from him, in so far as he is God from God, and naturally in God, although each is considered to exist in his own proper hypostasis. B C
B. You speak rightly.
A. That the Son will not be seen as inferior to the Father in divine nature, power, and efficacy in any respect whatsoever, you may also easily learn from these words, I think, as well. For through the voice of Isaiah, God and Father said: "Turn to me, and you shall be saved, you who are from the ends of the earth. I am God, and there is no other. I swear by myself, if righteousness will not go forth from my mouth, my words shall not turn back." Now, would you attribute to another besides him that brilliant boast of the Father—that he is able to call and save those from the ends of the earth, to speak righteousness, and to use a most powerful and irrevocable word? D
B. Not I; for those things which are peculiar to him and to him alone are fitting only for God.
A. But if the nature of the Son is also adorned with equal boasts, and possesses this glory in equal portion, would it then still be fitting, my good sir, to ascribe to him any inferiority at all in any respect?
B. By no means.
A. Then you shall hear him crying out openly: "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you." Is this not the same as saying, "I am God, and there is no other"? For all things are subjected to the divine yoke, and are oppressed by the condition of servitude; but of his own...
A words, he speaks thus: "Amen I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, one iota or one tittle shall not pass from the law, until all be done. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." Do you understand, then, how the words of the Son are immutable, just as are those of the Father? B. I understand. A. Furthermore, to be able to provide for things, in such a way that nothing at all escapes his hand, belongs not to any other, but solely and deservedly to God, the Lord of the universe. Do I not seem to you to speak and think correctly on this? B. Indeed, most correctly. A. We shall find, moreover, that the Father and the Son provide equally for the universe. B. How do you mean that? A. For regarding God and the Father, the Son himself was saying: "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing, and not one of them shall fall upon the earth without your Father who is in heaven?" But it is possible to see that he himself, too, bestows that immense, all-encompassing care even upon the most vile things, and those which are not B held in much esteem. For after he had left the borders of Judea and had migrated into the land of the Gergesenes, he was casting out evil demons from men; and they, obeying divine nods, were doing out of necessity what was commanded, and thus they sought from him authority over the swine. Then he, having all things subject to his feet, willingly yields and bids them go. They suddenly invade the herds of swine, and by submerging the herd in the waters, they choke them. Therefore, I ask, did Christ voluntarily grant this favor to such execrable and impure spirits, who desire nothing good, and permit them to do whatever they wished? But it is not probable that we should harbor any such thought. But it was necessary that the Son, no less than the Father, should exercise care for all things; and he shows this to us by the clearest facts, so that the glory of an C all-encompassing equality might be made manifest, clear and pure, in both. B. And how, they ask, can this come to pass? For where will equality be seen in both, if the Son be subject and inferior—he of whom the divine Paul says: "And when all things shall be subjected to him (except, indeed, him who subjected all things to him), then the Son himself also shall be subject to him who subjected all things to him, that God may be all in all"? A. Why then will they say that the Son is subject to the Father, or how would they take away from him who was naturally generated from him the equality with the Father? And if we should ponder the reason of nature, why is this [notion] of subjection most foolishly introduced, when it is not placed among the D reasons of essence
B. Because, they say, from the fact that He is subjected, the quality of His substance is clearly understood. A
A. And yet, dear heart, you will perceive with no great effort that this reasoning is rotten and full of ignorance. For the spirits of the prophets are subjected to the prophets, as it is written, B and the son of a certain man, for example, to his own begetter; just as, to be sure, one might say that Isaac was subjected to Abraham, and in turn his own son to him. But neither did the spirits of the prophets, because of the subjection that took place between them, establish a dissimilar nature for them, nor was the blessed Isaac of a different nature, because, being overcome by reverence for his father, he was subjected to him and offered up obedience to his progenitor as a noble gift of sonship. If, therefore, that which is subjected always and in every way causes those in whom it occurs to be seen as being of different substances, and violates the laws of nature, let this be firmly established and remain true in the case of the Son. But if it does not in the least offend the principles of substance, but is, as I think, a certain manner of honor and obedience of the Son toward the Father, and a refined inclination of the wills of those who cultivate duty and propriety (a thing which does not, even in us, surpass the laws of nature), why do these wretched men foolishly allege it, and why do they oppose it as a kind of unassailable argument against Him who is God by nature from God? For did not Luke write, regarding Christ Himself, the holy Virgin, and him who was thought to be His father according to the flesh, "And He was subject to them"? C
B. Yes, he has indeed written that.
A. Should we then, my good man, have to suppose that He is also inferior in the nature of man, even though He has appeared as God from God and was ineffably begotten, since He subjected Himself even to them, and was subject to His mother according to the flesh, and, led by reverence toward Joseph, showed him honor as to a father?
B. By no means; yet the subjection causes great disturbance, and it is enough to cast a suspicion that He is lesser.
A. But it will not cast even the slightest scruple into those who are firmly established in the faith, and who, having embraced the sincere and incorrupt doctrine in their souls, do not admit the deceptive and base opinions of the heretics, but remember rather blessed Paul, who writes: "Destroying counsels and every height lifting itself up against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every understanding to the obedience of Christ." For the discourse of the adversaries does indeed at times rage and swell against the glory of the Only-Begotten, and from the very sacred Scriptures D they construct an accusation against us, such as that grave and celebrated utterance, as they think it: "And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son Himself also be subject unto Him that put all things under Him." But those who are stirred up in their sobriety of mind toward a pure and sound understanding, if they notice that any saying does violence to the truth, do not
merely interpret it by itself (for it is written correctly), but, since it has been pushed aside by the twists of those who hold the opposite view so as to appear to have been said incorrectly, then, at that point, being fortified by the weapons of truth, they "destroy every lofty thing" A of the foolish reasonings and, drawing back the saying that was already rushing in a way toward apostasy, they forcibly direct it into the obedience of Christ, that is, into the economy of the incarnation. For the very name and reality of "obedience" signifies for us the time of service, when He who is God became man, and though He did not have His authority over all things as something acquired, but as God from God, He was called a servant, and being in the form and equality of the Father, He humbled Himself, voluntarily submitting to an emptying. Therefore, and quite reasonably, being believed to have become among us, He accepted this common nature of all with its shortcomings; and the shortcoming of created nature when compared to God is the necessity of being subject. However, the essence of things does not consist in this subjection, as they frequently suppose and ignorantly teach; but since they are and subsist according to their own nature, and as nature allows for each, they receive a voluntary subjection, and this is a matter of mind and will. B. Indeed, that is quite clear. A. Subjection, therefore, consists solely in the inclination of the wills, B and conversely; but it does not express the meaning of the substance. B. You speak rightly. A. What then? Is it not worth our while to see this as well? B. What is it that you say? A. The holy Paul writes to us concerning Christ: "But now we do not yet see all things subject to Him." So, if He will be subject at that time to the Father, when all things shall have been subjected to Him, there will be some time, as it seems, appropriate to the matter. Yet, for the present, the Son is not subject, since the time has not yet arrived when He Himself will also be subject. B. I agree; for the word is clear. A. But if anyone should imagine that he says He is not now subject to God and the Father, but that this will happen to Him at some time, and because of this subjection should openly ascribe an inequality of substance to Him—as it seems, he is asserting that the Son will one day be unlike His own self in nature, and will be changed into something other than what He now is and is believed to be. C For if, O good sirs (for it is helpful to address the adversaries), subjection is to be placed among the definitions of substance, it will surely also have the power and rationale of the contrary of substance, that is, disobedience. And if we say that He is not now "subject" and that this is His nature, He will certainly shift, should He be subjected to the Father, into some other [nature] and entirely different one, in respect to
A a contrary nature. Therefore, the Son has become mutable and is no longer unchangeable; and the divine David will be speaking falsely when he attributes to Him that eminent glory of being stable, in short, and of remaining in the same state. “For the heavens,” he said, “shall perish, but Thou remainest; and they all shall grow old as a garment, and as a covering Thou shalt change them, and they shall be changed; but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail.” B And Paul also falls away from the truth, writing: “Jesus Christ, yesterday and today, the same, and forever.” For where, at last, has He remained the same, if He is to undergo change in respect to substance? B. It is true. A. Let those excellent sophists, then, answer what sort of change, and of what kind, there will be. If it is for the worse, because He must be subjected, it will bring no profit to the Savior of all and Redeemer for the glory of His future kingdom—that is, that final time—when He shall even be subjected to the Father; and yet now He is surely in a better state, when He is said to have emptied Himself and humbled Himself. But if, leaving that aside as ignorant, they shall say the change will be into something better, why, then, do they foolishly prattle against subjection and attribute for that reason a worse state to the Son, when He extols and lifts up Him who is now in equality with the Father? “For He thought it not robbery to be equal with God, as it is written, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant.” Do I not seem to you to have said these things most aptly? B. Most correctly indeed. A. Since, then, their words are everywhere insipid and absurd, come, let us finally proceed to what is blameless, not by declaring the substance of the Only-Begotten to be lesser because of that heralded C subjection, which the divine Paul also says will come to pass in the final times, but by rather thinking of it piously. B. In what way? A. No one, I imagine, would say that the Son turns aside into some will of His own other than that of the Father, and leans toward being carried, as it were, outside of what is pleasing to Him; but rather one would reasonably judge Him to be of one mind and of the same counsel with Him, inasmuch as He exists and is perceived to be by nature out of Him and in Him. For, in order that He may appear to honor the Father—and the One from whom He has been genitally begotten—with perfect and supreme praises, He sometimes says: “Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire; but mine ears hast Thou opened; burnt offering and sin offering Thou hast not requested. Then I said: Behold, I am coming; in the head of the book it is written of Me, that I should do Thy will, O God.” And at other times, again: “For I have come down from heaven, not that I should do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.” Behold, for behold, He says D very clearly that He has come down from the heavens, and that it is for this reason, that He might freely perform what is pleasing to the Father, so that if it were possible for Him to disagree in will, He would despise His own and embrace the will of the Father.
B. Certainly not.
A. Therefore, He who even now wills and thinks the same as the Begetter—or rather, who is the deliberation and will of the Father—in what way shall He be subjected, and that at fixed times, as if He were not yet understood to be of the same will, or were not already a subject? For I myself will also use the sentiment of Paul, which in no way harms the Only-Begotten regarding the nature of His substance.
B. What, then, is that future subjection?
A. We have excellent hope, Hermias, and we firmly believe that to those who have determined to live uprightly, and have lived a holy and truly praiseworthy life, the participation in every good thing will come from God; moreover, that all thought and speech is surpassed by those things that are reserved for the heads of the saints. The distributor and dispenser of all these, however, will be the Son. All things, indeed, come to us from the Father through Him in the Spirit, not, however, as if He provides a ministerial service in this, but rather because He distributes with authority, as the Son, the things of the Father, so that God may be all in all A, namely, sanctification, and wisdom, and life, and glory also, and incorruption. B And that, when all things have been subjected to the Son, God and Father of the universe will again reign and rule together with Him is easily shown by our clinging to the opinion that the Son will be then, as always, of the very same will as the Father, and will agree with Him in all things, and through His own mediation will fulfill the hopes of the saints. And indeed, we say that the divine Paul used the term "subjection" C improperly. For he knew that he would in no way injure Him, even if he spoke in such a way. For the purpose of the Son is always to venerate the Father, because He is from Him by nature, and is equal and similar in all respects, and is inferior in no way; and through Him and with Him, to the Father be glory, with the holy Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.
DIALOGUE VI
That the things which are proper to humanity, and which are not spoken in a manner very worthy of God concerning the Son, are appropriate to the economy of the incarnation, and not to the nature of the Word itself, insofar as it is understood to be and is God.
A A. We have, I think, spoken clearly and at sufficient length concerning equality, and that the nature of the Son is a manifestation of the substance of God the Father, and, as it were, an exact seal. For we have demonstrated that those things which are uniquely excellent to the substance of God the Father belong to the Son; or rather, we have shown that whatever is naturally called proper to the Father, this is the Son. Do you think then, Hermias, that that which is in no way naturally united to another can ever be distinguished by the properties of another as if they were its own, and be distributed as if into a foreign nature? B. What do you mean? A. Does not everything that exists bear its own specific definition of nature, while it appears to flee from all-encompassing identity with others, even if it is said to share some common thing with them? For both man and horse are animals; but in each there exists a different account, which separates it from others and prevents it from coalescing into one and the same thing—namely, in an all-encompassing identity. For there is a specific definition of man, and of ox, and B of horse. But if someone were to take away that which intervenes, and by removing the definitions of substantial difference, were to attribute the properties of human nature and all other things to others, would he not be defining the nature of man for us, and would that which is signified be anything else? B. It is true. A. Is it not then absurd, or rather entirely impossible, that something can be known by the properties of another, and yet not be that very thing which that nature is, by whose properties it is also known? B. You have spoken rightly. A. The Son of God, therefore, is in no way less than God the Father, if He is recognized as being, by nature, entirely distinguished by the properties of the Godhead. For this reason, He is also the character of the substance of the Father. For through Him and in Him we may gaze upon the nature of the Father. B. Do you wish us to bring forward something useful for our benefit, or, having now abandoned the intention of contradicting you, shall we simply pursue the opinion of our adversaries?
A A. Indeed, my friend, you may say freely whatever you wish. We are ready, and let all delay be set aside, as the time even now urges us to defend the dogmas of the truth. But the divine Peter encourages us to proceed eagerly to this, saying somewhere in this manner: “Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you” (1 Pet. III, 15). For what other hope is there among us besides our Lord Jesus Christ?
B B. Therefore, know that they will certainly say that the Son is not equal or similar to God the Father according to the logic of nature, since he is also sanctified by Him, and is exalted, and is glorified, and is said to be strengthened. For we are ready to demonstrate from the very sacred Scriptures that he both worshipped with us and confessed that he was ignorant of the day of the end. And I would easily set forth, if you wish, the expressions and the proofs for each of the things mentioned, from the divinely inspired Scripture.
C A. Indeed, I thought the struggle was finished for me by now, but it is actually still at its peak, and its onslaught is still vigorous. Since, however, I have been frustrated in that hope, and we are forced to undergo other labors (for the objections of the unlearned bring themselves upon us in a mass), come, let us again oppose to each one separately the true and blameless doctrine, and let us demonstrate that they are ignorant of the mystery of Christ.
B. Indeed, my soul vehemently desires to pursue the same path with you. For it is not otherwise possible to explain and resolve each point clearly. Since, therefore, they say that the Son is a partaker of sanctification, the blessed Paul will show this, writing about him: “For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying: I will declare thy name unto my brethren” (Heb. II, 11). Moreover, the wise John says that he saw the Spirit descending upon him as a dove (Joan. I, 32). And in addition to these, the Son himself said, addressing the Jews: “Is it not written in your law, that I said, Ye are gods? If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken; say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?” (Joan. X, 34-36). Innumerable other things of this kind can be gathered together without any trouble, through which you may learn that the Son was sanctified by the Father.
D A. But what kind of manner of sanctification is to be understood, even if it is attributed to the Only-Begotten himself, I would gladly hear from you. For a very great difference in this matter is seen in the sacred Scriptures. For some are said to be sanctified, as in the foreknowledge of God, who foresees that they, by leading a laudable and right life, will be worthy of partaking of the Holy Spirit. Such were those about whom the wise Paul writes: “For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image
A of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called.” And God said to the most wise Jeremiah: “Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee.” Others also are indeed sanctified, even if they do not know God by nature, yet their sanctification does not signify a relationship and kinship with the holy Spirit, but rather a certain disposition and leading toward the doing of those things which God might will. Therefore, concerning Cyrus and the Medes who were about to sack Babylon, and who were moved to this by divine wrath: “Giants come,” He says, “to fulfill my anger, rejoicing at the same time and behaving insolently.” He added, “For they are sanctified, and I lead them.” And through the prophet Haggai, God says: “If a man take holy flesh,” meaning, I suppose, a sacrifice offered without blemish and brought to God for a sweet-smelling savor, calling it holy flesh. We say, however, that those who are truly sanctified through the Spirit are holy, and thus have been shown to be partakers of the divine nature. By what mode, then, will they surmise that the Son was sanctified, since it is necessary to speak of Him as having been sanctified at the same time as His being sent into this world? For thus did Christ speak: “Whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world.” For the concurrence of both B is, I suppose, seen to be very useful for the correctness of thoughts. For in sending the Son, the Father is said to sanctified Him, and not before the mission. B. They say He was sanctified by the Father. A. But would the Father have sanctified Him in any other way than through the Holy Spirit? B. Truly, through the Holy Spirit; what then follows from this? A. Observe then, my friend, into what an absurdity their reasoning flows. For if, before the taking of flesh and the mission into this world, the Word was a partaker of the Spirit, according to what is conceived as correct by them, why did He receive it again even when with flesh? For that is something superfluous and vain. But no one in their right mind, I think, would believe that such a thing could fall into the ineffable nature of God. For He would not do anything without a cause, but He perceives what is right—not by any long delay of contemplation or reasoning, but from the very first movements of the counsel and wisdom inherent in Him. But if, since He has appeared among us and has been sent in the flesh into this world, He becomes wealthy in the Spirit and has attained, as it were, a new and brilliant grace for this, where has He emptied Himself, and how has He come to a lowering and humiliation, having been in a better state; unless perhaps, as they say, they care nothing for the worst evils, and [are suggesting] that He was in a worse state, having received the Spirit, and that [the Spirit], which by nature is accustomed to sanctify, pushes D those in whom It might be down toward a worse state?
A B. But they will not think this, I suppose; for they say that He was sanctified after the Spirit descended upon Him in the form of a dove.
A. Who, then, is he who said this, having at the same time beheld the descent of the Spirit upon Him from heaven?
B. John the Baptist bore witness, saying: "I have seen the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and It remained upon Him."
A. Therefore, measure out the time of His being sanctified. For the Word of God was not sanctified before His advent, but when He became as we are—those for whom sanctification is not a product of our own nature, but is external and acquired. Or do you not know that, while the nature of man was at the beginning enriched by partaking of the divine Spirit and by likeness to God through sanctification (for it was made in the image of the Creator), yet when it violated the divine commandment and lost the gift, it was condemned to death and subjected to the yoke of sin?
B. I understand.
A. It was fitting, therefore, since God in His inherent kindness wished to reform the fallen race into its former state, that Christ should arise as a second principle, as it were, of the race, and be brought into the light through the holy Virgin, yet not suffer the taking of a carnal father, so that we all might have God as Father with Him, returning through Him and in Him to the beginnings of that glory. It was fitting that, having become man, He should receive the Spirit, so that since He was and is without knowledge of sin, the Spirit might finally dwell and rest in Him, as in the firstfruits of the race and a second root. For I believe the divine Baptist clearly signifies this somewhere, when he cries out concerning the Spirit—that he had beheld It descending from heaven in the form of a dove; and he added that It "remained upon Him," for It had not remained in us because of the transgression, but [remained] in Christ. For He was endowed with a nature into which the stain of sin cannot fall. But just as a king, although he always exists and sits on the same throne with God and the Father, is said to be "appointed" king when He became man similar to us, and the kingdom was given to Him from above; and just as, while always coexisting with the Father, He is reckoned as Son through the Spirit because He was made like B adopted sons according to the flesh, and just as He called God His Father while being conformed to us who are under God, even though He Himself is God: so also is He said to be sanctified, with the sanctification pertaining to His humanity, or residing about this flesh, because the nature of man cannot possess sanctification from itself. For this indeed resides in that nature which is truly divine and above all—of which, since the Word is the fruit, He will indeed possess, as it were, as His own in Himself, the sanctification of the nature from which He was begotten.
A
B. What absurdity is it then, that they claim to exist, in that which is said of the Son: that He is sanctified by the Father?
A. I shall repeat again what I have said. For if they say this insofar as He is man, just as any other man is said to be sanctified, the statement would be indifferent, in the sense that there is no harm in it. But if, leaving behind the truth and rejecting what is reasonable, they slip into a most absurd and utterly rash sense, saying that the Word who shone forth from God the Father is Himself sanctified, the statement would go beyond every absurdity.
B. Then show us, I pray, the grounds for the absurdity which we find in this.
A. I will do so willingly. For I shall not hesitate, hoping that Christ, the guardian of truth, will be my aid and support. Having therefore cast aside all delay, let us bring the examination of the proposed matters into the midst, and tell me this—once again.
B. What is it? B
A. Whose property shall we say the Holy Spirit is? Is He that of God and the Father alone, or also of the Son, or of each individually, or of both as one, out of the Father through the Son because of the identity of substance?
B. That is precisely what I say.
A. Correct, my friend; I admire your mental acuity, and I affirm that this opinion of yours is expressed in excellent agreement with the divinely inspired Scriptures. For God and Father is understood as subsisting in His own right, and the Son, in turn, also subsists individually; yet, even though each possessed a distinct hypostasis, they nevertheless admit no distinction [of essence]. For the Son is not separated from the Father, as one angel is separated from another, or among us, one person is separated from another—perhaps separated in such a way that the whole is C apart from the whole—nor does the line of argument drive the difference to such an extent that it posits each as entirely separate; for otherwise there would also be two gods. But since there is one and only one divinity that is being understood, we would behold the Son living and subsisting in the Father, and vice-versa, the Father in the Son; for He is the character of His substance.
B. I agree.
A. Therefore, the Spirit is also of one nature, and He proceeds as if from a fountain—the Father; yet He is not alien to the Son. For the latter is begotten, having in Himself the entire property of the Father; and since He is the fruit of the supreme divinity, how could He be thought destitute of the goods of the divinity? Now, the property of the divinity is sanctification, of which the Spirit is the manifestation [or receptacle]. For He is holy by nature, and the sanctifier of the whole creation. D
B. And what proof would there be for these things, or how might I clearly learn that the Holy Spirit is the property of the Son, just as He is, to be sure, of the Father?
A. I will not seek a witness from outside, but I will bring in Christ Himself crying out: “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he shall guide you into all truth.”
A “He shall glorify me; for he shall receive of mine, and shall declare it unto you. All things whatsoever the Father hath are mine: therefore said I unto you, that he shall receive of mine, and shall declare it unto you.” Are these things not sufficient to create faith in the wise, seeing that He calls the Paraclete His own (for He named Him the Spirit of truth), and that there is no truth other than Him? By adding, “For he shall receive of mine,” He clearly demonstrates the substantial and natural conjunction, according to which His Spirit is one with Him. For He does not say that the Spirit will be wise from Him by participation, B nor that He will convey the words of the Son to the saints in the role of a minister; but just as if a certain flower were to say, regarding the fragrance that spreads from it and pours into the senses of those standing by, “He shall receive of mine,” it would signify the natural property, and not something separated and distinct through participation, so you should understand this regarding also the Son and the Spirit. For being the Spirit of wisdom and power, He is assuredly wisdom and power, preserving within Himself the whole efficacy of the One who sends Him forth, and showing forth, as it were, in His own nature, the nature of Him whose Spirit He is. But since He says, “He shall receive of mine,” He necessarily adds, “All things whatsoever the Father hath are mine: therefore said I unto you, that he shall receive of mine.” For just as He is holy by nature, because He is the Spirit of the holy Father, so too is He wise, because He is the Spirit of wisdom; and wisdom is the Son. C And we do not say in any way that the Spirit is holy and wise according to a certain relation and participation, but rather substantially, and as it were a certain natural quality of the holy and wise divinity, which is conceived as being in the Father and the Son, and in the Spirit Himself. That the Spirit of the Father is the Spirit of the Son, He Himself will teach you, saying: “But when the Paraclete is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall bear witness,” He says, “of me.” Do you understand, therefore, how He promises to send to us from the Father Him who is His own, and while He calls Him the Spirit of truth, He yet determined that He proceeds from the Father Himself, and has fore-announced that He will also bear witness of Him? D B. And what might be understood to be the manner of this testimony? A. For since He has worked the things of God through the hand of the saints, He has borne witness clearly that the Son is God, whose Spirit He also is, just as He is of the Father as well. B. Of such things, indeed, we have enough, my friend. For that which is clear and indubitable has no need of a defender. For the Holy Spirit is also the Spirit of the Son, and I do not think anyone at all will gainsay it. Therefore, having dismissed labor and toil on this, apply yourself now rather to those things through which it is possible to learn
A that the Son is holy by nature, and not by participation from the Father.
A. And yet, as I think, anyone who has any sense would be amazed that, while they define the Spirit as being proper to the Son, they ascribe participation in Him to Him again, and say that holiness from God the Father through the Spirit is something adventitious, and at times bestowed as if He did not have it. But why, since they do not endure to examine the harm of the absurdity that follows from this, do they rush only to what is pleasing to themselves, and do so unreflectingly? For in what way could the Son be a participant of the Spirit, as if He were brought in from outside? For He is in no way a participant of His own self. But if we wish to reason rightly and accurately, those things that belong by nature to any being will by no means be considered adventitious, or in the place of things external. How then do they say He is sanctified through the Spirit, although He says clearly concerning the Spirit: "He shall take of mine, and shall declare it to you"? And we say this, not because we believe that there is anything in the Spirit that is held by participation (for He is most perfect and in need of nothing by His own nature), but we signify rather that, since the Spirit is of the substance of God and the Father, and of the Word who shines forth from Him and in Him by nature, He assumes everything which is proper to the Godhead by nature, having Him as a fountain in a certain way, and proceeding as it were from the Father through the Son, and sanctifying the creation. But if they think that the Word Himself is also sanctified along with us, gathering foolish little arguments to prove this, let them speak, I pray.
B. Speak what?
A. When the Spirit communicates Himself to the nature of created things, He undoubtedly helps it. But how, my friend, does that happen? He makes it holy.
B. Then show this without obscurity. For I do not at all grasp it. What precisely it is to "make holy," I pray you to explain to me.
A. I will do so willingly. For He makes the rational creature superior to sin and to the turning toward malice, and transforms it toward the image of the Creator through sanctification. For the Creator of the universe is holy; therefore also He says: "Be holy, for I am holy."
B. You have spoken most correctly.
A. For we ourselves were created also to the image and likeness of God. But that which imparts the divine image to us is certainly the sanctification, that is, the participation of the Son in the Spirit. Accordingly, when the nature of man slipped toward turning away, and the beauty of the image was disfigured, we were renewed toward the beginning, recreated through the Spirit into the image of the Creator—that is, clearly, of the Son, through whom all things are from the Father. And thus the most wise Paul says: "My little children, of whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you." And indeed, that the mode of what is called the formation here is signified to our souls through the Holy Spirit, he himself will show, crying out: "But we all with open face..."
beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. Now the Lord is that Spirit." B
B. You have spoken most excellently.
A. Therefore, sanctification is adventitious to creatures and things produced, for they do not possess it from themselves, and consequently it can be lost, and those who are endowed with it decline of their own accord into wickedness. For the nature of the angels even fell headlong, and some have not kept their own principality, as it is written. And we ourselves are also guilty of transgression. Is it not therefore the case that, if anyone were to suppose that sanctification is also adventitious to the Son himself, he must necessarily say that he too could be susceptible to transgression? For that which is capable of suffering will suffer, even if it is not yet said to suffer.
B. It is true.
A. But what, O my friend? Does not the reason compel us to admit that what is said to be sanctified is at some time not holy? For I think that that is called to sanctification which is what it was not before it is sanctified.
B. It is necessary.
A. But that which is not yet sacred and holy is not free from sin, nay rather, it is still subject to the diseases of vices, since sanctification is the cleansing and casting away of sin and depravity.
B. I agree.
A. Therefore, if they choose to think and to say that the Son is sanctified together with the creatures, it will not be difficult to find a time in which he was still weak by nature and not yet free from the capacity to sin. But if he is understood and is of this kind, how would he be the image of God and the Father? How C the brightness and character of his substance? For the character was not made in time, but this was so by nature and in the beginning. And how was that pure and sincere glory of the Father, and the character of his substance itself, not holy? Or will not an inescapable logic force us, even against our will, to say that not even the Father himself is holy?
B. Indeed, entirely so. For it will follow in every way that the things of which they are images must be viewed as identical in kind with the images.
A. But why, O beloved, does not the Son claim to be the truth himself, and is he not called the true light in the divine Scriptures?
B. Certainly.
A. And will they not then be found to be foisting the trifles of their ignorance upon us, if they say that the true light lacks natural sanctification? For if they say that the true light is sanctified, they will be asserting nothing other than this: that it, not being holy in its own nature, has at some time been made holy. D
A
B. Nothing else at all.
A. But He, when He was among sinners, admitting not even the slightest falsehood—"who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth," as it is written—was He not afraid to say of Himself that He was sanctified by the Father? And to this He added nothing, but rather He gloried, and felt so magnificently and loftily concerning Himself that He audaciously said: "For their sakes I sanctify Myself."
B. By what means, then, does one recognize the truth?
A. If you would ponder it wisely, [you would know that] when He is holy in nature as God, He was sanctified with us, insofar as He is man, anointing His own temple with His own Spirit. B
B. How, then, is the Father said to have sanctified Him?
A. Because all things are from the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit. And that the Son, who is holy by nature and in truth, is also being sanctified because He became man, the word of Paul has introduced to us: "For both He that sanctifieth," he says, "and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare Thy name unto My brethren." For He sanctifies indeed, being holy by nature as God; but He is sanctified with us, according to the humanity, because He underwent the likeness to us, and I say that He was sanctified even on account of this very thing, even though, being Lord of all as God, He is not ashamed to call us brethren.
B. But, they say, He would not lie in saying that He was sanctified by the Father, even setting aside the incarnation. For although He appeared as man in the last times of the age, yet the Only-Begotten was even before this a brother to those who were called into existence, and a brother to the created things, insofar as He Himself is not unbegotten in nature, but was made by the Father. He speaks the truth, therefore, both in calling us brethren and in saying that He is sanctified with us. C
A. But, O you who rush into all things rashly and with reckless reasoning, I cannot fathom where such a headlong and stupid argument will eventually lead. For that the Son is not created is to be believed not by your dreamings, but rather by the holy and divine teachers, whom Christ Himself commanded, saying: "Go, make disciples of all the nations." John, therefore, spoke clearly to us concerning the Son: "And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know the true God; and we are in the true One, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and life eternal." But the true God is not of the same kind as created things. When, therefore, according to what they most absurdly suppose, the Word, being the true God, has become a partaker of sanctification—even though He be understood in Himself and without flesh—let them come forward and demonstrate with whatever words they wish the truth of the statement that, if the Word, being true God, is sanctified [adventitia sanctificatione]. D
Or is it not true to say that, if the capacity to be sanctified is granted within the Son, who is God by nature and true God, then nothing, I suppose, would remain to prevent one from foolishly assuming that the Father, from whom He is, is also sanctified, even if He is believed to be the true God B B. We are in danger.
A. But in order that their impious audacity may be besieged from every side, I shall not be afraid to bring forward also something absurd. For is not the power to sanctify something that belongs to and is uniquely attributed to God who is God by nature, just as surely as the power to bring things into existence from nothing?
B B. It is attributed to Him.
A. Therefore, if the Son is numbered among creatures, as they absurdly and nefariously teach, and if He performs those things that are proper and peculiar to the divinity by nature and ascribes them to the glory of His own nature (for He says that He sanctified Himself), then those things which far surpass the substance of all are, it seems, brought down to the level of the creature; and it will not be absurd, I think, to say that we ourselves are also able to sanctify, according to the likeness of the Son.
B B. How do you mean this?
A. For if, although He is Himself created, He makes His own the gifts of a substance so exalted, what prevents us from being able to fulfill those things which are His, especially since we are close to Him and in no way separated from affinity with Him, provided there is for every creature a kinship and relation to every other creature, in that they are created?
B B. What you say is plausible.
A. Moreover, it would be both impious and ignorant to believe that He Himself was sanctified.
B B. In what way?
A. Does not that which is sanctified receive sanctification from someone greater and more excellent than its own nature? For they would not say it is from one who is inferior, I suppose, since to be sanctified implies leading to something useful.
B B. You have rightly said.
A. Therefore, if it is true, as they would have it, that the Son was sanctified by the Spirit, He was certainly anointed as by one who is more excellent and who possesses a nature different from His own. For nothing is partaker of itself, but one thing is partaken of in another, in relation to their essence. C
B B. That also follows.
A. Now then, how does the Son dwell in us through the Spirit? And how does that which is by nature more excellent infuse into us, through Himself, the participation of what is inferior? And if we are made partakers of the divine nature [*] by the reception of the Spirit, how will the Son be inferior to the Spirit? Or how is the Spirit more excellent than He, and not rather that He Himself is the one from whom the Spirit is, possessing the Spirit’s entire operation and producing the participation of Him? D
A And indeed the Son said: “I will not leave you orphans; I am coming to you.” But since He ascended to the Father after His resurrection from the dead, He is in us through the Spirit. For His Spirit is His own, and not introduced from without, just as, to be sure, a man’s human spirit [is proper to him]. But since He made the flesh, which is separated by an infinite interval from His divine and supreme nature, His own—I mean the flesh—it is then, and only then, said to be sanctified, with the sanctification pertaining rightly and fittingly to that which is human. Indeed, He attributes the perfection or act of sanctifying, as in the person of the Father, to the nature of the Godhead, for to It alone is it proper to sanctify.
B B. I agree. For it is superfluous, and indeed far from wise, to bring forward lengthy arguments against one who speaks rightly. But if they say that the power to sanctify is seen to belong to, and should belong to, only that Being who is God by nature and in truth, and yet the Son appeared as the accomplisher of this, nothing prevents them from openly confessing that He too is God by nature. And if we grant this, yet God by nature is in need of no good thing, what reason is there why that Son of yours, who is also God, should have indicated that His own nature lacked glory, kingdom, and dominion? For He said in one place to the Father who is in heaven: “Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You; as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that all that You have given Him, He should give them eternal life. And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do. And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world; they were Yours, and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You, because the words which You gave Me, I have given to them; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came forth from You, and they have believed that You sent Me.” And Luke also said in the book of the Acts, as if in the person of Peter: “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made Him both Lord and Christ.” Do you understand, therefore, that the Father everywhere gives glory and dominion to the Son, and that the Son accepts them quite gladly? But if they dare to attack us with discourses of this kind, and perhaps add others, in what way, by thinking rightly, shall we avoid and ward off the evil?
D A. “Let the warrior be gentle,” the holy and divine Scripture sings out to us. But I say that we must stand against the opinions of our opponents without being intimidated by anything. For it is God who works in us, and while the word is on our tongues, He directs the mind of those who are pious toward what is sincere. But as for the...
A point of deviating from the divine way and being carried off toward that which is ugly and worn out, that is exactly it. B. What is it that you say? A. I think it is the failure to pay attention to the words, as people regard the knowledge of the times—which are appropriate to each of the things accomplished—as useless and contributing nothing to our benefit. For if the Word did not become flesh, if He did not dwell among us, then let the observation of times be cast aside henceforth as stale, and since there is no precision in these matters, let any word at all be spoken indiscriminately concerning the Only-Begotten. Then let that splendor of the Father, He through whom all things were made, the co-enthroned and co-eternal Word with the Begetter, He who cannot be touched or seen, be said to have suffered in His own nature—the stripes upon His back, the piercing of His hands and feet with nails, the wound in His side, and the culmination of evils, I mean death. B. But they will surely say that all these things happened to His humanity; for He suffered in so far as He was man. A. What then, my dear friend, do we not say that suffering brought shame and disgrace to the Son? B. It is so. Indeed, Paul writes that He endured the cross, despising the shame. B And He Himself says somewhere through the voice of Isaiah: "For this reason I was not disgraced, but I set my face as a hard rock, and I knew that I would not be shamed, because He who justifies me is near." A. But tell me, did He raise His own temple, having conquered death and defeated corruption, after the manner of us men, or as God from God, even though He appeared with flesh? B. As God from God. A. Therefore, the reproach and the disgrace of that confusion have been wiped away by the subsequent events, and the Son has been glorified through the resurrection, even though before it He did not reject the most dishonorable and inglorious death on account of His voluntary emptying. B. But the Son is said to have received this glory from the Father. A. Correct, my friend. For I shall agree. Since He appeared as man—though He is the Wisdom and Power of the Father—having conquered death through Himself, and filling His own body with the life that is from Himself, He referred C what was being done to His own hypostasis as to a fountain. For it would not befit any other of the things that exist and have been brought into being to have the power of life-giving, and of freeing earthly flesh from corruption, even if this is understood of Christ in so far as He is called flesh, but only to the nature of the Deity. That the Son is the active agent in the resurrection of His own temple, and that even if it be said that this was given to Him by the Father, one could see quite easily, with Paul saying that the Father raised Him from the dead and gave glory to Him, while to the Jews the Son Himself says: "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." For He died D as man, according to the flesh, though He is Life by nature, as God. Moreover, He came to life by an ineffable power
A and by unspeakable energies, even though He existed according to us—that is to say, according to the human. Therefore, He is glorified by the Father; not as one who is in need of glory, when He is considered apart from the flesh and believed to be God of God, but because He was man, and did not possess, as the fruit of His own nature, the ability to perform divine works, He receives this in a certain manner according to the union and that ineffable concurrence which is conceived to exist between the Word and the human. But He Himself also glorifies the Father. For He is acknowledged to be the Father of the Almighty God, even though He appeared in the flesh and lived among men with an earthly body. For this reason He says: "I have glorified Thee on the earth; I have finished the work which Thou hast given Me to do." B For You willed, O Father, He says, that I should abolish the bold and intractable power of death; but to perform this, and to prevail to fulfill it, was not of blood and flesh, but of Your divine, life-giving, and invincible nature, from which, since I have proceeded, I have accomplished what was pleasing, having become weakened in nothing that pertains to equality of operation; but although I am in flesh and blood, yet by reason of the fact that I have proceeded from Your substance, I am believed to possess an equal power. Glorify Me, therefore, also You, who as man have endured ignominy, by granting Me Your life-giving power and energy, and by showing that the temple ineffably united to Me is superior to death. And that He does not seek to be accounted worthy of an honor and glory that is strange and previously unknown to Him, is clear enough. For He said: "And now, O Father, glorify Thou Me with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was." C For the Lord of glory, who always was and is in the beginning, having suffered ignominy in the interval by reason of His descent to human things, returns to the glory that was above and naturally inherent in Him, bestowing upon the incarnation those words that befit the emptying, along with the suffering thereof. It is therefore necessary, above all else, to distinguish the times during which those things that belong to the flesh and to ignominy were still appropriate, and the times that preceded the advent, in which, while He is the Lord of glory, He is found not to have received glory, but to possess His own as God.
B. How, then, does He receive some of those from the world from the Father, concerning whom He also says to Him: "They were Yours, and You have given them to Me; they were Yours, and You have given them to Me D from the world"?
A. I shall then say something again, being compelled by the absurdity of the arguments to return to what I said at the beginning. In vain, as it seems, is He said to have been emptied, and if He has become like us, He who in the form and equality of the Father is the only-begotten Son. For if He possesses an acquired authority, and receives some from the Father, whom He did not have before,
A a new state of things is seen to have come to pass in the Son, and He is adorned with the glories derived thence, and grace, as it were, leads Him to something greater and more excellent than He was before. But whither, then, will that account of His humiliation depart? Or where will you see the very emptying of Himself, if it is clearly found that He possesses something which did not inhere in Him before, and that He obtains, as a kind of reward and remuneration, that authority over some?
B. That is how the matter stands.
A. But wise John himself will also be found to lie, as it seems, if he says of Him: "He came into His own, and His own received Him not." For how is that His own, which has scarcely, and at the last, and from another, been given? And yet, countless and altogether numberless times have passed, during which the Son was coeternal with God and the Father. But if, since He became man, He receives those from the world, and is seen to have assumed this newness of scepter, I would boldly say that the inhumanation into the Word of God is more excellent than that prior state, even if He be understood to be endowed with equality with the Father. For He transfers, as you see, to a more excellent and incomparably more glorious condition. Therefore, the Son perfected the dispensation with flesh for Himself, and attributed the mode of inhumanation to His own glory. How, then, is He said to have assumed the nature of man only for our sake, or how was He the price of redemption for the life of all, if by the death of His own flesh He procured a glory so unaccustomed and previously inaccessible?
B. You have spoken rightly indeed: but the discourse is carried off into temerity and absurdity.
A. Therefore, let them also cast aside that bitter and malignant manner of disputing. Otherwise, does not the matter seem intolerable to you, and one which forces even the unwilling into empty sophistries? For, having no care B to attribute words accommodated to fitting times, they decree to mix and confound all things upside down. But is it not better to consider that all things were indeed the property of the Word, and the nature of all produced things was subject to the glory of the Creator? But because the earthly race had fallen away from right reason, the Word, who appeared in the flesh for us, was not accepted by some; but He subjected those already persuaded by degrees, and believing, to His yoke, and receives those willing to learn better things. "For to Him every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord in the glory of God the Father." Therefore, all things are indeed the property of the Word, in as much as He proceeded from God, and rules over all things with the Father. But He receives these according to humanity, C when He became like us, over whom the power of reigning and commanding is from God, and given to Himself.
B. Shall we say, then, that He possesses His own glory, having assumed nothing to this end from God and the Father?
A. Yes, in so much as He is understood to be God, and the Lord of glory. For so is He named in the divine Scriptures.
A And thus the disciple of the Savior, James, was of this mind: "My brethren," he says, "do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with partiality."
B. Then what is the glory of the Son, alongside that of the Father?
A. It is not superior, my friend, nor inferior, but the same; nay rather, just as He is the Wisdom and Power of the Father, so too would He be the glory, ineffably beaming forth from the substance of Him who begat Him, and signifying by Himself the nature from which He sprang, just as a ray of the sun, and the radiance of light, that bursts forth from the substance of that which emits it, and which, because of the extreme likeness and identical quality, is understood to be in all respects similar to that from which it proceeds.
B. Could you say from the sacred Scriptures what the faith in these things might be?
A. Truly, this will be accomplished with very little labor if you collect the words of the saints. For writing to the Ephesians, Paul says: "For this reason," he says, "I also, hearing of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him." You understand, then, that immediately he named God as the Father of Christ and the Father of glory, B showing Christ, I think, to be nothing else than the glory of the Father. He also said elsewhere again: "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord." And, "Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith," who is the natural glory of the true Lord—namely, the Father—we are being reformed toward Him through sanctification in the Spirit. Peter, too, conspicuous among the disciples, cried out to those coming from the circumcision unto justification in Christ through faith, saying: "As all things for us, which belong to life and godliness, have been given by His divine power, through the knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and virtue." If, therefore, the Son is the own glory of the Father, through whom we have also been called to the knowledge of Him, who is he that dares to say that His being what He is is something given and acquired to the glory of the Father? C For who is he that would ennoble the glory of the Father with another glory? Otherwise, is it not the same as if some should say that the Wisdom of the Father is rendered wise by someone, or that His natural virtue—that is to say, the Son—has received from another that He should be His virtue, and that He has glory and wisdom from another? Would not our adversaries, by beguiling us with such discourse, lead us into every kind of perversion? If, therefore, the things already said suffice to demonstrate clearly that the Son is the own glory of the Father, it is well, and we must be silent. But if, as I think, there is need of other testimonies as well, I will bring forward the divine Psalmist to the Father and God of all, as though speaking for those who D
A are justified by faith: "But I, in righteousness, shall appear to your countenance; I shall be satisfied when your glory appears." For who would be the person and image of the Father and the character of his substance, other than the Word who has shone forth from him, through whom he is known even to those on earth, illuminating all things as if with his own glory? Therefore, he once proclaimed to the most wise Moses: "But I live, and Living is my name, and the glory of the Lord shall fill all the earth." For all things have been filled with Christ, and he has appeared to us in him. Knowing this, the divine David said again: "The Lord shall build up Zion, and he shall be seen in his glory." B For he was seen for us in the Son, who clearly says: "He who has seen me has seen the Father."
B. It follows then, if the Son is truly the proper glory of God and the Father, that he must be by nature the Lord of all; and as king, he is in no other manner than the Father. But why then did he say again through the voice of the Psalmist: "But I was appointed king by him"? The wise disciple has testified to us clearly that he was made Lord and Christ by the Father.
A. Will you then, my friend, tell me without hesitation if I wish to ask you something?
B. Why certainly.
A. Is it not fitting to understand that what is called to lordship, and is brought to this in an unusual way, was not Lord at some time? For nothing that is what it is would drift back C to something else, as if to another thing.
B. Certainly not.
A. When, therefore, they say the Son was brought to lordship—he who, before he came to this, was still destitute of the glory and honor of lordship—is it not necessary, even if they are unwilling, to say this?
B. What if they were to say even before the incarnation?
A. I know well that they will say this, going easily beyond what is appropriate; but the argument of truth will withstand them. For we say that it was when he became flesh and dwelt among us that an adventitious power occurred to him, and he seemed to have received kingdom and lordship. For the divine disciple says that he was made Lord and Christ D by God and the Father—not indistinctly the Word who has shone forth from him, but Jesus who was crucified. But that the Son was Lord before the incarnation and the conjunction through union, we shall see without difficulty, considering it further in our minds.
B. What is that?
A. Is it not said that when he became man, then he also descended in the form of a servant?
B. So I say.
A. It must be understood, therefore, that before the incarnation the Word who came forth from God was not in the form of a slave, but in natural lordship and proper eminence. Out of love for us, He left these things A behind and was called a slave, so that, just as He of His own will underwent for our sake things that are contrary to His nature, we too might willingly be eager for His sake in things that are above our nature. For He descended to an emptying, not by letting the emptying overwhelm His innate and unchangeable glory, but so that that which is lowly and downcast—namely, we ourselves—might be able to rise upward through Him. For that which is inferior will never put constraint upon that which is superior; rather, that which is incomparably less will yield to the more preeminent and excellent. It is therefore most absurd to think that He was compelled by us to remain down here with us for our sake; but we shall wisely and truly think and say that humility has returned to His divine and ineffable beauty, vanquished by His supreme glory. For just as it happened that He suffered death according to the flesh because of the flesh B which was subject to death, but, being Life by nature, He brought it back to its proper state, suffering nothing in His own nature but rather shattering the power of death; so we say that it came about that He underwent slavery economically. Since He is by nature God and Lord, that which is burdensome recedes, and the ignobility of slavery is obliterated, being conquered by the superabundance of His glory. Therefore, if He remained among the dead—according to the flesh, I say—He also remains among the slaves. But if He has been roused and ascended to His original state, I mean to Life, having economically granted victory over death, then it is obvious that He will also open the way to that other state, that is, to the splendor of natural lordship, the victory having been granted to the incarnation for a brief time in the manner of slavery.
Thus, since He is endowed with equal glory and, as Son, sits upon the same throne with the Father, and as God with God, C yet He seems almost to be recalled to the beginning of such illustrious and supramundane glory, with God and Father saying to Him: "Sit at My right hand, until I make Your enemies a footstool for Your feet." 1 For whatever the divine and ineffable nature brings under itself and subjects, calming it into obedience, this is surely subjected to the feet of our Savior—not because He acted in a human way, nor because He is able to overcome the unbelieving simply for the reason that He became flesh, but because, raising the lowliness of humanity to the dignity of the supreme and highest nature and installing Himself upon the throne of Godhead, even with the flesh, the only-begotten Word of God will have lordship over all D things, not without the Father. For whatever is done by the Father, this is surely the work of the Son; and whatever is said to be accomplished through the Son, this is clearly the act of the Father. For all things are done equally through both, the Father indeed working, but having through the Son, and with Him in the Spirit, the operation and will in each one of the things that are done.
1 Ps. CX, 1.
A B. You speak very skillfully; for you instruct us to keep to a right and blameless path; but you would benefit us no less than before, if you were to demonstrate more clearly the lordship of the Son.
A. If, then, someone were to inquire, and were to press us thus: "Tell me, I entreat you, what do you say the lordship of the Father is? What would you define it to be?"
B. I would say: to rule over the totality of things, to be glorified by all, that all things are His, both those in heaven and those on earth.
A. And do they not say that the Son is adorned with such august and illustrious titles?
B. They would say, I suppose, that He is; yet only because the Father grants it to Him.
A. But would not that be a lying and empty fiction, when God and Father explicitly cries out: "My glory I will not give to another"? For He has not granted to any others besides Himself—insofar, I say, as concerns the essential difference—to boast with the surpassing titles of true divinity. For B where is its surpassing nature left, if the condition of created nature reaches such a point that it leaves nothing beyond its own nobility? Or is it not necessary to think that things which are made and brought into being are utterly and entirely excluded from those things which are specific and proper to God?
B. It is necessary.
A. How, then, would the Son be resplendent with the glory of the Father, if not in that very way in which He Himself is, and not in another? For blessed Daniel, describing for us divine and prophetic visions, places the Ancient of Days upon a throne, and stations around Him thousands of thousands ministering, and ten thousand times ten thousand standing by. The divine Isaiah, moreover, says that he saw the Son in no C lesser glory: "For I saw," he said, "the Lord Sabaoth sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and the house was full of His glory. And the Seraphim stood round about Him, and each one had six wings, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew, and one cried to the other,"—a sanctification, manifold at the beginning, but ending in a unity and a single lordship. Does it seem to you that the Son possesses equality of glory? For where there is the supreme throne, and an equal eminence, and the surrounding hosts of heavenly Virtues, manifesting the servile condition of generated things and bearing witness to the glory of lordship for Him who sits upon it, who would doubt that he has reached the very depth of ignorance who thinks that the Son D is not resplendent with the natural lordship of the Father?
B. Yes indeed, this is truly a faithful statement.
A. You would admit, my friend, that neither I, nor you, nor indeed anyone else, would be deceived in saying, if we assert that to the God who is true by nature belongs power and authority over every creature, and that all things are of God, as —
A one might say, the heaven and the earth and everything contained within them.
B. I would grant that, indeed.
A. Thus, in the same way, those who lead the blessed life above in heaven—the angels and archangels, and whatever may be beyond these—would be God's and the Father's. But they would also be the Son's. And you know well that I hold this same view regarding those on earth as well.
B. You have spoken rightly. But if you were to prove individually the things we are saying, you would do a very excellent thing.
A. Therefore, the blessed Psalmist says: "Bless the Lord, all His angels, His ministers, who do His will" (Ps. CIII, 20), attributing that holy multitude of heavenly beings to the power of the Father. Yet, foretelling that He will one day come as judge, the Son Himself says: "For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His holy angels" (Matth. XVI, 27). For He will come, He will come at the appointed times, to render to each according to his work. However, we do not say that He will be glorified or boast in foreign ministers, but rather that He is truly attended by the angelic guard as being properly His own.
B. I agree.
A. Again, when the divine David sings and speaks concerning God the Father: "Come, let us worship and bow down before Him, and let us weep before the Lord who made us, because He is our Lord God, and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand" (Ps. XCIV, 6, 7), the Son says that the rational flocks in this world are His own, at one time saying to the Father, when the Israelites had believed: "My sheep hear My voice" (John X, 27); and at another time, regarding those who had not yet believed: "And I have other sheep, which are not of this fold" (ibid. 16). B Therefore, from countless passages it is easy for us to prove that the Son is said by the Father to be glorified on account of His humanity, even though He is Lord of glory and sits forever as a co-enthroned assessor with the Father. Those who attribute to Him a glory acquired from elsewhere, and say that power over all things has been brought in for Him, will not escape the charge, nor will they easily wash away the stain.
B. Therefore, if the power over all things is not from without, C nor brought in for Him, but is essentially inherent, I am unable to say what reason the divine Paul could possibly have had for asserting that His kingdom will one day cease, saying: "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then those who belong to Christ at His coming. Then the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when He destroys every principality and every power and authority. For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. For He has subjected all things under His feet. The last enemy, D death, shall be destroyed" (I Cor. XV, 22-26). For behold, behold, as one might say, the boundary line of the...
ending of His kingdom is the rendering of principalities vain and the destruction of death; for then He shall deliver up the necessity to rule to God and Father alone.
A. Away with such an old-womanish and ridiculous thought! For he who thinks and speaks these things has abandoned the paths of his own vineyard, and has wandered through the tracks of his own field; he walks through a wilderness void of water, and land placed in thirsty places, and gathers with his hands barrenness, as it is written. For the divine teacher did not say to us that the Son would one day lose the titles of kingdom and sovereignty forever. For he knew, I suppose, how to strike the spiritual lyre of the divine David, and sing to the Son in the Spirit: "Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom" (Ps. XLIV, 7). B What then could they possibly do, they who are carried away to any absurdity with loose reins of speech, and labor with such a rustic mind, when the blessed Gabriel, announcing Christ to the holy Virgin, says: "Fear not, Mary, the incarnation: for you have found favor with God, and behold, you will conceive in your womb, and bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus. For He Himself shall save His people from their sins. And the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David, and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there shall be no end" (Luc. I, 30-33)? Since therefore the holy man has predicted that the kingdom of the Son would extend to infinite ages, and indeed the voice of the angel chimes in with the truth, I believe that he who is upright and prudent will agree, and will condemn these trifles, and will pronounce those insane who wish to hold any other opinion, since the law openly proclaims: "In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established" (Deut. XVII, 6). Otherwise, is not the objection riddled with the greatest impiety? C
B. I would grant that, indeed. Nevertheless, know that they are not affected in the same way as we are by the opponents.
A. But it will certainly lie in our own power to think and learn what is best, and we shall not sit idly by, allowing their ignorance to blurt out whatever it desires; but, by repelling from every side the insolent fabrications of their minds as much as we are able, and by generously overcoming the snares of their nefarious falsehood, we shall sing among ourselves: "Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us to be caught in their teeth" (Ps. CXXIII, 6). D Since, however, as it is written in the book of Proverbs, "the impious govern deceits" (Prov. XII, 6), come, let us say something that may benefit the hearers, and by which they may be able to generously repel the onslaught of fraud. Therefore, the divine Paul writes thus to those who have been justified by faith, and who have a glorious hope in this: "Therefore, receiving an unshakable kingdom, we have grace, through which we may serve God with fear and reverence—
A. Whose kingdom, then, shall we say he wishes to be remembered here, I ask you, my friend? Observe how he indicates it is firmly established, for this is what that word "unshakable" signifies, as I believe.
B. I would not be able to explain it clearly, but I want to hear it from you.
A. It must, then, be examined, if it seems good to you, whether he speaks of the kingdom of the Son, or that which is to be given to the saints themselves. If, therefore, they say the kingdom and majesty of the Son is immutable and immovable, I think the adversaries will be covered with shame for their empty triflings. But if, leaving aside and pushing away the Son, they say the kingdom will be immovable for the saints, in the first place they will appear superior even to Christ himself, and having obtained a condition far better than his own—if he indeed possesses a kingdom that can be lost, while they are endowed with infinite and perpetual happiness and B constant glory.
B. You have spoken most excellently.
A. But to offer us such a rustic cavil, is it not completely full of stupidity and foolishness? For to rule and preside over the universe befits no one other than Christ himself, who does not possess this as something adventitious or received from elsewhere, after our fashion, but joined to him by the principles of natural lordship. "But if we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him," as it is written. Therefore, He is the master of ruling, whereas we are adoptive, and honoured by a certain participation. For they will reign with the reigning Christ. But how will they have an immovable honor in Him, and be destined to reign perpetually, if the empire of Christ—of which we say they are participants—is eventually to be shaken and brought to an end? And if the bestower and distributor of the kingdom ceases from his rule, upon what, then, will their affairs rest? What foundation will they have? For where will they still be participants, if that which has called them to glory labors under weakness? Or is it not necessary that, together with those things that lift them up, that which is lifted also falls, and that those things which are founded upon them should collapse together to the very lowest foundations? Since, therefore, that basis of glory and foundation of happiness, according to them, is to be shaken, the hope of the saints will also surely collapse together into dishonor. C
B. It will surely collapse. So clear and true are the things you say.
A. But what, then, is the reason why that minister of the divine mysteries to us called the kingdom of Christ the kingdom of God? For he writes thus: "For know this, understanding that no fornicator, or unclean person, or covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God." For I would in no way doubt that to whomever a natural dignity of majesty to rule belongs, there will surely follow for him, in every way, the necessity of being unshakable. D
A Or shall we not understand these things to be so, Hermias?
B. Most certainly. For if he is God at all, he would surely also be King.
A. If it were then to come to pass that the glory of ruling ends, he would also slip away from being God; and life or light would be no more (I pass over the absurdity). What then, pray, could be the nature of the Son, stripped of divinity and kingdom and of being light, and not possessing the power to quicken that which is deprived of life? Could you tell me, my friend?
B. I do not understand.
A. But that which compels us to fear most of all that so shameful and abominable an opinion of the adversaries, is this.
B. What is that?
A. What time is it that they claim will be revealed, at which, as they think, the Son delivers the kingdom to God and the Father?
B. They would say that we, for our part, will by no means appoint a time; but Paul himself defines it, saying: "For Christ is the firstfruits, then those who are Christ’s at His coming; then the end, when He shall deliver the kingdom to God and the Father; when He shall have put an end to all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign until He has put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that is destroyed is death." B
A. Therefore, as this present age is, as it were, growing old, and the time is already tending towards its end, the Son, according to them, delivers the kingdom to God and the Father. Yet now He holds the rule over all things and is endowed with glory befitting God, while God and the Father says to Him: "Sit at My right hand, until I make Thine enemies a footstool for Thy feet." C
B. True.
A. He is, therefore, on the same throne and possesses the same glory with the Father, while the rebels have not yet submitted themselves and are casting off the mode of subjection. But He will be cast down from the thrones of divinity when they shall have placed their necks under Him, and shall have softened that mind, once stubborn and hard, and have melted it into a gentle, pliable, and tractable disposition and will? D Then what would that profit the Son? For to whom do we say they are subjected, when they have been led to this only after a long time? For if they are brought in through subjection, while He departs from the throne, what the end of the dispensation will be, I am not able to grasp. But what do you say, my friend?
B. Neither would I be able to discern.
A. But come, let us consider this too.
B. What is that, I pray?
A. Is not that time better for the Only-Begotten, in which some struggle against Him, refusing to obey, than
the time when they have already been brought under Him, the enemies having been placed beneath Him and becoming subject to Him — or according to A what necessity is there for the kingdom to be destroyed, when the enemies have been placed beneath him and those who were once known to behave like enemies have been subjugated? B. It seems so.
A. I shall not hesitate to add this to what we have said before: B the Father, it seems, would be overturning the kingdom of the Son by subjecting the enemies to Him and putting to flight those who hate Him. For thus He said through the voice of David. But the Son Himself might perhaps be convicted of not having known those things by which He could possess a long and unshaken glory. For He would not have thought it necessary to call out kindly to those who were still turning away from the straight path and did not accept the subjection understood in faith because of the stubbornness of their character: "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. C Take my yoke upon you." Or would such a statement not mark the final end and limitation of His own kingdom and glory, O good sir, if He were no longer to rule over those who have been made subject?
B. That is how it is.
A. I would say that the Father Himself would also be telling a falsehood when He says to the Son who has become man: "Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, and the ends of the earth as your possession." For where would the inheritance of the Son be considered to be any longer, if it is being handed over to the Father? And where will the meaning of the "possession" D maintain its own proper notion, if that which was given slips away, and when it ought most of all to be established, it falls into ruin as if by a sudden accident?
B. I think that is enough and more than enough to object to the adversaries. But you would most gladly address yourself to that point which I think is still lacking in what has been said. For I am really unable to grasp what that is, the kingdom being handed over to God and the Father by the Son.
A. Will you not yourself also say, O good sir, that sin, which is difficult to overcome, has reigned, and that corruption and death have tyrannized over us, and that hell has widened its soul and opened its mouth without limit, as it is written?
B. Yes, for it is very clear to one who is in such a C state.
A. What then? Are these worldly spirits of wickedness not also present, and their leader, who has trampled the whole inhabited world under his own feet, as it were, and is himself called the god of this age, while they are called powers, and principalities, and dominions, and furthermore the rulers of the world?
B. That is true.
A. But the Son has come in order to reduce all these to nothing and to abolish them completely, so that the power of God might shine forth clearly [freeing us] from that tyranny of those who had formerly held sway over us, and might go forth over all the earth, with sin being rooted out through faith, and the principalities and powers having been triumphed over, 614
A by means of the precious cross, and death having been shaken off through his resurrection from the dead. By his own power, therefore—that is, by the Son—the Father, having permitted that all these things should be brought to pass, restored the world and brought back the captive man to his former state. Wherefore, the Son also said to him: "I have glorified you on the earth; I have accomplished the work which you gave me to do." B B. You have spoken most correctly. A. Consider, then, that in the present time, while corruption still holds sway, and sin has not yet been entirely rooted out, and the wicked and deceitful dragon still maintains an empire over the unbelieving, the power of God is in a certain way divided, and as it were hanging in the balance, since those who have not yet renounced the deception of the demons and this unholy and earthly life still shake off his yoke. But when the time draws near in which death will grow weak, and the power of sin will fall, and that tyranny of the devil will be completely destroyed, then the Son will render to God and the Father a kingdom that is pure and sincere, and in no way mixed with anything inferior. For he will reign alone through him and with him. The fulfillment, therefore, of the dispensation and the perfection of the whole mystery, that man moved by the Spirit, John, signified by the word "handing over." C For as if the kingdom of God were held by others, and having snatched it from those who had usurped it, the Son approached and handed it over to the Father, though he himself is in no way excluded from reigning; for he will certainly reign together with his own Begetter, of whom he is the living and hypostatically existing power, and he must reasonably be understood to have actively brought all these things about. But that the kingdom of Christ is incomprehensible, even if it is said to have received it according to his humanity, one may know from the things which the divine Daniel has written for us, who already in a certain way beheld the Only-Begotten in human form and appearance. He spoke thus: "And in the days of those kings, the God of heaven will raise up a kingdom which shall not be destroyed for the ages, and his kingdom shall not be left to another people. It will grind into powder and scatter all kingdoms, and it shall rise for the ages." And again: D "I was watching," he says, "in the vision of the night, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, one like the Son of man was coming, and he reached even to the Ancient of Days, and was brought before him, and to him was given dominion, and honor, and the kingdom; and all peoples, tribes, and languages shall serve him. His authority is an eternal authority which shall not pass away, and his kingdom shall not be destroyed." B. The faith in these things spoken is clear and beyond dispute. A. But, good man, do not weary yourself any longer over this. For it is not obscure that the Only-Begotten will remain in an unshaken state, in so far as it concerns his own kingdom and glory, and in the same way he will always continue to have...
A it without any mutation into something else. For he will suffer no harm at all, having obtained a nature that is sublime and placed beyond every passion. But since some of the perverted ones—senseless, as it seems, yet not lacking in harsh speech—are mocking us with other words, for this reason let him who draws his bow, according to the voice of the Prophet, draw it against them, and let him who is about to be girded with his sword, which are his weapons, be girded.
B. You will certainly free us from sharp anxiety if you pursue this path and apply this examination of reason. They say, therefore: Why do the divinely inspired Scriptures declare that he who, as you wish, sits on the same throne with the Father and holds a scepter befitting God, does not also possess his own power? B For you will see that the power of acting is imparted to him by the Father, and you will learn this from the very words of the Savior. For he said: "Amen, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of himself, unless he sees the Father doing it: for whatever he does, these things the Son also does in like manner." And again: "I do nothing of myself, but the Father remaining in me, he does the works."
A. Therefore, the bold speech of the adversaries prophecies that the Son who has clearly emerged from God the Father is truly lacking in power and is weak—a speech to which might rightly be said by us and by Christ himself: "You err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God." C For just as he is the image of the Father, and wisdom, and glory, and radiance, and character, so also he would be understood as the power through which the creator was, is, and will be of all creatures. "For all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made." For in the same way that certain skilled craftsmen in some trade, say, copper-smiths, or those skilled in stonemasonry, do not perform the works of their own art otherwise than by their own hand, fabrication, and industry: in the same manner, I think, God and Father will perform through the virtue of the Son, as through his own, the creative work that he has proposed to himself to do by his creative power. And so the divine David, knowing the Son to be the living and hypostatic D power and operation of the Father, prayed, saying: "Command, O God, thy power; confirm, O God, that which thou hast wrought in us." And Paul, most wise, clearly proclaimed Christ to be the power of God and the wisdom of God.
B. Not even they would say that the Son is weak, but neither would they say that he received power by grace in time, as the prophets and apostles did, but rather that he possesses the power to accomplish anything, implanted immediately along with his very nature.
A. Our enemies are foolish, as it is written. For they seem to be ignorant of that which is at issue. But now we are inquiring not when and how the Father gave power to the Son, but whether it is
A altogether a given thing, and not rather a property essentially inherent in Him. For it will profit the nature of the Son nothing, as far as it is concerned, for it to be upright and perfect, to say that to it also in the beginning the power was given by the Father, since a dishonourable condition is manifest in this deficiency—not indeed in that it did not receive it at the beginning, but in that it has something adventitious. For one must imagine the nature of the Son as having been formerly destitute of power, before it received it from the Father, and led to this not by its own, but rather by alien strengths. What, moreover, will they say to one asking them about this? B. What is it? A. Would they say that that which is strengthened is the same as that which gives the strength, or something else besides it? B. Something else, I suppose. A. If, therefore, as they desire, God and Father bestowed power upon the Son, He will be caught in the act of confirming His own power. Is not this, therefore, utterly ridiculous, or rather, madness? B. Quite so. A. Following, therefore, the faith of the Sacred Scriptures, and as it were walking the beaten path for the wise, let us say that the Son is the power of God and Father, B both immediately and closely, through Whom and in Whom He has an ineffable power in all things; and He compacted the heavens and what is contained in their circuit, and founded the earth, and produced those things of which He is the vehicle and nourisher, and makes His angels spirits, and His ministers a flame of fire, as it is written. But when, with the Father’s consent, the Only-Begotten, Who is the strength and power of the Father, was named and became man for the salvation of men, He brought the dead back to life, and raised them from the tombs already corrupted, and drove from men the wicked spirits; and to those deprived of sight, He brought an unusual, yet nevertheless pleasant light, and accomplished other similar prodigies by divine power. B. But, they say, the Father is working in Him. A. And what the mode of the Father's working might be, they would not be able to explain, I suppose, if asked. Is it as through an instrument, and the Son as suggesting a ministerial use for the Father's wills, C or, which is better and more true, as if the Father worked through His own power? But if, having abandoned what is better—which is rightly presumed to be the correct view—these wretched men should pass over it most vainly and attribute to Him a ministerial force and operation, it must be known that His glory and grace will vanish into nothing and be finally disfigured. For it is manifest to us even from the divine Scripture itself that an instrumental ministry is nothing at all, so far as it is concerned, but that the praise for turning the instruments wherever they might wish belongs solely to the movers. For God said somewhere, an instrumental ministry...
A as worthless, mocking: "Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? Or shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it?" Therefore, so far as his own nature is concerned, he would be understood as nothing, although the Word was God, having no natural operation, but appearing like inanimate instruments, and subject to the will of the mover. But since he is of such a nature (for so the adversaries gratuitously babble), why does he stir us to praise him beyond what is fitting, saying: "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work"? And further, he clearly and plainly adorned his own nature with the same honors, openly crying out: "For as the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, so also the Son quickeneth whom he will." Yet how is it not easy to understand, and stripped of all deception, that he has no operation at all of his own upon his tongue, but attributes the accomplishment of all things done to God and Father alone, saying: "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work; by me and in me, furthermore, he quickeneth whom he will"? But he does not say this: rather, by attributing also to his own powers, as if in turn, the acting without hindrance on whatever he might B wish to accomplish, no less than the Father, he clearly demonstrated that, having sprung from the substance of God and the Father and existing in his own hypostasis, there follows naturally an all-around equality of operation in every respect. For, measuring things that are far too exalted and superior with our own condition, we shall not grant, according to his own doctrine, that the power understood in God, that is to say the Son, is non-existent. For he is, he is living and subsistent, proceeding ineffably from his own Father as from a fountain, and distinguished not from elsewhere, but rather substantially by the properties of the Godhead. B. You speak well. A. Therefore the divine Moses also said: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth." And the great David, knowing that the power which is from him and in him, that is the Son, is not foreign to God, said: "By the word of the Lord were the heavens established, and all the power of them by the Spirit of his mouth." Or is not the Word, I ask, who is from him and in him, considered different, I say, according to his own hypostasis, from the Father and God? B. He is certainly different. For he subsists specifically, even if he is consubstantial. A. Since, therefore, the Father produces all things into existence, and establishes the heavens, how is the Word the maker of these? B. Explain it to me, I pray, for I am eager to know. A. I shall do so gladly. But the inquiry is sharp and subtle. The nature of the one Godhead is known in the holy and consubstantial Trinity by us ourselves and by the holy angels. And it is indeed according to his own
A hypostasis that the Father is most perfect; and likewise the Son and the Spirit. But the creative will of one of these, in whatever matter it is said to be engaged, is indeed his own efficacy, yet it passes through the whole Godhead and is the effect of a substance that is above creation; it is common, as it were, yet also specifically appropriate to each person, so that it might befit each through the three hypostases, having its own complete subsistence in itself. Therefore the Father acts, but through the Son in the Spirit; the Son likewise acts, but as the power of the Father, who is understood to exist out of him and in him according to his own peculiar subsistence. The Spirit also acts; for the Spirit is the Spirit of the Father and of the Son, and is the maker of all things. B. Not everyone can follow what you say; nevertheless, they rest upon the foundation of the truth. A. Let us therefore lower our discourse from such subtle concepts and take another path, if you please, by gathering arguments derived from other lines of reasoning to produce faith. B. Let us go; for I shall follow gladly. B A. Well then: if the Son is not the power of the Father, but possesses power as a borrowed thing, just as the creatures do, and worked wonders on earth—tell me, how could you not reproach him, and rightly so? For he did not wish to rebuke the leper when he said: "Lord, if you will, you can make me clean," but in a way he nurtured his ignorance, immediately promising—nay, even commanding—that what he sought should come to pass. "I will," he says, "be made clean." And as for certain blind men who came rushing forward and saying: "Have mercy on us, Lord, Son of David," he asked: "What do you want me to do for you?" When they asked for the light C they most desired, he immediately gave it back to them. But why was it not more appropriate to say to the leper, "The Father wills it: be made clean," and to the blind men, "What do you want the Father to do for you?" Otherwise, would it not perhaps be better to say that the holy apostles acted deliberately when they removed far from themselves the opinion that they were believed to be working miracles by their own power and virtue? For they said to him who sat at the Beautiful Gate: "In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise and walk." And to another: "Aeneas, Jesus Christ heals you." And when some did not cease to marvel at what had been done, they said openly: "Men of Israel, why do you marvel at this, or why do you look at us, as though by our own power or piety we had made him walk?" For they D thought it necessary to attribute the glory to Christ, and not to themselves, since in truth Christ is the supreme fountain and root of the grace and operation with which they were endowed. For when he had preferred them to others and had given them the prerogative of the apostolate, adorning them with divine gifts and granting them the power to work miracles easily, as God, he said: "Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons; freely you received, freely give." And so, when
they had discerned—as best they could and as well as they perceived—who the giver and master of the power within them was, they wove for him the crown of glory, always invoking over the sick: "In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth." To whom our divine A Singer also sings, saying: "You are the glory of their strength, and in your name they shall exult all the day." Or do you not say that it is most praiseworthy of the holy apostles to choose to think great things in Christ and to count it their pride to love Him through the working that is in them?
B. Indeed, most certainly.
A. What then, Hermias, would they say to us in our questioning, if they were to object and say, why does the Son himself, having once set aside the glory of power for his own Person, make mention only of the Father, but attributes the miracles to his own intentions—declaring that he can easily make alive whomsoever he wishes, according to his co-equality with the Father and his co-equal power, and offering his will to the leper for the washing away of the disease, and bestowing light by the touch of his hand upon those whose sight had flowed away? Is it still a matter of doubt, or rather is it not B indisputable, that as he himself is the power of God and Father, he restores creation to its original state—not as something adventitious or extraneous, heaven forbid, but having as the fruit and work of his own nature a creative force, just as the Father does? For it is, I believe, a work and effect of the same power and authority to bring things created out of non-existence into being from the beginning, and to be able to reshape things that have been corrupted by sin and have endured a decline toward worse and baser conditions, back to their original state. C
B. How then did he say, without hesitation: "Amen, amen I say to you, the Son cannot do anything of his own accord, unless he sees the Father doing it; for whatever he does, the Son does likewise;" and in addition to this: "I do nothing of my own accord, but the Father abiding in me does the works himself?" If I could rightly understand these things, I would be no small measure grateful.
A. Recall then to memory what we said just now about the holy and consubstantial Trinity. For I said that, though there are three hypostases existing specifically yet at once together and joined to one another as in one nature of Deity, the operation of one Person would be called that of the whole substance, and of each D hypostasis specifically; for it is as if the whole is accustomed to be moved totally and specifically through each one.
B. I shall remember; for how could it be otherwise?
A. Therefore, if God and Father wills to work something concerning creation, the Son would not be inactive; nor, if the Son were to work something, would the Father be idle, since there is one God and Creator. For the one is understood in the other, and is truly so, according to the unity of nature and substance, even if they are understood as distinct in their existences and specific Persons.
A B. You have spoken correctly.
A. Since these matters have thus been most excellently contemplated by us, as is reasonable, let us examine the economy in the things set before us, and let us admire the artfulness of the Savior’s words, for He always draws toward faith by means of a miracle. And if miracles were to follow upon discourses, even those who are quite strongly inclined toward apostasy would most easily come to choose to think aright. Knowing this, Christ Himself addressed the centurion, saying: "Unless you see signs and wonders, you will not believe."
B. I have grasped what you say. For you wish, as I suppose, to say that Christ performed miracles, offering to the Jews a certain benefit from this, and artificially contriving as it were a way toward that which is persuasive and docile for those who had impiously recoiled from the doctrine of truth.
A. I say so. For your quickness of mind, my good friend, anticipates me. How I admire having so wise a student, and one who has a ready ear, as I pipe a melody to it as if from a reed. Therefore, since He worked one of those highly marvelous deeds also on the Sabbath, the Jews were barking bitterly and severely; and opening their B pathless and unrestrained mouths against Him, and sharpening their tongue toward the most bitter reproaches, they thought they were speaking correctly, and as they clamored that the law was being broken, they said: "If this man were from God, he would not be breaking the Sabbath." Therefore, Christ was warding off the accusations, and by showing that the Father also is working on the Sabbath, He demonstrated that He did not shrink on account of the law from doing those things which are necessary for the sustaining of the life of mortals. For He said: "My Father is working until now, and I am working." And that there is one will, and one power of all things that are done, both of His own and of the Father’s, He confirmed by adding: "Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son cannot do anything from Himself, unless He sees the Father doing it." And He discourses somewhat more coarsely than is appropriate regarding the divine subtlety and excellence. For it was not possible for things that surpass human reason to be explained otherwise; but we understand these things subtly and sharply, and in a way that is fitting to the divine and incomprehensible nature itself. "For whatever He sees the Father doing," He says, "these things the Son also does likewise." Is it not true to say that, if He had known His own nature to be destitute of strength, He would have said, I suppose, more clearly and more appropriately: "The Son cannot do anything from Himself, unless He receives the *power* from the Father"? But since He knew Himself to be endowed with equal power and strength, He showed that, because He has one and the same essence with Him, He Himself also approaches the things to be done together with Him, moving along with His Begetter toward whatever it may be with one will, and joined together in the sameness of operation and sameness of will in all things, as if by certain common laws of divinity. Surely, therefore, the "cannot" does not signify weakness in every way and in all respects, but rather [the character of] the nature in those things on which it is founded and consists.
A It would reveal an unchangeable perseverance—just as if one were to say, for example, "God cannot sin." And light, too, might say, "I cannot not be light." Fire and water, also, if they had a voice, would cry out, "We cannot not be fire and water." Now, since the most audacious [heretics] were carping at the miracles and signs which surpassed all wonder, and hindering them from insulting Him, He attributed the working of the effects to the Father, saying: "I do nothing of myself; but the Father abiding in me, He does the works." For the Father is active through the Son, and He would never do anything apart from the power that is inherent in Him—that is, the Word who has shone forth from Him and is in Him. Therefore, He also said: "If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe me; but if I do them, even if you do not believe me, believe my works," establishing here also, I believe, the equality of power in all things for the purpose of demonstrating His consubstantiality with Him. B
B. There is nothing in such correctly stated things that I could argue against; but you will permit me to ask something small besides, or else you will think me unlearned and troublesome, and otherwise importunate.
A. Not at all, my friend. For there is nothing more eager than zeal, and it is glorious to be ready if the glory of the Savior is being maligned by anyone.
B. That One, therefore, they say, whom you believe to be consubstantial and coequal in power with the Father, worships with us. For, speaking to the Samaritan woman, He says: "You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, because salvation is from the Jews." But, O good sirs, they say, if He is numbered among those who worship, how will He still carry the glory of consubstantiality, and how will He contend about equal status with the Father who is worshiped, when one can see in another way C that He concedes a more excellent and sublime nature to the Father by admitting it? For He said: "But concerning that day or hour—it is clear that [He means] the last one—no one knows, neither the angel in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father."
A. And so, as a worshiper instead of God, and as one observing God and Father just like the things which were made through Him, the Son appears as if from a machine, suddenly ignorant. Is it not then ridiculous, and fit to be likened to stage plays? For we should not, if by such buffoonery and human arguments they come to the very goal of ignorance, submerging their mind as if in mud, lose the most fragrant knowledge of the sacred dogmas. They seem indeed to have completely forgotten—although they have often heard from us and from the divinely inspired Scripture—that the Word, being God, and in the form and equality of the Father, appeared as man, D not by the appearance of flesh alone, but also by the properties of humanity, or by whatever other name one ought to use. Now, the property of humanity joined to God, and bound with the yoke of servitude along with obedience, is worship, and
indeed also not knowing what is the will A and counsel in God. "For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?" And just as, since the Word has appeared among us, they would not, I think, say that he has been shaken from being the Word, having been transformed into earthly flesh; so also, if humanity was assumed, and became his own, nothing hinders us from thinking and saying that, by reason of the incarnation, those things which belong to humanity are his together with it. For the very logic of the emptying B required this. Therefore, either let them openly strip the Word of the flesh and of those things which pertain to it, and do away with the entire economy from the foundation, and they will clearly see the Son as God; or if they shudder at this as impious and repulsive, why finally do they blush at the human condition and propose to attack those things which most especially befit the incarnation? Since at any rate it must be wisely considered that, just as being God by nature, and having appeared from God, he makes human things his own; so also, having been made man, he has as his own the honor and glory fitting for divinity. For he is worshipped not on C earth alone, but also in heaven, since he does not disdain or despise being worshipped as man and as a Jew. "For when," he says, "he brings the First-born into the world, he says: 'And let all the angels of God worship him.'" If, therefore, they say that the Word who shone forth from God was born from the seed of Abraham, we are talking nonsense; let him be called a Jew, and let him be a worshipper. But if that matter is found to drive them to extreme madness, and they assert rather that when he assumed the seed of Abraham, and also according to the flesh came forth from the root of Jesse, he was called a Jew and was a worshipper D as man: why, omitting the mystery of the incarnation as if it were futile, do they return to the nature of the Word itself, and impiously force him who is consubstantial with the Father to be worshipped nakedly and openly, even if he is perhaps not understood as man, or among us, to whom, if it were proposed to worship, no one would take offense, but rather the act would be for praise and the greatest pleasure? For is it not written concerning him that he is inferior, as far as humanity is concerned, and has been made a little lower than the more excellent nature, that is, the angelic, and their glory? B. It is so. For Paul said: "But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death." A. Then explain, I pray, what might be the cause why, although the inhabitants of the celestial city have obtained a more excellent nature, and are endowed with the most certain and altogether indubitable knowledge of God, they have made him to be worshipped who is inferior by nature and yields to their glory? B. Indeed, this is now your part.
A. Therefore, if he is the same and at once inferior and incomparably excellent, we shall readily assign to the humanity that which is lower, which fittingly belongs to it (for the nature of man differs greatly from the angels); but we shall assign to the deity, which surpasses all things, the state of being supreme and raised above created things, and of substantially transcending every rational substance and every name that is named. But if one should suppose that the Word, even without flesh and not yet, as it were, inserted into humanity, is inferior even to the angels themselves, he will be less than his own creatures, and moreover a worshiper, and our defense will not further assist or plead for him. But if to say and think these things is both impious and most dangerous, and yet he is "less" because he is also man, then it will necessarily follow that one must think he is a worshiper because he is also man, even though he is God by nature and is worshiped equally with the Father by all. For God says somewhere through one of the prophets: "As I live, says the Lord, for to me every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall confess." A And the divine Paul, when establishing that the Son is consubstantial with the Father, and knowing that what is begotten is in the glory of the Begetter, says: "In the name of Jesus Christ every knee shall bow, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." B B. But, they say, we shall find the Son worshiped together with the Father, yet also worshiping, as one honored and not ignorant of what he is by nature; for he surpasses the nature of created things, but he is not equal to the Father. C A. So the Son has obtained the glory of deity as a gift and reward of virtue, and that he is to be worshiped is not of the dignity of his own nature, but he has obtained it by the bare and sole will of the Father. B. Thus they think and say. A. Then let them show when and how the Father granted the worship to the Son; for they will not say as though, whatever they might choose to imagine, that this is the decree of God and the Father. B. They say, He commanded the holy angels to worship him. For what else could this signify: "When he introduces the Firstborn into the world, he says: And let all the angels of God worship him"? D A. Will they, then, because they deem that the Father commanded the Son to be worshiped, indeed deny that the term "firstborn" applied to the Only-Begotten according to the manner of humanity has necessarily brought with it the appearance that his glory is also acquired? For tell me, when was he the firstborn, if not when he became among many brethren? If, therefore, the Word was of the same kind as us and a brother in nature even before the flesh, why is it said that this did not exist in the beginning, but has come to be in these last times? And how indeed
is the Only-Begotten to be understood, he who is numbered A with the creatures? Since it is not a matter of doubt, but rather a truth that stands firm, that he appeared as man in the last times of the age, and therefore has the title of Firstborn, did he receive this glory as something added, as well as the necessity to be worshipped? If they do not think that matters stand thus according to their own view, their argument will necessarily drive them into a foolish and absurd stupidity of thought. For someone, I imagine, might say: "If, because he became man, he is therefore the Firstborn, and if he is to be worshipped when he is said to be most humbled, then the season of emptying itself will bring him unusual glory." But that baseness and ignobility would be more ancient than the humanity, when, existing—as it is written—in the form and equality of the Father, he humbled himself to a nature so abject, that is, the human. But if he were lowly and B nowhere near worthy of being worshipped, for what reason do the Seraphim, encircling the Son who sits upon the throne of the Godhead, honor him with hymns and doxologies, and call him Lord Sabaoth, and say that heaven and earth are full of his glory? For with what glory would heaven be full if he barely receives the right to be worshipped with the Father only when he has appeared as one of us? Hear, moreover, the wise Ezra writing: "All the earth calls upon the truth, and heaven blesses it, and all works shake and tremble." Although the blessed David cries out clearly concerning the Almighty God: "He who looks upon the earth, and makes it tremble." He, then, who before the incarnation and being called Firstborn was illustrious with the honors of God the Father, how could he be inferior to the Father in even the slightest detail?
B. "Let it be," they say, "according to your own opinion, that when he became Firstborn, then he was also commanded to be worshipped: is this not something given to him by the Father?" C
A. But one must consider not simply whether it is given, but at what time it is given, when, namely, he descended as Firstborn in relation to the brotherhood that is ours. For this, I imagine, is what the term "Firstborn" signifies.
B. I agree.
A. But then, tell me, would it be fitting for the nature of man, considered in itself for what it is, to be worshipped in the order and measure of God?
B. By no means.
A. Very rightly, my friend. For those things that are properly its own belong only to the nature that is queen of the universe. Therefore, when the Son descended from his own eminence, and did not count it robbery to be equal with God, he assumed the mode D of a nature that is servile and upon which the necessity of being worshipped lies, and worshipped with us. Since, however, it was entirely unreachable and beyond the logic of what is fitting that the Son who has shown forth from the Father should not be seen as illustrious in the Father’s glories, even if he has become flesh, through the illumination of the Spirit his heaven is initiated...
A, that is, the multitude of the holy angels, and it was commanded to adore him who was declared to be the Firstborn, and the Only-Begotten among many brethren, and Co-throned with the Father, the Father not leading him back to the first entrances of such glory, nor yet assigning the adoration as if it were something unaccustomed and strange, but declaring as adorable him who is adored by them always and from the beginning of ages, even after he has become flesh. Therefore (for I shall return again to the word concerning the beginning) the Son worshipped, when he also became the Firstborn and appeared in the form of a servant, from which a person might most clearly discern the dignity of the eminence that is in him by nature. For if it is fitting for the form of a servant alone to worship, to whom among existing things is the noble beauty prior to the Incarnation unknown? But that we do not insult the nature of the holy angels when we say that they too stood in need of the instruction of the Spirit, but rather that we are following the divine Scriptures and remain in this reasoned opinion, Paul will confirm by writing: "To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord." And in addition to this, the inspired Psalmist also says: "Lift up your gates, O ye princes; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory." For since Christ, after having despoiled hell and overcome death, came to life again, and, as he was returning at last to the heavenly places and wishing to go back to the Father who is in the heavens, the Spirit commanded to open the gates in the heavens to him with all speed—the Spirit, surely, who resonates within them—and was revealing to the powers above the God who appeared in the flesh B, saying: "The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory."
B. It is established, then, that he worshipped indeed as man, although he was God by nature. You would say, however, I suppose, that we should adapt to the condition of his humanity, with correct understanding, that which he also says, to be ignorant of that day and hour.
A. I would not blush to say so, as you know. A multitude of certain arguments, nodding almost with their very eyebrows, bids us pursue this opinion as one void of all difficulty and as a trodden path, so to speak. For it is not alien, I think, to the condition of the emptying that the meanness of ignorance—not a diminution proper to the nature of the Word, in as much as he is understood as the Word and Wisdom of the Father—should be present. Do I not seem to you to have observed these things correctly?
B. Most certainly.
A. For what line of reasoning, so wicked and maliciously constructed, would drive us to believe and think that the Only-Begotten was ignorant of any of those things which in God [are hidden...
if He is truly, according to the Scriptures, the wisdom and counsel of the Father? B. No one who is truly wise would ever be led to believe that. A. Would not the blessed Paul also have spoken falsely, my friend, writing to us: "For what man knows the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knows no man, but the Spirit of God"? B. Certainly. A. Does the Spirit of God then not know the things that are in Him, and is nothing hidden or obscure to Him? B. He knows them; for how could He not? A. If then the Spirit of the Father is the Spirit proper to the Son, how shall He be ignorant of anything that is hidden in God, since He Himself possesses the proper Spirit who knows all things that are in the Father? I hear Him clearly saying to His holy apostles: "I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak of Himself; but whatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak: and He will shew you things to come. He shall glorify me: for He shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you." Does that oracle which we have produced seem clear to you, and have you further perceived that while He named the Paraclete the Spirit of truth, He nevertheless said that He proceeds from the Father, thereby manifesting that all things which are the Father's are His own? B. You have spoken most excellently. A. Through this, one can also learn of something truly ridiculous—a thing which rightfully exposes the opinion of our opponents as one to be rejected. For to imagine that that which proceeded and shone forth from God the Father—the Word, the splendor, the image, the bright character of His substance, endowed with equal glory and throne, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge hidden, as it is written—could be ignorant of such a small matter, what a great opinion of their utter foolishness would that justly bring upon them? C B. The greatest imaginable. A. But I do not think that the Father and God Himself would have preserved His own glory intact, had He really been ignorant of anything of His counsel and wisdom. B. I agree; for anyone at all who knows this will surely acknowledge that [God] is certainly not without His own counsel and wisdom. A. Well said, my friend; for it is not fitting for defenders of the truth to think otherwise. Having therefore left behind superfluous and long discourses, let us proceed to this point: It was the custom of Christ the Savior to act in such a way, especially towards His holy disciples. If they asked something with a desire to learn, but which required further investigation, He was accustomed to recount and explain it as subtly as possible. But if they wished to curiously inquire into something greater D than their own capacity, He would gradually
restrain them A and very diligently persuade them to seek what is more suitable, and to perform good works through which they might obtain praise and suitable glory before God. Therefore, when they wished, I know not how, to investigate and learn things above their capacity, He persuades them to stop, refuting them with necessary arguments, since the Father did not reveal these things even to the angels, nor did He make them manifest to the Son Himself, if indeed He were a simple man and like unto them, and not God by nature. But because they were insistent and pressing that these things be explained to them, He at length rebukes them after a fashion, saying: B "It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father hath put in his own power. But ye shall receive power of the Holy Ghost coming upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and even unto the uttermost part of the earth." You see how He commands them not to curiously investigate things that exceed their capacity, but rather, as it were, directs them toward what is at hand and more suitable; for this was His custom. Indeed, the divine disciples once brought to Him a man blind from birth as He was just coming out of the sacred vestibules, and, still following Judaic opinions, they took the sick man as an occasion for learning, and said: "Rabbi, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?" But since they were touching upon divine judgments, and were asking that a matter so inaccessible and impassable to men be explained to them even C more than was fitting, He again transfers them to familiar matters, and wards them off from knowledge that is above man, and exhorts them to apply themselves rather to the care of acting and to good studies, saying: "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work." You hear how, having swept away these opinions as absurd and more suited to the ignorance of the Jews, He commands them to act rightly rather than to investigate things that are above man, attributing to the divine nature alone and of itself the knowledge of what it wills to accomplish. B. You speak rightly. A. We shall therefore conclude nothing otherwise, if our mind is right, than that, D even if, in accordance with His humanity, He is said to be ignorant of something along with us, nevertheless, since He is God, the Son knows all things that are of the Father, through whom and with whom to God and the Father be glory with the Holy Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.
DIALOGUE VII.
Concerning the Holy Spirit, that He is God and from God by nature.
A A. When some wise man declares in song that the fruit of noble labors is glorious, and almost chants it to those who are accustomed to work most diligently, would you reject the truth of that saying, or would you praise it as rightly and excellently thought out? For to endure labor is indeed becoming to the saints, O Hermias. B. So it is. A. Come then, having advanced to the very goal of our labor, let us gird up our loins with the utmost alacrity, and putting on the breastplate of righteousness; and taking up the most sharp sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and the shield of faith, as it is written, let us manfully withstand the trifles of the heretics, who sharpen their mind and petulant tongue to heap insults upon the divine Spirit Himself, and plunder the minds of the weaker, leading them away from certain and true knowledge, and casting them, as it were, into pits of destruction, and pouring out the poison of their own ignorance. B Although the law through Moses has forbidden it—"Whoever strikes the life of a man, and he dies, let him surely be put to death"—yet Christ has clearly and openly declared: "Whoever shall cause one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it is better for him that a millstone be hung about his neck, and he be drowned in the depth of the sea." B. The judgment of such men is indeed great and most severe. For when they insult the brethren and strike their weak conscience, they sin against Christ. But by what reasoning, pray, are these men led? A. It is sheer absurdity, even if they cloak their own beliefs under the name of opinion and reason. But this I would very much like to know from you: these men, using a kind of unbridled audacity and an openness now bordering on impudence, say that the Spirit of God is created and made. Others, however, on the contrary, making the coarseness of their blasphemy somewhat more subtle, are rightly ashamed of this opinion, and turning their discourse into a more refined error, they say that He is not God, but stupidly leading Him away from the supreme substance, they believe Him to be uniform, and to have been allotted a certain individual and intermediate nature, which neither reaches the highest C perfection, nor
A creature conditione longe sublimiorem statum obtinet.
B. But what, I pray, is that nature, which is neither God nor creature? For I think there is absolutely nothing intermediate. For there is one, most complete, difference between the two, which separates God and creature in their natures, and there is nothing else among things believed to exist that one can notice besides these. Otherwise, do you think that anything else beyond these must be admitted?
A. Not at all, my friend. For divinely inspired Scripture says that all things were made through the Son; so that, if any thing of all that exist were separated by nature from the universe, it would avoid the insignificance associated with being a creature, and would be recognized as God by the excellence of its own nature. But the converse is not false either: for if anything is not God by nature, it will certainly be in the order of creatures. Therefore, let them either exalt the divine and holy Spirit on high and acknowledge that it is not substantially joined to the creature, or, dragging it down from the supreme and highest thrones, let them count it among the creatures. For no place or reason for another nature has been introduced to us in between, such that it denies kinship with both. And as to saying that the Spirit is "uniform," and thinking that this bestows glory upon Him—is this not utterly hollow? For there are very many things among us which, although they are in the number of creatures, have uniformity in themselves. For there is one sun, and one moon; and there is no other earth than the one that exists; and the nature of all water is likewise one, preserving uniformity, even if it seems to differ in its qualities. It is, therefore, a sign of an ignorant and childish mind that some think they are adorning the Holy Spirit and crowning Him with supreme glory by means of such cold quibbles, while they dare to enclose Him in the measures of a creature—not recognizing that He is separated by incomparable excellence and placed above it, just as, of course, the Father is, and the Son as well; but they impiously force Him into a lower and more humble nature, one which finds no place at all in the scale of things.
B. What, then, if they ask: "Where is the Spirit called God?"
A. B But where, I pray, and by whom was it said that He is of the same kind as created things—He who is coordinated and enumerated with the Father and the Son, and has been admitted into the faith of the one and supreme Divinity? For has not the Savior commanded us to be instructed by the holy apostles in this way? "For going," He says, "teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." C Therefore, the blessed Paul also asked some of the believers: "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" And when they denied this, and openly said: "But we have not even heard if there is a Holy Spirit," he rebuked them, saying: "Into what then were you baptized?" D since he knew that their faith was not correct, nor was their conduct rightly ordered.
it could never be A perfectly achieved unless it were completed in the confession of God the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Thus have those delivered it who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word; thus have the Fathers instructed us, and it is for the wise to know what is written: "Do not remove the eternal boundaries which your fathers have set." "One Lord, one faith, one baptism," according to the Scriptures. For we have been baptized into one divinity and lordship of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, not as if into a plurality of gods, nor yet as those serving a creature, lest that proverb fall true upon us: "A dog returning to its own vomit, and a sow that was washed to wallowing in the mire." For we who have been liberated from the worship of the creature, through faith, plainly, in the one true and naturally existing God, and in whom we place the hope and glory of our salvation, because we have cast off the old and profane error—if we do not confess the Spirit as substantially conspicuous in the thrones of the true divinity, B to where, then, and from where have we fallen? I am hesitant even to think of it, nor am I able to explain it; nay, rather it will be clear, and that most easily. For we have fallen, as it were, from the royal road, and wander no less than we did formerly, and we have been mocked, as it seems, by Paul, who says: "But then indeed, not knowing God, you served those who by nature are not gods. But now, having known God, or rather having been known by God, how do you turn back again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you desire to serve again?" For where, I ask, have we known the true and substantial God, unless the Spirit is declared to be God together with God and the Father?
B. Verily, they say, we have known God the Father and the Son, but not also the Spirit.
A. But we will not use those teachers who have corrupted their own mind, nor will we pay heed to spirits of error, according to the Scriptures; C but rather we shall believe that His Spirit inhere and subsists substantially in God, just as the human spirit inheres in a man. And just as if someone were to name for us, for example, Peter or John, he would at the same time and assuredly indicate to me their own spirit that is in them, and makes a declaration of the whole living being, in the same way, I think, it is with the Father and the Son. For the Spirit is indicated together with each, and not as if He were a part of Him, just as we understand it in the case of men. For He exists hypostatically, and the Father indeed pours Him forth from His own nature, and the Son Himself also grants Him to those worthy. But it is impious and altogether senseless to cut [the Godhead] into a duality, and to dare to as it were contract the nature of the divinity, even though the holy and divinely inspired Scripture unfolds it, as it were, in the three hypostases, D and again gathers it together, through an all-encompassing equality and likeness, into a natural unity and into the same thing in substance.
A B. Whence then, they say, or how might the Spirit also be known to be God?
A. From his own nature, my good man, and from that which is according to nature, in so far as it is possible, he is known. For things that exist are truly known from what each one is in reality; but we do not care much about names, provided that those things which are known without error are signified, although a suitable appellation is useful for each existing thing.
B. The discourse is obscure, and I do not grasp it very well.
A. I will explain further. For I will clarify, as far as I am able, what is meant. If someone were to say of something: "a rational, mortal animal, capable of intellect and knowledge," what would you say he has defined, I pray you?
B. A human being, evidently.
B A. But if he were to say "a whinnying animal," adding that?
B. I would say a horse.
A. Then, since he has kept silent the name of each of the things defined, how would you yourself say that they are a human and a horse?
B. Because, my friend, he defined the nature of a human and of a horse.
A. Now, if someone were to find fault with you for saying these things, and were to say that neither is the rational animal a human, nor is the whinnying animal a horse, because the names were not attached to the definitions, would we not judge that man to be ignorant, and that he ought to be called unpolished, narrow-minded, and stupid, for being so lacking in learning?
B. Certainly.
A. But if you were doing this, and someone were to ask you, and wished to learn further, what would you answer?
B. I would say that it is the mark of a rustic and an ignorant person to find fault with things that have been defined so very correctly and skillfully. For the definition of each of the things that exist is peculiar to it, which shows what it truly is; but names are often employed equivocally.
C A. Therefore, the demonstration of things is truer and free from error if each thing is accurately examined according to what it is by nature, and not altogether from names. For would we not attribute to the nature that is the queen of all things, incorruptibility, immortality, and immutability?
B. Completely so.
A. What then, tell me, is "God"?
B. That is surely the queenly nature itself.
A. But while the incorruptible and the immortal are proper to it, the name "God" is common to the angels and common even to us ourselves, even if it is adoptive and given. Similarly, there is indeed in a human the "rational," but the name "human" is attributed also to images made out of stone, or from some other material, shaped very well into our likeness. Come, therefore, consider whether the Spirit is God, and in God, and from Him naturally, especially since He is also substantially resplendent with the properties of the Godhead; or whether, condemned by D a fault as they wish, He has fallen from consubstantiality with God, since He is not called "God." Yet we shall refute those who babble here, even without labor.
A, using not arguments derived from contention, but taking our stand upon the holy Scriptures, and ridding our mind of the bleariness of their stale and empty clatter.
B. I would grant, indeed, that it is far and incomparably better to examine whether the Holy Spirit is distinguished by the properties of the Godhead, and is in no way less than the Father and the Son, than to argue rashly and to exhaust oneself in vain over a mere inquiry into a name.
A. Most distinctly and very rightly do you speak, Hermias. For I think this is the better and more accurate course B. But yet, for those who desire to busy themselves with unnecessary things against our adversaries, it is possible to see that the Spirit is also called God. For the divine and most sacred Peter, having exposed Ananias as guilty of theft and the interception of holy offerings, rebuked him vehemently, saying: "Anania, why has Satan filled your heart, for you to lie to the Holy Spirit and to defraud from the price of the land? While it remained, did it not remain for you, and when sold, was it not in your power? Why have you put this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God."
B. It is so. For he who acts thus toward the Spirit, they say, lies to God.
A. In what way, my friend, unless the Spirit is God?
B. Because if one is pious toward the saints, they say, he is pious toward God. And thus Christ said openly to the holy disciples: "He who receives you, receives me." C Yet we do not say, following sound and true doctrine, that the disciples are gods by nature, even if one receives the Son by receiving the saints. Therefore, by a similar line of reasoning, perhaps he who sins against the Spirit sins against the God who sent Him.
A. But where the subjects are naturally endowed with equal powers and altogether the same properties, and thus have a necessary relation of consubstantiality with one another, there the reasoning that they be referred to something more excellent is D altogether superfluous; rather, they would be according to the identity of substance, both in both, and the one as the other, and the other again as the one. But when a natural inequality makes things diverse and other among themselves, I would not say that the argument by which they are referred to something more excellent is incredible or absurd. If, therefore, the Spirit is not consubstantial with God, he who sins against the Spirit will not have sinned against God. For the matter would be referred to Him who sent Him. But if logic compels them, even against their will, to honor the Spirit with consubstantiality with God, let them be ashamed of their own fables, who place "consubstantial" among those things that are not of the same substance with God. For it will not be the same thing to do something against the saints and against the Holy Spirit; but if they speak of a man, by right...
we shall refer the report to his Author: but when the Holy Spirit is brought into our midst, whatever has been done will be toward that very divine and ineffable nature, not tending through a mediator toward something more sublime, but leaping forward proximately and immediately to that very highest and supermundane beauty. A Therefore, because of the identity of substance, the appellation of Spirit is appropriate to God and Father, even if it is third according to the order of names only; and it is likewise appropriate to the Son. For Christ said, when He was instructing the Samaritan woman: «God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.» Paul also writes: «But we all, with unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord»; B and again: «The Lord is the Spirit.»
B. The Spirit, then, is consubstantial with the Father and the Son?
A. Yes, absolutely, since the saints do not otherwise attain the participation of God than by the reception of the Spirit. For we are made partakers of the divine nature, according to the Scriptures: whether one is subject to Him together with a created and made nature, or whether we are truly, so far as is possible, partakers of the Godhead, and are thus called the genus of God?
B. If one cannot be a partaker of fire without fire, how will one be a partaker of the Godhead, if not through God?
A. That which is in us, then, as God, and which fulfills the place and power of God—can it be that it is not God?
B. In what way?
A. Observe, I pray, C God saying to those ancient men: «Therefore I am with you, says the Lord Almighty, and my Spirit has stood in the midst of you; be of good courage.» And again, to us [He says through] the divine evangelist: «In this we know that He abides in us, from the Spirit which He has given us.» For in what way, tell me, was God in the ancients, while the Spirit was standing by? Or how would He be in us ourselves, who possess the Spirit? For the Spirit would not have produced the natural presence of God in us, if He were of a different nature from God.
B. Certainly not.
A. The Spirit, then, is God, and is from God by nature; or, if they think that it is not so, in their own opinion, then the word of the most wise Paul—who wrote in this way to those who had received the Spirit and were prophesying D through Him—is revealed as a vain lie and a deception: «If, however, all prophesy, and there comes in some unbeliever or unlearned person, he is convicted by all, he is judged by all; the secrets of his heart are made manifest; and so, falling on his face, he will worship God, reporting that
A truly God is in you.” Furthermore, to those who love tongues: “Therefore,” he says, “one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God; for no one hears, but by the Spirit he speaks mysteries.” For where would God be understood as dwelling in those who prophesy through the Spirit, if it were not so? But since “he speaks mysteries by the Spirit,” in what way does he who speaks to God have a Spirit which is foreign to the natural identity of God? B. How rightly and justly you speak! A. And in addition to these things, I would say that a countless multitude of not-unsuitable arguments is at hand, which would lead us far away from blasphemy against the Spirit and establish us on the path of truth. B. What do you mean? A. Do we not say that man was fashioned on earth according to the image of God? B B. Who doubts it? A. And is it not the Spirit who imprints the divine image upon us and, like a seal, implants that supramundane beauty? B. But they say, not as God, but as a minister of divine grace. A. Therefore, it is not He himself who is imprinted upon us, but grace through Him. B. It would seem so. A. Then it would be necessary for man to be called an image of grace, and not an image of God. But consider this further. For what I am about to say is, I think, wise and simple. For the living creature was created in the beginning, with God himself as the craftsman and honoring it as it were by the formation of His own hands, according to the Scriptures. And this, when brought into the light, was formed according to the likeness of God, when the breath of life was breathed into it. But when it had lost sanctification through a turning toward vice, it was again brought back to its pristine and most ancient beauty, with Christ restoring what had grown old into a divine and spiritual form, and in no other way than that pristine one. For He breathed upon the holy apostles, saying: “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Is it not the case that if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation? B. Indeed. A. Therefore, it is true to say, or rather it is now necessary to conceive, that if the aging and the manner of corruption have brought about the loss of the image endowed with sanctification, we must confess that through the return to the ancient state and the renewal through Christ, the likeness to God is inserted? C D B. Absolutely so. A. But if the grace given through the Spirit were separated from the essence of the Spirit, why did blessed Moses not clearly say that when the living creature was brought into the light, the Creator of all breathed into it grace through the breath of life; and why did Christ not say to us: “Receive grace through the ministry of the Holy Spirit”? And yet, He is indeed designated in that passage as the Spirit of
life; for a true life is the nature of the Deity, if it is true that in Him we live, and move, and have our being. A Through the voice of the Savior—He who truly leads and sends forth the Spirit Himself into the souls of believers—the Holy Spirit is and works, and through Him and in Him transforms them into the form that was in the beginning, that is to say, into Himself, or rather toward His own likeness through sanctification; and thus He leads us back to the archetype of the image, that is, the character of the Father. For the true character, perfectly expressing the likeness, is the Son Himself; but the pure and natural likeness of the Son is the Spirit, to whom we are also configured through sanctification, and are configured to the very form of God. The apostolic word will convince us of this. B “My little children,” he said, “of whom I travail in birth again until Christ is formed in you.” He is formed through the Spirit, who reforms us to God through Himself. When, therefore, we are formed toward Christ, and He is marked within us and is rightly formed as through the Spirit, who is naturally similar, the Spirit is therefore God, who forms toward God, not as if through a ministerial grace, but as bestowing Himself upon those who are worthy as a participation in the divine nature. C That the Spirit is the true likeness of the Son, you shall hear the blessed Paul writing: “For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.” We are reshaped into an icon toward the Holy Spirit, that is, toward God, through faith and sanctification and the relation to Him, it being clear that we are named participants—if indeed we are—of the divine nature in distinction and through participation.
B. I would have nothing to refute in what has been said.
A. But why are we called, and are, temples of God, and indeed even gods? Ask your adversaries if we are in reality participants of a naked and insubstantial grace. D But it is not so: by no means. For we are temples of the existing and subsisting Spirit; and we are called gods because of Him, since, indeed, we are joined to that divine and ineffable nature by our participation with Him. But if the Spirit who deifies us through Himself is truly foreign and substantially distant from the divine nature, then we have failed of our hope, somehow gleaming with an empty glory. For how are we eventually gods and temples of God, as the Scriptures say, on account of the Spirit who is in us? For how could that which is not God bestow Deity upon others? Yet we are temples and gods; and we must not acquiesce to those who wander in error. The Spirit of God is therefore not of a different substance.
B. But if He is not, as you say, of another essence, why, they ask, is He not then the Father Himself, or the Son?
A. What then, my friend? Is it regarding the supreme and eminent...
B. That is how they think.
A. But indeed, most foolishly and impiously have they devised this also, to overturn the simple-minded, if one considers the right doctrine. For God is not Father in that He is Father, nor again is God Son in that He is Son. For tell me, is it not the case in every respect, that if that which begets and that which is begotten is deity by nature—if anything whatsoever has begotten, or has been begotten, it would by all means also be God in truth? But the argument to this effect is admittedly reckless. For God is not the Father because He has begotten, nor again is God the Son because He has been begotten; but being God, He has begotten as Father, and being God, He exists as the Son who has been begotten. Nothing B therefore hinders us from believing that the holy Spirit, who is naturally from Him and in Him, is proper to the divine nature, even if He is neither Father nor Son. But what the nature of the Spirit is, must be diligently investigated, leaving aside for the present the property of the names, which does not indicate the deity, but which signifies the mode of existence of each as understood by us. For that name, Father, signifies the one who begets, and the name Son demonstrates that He is begotten; and the term indeed declares that the Spirit is from God the Father, and is proper to the Son Himself, like our own human spirit, even if He is understood to exist truly and hypostatically.
B. What, then, is the nature of the Spirit?
A. It is that which is deemed to be the same as the Father’s and the Son’s, and is C undoubtedly ineffable. For those things which are perceived concerning the deity exceed the measure of our mind and reason. Thus, for those accustomed to contemplation, even if in a mirror and in a riddle, and knowing in part, the subtle splendors of divine vision arise, which illuminate the ether of the mind and lead them to such knowledge as the soul can grasp. The nature of all things that is supreme is simple and incomposite, diffused indeed by the properties of the hypostases and the differences of persons and names, and extending into the holy Trinity, yet concurring in natural unity and in identity that is in every way undifferentiated, into one thing, namely the name and D reality of God, so that the whole nature is understood in each, together with its property, namely the hypostatic one. For each remains that which it is, possessing that natural union with the others also in its own nature. For the Father is in the Son and in the holy Spirit, and likewise the Son and the Spirit are in the Father and in each other.
B. And what authority do you bring for this?
A. The sacred Letters, that divinely inspired Scripture, which openly and exactly unites His Spirit to God, and teaches clearly that there would be no participation of God in us otherwise than through the holy Spirit.
A And so our Lord Jesus Christ, I think, says to every faithful and good person: “We will come, I and the Father, and we will make our abode with him.” And, “In this we know that He is in us, from the Spirit which He gave us.” For one might say that he who receives not some alien spirit, separated substantially from Him, but rather the Spirit who is from Him and in Him, and is His very own, and who bears an equal lordship with Him—and is thus named and taken in the order of the Son because of natural identity—possesses as an inhabitant and a natural guest the true God. “For there is one God the Father, from whom are all things; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things.” But since there is one Lord according to the Scriptures, the Lord is the Spirit. Is what I say not true?
B. Yes. For it is written thus.
B A. It is said that when blessed Samson had not yet had his hair cut, the Spirit was present and fought along with him. But when he gave himself over to the pleasures of a woman and his head was laid bare by the iron, “The Lord,” it says, “departed from him.” But when Christ was about to ascend into the heavens, He announced to those who believe in Him: “I will not leave you orphans; I am coming to you.” And furthermore: “Behold, I am with you all the days, even unto the consummation of the age.” He sent to us the Paraclete from heaven, through whom and in whom He is with us and dwells in us, pouring into us not some alien spirit, but the Spirit who is proper to His own substance and that of the Father.
B. I agree. For I myself also remember the holy Scripture speaking in this manner concerning the holy apostles, that: “They tried to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them.”
C A. What then? Does not Scripture say that the very words of God are the words of the Spirit? For the divine Isaiah, narrating to us that extraordinary and most fearful vision of God, says: “I saw the Lord Sabaoth sitting upon a throne high and lifted up.” And after bringing in the things in between, he says: “I heard the Lord Sabaoth saying: Whom shall I send, and who will go to this people? And I said: Behold I am here, send me. And He said: Go, and say to this people: You shall hear with your ears and shall not understand.” But the divine John says concerning the Only-Begotten: “Isaiah said these things when he saw His glory and spoke of Him.” Furthermore, the most wise Stephen, addressing the Jews, said: “Stiff-necked and uncircumcised in hearts and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit.” Is it not now evident in some way how, by a distinction according to hypostasis, what the Father is, and what the Son is, and what indeed the Spirit is, is very well discerned by us? Yet, through the bond of natural unity, all things are truly common to all: the coming, the words, and the participation,
energy, and glory, and whatever adorns the divine nature. But one thing very nearly escaped me.
B. What is that?
A. You shall hear, my friend. You hear the holy prophets crying out: "Thus saith the Lord," while our own teachers, who themselves were eye-witnesses and ministers of the Word, say: "Thus saith the Holy Spirit." It is also written: "As they were fasting and ministering to the Lord, the Holy Spirit said: Separate for me Paul and Barnabas for the work to which I have called them" (Act. xiii, 2). But if the Spirit is inferior to the Father, and posterior in his essence, different, and endowed with a truly different nature, does not the ministry of the holy men of old surpass the evangelical and apostolic ministry, A seeing that the former announced words delivered by the Lord and God, while the latter [announced those] of the Spirit?
B. Very nearly.
A. But why, then, did Paul in some place designate that former ministry as a ministry of condemnation and death, while this one he called a ministry of life and righteousness, writing: "For if the ministry of condemnation be glory, does not the ministry of righteousness much more abound in glory?" (II Cor. iii, 9) And regarding himself and the other apostles: "Who also has made us fit ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (ibid. 6)? Will it not be most easily evident to anyone from this that those ancient words, delivered by God, were for the condemnation and the leading of the ancients to the extreme of evils, while now the words of the Spirit justify and give life? Do you not understand, then, whither our discourse is at last tending?
B. I do. For there is much fear lest we should think something even more excellent about the Spirit than about God the Father and the Son. But if it pleases you, I ask you to let these matters stand as they are and be spoken of rightly. However, since we say that the Spirit is God and from God by nature, let us carefully consider whether his excellence is discerned B by the properties of his deity, not by a relation to God, but as if in his own nature.
A. You will by no means prove it from that, my friend, if you conceive of the Spirit as adorned by a relation to God just as we are, and not enriched with the beauty of true deity in his own nature, just as surely as the Son, who said to the Father: "All mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I am glorified in them" (Joan. xvii, 10). For that which is graced by a habit not natural to it receives, at any rate, an alien glory into itself. But when a thing is partaker of nothing of its own, but becomes this by relation to another, it is absolutely necessary that that which participates be of a different nature from that which is participated.
B. It is necessary.
A. Then who, I pray you, will set forth, tell me, regarding the substance of God and the Father...
and the holy Spirit that is in Him and from Him? Would not this reach the height of all boldness, even if only one were to harbor such things in his mind? For I should think that only those have strayed from sound reason and the most excellent state of mind who imagine that it is necessary to think in this way. But come, let us speak of the things of God and of the Spirit. B. Let us speak.
A. State, then, how God’s glory and the power of His natural operation are to be understood by us.
B. I say that God’s glory is to be elevated above the nature and condition of everything created, and to be uncreated; and that His natural operation is the power to produce things from nothing and to call things that are not as though they were, to sustain well the things that exist in their being, to give life, to sanctify, and to impart wisdom A in a most excellent way to those who are capable of it.
A. We must then examine—if it seems good—the argument concerning the holy Spirit. For those who hold cold and childish views concerning Him would recognize in no other way than this that He is in no sense inferior to the Son, who is in the form and equality of God and the Father; but rather, we shall demonstrate by every method that He is substantially equal to Him and equal in power according to operation.
B. Proceed, therefore, with great courage, trusting in God who says: "Open your mouth, and I will fill it."
A. Then—for I will ask—does the ability to make gods of those who are not gods befit a generated and created nature?
B. I would not say so. For that which is less could by no means raise another to such a height.
A. You said rightly. And furthermore, it is B for your brilliant mind to consider this point as well: If the participation of a creature knows how to make the generated thing divine, how would the inverse not also be true? For it injures rather than truly benefits one to participate in God according to nature. Yet the creature will never be conceived as deifying; rather, this is to be attributed only to God, who implants in the souls of the holy the participation of His own propriety through the Spirit, through whom we also, having been made conformed to the natural Son, have been called gods according to Him, and sons of God. "For because we are sons, as it is written, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying: Abba, Father." If, therefore, C it is greater and more excellent than pertains to the nature of a creature to be able to deify by itself, who—if he has a mind not corrupted—will count the holy Spirit among the things that have been made, or how could he be called a creature, he who makes them gods?
B. I do not see how.
A. But the name and reality of servitude, Hermias, would, and quite reasonably so, accompany a created and made nature, but it would be very far removed D from God.
A B. Assuredly so. For it is surely true what is sung to God: *For all things are your servants.* A. Therefore, whatever can strip the slave of servitude and illuminate [him] with the glory of liberty also from his own self, will first leave behind the servile condition itself, and will belong to a supreme and free nature. For thus indeed would it also provide liberty to others, a good that is proper and essentially inherent to itself.
B. Indeed, I willingly agree with you speaking correctly.
A. Let the blessed Paul cry out, therefore: *But we all, with unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.* And again, in another passage: *For you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption, he says, by whom we cry out, Abba, Father.* And with the glory of sonship, liberty B would certainly always accompany it. And thus our Lord Jesus Christ, since He knew how to honor the holy apostles with gifts beyond nature—inasmuch as, not long after, they were to be partakers of the holy and free Spirit—already called them friends and free men. *For no longer, He said, do I call you servants; you are my friends.* When, therefore, the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there liberty is to be sought, then He must be considered to have proceeded from a free nature, and not to be ranked among the creatures or numbered among created things—He, through whom and in whom the creature attains free glory, having cast off and declined the disgrace of servitude.
B. But, I suppose, they will say that the Spirit, fulfilling ministrative functions, brings to the saints those things which are from God.
A. They will think, of course, as it seems, that liberty is something great among those things administered through Him, and something greater than the creature. For whatever is produced is servile.
B. Perhaps they will think so.
A. Therefore, that which ministers is not by nature free, if indeed it ministers nothing to itself, but rather conveys to others a grace received from another. But as for that which ministers and is the medium, must it not be considered C to be that very thing which is ministered?
B. Necessarily.
A. How then is the Lord the Spirit, if, being bereft of free glory, He does not escape the condition of a servant and of one subject? And if indeed He is endowed with the natural glory of the Godhead, He no longer ministers—far from it—but rather He distributes liberty to us ourselves as an innate good. But if He has truly fallen away from being God by nature, He will indeed be inscribed among the servants and ministers; and He will minister what is alien, and will convey to those worthy [of it] a thing greater than what D He contains within Himself.
A For He will yield, I think, to those who are of God the palm [of victory]. Are we, then, already better by this much than the Holy Spirit, being gilded with a glory higher than His? Or does it not seem to you that I have spoken these things most excellently, even if the words should perhaps suffer from the greatest astonishment? B. Most certainly. A. Let us proceed, however, to track down the truth by means of other considerations. Terrene kings, if they should choose to adorn certain of their intimates, that is, those of blood and kin, with their own honor, and to crown them with royal glory, in what manner, pray, would they do this most excellently and reasonably? B. By raising them, surely, with the highest honors. A. Whether, then, B would you judge the royal honor and glory by which one, being crowned, is raised above himself and others, to be superior and more excellent for the one to whom that honor is deferred, or perhaps equal or inferior? B. Superior, surely, and more excellent. For thus it brightens the thing adorned. For that which is less and inferior to the glory of someone will not render it more brilliant if it should be added to it, but rather will lead it toward the baser. A. You speak well. For the matter is thus, and you think rightly. Therefore, if the Holy Spirit is not naturally possessed of glory that is truly free, but rather distributes as a minister a grace received from another, how is Christ anointed into a king, receiving the Spirit as an anointing? For it says, "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit." And the wise John himself writes thus to us: "And the anointing which you received from Him remains in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you, but as His anointing teaches you concerning all things." It is possible also to hear Christ Himself through the voice of the Psalmist crying out in this manner, and interpreting the glory received from the anointing: "But I was established king by Him." Tell me, does a servile Spirit make a lord? Does royal dignity have its own nature, if, as they wish, it is not free? Away with such wickedness. For I cannot endure the vomit of my adversaries. For it was necessary, it was necessary, if they were thinking rightly, to perceive from this the free and royal dignity of the Spirit. For concerning those who are justified by faith, the great Paul said to us: "Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies; who is he who condemns?" But having kindled the power to justify some, and to make them the chosen, solely in the divine nature which is above all things, he attributes the same thing also to the nature and glory of the Spirit. For he writes again: "And we were by nature children of wrath, just as the others; but you were washed," he says, "but you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God." D
B B. Does the Spirit, then, justify those who have sinned, as God does?
A. Most certainly, my friend. For it is fitting for God alone, and for no other being, to be able to absolve those who are liable to transgression and sin. That the Spirit is God and from God by nature, we have already demonstrated in many words and will demonstrate again, unless I should be wearisome in this matter.
B. Far be it! For what is useful holds no weariness for those who are fair-minded.
A. Therefore, those who are destitute of God and lack the hope of the saints live in the world, according to the Scriptures, as having worshipped the creature before the Creator and Artificer.
B. That is so.
A. But now, having known God and having been known by God, we have known the Father of all and God through the Son in the Spirit. And our Savior himself is witness, saying of himself: "My sheep hear my voice, and they follow me, and I give them eternal life; and I know my own, and my own know me." And concerning the Spirit, to his holy disciples: "When the Paraclete comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness concerning me." Is it not, then, manifest that he is God, who is known as God and who dwells in us, not as a creature or a work subject to our servitude, but as free by nature and the Spirit of truth itself, or rather, through his unity with the Son, C the truth itself? "For the Spirit is truth," according to the Scriptures; and the Truth is Christ.
B. Is, then, that natural identity with the Son sufficient for us to demonstrate and prove that the Spirit is God?
A. Yes, since if the Son is one Lord, the Father is Lord. For since the Holy Spirit concurs thus and is understood as being in both, the mind of the believers will follow the straight path of truth and will not stray at all from the right understanding. For on account of the identity of substance, the Spirit is Lord and God, and by this name he is designated in the divine Scripture. For the divine Isaiah, concerning the Israelites, says: "The Spirit descended from the Lord, and led them; so you led your people to make for yourself a name of glory." And that great Moses, when he acknowledged the Spirit to be Lord D and God, speaks thus: "The Lord alone led them, and there was no foreign god with them.” And in the song he addressed the Israelites: "Remember, do not forget how much you provoked the Lord your God in the desert." And signifying again the Lord and God who was provoked, the prophet says:
A "Not a messenger, nor an angel, but He Himself, the Lord, saved them, because He loved them, and spared them. He Himself redeemed them, and took them up, and exalted them all the days of eternity; but they were disobedient, and provoked His Holy Spirit, and He turned to be their enemy." Does he not clearly call the Holy Spirit, who deigned to visit and guide the redeemed, both Lord and God, and not an alien? How, then, could He who is neither essentially separate from God nor an alien, but His very own, be of a different nature? And tell me, you who provoke the Spirit, in what manner do you provoke God? Or how could those to whom the Spirit seems to be an adversary have chosen to think thoughts hostile to Him?
B. You tell me; for it is somehow your part to explain this.
A. I would say, then, that by His union with God the Spirit is God. And this will be most manifest immediately, even if one should choose to proceed by other lines of reasoning. For since God is not subject to place and limitations, to quantity and measures (for this is more appropriate to created things; for the divine is without quantity, without limits, and without size, and is not conceived as having a position in space, since it is entirely incorporeal), the Spirit Himself will also appear conspicuous B by the properties of the divine nature, filling all things with the Father and the Son, and believed to be in all things. For He who is God in all things says somewhere through one of the prophets: "Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the Lord." And attributing the same thing to the Son, Paul wrote to us: "He who descended, He is also the one who ascended above all the heavens, that He might fill all things." And the divine David sings to God: "Where shall I go from Your Spirit, and from Your face where shall I flee? If I ascend into heaven, You are there; if I descend into Hades, You are present." If, therefore, there is no place where the Spirit is not, and since it is the Spirit who fills all things, it is God who fills, according to the well-spoken word, that "The Spirit of the Lord has filled the world; and that which contains all things has knowledge of the voice." How, then, could it remain obscure C that the Spirit is God by a natural union with God? But if He contains all things, how could He be created or made, since that word "all things" encompasses every species and genus of substance, and He who contains them clearly signifies that He is something other than all things? But that which is not in all things, but is outside all things, will naturally excel all created things and surpass the nature of those things which are filled and contained by Him. And that which surpasses creation is God. Is what I say not true?
B. I agree; however, know that they will say again that the Spirit is created and made. For God says somewhere, or one of the ancients has proclaimed: "I am the Lord, who establishes the thunder, and creates D the spirit,"
and announcing unto men his Christ, making morning and mist, and mounting upon the high places of the earth.”
A A. And yet, my friend, the majesty of the Holy Spirit will in no way be harmed by what has just been brought forward, unless one be of feeble and corrupted mind. For "spirit," when the term is used simply and indiscriminately, does not necessarily signify that holy and divine [Spirit]—otherwise I would say, not at all absurdly, that they have fallen into that blasphemy—but it is used equivocally, and of very many things that differ from one another by the law of nature. For an angel is a spirit, and so too is the soul of man, and the motion of the air. Why then, neglecting an exact and fitting investigation of the thing signified, do they not fear to afflict with vain mockery Him who excels the creation and is its Creator, in unity with that one only and natural Artificer? For the Prophet, or rather God through him, by no means says that He creates His own Spirit; far from it. We shall not be persuaded that the matter is so; but since some, by a vecordia excessive and great, supposed that they and others could attain happiness even against the will of heaven, and occupy royal thrones, and possess glorious empire and sceptres, that power is undoubtedly claimed by Him who is God over all, showing that the whole creation is governed by His own laws and nods. “I, He says, am the Lord, establishing the thunder,” and sending forth the force of the winds B to created things. For thus I create the spirit, and clearly announce whom I would have to be Christ, that is, who is to be anointed for the kingdom, and is to obtain the empire: and not against my will, but by my command is the dawn and the mist fashioned, that is, night and day, light and darkness. But let them tell me what there is in common between thunder and the Holy Spirit, or what [commonality] dawn and mist have with Him who is of God and in God. Is what I say not manifest?
B. Entirely so. For the incoherent and diverse nature of the things mentioned will argue the absurdity of their opinion.
A. But how else could He be conceived to be a created and generated thing, who creates together with the only Creator, and who possesses in this [act] a power and authority not brought in from without, nor adulterated, nor received from another, but [proceeding] from Himself, and being His own and natural? For "divine Spirit has made me," He says, although the Holy C Scriptures assert that God took dust from the earth, and in a manner adorned man by the work of His own hands, seeing that He who says, “Thy hands have made me, and fashioned me,” is true.
B. This is indeed true.
A. But what, shall we not also believe that the restoration and resurrection of human bodies in the last times of the age will come to pass by the power and operation of the Spirit, and has the divine oracle also preached this to us?
B B. It is so, for I remember the blessed David crying out, and describing our fall from sin into corruption and death, and very well foretelling the renewal from the resurrection. For he spoke thus to God: "When you turn away your face, they shall
be troubled," and then he describes the transition of nature, and one might contemplate the transformation into well-being. But A if anyone wishes to philosophize on this, he would apply it not solely to us humans, but rather to the entire creation.
B. What then follows from this for us?
A. I hear the blessed David singing and, as it were, plucking a spiritual lyre, saying clearly: "By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established, and all their power by the Spirit of his mouth." B Tell me, therefore: would that which establishes the heavens, and is the entire power of existing things, be God or creature?
B. I say God, and with very good reason. For I would not concede that creatures have no need of God, but rather that they can perform and provide for themselves those things by which they are able to be saved and remain in a correct state, even though they naturally fall into corruption.
A. The Spirit, therefore, establishes the heavens, not by imparting to them a participation in a created and made substance, but by bestowing his own power as the power of God. For that which holds things together C and establishes in a state of permanence that which is by nature prone to decay and capable of reverting to non-existence, would demonstrate that it is the very Substance that governs this universe. And indeed, the divine Paul persuades us to contemplate and conceive, as far as possible, what the nature of God is from the things that have been made, saying: "For his invisible attributes, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and godhead, so that they are without excuse; because when they knew God, they did not glorify him as God, nor were thankful, D but became futile in their imaginations." Therefore, his eternal power will bring the beauty of the divine nature into view as something more manifest. And the Spirit establishes the heavens, not as one of the creatures taken and assumed for assistance (for it is the sign of a foolish mind to think or say this), but as the proper Spirit of God who creates and strengthens all things. Or if they say that it is not even so, let them answer and point out to us the reason why the Maker of all things implants and grants a glorious state and harmonious order to creatures through the participation of the Holy Spirit. For he establishes the heavens, to which, if being created alone had sufficed for them to remain in a firm state, it would not have been necessary for them to be established by the Holy Spirit. But if we wish to examine this a little more accurately, we shall find this not to be true; and thus the contrary will be commended.
B. You have spoken rightly; but why do we say that the nature and origin of man was brought to such a state of perfection, barely suitable to himself, only when he received within himself the divine image through the Spirit?
A. Certainly this is not obscure, if one considers the nature's...
slip and the reformation into well-being. For when the living creature had inclined toward wickedness, and through its total devotion to the flesh had fallen ill with the imported disease of sin, the Spirit—which formed it after the divine image and had been imprinted upon it ineffably like a seal—withdrew, and so it appeared, having caught corruption and vice, and every form of wickedness (for why should I not mention things that are bizarre?). But when the Creator of all things wished to restore to stability and beauty that which had slipped into corruption and had become base and unsightly on account of the imported sin, He introduced again into it the divine and holy Spirit that had once departed, transforming it well toward the transcendent image, having both the nature and the power to reshape us to His own likeness. Shall we then persuade ourselves that the One who sustains the creature in a good state, and preserves it with a mutual relationship to Himself, and transforms the living creature into the likeness of God, is inferior to the Creator, and—by positing Him as different and alien—strip Him of the perfection suitable to each person, which is imparted by Him to the creatures? Or shall we, by saying that He who is from Him and in Him by nature is of equal nature and consubstantial with Him, honor Him with the complete work of creation, and attribute to Him the whole operation upon the things that have been made, just as we do to the Father, brought to perfection through the Son in the Spirit? B B. I would say that these things are most rightly spoken. C A. That all things are through the Son in the Spirit, throughout all things, and in all things the power and efficacy of the Father is made manifest—is it not easy to discern even from this? For it suffices for the demonstration that the heavens were made firm by the Word of the Lord, and that the whole strength of them is in the Spirit, as the Psalmist of old well sang. I will offer, however, Christ performing miracles through the power of the Spirit; for it is written that “Jesus was led in the power of the Spirit into Galilee.” And elsewhere, when the Jews had poured out impious words against Him and were sharpening their churlish tongue against Him, He rightly rebuked them. For they said, “This man does not cast out demons except by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons.” And after other things, He says, “And if I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges. But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” D For one must confess that the generation of the Only-Begotten from God the Father transcends every mind and reason of ours. But since He became flesh and dwelt among us, even while being man, He revealed the operation of divine authority. Therefore, He says, as having entered into the measure of our condition: “But if I by the Spirit of God cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” And this is nothing other than to say that the divine authority and power has descended even into men, since I, having become like you for your sake, perform miracles through the Spirit. For the kingdom of God, I think, is that most divine power and operation in the Holy Spirit...
A or perhaps it is the Spirit Himself, in accordance with that which was said to us: "The kingdom of heaven is within you." Since, therefore, the Son performs mighty works in the Spirit, although He is God, and calls kingdom that most firm and invincible power which is in Him and through Him, then tell me, how could He be called a creature, and not rather a state by far superior to that of the creature, as understood both by us and by the upper spirits? For He has been glorified in the Spirit, and has acquired in Him the glory of omnipotence. Why, then, by the excellence of the works performed, and by those things which He has done for us in the Spirit, did He wish to be believed God, equal in nature and thus consubstantial with the Father, even though the Only-Begotten became man? "For if I do not the works of my Father," He says, "believe me not; but if I do, though you will not believe me, believe the works." B Since, therefore, the divine nature is recognized from the supernatural brilliance of the works, and these things were done by the power and operation of the Spirit, how could He then be a creature, He who is equal to God, creates with Him, and simultaneously grants life to things deprived of life? Does not the power of vivifying belong solely to the true and natural Life, that is, to God?
B. I assent. For it is written concerning Him: "Who alone has immortality, and dwells in light inaccessible."
A. Since, then, God alone has immortality of Himself and in His own nature, and is believed to be Life, how could the Spirit be vivifying—while, according to their opinion, He is numbered among those things which are vivified—unless He has cast off the status of a created thing? C Yet the matter is not so. For the Spirit is vivifying, but in no way receiving life from another, nor is He in need of it. Therefore, the fabrications of the heretics against Him are an imposture and a vain lie. But we, not embracing a view that is akin to or in agreement with their foolish talks, hold to the straight path, and having liberated our mind from an inclination toward any vice or corruption, being educated only by the sacred Scriptures, and contemplating from them the pure glory of the Spirit, we believe Him to be God and from God—not adorned with some foreign and external goods, but being by nature whatever God is. And indeed (for the voices of the apostles must everywhere be heeded), "in God we live, and move, and are." And concerning God and the Father, the most wise Paul says to Timothy: "I charge you before God who gives life to all things." D And Christ, instructing the sister of Lazarus, says: "I am the resurrection and the life." And concerning the Holy Spirit: "The flesh does not profit anything: it is the Spirit who gives life." Since, therefore, God and the Father gives life to all things, and the Son is Life, and it is the Spirit who gives life, who will separate and divide His vivifying...
power from life, and declare that the Spirit is something other than life—or rather, not life at all? For if He lacks the power of vivifying by nature, how could He still be conceived of as life? B
B. They say that the Spirit is vivifying in that He administers to creatures the life that is from God, but is not life itself.
A. But we shall by no means admit such self-appointed legislators and judges of things that exceed mind and speech, these men who suffer from such a corrupt contagion of mind, with that "invincible" argument of theirs, as they imagine. Instead, they will yield with us to the holy and divine Scriptures, which clearly proclaim that the vivifying and holy Spirit is not a minister of life handed down from another, but is life itself and the bestower of life by nature. For thus the blessed Paul once said again: C “But if the Spirit of him that raised Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ Jesus from the dead shall quicken also your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.” The Spirit of life, therefore, would indeed essentially be none other than life itself, according to the opinion that is blameless in the correctness of its reasonings. For how could He not be life, He who has life as His root, and a fountain, as it were, that is incorruptible, and is the nature of God, which is superior to every created thing? For it is not obscure—and it will be easy for those who are truly quick-witted to see—that He proceeds from the very substance of God and the Father, from the fact that it has been clearly said: “He that raised Christ Jesus from the dead shall quicken also your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.” For the Spirit that is indwelling in our hearts is truly the vivifying Spirit of God. D But if we concede that the Spirit—who is proper to God and proceeds from Him by nature—is bereft of life, since He possesses life as an adventitious quality, how would He not be considered dead in power? For whatever might be capable of undergoing such a thing, someone might say—even if the time for undergoing it has not yet arrived—just as everything that is thought to be adventitious, or is truly added from without, is not believed to be exempt from destruction, but is in fear of falling away. For it is not supported by the laws of nature, nor does it have a stable foundation, since it exists by way of an accident, and is like a color once applied to things.
B. It is certain, therefore, that the Spirit is life, naturally of course, and not by participation.
A. It is so entirely, my friend, and you will understand this well also from other considerations. For you will hear God speaking, as it were accusing of desertion those who worshiped the creature: “The heaven was astonished at this, and shuddered exceedingly, says the Lord. For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me the fountain of living water, and they have hewn them out cisterns broken, that can hold no water.” Moreover, we shall find our Lord Jesus Christ addressing the Jews: “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as...
the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” A And the divine evangelist John, explaining this and making it plain, refers it to the nature and operation of the Holy Spirit, saying: “But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him were to receive.” Behold then again, clearly and perspicuously, the Spirit, like the Father and indeed the Son, is water of life in equal manner and equal power, because, I should think, of the identity of substance that follows from the community of the name. For that it is so by nature, it is possible to demonstrate in another way as well. For seeing that God is holy by nature, the Spirit is holy substantially, and through him and in him any one may partake of the holy God. B
B. Not because it is his own, they say, but because sanctification is adventitious to him, and he conveys it from God to the creature.
A. Therefore, the Spirit is first sanctified and then bestows upon creatures a sanctification that is not his own, if indeed we say what is true, namely, that in everything which is thought to convey that which passes through it to others, that which is conveyed must be something other than the thing itself. For nothing could convey itself to others in the way it conveys something else.
B. It is true.
A. Therefore, if the Spirit who is in us is not holy by nature, let them say what nature he has received. And if they are unwilling to ascribe a holy nature to him, would not their argument fall into unavoidable blasphemy?
B. So indeed. Nevertheless, they say that Christ spoke about him: “He shall take of mine, and shall declare it unto you.” Therefore, they say, the Spirit is a partaker of the Son.
A. By no means; far from it, I think. For how could he who is from him, and in him, and his own, ever be a partaker of him, or be sanctified by a certain relation, just like those things which receive holiness from elsewhere, and be C futurely alien in nature from him of whom he is even said to be own? But those sharp-witted and most subtle examiners of the divine words, as they persuade themselves, why do they, having rejected the contemplation of the truth, float upon adulterated and spurious reasonings? For the Son did not signify a difference of nature when he said concerning himself and the Spirit, “He shall take of mine, and shall declare it unto you.” For he would then have said quite clearly: “He shall receive sanctification from me, and in his turn shall sanctify you.” For these words would have indicated a division into inequality of nature, and would have clearly shown that sanctification as one thing in another was in the Spirit. D But he did not say this, but rather that he would use his words because of the identity of substance and the complete equality of nature, speech, and operation, so that, if he should choose to sound something into the holy ones, he is said to be of Christ. For he shall not speak, he says, of himself.
A Just as, therefore, the Son, existing as consubstantial with God and the Father, and being his Word, speaks his things—"For he whom God has sent, speaks the words of God," according to the voice of John—since there is nothing else besides the will of the Son that is in God and the Father; in an equal manner, I suppose, and by the same logic, the Holy Spirit speaks the things of Christ, being his Spirit, and having his glory and his complete identity of speech by way of that natural identity in all things. Therefore, he is holy not by participation nor by any external relation to the Son, but by nature and truth, as his Spirit. And just as it is stupid and insipid for a man to be truly called a man, yet to be understood as something else apart from that, so it is extremely foolish to name the Spirit the Holy Spirit, and yet to restrain him from being holy by nature, and to force him absurdly into another nature. For his name will not signify a certain mode of glory or preeminence, as do, for instance, "Principality," "Throne," and "Dominion," concerning those things that were brought into existence through him; but it will rather be indicative of his substantial quality, just as the name "Father" is to the Father, and "Son" to the Son. And if it is an exact indication of the utmost folly to name God the Father, yet not to understand him to be the Father, or to name the Son, the Son, yet to say he is not this, how shall we exempt from the accusations of ignorance those who dare to strip of natural holiness the Spirit who is by nature and truly holy? If, therefore, God is holy by nature, and the Spirit who is understood as being from him and in him is also holy according to him, what then would be the mode of difference, I mean, the difference of essence? Or how would those who ascribe to a creature that by which and in which the nature of the Godhead is within us not be found to be rotten and narrow-minded? For that which is above creation is not communicable in a creature. Or is not what I say true? B Indeed, it is.
The Spirit is Wisdom itself
C A. What then? Is not God wise, or rather, Wisdom itself? B. To whom is this doubtful? A. And in what are those things that receive wisdom wise? B. In wisdom, clearly. A. If, therefore, the Spirit imparts wisdom to those capable of wisdom, he will surely be, and be understood as, wisdom. And this we said is God. B. What then, they say, if humans and angels are also wise, and are apt for infusing wisdom into others? A. But not, my friend, by infusing wisdom into those who are said to receive wisdom from them, as God does, but by making them partakers of their own instruction. For I would say that that holy utterance applies to the saints: "Freely you have received, freely give." But the Holy Spirit in fact Dto the A God. Thus, if He has granted Himself to anyone to be participated in and to be an indwelling guest, He absolutely makes that person wise through Himself, and in this again He fulfills the operation of the supreme nature. Therefore, to Moses, the interpreter of sacred mysteries, God Almighty said: "Who has given a mouth to man? And who has made the deaf and the hearing, the seeing and the blind? Is it not I, the Lord God?" And again elsewhere, through one of the prophets, regarding the flock of the Jews: "For in other tongues and with other lips I will speak to this people, and not even so will they believe." And in the Acts B of the holy apostles, the matter is performed by the power of the Spirit: "And they began," it says, "to speak in other tongues, just as the Spirit was giving them the power to utter." And since Christ again tells His own disciples that they would be led before leaders and kings, but that they ought not fear them at all: "For do not be anxious," He says, "what you should say or what you should speak. For I will give you a tongue by the power and nature of the Holy Spirit," the sacred Scriptures say that the promise was fulfilled for the saints. For Christ Himself used to say: "It is not you who are speaking, but the Spirit of your Father who is speaking within you." How then, finally, is He created and made, and inferior to the supreme nature—He who, being wisdom, pours forth wisdom, when God is Wisdom? And how, when He knows all things and searches the depths of God, shall He be placed among those things that do not know what belongs to God, and receive from us a servile glory, when the Savior clearly says: "A servant does not know what his master is doing"? Since, therefore, the Spirit knows the things C that are in God and in the natural Lord, how is it that He is not free and above creation? And how, indeed, is He who surpasses creation not placed in the same rank and order with God the Father, by identity of substance, and likewise with the Son? Through whom and with whom, to God and the Father, be glory together with the same Holy Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.
SUMMARIES OF ARGUMENTS
DSummaries of the Arguments contained in the Dialogue on the Holy Spirit, with the addition of others.
If the ability to deify, and furthermore to bestow upon creatures a dignity greater than a creature can receive, is greater than the nature and glory of a creature, and the Spirit deifies, how shall He be created, and not rather God, inasmuch as He deifies?
If God is believed to be in us, the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, how shall He be created? For it is not possible that God, who is superior to creation, dwell in us through a creature. For just as, when God by nature dwells within us, we are not participants in a creature, but in Deity; so, if a creature dwells within us, we are not participants in Deity, but in a creature. Therefore the Spirit is God, if indeed God, who is God by nature and in truth, is in us through Him.
A If everything that is called from non-existence into being is a slave of the Creator and possesses the measure of a servant, while we who have become participants of the Holy Spirit are free, then the Spirit is certainly free by nature. And if this is the case, He is neither created nor under the yoke, as is the creature, but is rather of a nature beyond the yoke and is instead free.
If the Holy Spirit works the divine gifts in us as He wills (for this is what the blessed Paul said), and it is God who works all things in all, then the Spirit is also God, and is God by nature, derived from God.
The blessed David sings to the Savior and God of all regarding things that lie upon the earth: "You will send forth your Spirit, and they will be created; and you will renew the face of the earth." That which is renewed is renewed in such a way that it is as it was in the beginning; and it would be the work of the same power both to bring into existence in the beginning, and to renew again to its original state that which had been corrupted. The Spirit renews the creature, in the same way that He Himself created it in the beginning. How then is He still a creature and made? For the creature is not made or renewed after suffering corruption through a creature, but through the God who is such by nature. Therefore, the Holy Spirit is God and is God by nature, derived from God.
B If all the power of created things is in the Spirit of the mouth of God, as David sings, but the Spirit is a creature, let those who think so say by whom He Himself is supported. And if the Spirit, being of created nature, strengthens the creature, then the creature strengthens itself, having no need of God in any way. But it is entirely absurd to think or say this. For we are strengthened by God through the Spirit, and the voice of the Psalmist is true, that "By the Spirit of the mouth of God is all the power of created things." Therefore, the Spirit is God by nature, derived from God, entirely and in every way different in nature from the creature that is supported by Him. And whatever is altogether above the creature and different in nature from created things is certainly God, and nothing else.
C God makes us wise, and indeed also powerful, through the Son in the Holy Spirit; for He is called the Spirit of wisdom and power. How then can the Spirit be a creature? If this were true, nothing, it seems, would prevent us from thinking that God is wise and powerful in a creature, and that He has His own wisdom as a thing made. The creature, therefore, would adorn Him, and not He the creature. But to think or say this is impious. Therefore, the Spirit is God and is God by nature, derived from God, through whom He makes the creature wise and powerful.
The blessed Paul said concerning the Son: "The Lord is the Spirit." And the Son Himself also said: "God is Spirit." Since, therefore, the Holy Spirit sometimes signifies the Father, and sometimes also the Son, how is He not consubstantial with them? For God is not recognized in a creature, just as a creature is not in the nature of Deity.
If we cannot participate in God otherwise than through the Holy Spirit, how will He be considered alien to the Deity, who makes those in whom He dwells participants of God through Himself?
To call the creature, or one of those things that have been made, equal in power and strength to God is to give the highest proof of impiety. Since the Holy Spirit has the same operation as the Father and the Son, it is evident that He is God and is God by nature, derived from God, inasmuch as He is able to work the things of God. Proof of the things said is found in what is clearly stated by the voice of Paul: "There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are diversities of ministrations, but the same Lord; and there are diversities of operations, but the same God, who works all things in all." And while the Spirit is life-giving...
A, the Father is likewise, and in like manner the Son; the Holy Spirit is also life-giving. The blessed Paul writes indeed: “I charge thee before God who gives life to all things.” And the Son said: “My sheep hear my voice, and they follow me, and I give unto them eternal life.” That the Spirit also gives life, the Savior himself teaches in these words: “The flesh profits nothing, it is the Spirit that gives life; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.” Blessed Paul also writes: “He who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies, through his Spirit that dwells in you.” He, therefore, who is able to work equally with God, is God, and from God by nature.
Our Lord Jesus Christ, rebuking the crowds of the Jews, said: “Many good works have I shown you from my Father; for which of these works do you stone me?” Again: “The Father who dwells in me, he does the works.” Moreover, he confessed that he casts out demons by the Spirit of God. Since, therefore, he says the works of the Spirit are the works of the Father, and obviously his own as well, how could the Spirit be created? For if this were true, the Father B is glorified through a creature, and likewise the Son, if he wrought divine signs through the Spirit. But this is absurd; the Spirit, therefore, is God and from God by nature, as fulfilling the works of the Father and the Son.
Blessed Paul, showing that the New Testament in Christ is more excellent than the worship according to the Law, said: “For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, the ministration of righteousness much more exceeds in glory.” The law, indeed, was the ministration of condemnation, but the preaching of the Gospel is the ministration of righteousness. But the ministers of the Old Testament, which condemned, used to say: “Thus says the Lord.” And those of the New, which justifies, used to say: “Thus says the Holy Spirit.” Are, then, the ministers of the condemning Testament better than the second? For those were served by the words of God, but these, if the Holy Spirit is created, by the words of a creature. How then does the ministration of righteousness C excel in glory? For what is more noble or more excellent: to be served by the words of God, or by those of a creature? But the former are neither better nor more noble than the latter. Therefore, when they say, “Thus says the Holy Spirit,” they also are served by the words of God, because his Spirit is God and from God by nature. And that the ministration of the second is more glorious than the first, the Savior himself will confirm, saying to the holy apostles: “Amen, amen, I say to you, that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it; and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it. But blessed are your eyes; for you have become the stewards of mysteries, into which angels desire to look.”
Our Lord Jesus Christ said to the holy disciples: “Do not think how or what you shall speak, when some call you before governors or councils; for it shall be given to you in that same hour what you shall speak (namely, the mouth and wisdom); for it is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaks in you.” Furthermore, blessed Paul says: “Do you seek proof of Christ who speaks in me?” When, therefore, it is Christ who speaks in the saints D, and the Spirit who is the one speaking, how could he be created, and not rather be God, and from God by nature, as consubstantial with the Son, through whom he is also in us, and speaks?
Blessed Moses said in the book concerning the creation of the world: “And God made man, he made him after the image of God.” And he said somewhere also...
the Creator of all things through the voice of Isaiah: “I made the earth, and man upon it.” And if this be true, the blessed Job is found saying: “The divine Spirit is that which has made me.” But if the Holy Spirit is created, then he was made through a creature. And then how does Sacred Scripture say again: “And God took dust from the earth, and fashioned man”? A If, therefore, it is of the most absurd things to attribute the glory of the Creator to any of the things that have been made, while the Spirit is a Creator, then He is God and from God by nature.
If the lesser is blessed by the greater, according to the word of the blessed Paul, and the intellectual creation is blessed, being sanctified by God through the Spirit, then it is blessed and sanctified as by one who is somehow greater than all things by nature. But if this is the truth, then the Holy Spirit is not created. For that which is greater is no longer blessed by the lesser.
If created things are conceived of in place and circumscription, but the Holy Spirit is not so, it is written, for: “The Spirit of the Lord has filled the world.” And David also sings: “Where shall I go from your Spirit, and from your presence where shall I flee?” How could that which fills all things be created? B And this would only befit the divine and supreme nature. For it is written also concerning the Son: “He who descended is the same as he who ascended above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.” And indeed, the Father himself said to the Jews: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is the footstool of my feet. What house will you build for me, says the Lord? Or what is the place of my rest?” And again: “Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the Lord.” And what did God say to those of Israel redeemed from Babylon? “And I am with you, says the Lord, and my Spirit has stood in your midst,” that is: In you is the God who is God by nature and in truth. How could He be conceived as created, and not rather as God and from God by nature, since He fulfills the presence of God through Himself?
It is written that “by the Word of the Lord the heavens were established, and all their power by the Spirit of his mouth.” C But that the strengthening of the creature should befit God, and not a creature, how is it possible to doubt? But if, being created, the Spirit strengthens the creature, the creature holds itself toward the good, having received nothing for this from God; or rather, if one must say something even jarring, the creature is found to be a boast of the supreme nature, if it operates through itself and is admired for this reason. But this is absurd; rather, the Spirit strengthens the heavens and gives power to the creation; therefore, He is of the nature that is above the creation, that is, God.
If the Spirit gives life, and is life, according to the word of the Savior, how could He be created? For that which does not exist at some time is no longer life. For if He too was created with the others, He was brought from non-being into being. D But this is absurd; but He is life in truth and is life-giving. Therefore, He was not made, but existed eternally, as being from God by nature, and God.
Simple and incomposite is the divine and immortal nature, and it brings all things into being and perfects them through the Spirit. But if the Holy Spirit is created, as those of the opposite opinion say, the works of the Godhead are perfected in a creature. But while God is simple by nature, how could His Spirit be conceived as composite? For nothing among created things is simple by nature.
Yes, say those who disparage the glory of the Spirit, the Spirit receives sanctification from God.
A That which is given and comes from elsewhere and from another is entirely and altogether both separable and possible to be removed; and that which we do not possess by nature, we can also lose. Will the Holy Spirit, then, ever be destitute of the power to sanctify? And yet, the name bears the signification of His substance—the substance in which He is also believed to exist—and not of an office or of a preeminence, as is the case, for example, with "Authority," "Throne," and "Dominion." For such names as these are not indicative of the substance of the things signified, but rather signify the measure of each one's honor. But in the case of the Holy Trinity, the name "Father," and "Son," and furthermore also "Holy Spirit," does not declare a certain preeminence, but rather demonstrates what each of the named things is. If we say that the name of the Spirit—that is, B of that which He is by nature—is indicative of His substance (for He is named "Holy," and God is holy—for so the powers above hymn Him, not as having an adventitious sanctification, but rather as being holy from Himself and essentially), then the Spirit will not be alien to His substance; for He is holy by nature, as being from the Holy and in the Holy by nature, God.
Those who say that the Holy Spirit is created and generated do not understand—for they are blind—that every ministerial service is lesser than the operation that is wrought, so to speak, by the very hands of God. For example, the law was given to those of old, having been spoken through angels and the mediator, the all-wise Moses. But He who of old spoke the law, He Himself wrought for us the grace through faith. Hence the ministry through Christ is also C more glorious than that of Moses. If, therefore, the Spirit performs the sanctification in us in a ministerial way, who has been sanctified more greatly by the Father? For He does not sanctify in any other way than through the Holy Spirit, and the highest peak of divine blessing is the sanctification that is through the Holy Spirit. Therefore, the Spirit does not provide the sanctification to the creature in a ministerial way, nor as something given by another, but as God Himself working this into us, as through His own Spirit.
Christ said somewhere: "If anyone hears me, I and the Father will come, and we will make our abode with him, and we will dwell in him." But in what way this very thing that was promised is performed in us, the word of the God-inspired Scriptures will clearly teach. For the blessed John says: "By this we know that He is in us, because D He has given us of His Spirit." But the most wise Paul says: "Do you not know that you are God’s temple, and the Spirit of God dwells in you?" How then is the Spirit still created, if we become partakers of the Father and of the Son through Him? For we would not become partakers of the divine nature through a creature, one of the number of holy angels; but this is not true. Therefore, God is in us through God the Spirit.
The God-inspired Scripture says that the Holy Spirit was present with Samson while he was unshorn; then it says again, "The Lord departed from him," when he had cut his hair badly. How then is the Spirit created, if He is Lord by nature? For among created things there is not truly any freedom or lordship.
Our Lord Jesus Christ, about to return to the heavens, was consoling the holy apostles, saying: "I will not leave you orphans; I am coming to you." And He has fulfilled the promise, sending to us from heaven the Paraclete.
A or rather, having come into us through Him. How, then, is the Spirit created, through whom the uncreated nature of the Word who creates all things is in us?
They act most irreverently who dare either to think or to say that the Holy Spirit is created and generated. For just as a man’s spirit is not something other than the man himself, so His Spirit is not something other than the nature of the true and natural God, even if It is conceived of as existing in Its own subsistence, as, indeed, are the Father Himself and the Son. For that the Son is in us by reason of the identity of essence, seeing that the Spirit is in us, and that the Spirit is by nature His own, the divine Paul will attest, writing: "Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. If Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness" (Rom. viii, 8-10). Understand, therefore, how, while calling It the Spirit of God, he also names It Christ by reason of the identity of essence. When, therefore, Christ is in us, how could His Spirit be created, since the Son is God by nature and consubstantial with the Father? B
The blessed Paul, discoursing on those who prophesy in the Spirit in the churches, says that the observers will then be edified if they prophesy in order and by turns, proclaiming that God is truly in you (1 Cor. xiv, 25-26). But he also said concerning those speaking in a tongue that they do not speak to men, but to God: "For they speak mysteries in the Spirit" (1 Cor. xiv, 2). Behold, he clearly says that those who prophesy in the Spirit have God in themselves, and those who speak in a tongue speak to God: "For they speak mysteries in the Spirit." The Holy Spirit, therefore, is God.
Everything that is created and made is altogether inferior in divine excellence and falls far short of the highest glory. For a slave will never possess the same dignity as his master, nor the work the same as the one who made it. Accordingly, God of all justifies those who sin, inasmuch as He has the power to forgive sins; yet the Holy Spirit also justifies with equal rank. For Paul writes: "And such were some of you, but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God" (1 Cor. vi, 11). If, then, He justifies in equal rank with God who is such by nature, how will He not also be consubstantial with Him? For a creature cannot justify us. C
That which has the same operation with God and the Father is surely also consubstantial with Him. Therefore, since God and the Father is vivifying, the Holy Spirit is vivifying in the same equal way, or rather, the Father is vivifying in the Holy Spirit. And Paul, writing to his genuine disciple Timothy, will testify: "I charge you," he says, "before God who gives life to all things, and before the Lord Jesus Christ, to keep the commandment without spot" (1 Tim. vi, 13). And in another place: "But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus Christ from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you" (Rom. viii, 11). Therefore, God and the Father does indeed give life to the dead, but, as I have said, He gives life through His own Spirit. How then is He created? For the Father is not vivifying in a creature, but in the consubstantial and uncreated Holy Spirit. D
God said somewhere to the hierophant Moses: "Who has given a mouth to man, and who made the deaf and the mute, the seeing and the blind? Is it not I, the Lord God? And now go, and I will open your mouth" (Exod. iv, 11-12). And further, our Lord Jesus Christ also promised to the holy apostles, if they were to be brought before the princes...
A that He would give them a mouth and a tongue. But it is written in the Acts: "And there appeared to them cloven tongues as of fire, and it sat upon each of them, and they began to speak in various tongues, as the Holy Spirit gave them to speak" (Acts ii, 3-4). Behold, then, as God gives a mouth to man, the Holy Spirit similarly gives it. But since He has the same operation, power, and authority as God by nature, how will He not be His own substantially, and not a creature or a thing made?
If one nature of the Godhead is worshipped in the holy and consubstantial Trinity, how shall the Holy Spirit be a generated thing? For there will no longer be a Trinity, or the fullness of the Godhead will limp in some way, if the Holy Spirit is numbered among the creatures, although the blessed Paul necessarily numbers the Holy Spirit with the Father and the Son. For he writes to some: "The grace of the Lord Jesus, and the charity of God, and the communication of the Holy Spirit be with you all" (II Cor. xiii, 13). For he was not praying that the faithful should become partakers of a creature, but rather that they should be sanctified in the participation of the Divine nature. B This is fulfilled through the spiritual communication with the Spirit, through whom we are made partakers of the Divine nature.
The blessed prophet Isaiah says: "I saw," he says, "the Lord Sabaoth sitting upon a throne high and elevated, with the Seraphim standing around Him, of course, and singing hymns to Him" (Isa. vi, 1). He adds also: "And I heard Him saying: Whom shall I send, and who will go to this people? And I said: Behold me, send me. And He said: Go, and say to this people: You shall hear with the hearing, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive" (Isa. vi, 8-9). But the blessed Paul says that this utterance was made by the Holy Spirit. For it is written thus in the Acts, concerning him and the Jews: "And when they did not agree among themselves, they departed, Paul speaking one word: That the Holy Spirit well spoke by Isaiah the prophet to our fathers, saying: Go to this people, and say to them: You shall hear with the hearing, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive" (Acts xxviii, 25-26). C But how, when the Lord of hosts is speaking, is it the Spirit who is speaking, if He is a creature? But this is not true; rather, as the Spirit of the Lord Sabaoth, and His own by nature, He speaks what is His.
When God says: "Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the Lord" (Jerem. xxiii, 24), and so the blessed Paul writes concerning the Son: "He that descended is the same also that ascended above all the heavens, that He might fill all things" (Ephes. iv, 10), it is the Spirit who fills all things. For it is written: "The Spirit of the Lord has filled the whole world" (Sap. i, 7). Therefore, the Holy Spirit is not alien to God and Father by nature, nor indeed to the Son, but passing through from the Father through the Son into the creature, because He is also above the creature. For the creature is a participant, not of itself, but of Him who is above it by nature, that is, of God, through the Spirit.
The blessed Isaiah said somewhere concerning the Israelites: D "The Spirit descended from the Lord, and led them; you led your people, to make yourself a name of glory" (Isa. lxiii, 14). And the divine Moses in Deuteronomy again says: "The Lord alone led them, and there was no alien god with them" (Deut. xxxii, 12). Behold, then, clearly the Holy Spirit is called both Lord and God not alien. But if He is created, and alien to the divine and supreme nature, and not endowed with the glory of true dominion, then certainly He will also be an alien god. But this is impious to say or think. For He is called Lord and God not alien. Therefore, He is God and from God by nature.
That the Spirit is both Lord and God, we shall no less understand from those things also which are written in the Canticle of Moses.
For he says: A “Memor esto, ne obliviscaris ea quibus exacerbasti Dominum Deum tuum in deserto” (Deut. IX, 7). And the blessed Isaias says: “Not an ambassador, he says, nor an angel, but the Lord himself saved them, and took them up, and lifted them up all the days of the age. But they were disobedient, and provoked the Holy Spirit, and he was turned to them for bitterness” (Isa. LXIII, 9, 10). Behold again, the all-wise Moses says: “You have provoked the Lord your God.” The prophet Isaias says that the Holy Spirit was provoked. For the Spirit of the Lord—that is, the Holy Spirit—is not something foreign to the Lord and to God by nature.
Those who possess the right faith say that the Holy Spirit is divine. For it is written: “Divine is the Spirit that made me.” But those whose minds are perverted, and who say that He is a created being, swimming about in manifold arguments, say: “True, the Spirit is called divine, but not as existing in truth from God and being God, but just as a man might be called divine.” To such things we say this: The blessed Paul called the God of all “divine.” For when speaking to the Athenians, he said: “Being therefore the offspring of God, we ought not to imagine the divine to be like unto gold or silver, or graven by the art and device of man” (Acts XVII, 29). By “the divine,” he meant God. B And furthermore, he writes to the Romans concerning God: “For the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, his eternal power also and divinity” (Rom. I, 20). Empty, therefore, are the things which the adversaries bring forward when they say that the Holy Spirit is called divine, just as if one of us were called a divine man.
Our Lord Jesus Christ says: “If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink. He that believeth in me, as the Scripture saith, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water” (John VII, 37, 38). Then the blessed evangelist John adds: “And this he said of the Spirit, which they should receive who believed in him” (John VII, 39). Therefore, according to the Savior’s voice, the Spirit is living water. We find, moreover, through the voice of Jeremias, the God of all saying: “The heaven is astonished at this, and is very much afraid, saith the Lord, for my people have done two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and have digged to themselves broken cisterns, that can hold no water” (Jer. II, 12, 13). C Since, therefore, the God of all names Himself the fountain of living water, and the Holy Spirit is living water, how is He not God by nature, He who possesses the same life-giving power as He?
The blessed Paul writes: “Do you seek a proof of Christ who speaketh in me?” (II Cor. XIII, 3). And to the holy apostles, our Lord Jesus Christ Himself says: “For it is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaketh in you” (Matt. X, 20). Since, therefore, the Spirit speaks when Christ speaks, how could the Spirit that is proper to the Word who created all things be a created being? “For all things were made by him: and without him was made nothing” (John I, 3). But He who made all things is surely also other than all things by nature, and is in the preeminence of divinity which is above all creation.
That the Holy Spirit is God and from God by nature, the blessed Peter will teach, saying: D “Ananias, why hath Satan tempted thy heart, that thou shouldst lie to the Holy Ghost, and by fraud keep part of the price of the land? You have not lied to men, but to God” (Acts V, 3, 4). Therefore, if he who lies to the Holy Spirit lies to God, how is the Spirit not God by nature?
The blessed Paul, calling himself a servant of Jesus Christ and a called apostle, says that he was set apart for the Gospel of God (Rom. I, 1). Then again, signifying the same thing in another way, he writes to some as if concerning God:
A “Who also made us sufficient to be ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the Spirit.” If, then, he knows the New Testament to be the Gospel of God, for which he says he was also set apart, how is the Holy Spirit not God?
He writes again: “For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he might instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ,” 672 speaking of the Spirit who dwells in us. Since, therefore, he is called the mind of Christ, how could he be of the things that were created, when it is impossible for the divine and incorruptible nature to have anything from outside substantially in itself?
Writing to the Galatians, Paul says: “My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you.” And if Christ is formed in us, by the power of the Spirit remaking us through all virtue into his own likeness and rendering us spiritual, God, therefore, is the Spirit of Christ, who is formed in us as he himself is.
B Someone approaches in the Gospels and says to our Lord Jesus Christ: “Good Master.” To this Christ answered: “Why do you call me good? No one is good but one, that is, God.” Since Christ therefore asserts that one is truly and substantially good, the Psalmist says somewhere: “Your good Spirit shall lead me in the right way.” If, then, while one is good, the Spirit is good, it is evident that he is of the divine nature, of which “good” is truly predicated.
Paul, defining the laws concerning women, says: “A wife is bound by the law as long as her husband lives. But if her husband be dead, she is free to be married to whom she will, only in the Lord. But she is happier if she so remains, according to my judgment. I think also that I have the Spirit of God.” What do we gather from this? If it belongs only to God to establish laws, and Paul establishes laws as one who has the Spirit of God, then the Spirit in him is God, who also moves him to establish laws.
In the Gospels the Savior says somewhere concerning himself: “I am the truth.” But the blessed John, showing that the Spirit is from the substance of the Father and the Son, says in the Gospels: C “The Spirit of truth, which proceeds from the Father.” And in the Epistle: “The Spirit is truth.” How then could he who proceeds from the Father and is the Spirit of truth, and has such likeness to the Son because of the identity of substance that he himself is also called truth, be created and made? But this is absurd. Therefore the Spirit is God, since he is truly truth and proceeds from the Father.
The Mosaic law brings inevitable punishment upon those who blaspheme the God of all. And indeed, God commands the son of an Egyptian woman to be stoned to death by the whole assembly in the desert 673 because he had named the name, as it is written, and had dared to say something forbidden. D Nevertheless, our Lord Jesus Christ himself, preserving the same honor for the divine nature, affirms that it will be forgiven to one who has spoken against the Son of man, but that it will not be forgiven to him who has blasphemed against the Holy Spirit, neither in this age nor in the age to come. But if the Holy Spirit were a creature, and not existing of the divine substance, being glorified with the Father and the Son, how does the blasphemy against him have so great a punishment, as much as is decreed against those who blaspheme against God? But it is clear that the Spirit is God, and from God, and in God, who is honored as God in the divine Scriptures, and exists as such by nature.
If, as the Savior says, “That which is born of the Spirit is spirit,” and such a one is not of
blood, nor of the will of man, nor of the will of a woman, but is born of God, then the Spirit is God by nature, for He regenerates the saints into unity with God by dwelling in them and making them partakers of His own nature. A
That which is holy by participation, existing as it were as a receptacle of a holiness conferred upon it, must consist first of all in its own nature—just as man, for example, or an angel, or any other rational nature. Let those, therefore, who dare to say that the Spirit is holy by participation in the God and Father, and not by nature, tell us what He is in Himself and properly. But we have heard nothing else in the divine Scriptures. He is not, therefore, holy by participation or by composition, but is a sanctifying substance and nature, and, so to speak, a quality of the Godhead of the God and Father, just as the sweetness of honey is, or fragrance from a flower.
Paul, writing to the Romans concerning our Savior Christ, says, “Who was declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord.” If, then, by being raised from the dead and by the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit, Christ untied the bonds of death, and is declared and understood to be the true Son of God, the Spirit—through whom the demonstration of divine power occurs—cannot be a creature or a work. Otherwise, Christ would appear, in a certain sense, to be aided by a creature, rather than using a power that is his own, through the consubstantial Spirit. B
“For the creation,” he says, “was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but because of him who subjected it in hope.” If, therefore, they say that the Holy Spirit is created and made, they must necessarily admit that He Himself is also subject to vanity, and groans and travails with us, and is now in slavery, to be liberated only at the redemption of the glory of the children of God. But where then will Paul stand, who says: “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” If the Holy Spirit is a slave, as being made or created, how do we cry in Him, “Abba! Father”? But He delivers those in whom He resides from slavery, and rather reforms them into free sonship, showing them to be partakers of His own nature. He is not, therefore, a slave. If this is so, He is no creature. And to have escaped both the condition of being a creature and of being ranked among slaves, He must surely belong to the divine essence. C
Regarding the accomplishments done through him by our Savior for the benefit of the Gentiles, Paul boasts, saying: “I have reason to be proud in Christ Jesus in my labors for God. For I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to win obedience from the Gentiles, by word and deed, by the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Holy Spirit.” If, then, Christ performs signs and wonders through Paul by the power of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is, as it were, a natural and living activity, and, if we may say so, a quality of the Godhead of the Son. If this is so, how can He be a work, who is in God and of God by nature? And how, on the other hand, can the active power of the Son be a work? To say this is nothing less than complete impiety.
Teaching that the message of salvation does not need the cleverness of human arguments, Paul writes to the Corinthians: “And I was with you in weakness and in much fear and trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.” Behold, he shows that the demonstration of the Spirit—that is, the workings performed through the Spirit—is the power of God. For the Spirit is from Him and in Him by nature, working all things. D
A How then is that in which God, who is such by nature, is known, as far as it is accessible to us, as in a mirror and in a riddle, a creature or a work? «Do you not know,» he says, «that your bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God?» Since, therefore, when the Holy Spirit dwells in us, we are called the house and temple of God, how will He not be of the divine nature, but be numbered among created things? For it is also manifest that no created or made thing is said to dwell in a temple as God does, but this, too, is unique to the divine nature alone among all other things.
«I will therefore most gladly boast in my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me.» But if it is the Spirit who dwells and resides in us, and through Him Christ, then the Holy Spirit is the power of Christ. If this is so, how will that which is by nature present in the Son be a work? For it is time to say that the Word of God, who possesses no duality, is composite, being composed of a created and of His own nature. But if this is absurd, the Spirit is not created or made, but is from the incomprehensible and divine substance as its power, and as it were, its natural operation.
B Regarding our Savior Christ, Paul says: «In whom you also, having heard the word of truth, the Gospel of your salvation—in whom also having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the pledge of our inheritance.» If, when we are sealed by the Holy Spirit, we are transformed to the likeness of God, how will He be created through whom the image of the divine essence is engraved in us and the seals of the unbegotten nature remain? For the Spirit does not, in the manner of a painter, sketch the divine essence in us, being Himself other than it, nor does He bring us to the likeness of God in this way; but being Himself God, and having proceeded from God, He is impressed upon the hearts of those who receive Him like a seal upon wax, invisibly, by the communion and likeness to Himself, re-forming our nature to that exemplary beauty and showing man again [to be] in the image of God. How then will He be a work, through whom nature is transformed toward God, as having become a partaker of God?
C «Be prudent, therefore, and be watchful in prayers. But above all things have fervent charity among yourselves, for charity covers a multitude of sins. Be hospitable to one another, without grumbling, each as he has received a gift, administering it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.» Observe for me, again, that the admirable Peter insists that the variety and gift of such grace [comes] from God, acknowledging the Holy Spirit not to be alien to the divine nature, since He distributes the divine gifts as He wills, and apportions them to each of the saints with authority. Since Peter calls the Spirit God, how will he not be impious and deranged who classes Him among created things and dares to oppose the preaching of the holy apostles with headlong recklessness?
D «Who is it that overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? This is He who came by water and blood, and the Spirit: Jesus Christ, not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who testifies, because the Spirit is truth. For there are three who bear witness, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood; and these three are one. If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater.» See then, again, that the herald of truth calls the Spirit God and [that He is] from God by nature. For having said that it is the Spirit who testifies, after a little [more] he adds: «testi-
testimony of God is greater.» A How then shall He be a creature, who is spoken of theologically together with the Father of all, and who is the complement of the holy Trinity?
«Now the birth of Jesus Christ was in this way: When His mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child of the Holy Spirit.» B If the power to create resides solely in the divine nature, and this is its preeminent attribute along with other divine honors, yet the divine Spirit creates for Himself a temple in the Virgin according to the Scriptures, will not he who says that He has been made be found both impious and foolish? For he brings an accusation against the most primordial substance of all, dragging it down, as it were, and forcing it into the category of created things, which began to be recently and were not in the beginning. But in us God is not recent, according to what is written in the Psalms; therefore, He did not come into being, nor was He created, but is rather a divine and immortal nature in the beginning. But if this is so, how shall that divine and holy Spirit who is in God and the Father be considered created?
«But as many as received Him, to them He gave power to become the children of God, who were not born of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.» C If it is the Spirit who through faith in Christ regenerates us unto salvation, so that because of this very thing we are counted as children of God, how shall the Spirit not be God? And that we who have believed are born of the Spirit, the Savior Himself will testify, saying to Nicodemus: «The Spirit blows where He wills, and you hear His voice, but you do not know from where He comes and where He goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.»
«But when the Paraclete comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me.» If the Holy Spirit proceeds from God and the Father, and is, as it were, a vapor or quality of His substance, yet the Father is unbegotten and uncreated; how can the Spirit, who flows forth from Him, be begotten? And how are we called temples of God upon receiving the Spirit, if He is not God, according to the thoughtlessness of some?
OF OUR HOLY FATHER CYRIL, ARCHBISHOP OF ALEXANDRIA, ON THE HOLY AND LIFE-GIVING TRINITY. PROEMIUM.
A It would indeed be proper that all who are illumined by the name of our Savior Jesus Christ, and who boast of being sheep of that Shepherd who laid down His soul for us, should hear the voice of the Shepherd, feed upon the pasture indicated by Him, adhere to the boundaries and commandments of the evangelical faith, and love the simple doctrine of the Apostles. But because many, stirred by pride, desirous of vain glory, and ignorant of their own powers, prefer the concepts of their own wandering mind to the inspired doctrine; and, turned aside from the straight path that leads to the heavenly city, tread many various and deadly paths—all indeed wandering alike, though not all pursuing the same path of error, but following the fallacy of their own thoughts in different ways—I believe it befits those who B walk in the royal and well-beaten path of the orthodox to have pity on those who wander, to reveal their fraud to them, to teach them true piety, to provide guidance to their followers, and to take care that they do not deviate to either side, until they finally reach the royal city.
ON THE TRINITY. CHAPTER I.
A That God greatly esteems the salvation of men. For the sake of this, the Savior of all sent the holy choir of Apostles into the whole world, so that they might illuminate with the rays of divine knowledge those who had been nourished in the darkness of ignorance; that they might gather and diligently shepherd the sheep that were scattered and exposed to wolves; that they might change the wild olive into a cultivated one by the art of the Spirit; and that they might fish out with the word of doctrine those who were submerged in the abyss of impiety. Since, therefore, the salvation of men is most pleasing to the Creator of all men, and since it seems to be the law of nature that we should provide care for a neighbor who is in need, let us also deposit the talent of knowledge given to us by the Lord with the B money-changers, lest we be condemned along with that slothful servant. We shall, therefore, set forth the teaching of the divine dogmas, both for the remembrance of those who know and for the instruction of those who are ignorant.
II. What the character of ecclesiastical discourse should be.
Our discourse should preach the evangelical faith simply and didactically, not dialectically or contentiously, but in a manner becoming to the Church of God—to contrition, not to ostentation; to instruction, not to contention. It should be devoid of artifice, abound in theology, not investigate inaccessible things, not search out things beyond understanding, not attempt to encompass with mind and word things that are incomprehensible, not subject the supreme Architect to artificial methods, and not reject faith while demanding proof. Our discourse should follow the fishermen, trace the steps of the tanner, be led by the tax-collector, be illuminated by the prophetic lamp, be enlightened by the evangelical sun, mix in nothing of its own reasoning, and weave together only the teachings of the all-holy Spirit; for this is the definition of divine teaching.
III. That this instruction is to be given to the orthodox.
We have already refuted the heretical blasphemies in other writings, dealing with each one separately, stripping away the veil of deception, and showing the impiety naked. Now, however, C God willing, we shall set forth those things which are divinely granted by the Church to the foster-children of the faith, neither imposing a satiety upon those who encounter them by the length of the discourse, nor corrupting the precision by brevity, but holding to the mean between both extremes; so that we may neither be burdensome to the listeners by excess, nor fail to provide a clear instruction in divine knowledge. I shall begin from above, running toward the very fountain of good things. D
IV. What opinions are to be held concerning God the Father.
We, the lovers, adorers, and proclaimers of the Trinity, with a loud voice and sublime conception of mind, believe in one God the Father, without beginning, unbegotten, who has always existed as Father, and has not attained this quality afterward; for there was no time when He was not, but He was Father from before. Nor was He first Son and then Father, as the sequence of bodies requires; but from the time He exists, He always exists, and is and is called Father. A
V. What is to be thought concerning the Son.
We believe in one Son, coeternal with Him who begat Him, who had no beginning of existence, but always is, and has been with the Father. For from the time the Father is, and He is always Father, from Him is the Son; for these are inseparably related to one another, both the names and the realities. But if the Son did not always exist, but there was a time when He was not, then neither was the Father always, for He has this name from the time He begat. Now if God always existed as Father (for it would be blasphemy indeed to subject the Creator of times to times, and to declare the timeless and super-temporal generation younger by a temporal interval), then the Son always existed, begotten ineffably from the Father, yet always existing with the Father, and known with the Father. B
VI. That the Scriptures teach that the Son is coeternal with the Father.
"In the beginning," he says, "was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God." What therefore was in the beginning, when was it not? For he did not say that it was made in the beginning, but that it was in the beginning. However much we may try by our thinking to exceed the phrase "was," we shall not be able to cross beyond the beginning. All things are secondary to that which is in the beginning, namely time, and age, and any other temporal interval that can be conceived. If, therefore, the Son had not always existed with God the Father, but had been made afterward, necessarily time and age would be interposed between the Father and the Son. But if anyone concedes this, the thing made will be found to be anterior to the maker. "For all things," says the evangelist, "were made through the Son, and without him was nothing made." Now, one thing out of this totality is the age also or time, which is to be accounted for. But the blessed Paul says: "In these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the ages." C But if the ages are the works of the Son, they do not precede Him who made them; and the ages not existing, it is investigated that not even time existed, which days and nights create and measure. D
the Word, by the good pleasure of the Father, created by His word. And they are measured: for day and night are made by the rising and setting of light—a light which was indeed made after heaven and earth and air. All these things, furthermore, and whatever is in them, God the Word, by the good pleasure of the Father, created by a word.
Since, therefore, times and ages, with all other things, were created by the Word, there is nothing between the Father and the Son, but the Father was always God, and the Son was always with the Father. Wherefore the evangelist also cries out, A “In the beginning was the Word” (John 1:1). And the apostle Paul says, “Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person” (Heb. 1:3). And elsewhere, “Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God” (Phil. 2:6). And neither that one (John) by the word “was,” nor this one (Paul) by the words “being” and “existing,” implies this; since they proclaim the One who always is. For which reason, a little later, the evangelist says, “The life was, and the life was the light of men” (John 1:4). And again, “There was the true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world” (John 1:9). And again, “The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father” (John 1:18). B And in the Epistle, “That which was, he says, from the beginning” (1 John 1:1). In this way, those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word were taught by the divine Spirit to speak about the only begotten Word of God. For this reason, they did not count the Creator with the creation; they did not place the Maker in the order of the things made; nowhere did they call the venerable offspring of God a creature; nowhere did they join the phrase “it was made” to the Divinity. But the one said, “In the beginning was the Word;” but not, “In the beginning the Word was made.” And the other: “Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person.” He did not say, “It was made C brightness and image.” And again: “Who, being in the form of God,” not “having become the form of God,” but “Being in the form of God.” And elsewhere, “Who is the image of the invisible God,” he did not say, “who became the image of the invisible God,” but, “who is.”
VII. Proof from the Old Testament that the Son is eternal.
Thus, in theological discourse, “was,” and “being,” and “existing,” and “is” are everywhere conjoined. Thus, God, speaking with the great Moses, named Himself, “I am who am” (Exod. 3:14). And again, “Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel: He who is hath sent me unto you.” Now, that these are the words D of the Son, the standard-bearers of blasphemy themselves witness, who, while saying the Father is incomprehensible, call the Son a medium between the Father and the creation, and say that He appeared to and conversed with the patriarchs and prophets. But God the Word Himself clearly teaches us through Jeremiah the prophet, saying, “In those days, and at that time, I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the days when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt” (Jer. 31:31). Let us ask, therefore, who it is that delivered the new covenant. Is it not manifest to all that the...
[Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum ejus esse datorem?] A Let us inquire, therefore, who gave the new testament. And is it not clear to all that the Lord Christ is the provider of this? For He Himself cries out in the holy Gospels: "It was said to those of old, You shall not kill; but I say to you, Everyone who is angry with his brother without a cause shall be liable to judgment. It was said to those of old, You shall not swear falsely; but I say to you, do not swear at all." And He sets forth other things similarly, that it was said thus, but I legislate in this way, not indeed subverting the existing law, but making the legislation more perfect and teaching the manner of its observance. The Lord Christ, therefore, has given the new testament to us. But the One who delivered this is the same who also gave the old [testament] to Israel after their departure from Egypt. And He who had given that one is the same who, in order to deliver them from the Egyptian servitude, had, of course, sent Moses to Pharaoh. He Himself said: "Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel: He Who Is has sent me to you." B And the prophet makes this manifest elsewhere: "For this," he says, "is our God; no other shall be accounted against Him. He has found out every way of knowledge and has given it to Jacob His servant and to Israel His beloved. After these things He was seen on earth and conversed with men."
Therefore, beginning from the foundation, let us investigate the prophetic meaning. Who is it that was seen on earth and conversed with men? It is clear, I think, to all who possess a mind, that it is the Word of God, who took on our nature, who did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant. C This One, therefore, gave the way of knowledge to Jacob His servant and to Israel His beloved, proclaiming the old law in the desert through Moses. But the One who brought that law, before He delivered it, speaking with Moses, had said: "Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel: He Who Is has sent me to you." Therefore the prophet cried out: "This is our God, no other shall be accounted against Him," in which words He does not so much deny that He is less, as [He] affirms Him to be incomparable. Observe how the prophetic oracles harmonize with the evangelical sayings. Moses says "I am"; or rather, the Word of God Himself says "I am"; but Paul often says "He who is"; he also says "He exists"; which expressions have the same meaning. Similarly, John the theologian D inserts the word "He who is" many times in the narrative of the Gospels; and he adorns the very prologue with such words, not once or twice or three times, but many times proclaiming the "He was."
VIII. That some things befit the Word of God, and others the assumed nature.
Now truly, since the heralds of the truth have taught such things, who is so bold and reckless as to...
or not [was] to say? And instead of "being" A and "existing," to call a creature him who was begotten of the Father timelessly and impassibly, and who is established in the bosom of the Father? For he who is, is not founded; he who exists, is not created. For the words "it became" and "he took," and whatever similar things [exist], were stated by those who were entrusted with the mysteries of the knowledge of God, not as speaking of the theology of the Godhead, but as proclaiming the dispensation. And first the
A Word is called God, as participating in the Father’s nature, and as existing as the exact image of God who begat Him. He is the Only-Begotten, as the only one from the only one, and begotten in a unique manner; the Radiance of His glory, as showing the Father in Himself, and as always existing with Him who begat Him, just as the radiance is with the light; the Impress of His substance, so that you may not think the Word of God is a mere activity, but a living substance, showing the One who begat Him entirely within Himself. But the term "firstborn" is not a name of the divine nature, but of the dispensation. For how is it possible for the Word of God to be both Only-Begotten and firstborn? For these names are contradictory. For the Only-Begotten signifies the one who alone was begotten, while the firstborn signifies the one who was begotten before others, and who takes precedence over others by birth. Yet the Word of God B has no brother, seeing that He is the Only-Begotten. How, then, is He the firstborn, He who alone was begotten from the Father? It is therefore clear that "firstborn" is a term pertaining to the economy. And if anyone doubts this, let him learn from Paul, who cries out: "Because those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren." Whose brothers by nature are the believers? Certainly not the brothers of the Word of God, but of the connatural humanity; for they are indeed conformed to this. And elsewhere he says: "Who will transform the body of our lowliness, that it may be made conformed to the body of His glory." Therefore, He is also the firstborn who has many brothers, concerning whom He says in the Psalms: "I will declare Thy name to My brethren." We do not say that the Only-Begotten is one C person and the firstborn another, but the same person, though not according to the same respect. For He is named Only-Begotten according to His birth from above, but He is called firstborn as having been the first to break the pangs of that birth which leads to life. For this reason He is also named the firstborn from the dead, as having been the first to rise and to have opened the gates of death; and the firstborn of all creation, as having been the first born in the new creation, which He renewed by being born, concerning which the blessed Paul says: "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old things have passed away, behold all things have become new." And if those who prefer D contention to persuasion still dispute about "firstborn of all creation" being said of the Word of God, we shall laugh at their ignorance; but we shall nevertheless indulge them, so that we may thus show that the truth abounds among us more than sufficiently. For He is called "firstborn," but not "first-created" of all creation; so that it is evident that He was begotten before all creation, and that nothing is older than the Son, but that He always existed with the Father, and existed before all creation. But the whole nature of created things is certainly posterior, inasmuch as it was brought into existence by Him. Therefore, nothing will be gained by the blasphemers from this.
XI. That no one knows the Son, except the Father; and no one knows the Father, except the Son.
A And that we may demonstrate the equality of the Father and the Son, let us come to the Lord’s own teaching: "No one," He says, "knows the Son, except the Father; and no one knows the Father, except the Son, and he to whom the Son wills to reveal Him." What could be clearer than these words? Our knowledge, He says, is equal; for I know the Father, being known by Him, and the Father knows Me, being known in turn by Me. But the entire body of created things is excluded from our knowledge. For how could that which does not share in our nature participate in our knowledge? Yet some do partake of a small measure of contemplation; for I reveal, as far as is permitted and as I will, the knowledge of the Father, as in a mirror and in a riddle. We have learned these things from the Lord’s teachings. What room is there here for "greater" and "lesser"? What creature knows the Creator as it itself is known by the Creator? What created thing maintains equality with its Maker? Or B are we ignorant of how the Divine Scripture speaks concerning created things? Let us call to mind the words of the Prophet: "In the beginning Thou, O Lord, didst found the earth, and the heavens are the works of Thy hands; they shall perish, but Thou remainest; and all shall grow old like a garment, and as a vesture Thou shalt fold them, and they shall be changed; but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail." And again: "Who makes His angels spirits, and His ministers a flame of fire." This is the difference between the creature and the Creator. C Where, therefore, there is equality, there is no longer creature and Creator, but Father and Son; and for this reason He set forth these names, that from the names themselves we might learn the identity of substance. "For no one," He says, "knows the Son except the Father, nor does anyone know the Father except the Son." By saying "no one," He indicated the creature; and by casting out the creature, He points to Him who remains, superior to created things, and naturally conjoined to the One who begot Him. "No one knows the Son except the Father, nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and he to whom the Son wills to reveal Him."
Let the enemies of the truth say how one ought to read the Divine Scripture: whether to cling to the letter or to search out the meaning. If they say the latter, let them learn from what they say to apply this principle to their own propositions, and to seek the true interpretation of things. But if they say that the letter suffices for accurate instruction, I shall refute their own sense from the words set before us. For on their view, the Son would be found incomprehensible, while the Father would be comprehensible; the former beyond thought, the latter visible. For since the Lord Christ said of Himself, "No one knows the Son except the Father," He did not add, "and to whom the Father wills to reveal Him." But when He said, "nor does anyone know the Father except the Son," He immediately added, "and to him to whom the Son wills to reveal Him." And He has not only made the Father knowable, but by making this depend upon His own power, D
knowledge. Moreover, even if they should wish ten thousand times to act impiously against the Son, as is their habit, we will not endure to accept a blasphemous conception concerning God the Father. For we believe that the God of the universe is A invisible and inconceivable. For how could the Son be incomprehensible if He belongs to One who can be comprehended? Therefore, we declare the Father as well as the Son to be unintelligible, inaccessible, and incomprehensible. We believe, however, that knowledge of the Son is revealed by the Father to the vision of the mind and to the contemplation of faith. "No one knows the Son, except the Father; nor does anyone know the Father, except the Son." And in another place: "As the Father knows Me, so I know the Father." For indeed it is not that the one knows more and the other less, but just as I know, so also am I known.
XII. That the power of the Father and the Son is equal.
Therefore, those whose knowledge is equal, their power is also B equal. And those whose power is equal, their substance is evidently also one. Now that the power of the Father and the Son is equal, the Savior Himself has taught us again by saying: "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand. My Father, who gave them Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand. I and My Father are one." Observe how He did not simply put: "I and the Father are one," foreseeing the heretical malice, C lest they should interpret this saying regarding intent and will. But having first established the equality of power, He then added the aforementioned statement. For to the sheep, He says, that follow Me, I give eternal life, so that none of them may perish forever. For who is so great as to be able to snatch from My hand that which is pastored by Me? For just as it is impossible for anyone to get the better of the right hand of the Father, who is greater than all, so it is impossible for anyone to be snatched away who is guarded by Me. "For I and the Father are one." Where, therefore, is the greater and the lesser? For if, likewise, D no one can snatch from the hand of the Son, nor from the hand of the Father, there is no room for "the greater." And since the Father is greater than all, and no one can snatch from His hand, it follows that the Son is also greater than all, since likewise no one can snatch from His hand. Therefore He added: "I and the Father are one." For if we follow the letter again, we shall see the Son placed first: for He said, "I and the Father," not "The Father and I." And having demonstrated the duality of the persons, He proclaimed the unity of the nature. For by saying, "I and the Father," He signified the number of the hypostases; but by adding, "are one," He declared the unchangeable [m] nature of the power. Therefore, of those whose knowledge is equal, their power and will are also
of whom there is knowledge, and power, and volition, of these, it is evident, the nature also is one, even if those who utter blasphemies should act shamelessly.
XIII. That it is possible to learn the equality of the Father and the Son from many sources.
That the Son can do the same things as the Father may be learned from other sources. For at one time He says: "My Father worketh until now, and I work," and at another: "As the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son also quickeneth whom He will." "Whom He will," He said, not "whom He is commanded"; "whom He desires," not "whom He is ordered"—for the former is proper to mastery, the latter to servitude. And again from another place: "If I do not the works of My Father, believe Me not; but if I do, even if you do not wish to believe Me, believe the works, and know that B the Father is in Me, and I in Him." See again from this the equality of the Father and the Son, for, He says, "The Father is in Me, and I in Him." But for this to be found in the greater and the lesser is absolutely impossible. And I shall now demonstrate this. Universal God encompasses in Himself all creation, both visible and invisible, or rather, He holds it in His hand: "For in His hand," it is said, "are all the ends of the earth." And again: "He who holds the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants as locusts." And elsewhere: "Who has measured the water with His hand, and the heaven with a span, and all the earth with a fist?" Therefore, as I said, the Creator of all things holds the whole of creation in His hand; but that He Himself should be encompassed by creation is impossible; therefore it is impossible for unequal things to contain one another. But if this is true, as it is indeed true, and the Son contains the Father, just as the Father contains the Son, the argument for inequality is clearly cast out, and equality is recognized in the Father and the Son.
XIV. Demonstration that the Son is of equal honor to the Father.
This again the Lord Christ Himself teaches us elsewhere, saying: "I am the door. No one comes to the Father except through Me." And from another place: "No one comes to Me, the Son, unless My heavenly Father draws him." And we are taught from this that the Son in like manner leads those who are being saved to the Father, and the Father to the Son. Where, then, is the servile liturgy of the heretics? Where is the worship befitting a creature? Where do they show the inequality of the Father's mastership and the Son's servitude? For we hear that now the Son leads those who desire salvation to the Father, and now the Father does this, and leads the nurslings of the faith to the Son.
XV. That the nature of the Father and the Son is one.
And we learn from this the equal honor of the Father and the Son; but this can also be learned from another source, when the Lord Himself is conversing with the Jews who are listening. For after having spoken of many things, He concluded: "Even if I C
A bear witness of myself, my testimony is true, because I am not alone, but I and the Father who sent me. And it is written in your law that the testimony of two men is true. I am One who bears witness of myself, and the Father who sent me bears witness of me." B The Jews therefore said to Him, "Where is your Father?" Jesus answered them, "You know neither me nor my Father; if you knew me, you would know my Father also." Good heavens! How great is the insanity of the heretics! How great is the stupor under which those who are the heirs of the blasphemy of Arius and Eunomius labor! Besides their insanity, one can also see much impudence thriving in them; for they speak of the mission back and forth, and they say the sender is greater than the one who is sent. Such is their ignorance of the Scriptures! And they do not consider that Jacob, having been sent by Isaac into Mesopotamia, is not on that account, so far as his nature is concerned, lesser than the one who sent him. Likewise also, Joseph was sent by Jacob to check on his brothers, and yet no one would say that he did not share in his father's nature because he undertook the mission to be performed while obeying his father.
But they say perhaps: Even if, by reason of nature, these senders were not greater than those who were sent, at any rate they held the primacy of honor by paternal dignity. And yet we discover, O insane ones (for I am addressing you by name), that greater ones have also been sent by lesser ones, and we shall not for that reason strip those who were sent of their own honor. For Jonathan, the king’s son, was sent by David, a fugitive; and the co-ruler of his father was sent by one who dared not even appear in the rank of a servant. C Since, therefore, the one sent while the other sent, then, according to your reasoning, the one who was sent will no longer be king, and the one who sent will no longer be a fugitive; but the dignity of the one who was sent has passed over to David who sent him, and the misfortune of the one who sent has passed over to Jonathan who was sent. But in reality, these things are not so. But why do we recount human affairs? We find a God who was sent, and a man who sent. For he who had wrestled with Jacob said, "Let me go, for the dawn is rising." To whom Jacob said, "I will not let you go, unless you bless me." What have these wise and ingenious teachers of the faith to oppose to this? D Moreover, from the Lord’s own words, we shall also know that the Father who sends is himself co-existent with the Son who is sent. "For I am not alone," He says, "but I and the Father who sent me." And in another place: "My Father has not left me alone." And elsewhere: "My Father who abides in me, he does the works." If, therefore, the One who sent was in Him and with Him, where is the lowliness? Furthermore, He who fills all things—whither or whence was He sent? For a mission implies a change of place. Now, if the Father and the Son contain all things, and the Father is not removed from those to whom He sent the Son, nor did the Son pass from one place to another [694m]
A it remains to be understood that it was the mission of the humanity that had been assumed.
But it is time to turn to the interpretation of the Lord's words. "In your law," He says, "it is written that the testimony of two men is true." Then He adds: "I am He who bears witness of Myself, and the Father who sent Me bears witness of Me." Therefore, looking upon the image, let us understand the archetype: "The testimony of two men," He says, "is true." Now, that the nature of two men is one is clearly confessed by all; therefore, the essence of the Father and the Son is one, and it will be understood and confessed as one from the image. For just as there are two men there, so also here God and God, Father and Son, and by these very names they signify the identity of nature. For neither can He who is truly God be of a different nature from Him who is truly God, B nor can the Son be different from Him, since He is the Son of God. Having heard these things, the Jews asked Him: "Where is Your Father?" Jesus therefore answered: "You know neither Me nor My Father; if you knew Me, you would know My Father also."
See again how the consubstantiality is demonstrated from this. For if you knew Me, He says, you would know My Father also. But from that which is different in nature, the other thing is not naturally recognized as different; for things that are of a different kind and foreign to each other do not signify one another, but things that share in the same nature are known through each other. Through one man, it is possible to see the whole nature of men; and through one sheep, the C whole genus of sheep; but one does not see lions through sheep, nor sheep through lions, nor angels through men, nor men through angels; for every animal is a demonstrative of its own nature. If, therefore, the only-begotten Word of God is a creature, and has been born from non-existent things and from some other nature, how does He, being believed in, demonstrate the Father in Himself? But if the Father is known through the Son, and he who knows the Son knows the Father also, let every blasphemous tongue be silenced, and, as the Prophet says, let it cleave to the throat. D We, however, the worshippers of the Trinity, receive from this the accurate knowledge of the consubstantiality, reasoning that the Father would not have been known in the Son in any other way unless He were of the same substance. And let us worship our Savior, awaiting the fruit of our worship, the giver of which is the Father Himself, according to the word of the Lord: "For if anyone," He says, "serves Me, My Father will honor him." And also the admirable John the theologian: "He who believes in the Son," he says, "has eternal life; but he who is disobedient to the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him."
Capitulum XVI. That the Lord taught in many places that his substance and the Father’s are one.
A But so that we may demonstrate their consubstantiality from another testimony as well, let us hear the Lord himself crying out and saying not only to the apostles, but also to the Jews: "He who believes in me, does not believe in me, but in him who sent me. And he who sees me, sees him who sent me. I have come as a light into the world, so that whoever believes in me might not remain in darkness." If, therefore, he who sees the Son believes in the B Father, where then is the "greater" and the "lesser"? For in the lesser, the greater is diminished and is not recognized. If, however, the Father is greater, how is he seen in the Son? But if he is seen in the Son, then clearly he is recognized as being in an equal. For things that are equal are demonstrative of each other. And again, after a few words, the Lord himself says to the apostles: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me; if you knew me, you would also know my Father, and from now on you know him and have seen him." Philip says to him: "Lord, show us your Father, and it is enough for us." Jesus says to him: "Have I been with you for so long a time, and you have not known me, Philip? He who sees me, sees also my Father; and how do you say, 'Show us the Father'? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me? The words which I speak, I do not speak from myself; but the Father who remains in me, he himself does the works. Believe me, that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me: otherwise, believe me because of the works themselves."
What is clearer than these words? What is more evident than this doctrine? But indeed, as it seems, the veil of the Jews has passed into the mind of the heretics. Because of this, they do not wish to behold things clearer than the sun, drawing upon themselves a voluntary cloud of ignorance. But let us hear the Lord saying: "If you had known me, you would also have known my Father; and from now on you know him, and have seen him." C He says this to Thomas, by whom it had been said to him, "We do not know where you are going, and how are we able to know the way?" And he teaches him and the rest of the apostles at the same time that a man who has believed in him, while he sees him thus with the eyes of the mind, becomes also a spectator of the Father, since the Father is recognized in the Son. Philip, not understanding these things, asks him, saying: "Show us your Father, and it is enough for us." Therefore he is not praised, because according to the heretics he seemed to desire to see something greater; but rather he is reproved, as one who had not seen the Father in the Son: "For I have been with you," he says, "for such a long time, and you have not yet known me, Philip?" And yet Philip desired to see not him, but the Father. Why, therefore, is he reproved because he did not know the Son? With the addition of this reproach, the Lord reveals the cause of the matter: "For he who sees me," he says, D sees the Father.
has seen the Father." A And how, then, do you say, "Show us the Father"? "I am another," he says, "according to person, not according to nature. I carry the whole Father within myself; for I am the indistinguishable seal of the One who begat, the image of the Father’s substance, a natural image coexisting with the One who begat. When, therefore, you wish to see Him, by looking at me you will see both. Yet you will see them not with the eyes of the body, but with those of faith; and with the eyes of faith only to the extent of knowing the operations, not the nature or the substance; for this comprehension exceeds every mind. Therefore he added: "Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you, I do not speak on my own authority; but the Father who dwells in me does the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me; or else believe me for the sake of the works themselves." If, therefore, he speaks the same things as the Father, and the Father dwells in him and he in the Father, and he who has seen him has seen the Father, and he who knows him knows the Father, it is plain to all who have a mind that the nature of the Father and the Son is one, and that the Son possesses all things that are the Father's. For he would not have shown the Father in himself in any other way, unless he possessed everything that the Father has, except the fatherhood itself; for this is the property of the Father, just as sonship is the property of the Son.
XVII. Another demonstration that the Son is equal to the Father.
This equality can also be learned from another angle. For Jesus says: "Now the Son of man is glorified, and God is glorified in him; and God will glorify him in himself, and will glorify him at once." C And again: "Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son, that your Son may also glorify you." O the surpassing folly of the heretics! The one who glorifies, they say, is greater than the one who is glorified. And the Father, to be sure, glorifies, while the Son is glorified; therefore the Father is greater than the Son. But if the Son is not only glorified, but also glorified the one who glorified him, what room is left here for "greater" and "lesser"? Unless, perhaps, as would follow from the premises, the greater dignity passes to the one who glorifies, so that the Son becomes lesser when he is glorified, and greater when he glorifies. But to say such things is the height of madness and insanity. For we are not taught "greater" and "lesser" from these things, D but the equality of the Father and the Son. For we hear that the Son is glorified by the Father, and in turn the Father [is glorified] by the Son; and the Son is glorified by the Father, and he simultaneously glorifies the Father. For the one who has been glorified did not receive what he did not have, but [received] what he already had. This same thing he teaches us in the same place: "For glorify me," he says, "with yourself, O Father, with the glory which I had with you before the world was." If, then, even before the world was made, he possessed this glory, how does he ask to receive what he always had?
XVIII. That the dominion of the Father and the Son is one.
Then, having shown that he is not only glorified, but in turn also glorifies, he added: A "I have manifested your name to men." And a little later, stopping the mouths of the heretics: "All mine," he says, "are yours, and yours are mine." He is not, strictly speaking, dividing a common dominion, nor does he wish to show that some things pertain to him and others to the Father; but because those who omit no species of blasphemy against the Only-begotten say that he receives, but the Father gives, he demonstrates that he holds a dominion over all things equal to the Father. For "All mine," he says, "are yours, and yours are mine," teaching us not a division of dominion, but that the communion of dominion is one. B
But I feel that I have extended this discourse on the faith for a long time, even though I had promised at the beginning to contain its definition as if in a single chapter. For when I had undertaken to demonstrate the dignity of the Only-begotten from evangelical doctrine, I made the discourse longer than I had promised, although I studied brevity in the interpretations of the texts themselves. Therefore, having sent the pious Christians to the evangelical and prophetic books themselves, which all overflow with the theology of the Son, I will pursue the series of the argument concerning the Trinity that I have proposed.
XIX. Concerning the Holy Spirit.
We believe, therefore, as I have said, in God the Father without beginning, and in God the Son, coeternal by nature, C born of the Father, but existing always with the Father, according to the voice of the Gospels: "In the beginning," it says, "was the Word." We believe also in the Holy Spirit, the upright, the directing, the good, the Comforter, proceeding from God, not begotten; for the Only-begotten is one. Nor created; for nowhere in divine Scripture do we find him numbered among the created, but placed in the same order with the Father and the Son. We have heard, however, that he proceeds from the Father, but we do not curiously investigate how he proceeds, but are content with these boundaries which the theologians and blessed men have set for us.
XX. That the Spirit is placed in the same order with the Father and the Son.
For we have been taught by our Savior Jesus Christ himself that the Holy Spirit is the completion of the Trinity. D "Go therefore," he says, "teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." Moreover, he whom we confess with the Father and the Son is superior to all that is created. Wherefore also blessed Paul preaches him in a continuous series with the Father and the Son: "For the grace," he says, "of our Lord
Jesus, and the love of God and the Father, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. A
XXI. The dominion of the Holy Spirit is demonstrated.
And again, Paul says: "There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord; and there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all." And proclaiming His power, he cried out: "But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will," distributing B the gifts to those who believe. For through Him we have received the remission of sins; through Him we attain to liberty; through Him we enjoy the grace of adoption. "For we have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear," says Paul, "but we have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father." And elsewhere: "For the law of the Spirit of life hath made me free from the law of sin and death." And in another place: "Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." Now, He who sets others free is not a servant. For how could He grant to fellow-servants what He does not possess, what He is unable to attain, and what He would indeed wish to enjoy, C as is fitting, but cannot? But if He truly communicates liberty to those who believe and sets servants free, He is evidently not a servant, but a master, and with sovereign authority bestows liberty upon whom He wills. Wherefore also blessed Paul said, that "All these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will." Wherefore the prophet in the Old Testament also, proclaiming His power, cried out: "The Lord hath sent me, and His Spirit." And God, reproving the Jews, says: "Ye have taken counsel, but not by me; and made agreements, but not by my Spirit," thus showing the Holy Spirit to be a sharer in sovereign authority. And finally elsewhere: "Therefore," He says, "I am with you, and my Spirit remaineth in the midst of you."
XXII. That the Paraclete is Creator.
Job also, believing Him to be Creator and Lord, and D not a minister nor a creature, says: "The divine Spirit, which hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty which teacheth me." But if He created human nature, He has the same substance with the Father and the Son; for in the creation of man God said: "Let us make man in our image, and after our likeness." But if the image is one, it is evident that their substance is also one.
XXIII. That the Holy Spirit is from God.
That the Holy Spirit exists of the divine substance,
A itself, God teaches us through the prophet, saying B Joel: "In the last days I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh." And the Lord Christ teaches us, saying to the disciples: "When they deliver you up, do not worry about how or what you should speak. For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you." And again Paul: "But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you." And a little later: "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God." And elsewhere: "But to us, he says, God has revealed them through His Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit who is from God." From these things it is excellently evident that the Holy Spirit is not of another nature nor of a diverse substance, but is in reality endowed with the divine nature. Wherefore he also knows the arcana of God, and knows whatever is of God, just as our soul knows the things that are its own. But if anyone perhaps thinks that the word "searches" denotes ignorance, he will find the same thing said of the Father also. "For he who searches hearts," he says, "knows what is the mind of the Spirit." C Since, then, the God of all does not search because He is ignorant, but knows all things perfectly before they come to pass; so also the holy Spirit of God does not search the deep things of God by reason of ignorance. For how would the cited words be consistent for one who is ignorant: that just as the spirit of a man knows the things that are in him, so also "no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God"? For knowledge is opposed to searching; but the soul does not search its own things, but knows them supremely. Therefore, the Holy Spirit has the accurate knowledge of God: and just as "no one knows the Father except the Son, and no one knows the Son except the Father," so, he says, "no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God." Therefore, from what has been said, we are taught the communion of nature.
But because the disciples of the blasphemy of Arius and Eunomius have exceeded all bounds of impudence, and (I speak of them) say that the Spirit of God is God Himself, the blessed Paul necessarily demonstrates the person of the Spirit: "For we," he says, "have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God; that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. These things we also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ."
Lord, who shall instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ." Therefore, by saying, "We have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God," He taught that the Holy Spirit is not of the same nature as the world, but exists of the divine essence. And in addition to this, He taught that He is speaking not of God the Father, but of the Holy Spirit, whose grace those who believe receive. Wherefore He said the Spirit is "of God," teaching that He has existence from the Father, and exists of that same nature, not indeed by generation, but in that way which He alone knows who understands the Son, and He who alone knows the Father, and He who alone understands the Father and the Son; a thing which we have learned from God, but the mode of which we have not been taught. Therefore let us be content with the measure of knowledge given to us, and not ignorantly pry into things that are incomprehensible. B
XXIV. That the great Apostle knew that the Holy Spirit is God.
That the Holy Spirit is of God, Paul teaches us again, saying: "Ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God." For why are we called temples of God upon receiving the grace of the Spirit through baptism, if the Holy Spirit Himself is not God? And that the faithful are called temples of the Spirit, the same Apostle teaches us, saying: "Know ye not that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, whom ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price." C Now, a temple proclaims the God who inhabits it. Wherefore he also said above: "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are." If, therefore, believers receive the grace of the Spirit through baptism, and having been deemed worthy of this gift, we are made the temple of God, then the Holy Spirit is God. For this reason, if those who enjoy the grace of the Spirit are and are called the habitation and temple of God, it is clear that the Holy Spirit is of the divine nature, and is consubstantial with the Father and the Son. But if He were a creature, D and of a different substance, those who obtain His gift would not rightly be called temples of God. But if those who enjoy some portion, however small, of His grace are called temples of God, we shall understand His fellowship from the appellation. The chief of the apostles also teaches this in the Acts, when he rebukes the theft of Ananias.
XXV. That the divine Peter also holds a consonant opinion regarding the Holy Spirit.
"Ananias," he says, "why hath Satan filled thine heart
to lie to the Holy Spirit, and to defraud [God] of the price of the field A?” And shortly after: “You have not lied to men, but to God.” For because he had thought to deceive the apostles, as being men, while he subtracted from the price of the property as much as he pleased, the prince of the apostles teaches him that those who possess the grace of the Spirit know clearly all things that have been done in secret. “You have not lied to us,” he says, “but to the Holy Spirit.” Therefore do not think that you have deceived men; for it is God who has been lied to by you; for you have not lied to men, but to God. Assuredly, you have not tricked us, but the Holy Spirit, who is God, having his subsistence from God, and being a sharer of the same nature. Luke also makes this clear in the Acts; for having said above that while the brethren at Antioch were serving the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said:
XXVI. It is demonstrated in many ways that the Holy Spirit is God.
B“Separate for me Paul and Barnabas for the work to which I have called them.” He proceeds to say that they, sent by the Holy Spirit, departed to Seleucia. And when he has related how, traversing Cyprus, Lycia, Lycaonia, Pamphylia, and Bithynia, they preached the Gospel, he adds: “And sailing from there to Antioch, whence they had been entrusted to the grace of God for the work which they had completed; when they had arrived there, and had gathered the Church, they reported how great things God had done with them.” And although he had mentioned the Spirit above, as the one who had chosen Paul and Barnabas for the work destined by Him, he names the Spirit again after their return, and twice attributes the name of God to Him: first, by saying C that they sailed to Antioch, whence they had been entrusted to the grace of God for the work which they had actually finished; secondly, when he says that they reported to the gathered Church the things which God had done with them. Certainly, the gift of miracles was from the Holy Spirit; He himself supplied wisdom and prudence; He himself imparted strength to those preaching; He himself inspired in them the discourse of instruction. Whence also Paul was saying: “To one indeed is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another, the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit; to another, faith in the same Spirit; to another, gifts of healing in one Spirit,” and the rest. Then, teaching that the Holy Spirit does not distribute these in the capacity D of a minister, but bestows them potently to whom He wills, he adds: “But all these things one and the same Spirit works, distributing to each one individually as He wills.” If, therefore, the Holy Spirit performed these things through the apostles according to His own will, while Paul and Barnabas reported to the gathered Church how great things God had done with them, the Holy Spirit is certainly God, according to the language of the apostles.
A This same thing happened at Jerusalem, as the most illustrious Luke relates: "The whole multitude kept silent, and heard Barnabas and Paul relating how many signs and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles through them." The Holy Spirit, therefore, is God, for it is the same One who miraculously performs signs and wonders. Hence also the Lord said in the Gospels: "But if I by the Spirit of God cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you." Again, in the Acts, Luke says that Paul, having chosen Silas, departed, having been commended to the grace of God by the brothers; here, by this phrasing, he calls the Holy Spirit—who through the brothers at Antioch had separated him for the work to which He had called him—God once again. B Furthermore, the blessed Paul says in the Epistle to the Corinthians: "Those whom God has placed in the Church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers and evangelists, for the perfecting of the saints." But taking leave of the brothers at Miletus, and calling to mind the grace that had been given, he says: "Take heed therefore to yourselves, and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has placed you as bishops to shepherd the Church of the Lord, which He acquired with His own blood." C See once again from this, too, that the Holy Spirit is affirmed to be God. For since he had said there that God appointed shepherds, teachers, and evangelists, here he says of the Spirit: "In which the Holy Spirit has placed you as bishops to shepherd the Church," teaching, clearly, that the Holy Spirit is God, and that it is the same thing to say God and Spirit, because of the communion of nature. For the Son and the Holy Spirit cooperate in the works done by God the Father; and God the Father likewise gives His consent to the things accomplished by the Son and the Spirit. And elsewhere, again, the blessed Paul preaches that the Spirit is God: "For if," he says, "all prophesy, and an unbeliever or unlearned person enters, he is refuted by all, he is judged by all; the secrets of his heart become manifest; and so, falling on his face, he will worship God, announcing that God is truly in you." For because prophecy is a gift of the Spirit, and secrets of the heart are made manifest through the revelation of the Spirit, D and because it is the property of God to know the minds of men, necessarily the one who is refuted by prophecy and judged will worship God, announcing that God is truly in you. They had, however, the grace of the Spirit. If, then, God was in them because they enjoyed the grace of the Spirit, it follows that the Holy Spirit is God and from God.
...and therefore He is called eternal. A XXVII. That the Holy Spirit is from God, uncreated, and therefore called eternal.
The most illustrious Peter also says in his Catholic Epistles: "If you are reproached for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of power and of God rests upon you" (1 Pet. iv, 14). The blessed John also says in his Epistle: "In this we know that we abide in Him, and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit" (1 John iv, 13). But that which is proclaimed to be from God is not a creature, but exists from the substance of God. Wherefore the blessed Paul also calls Him eternal, and He who has had no beginning: "For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of the ashes of a heifer, sanctifies those who are defiled for the perfection of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself" (Heb. ix, 13, 14). If, therefore, the Holy Spirit is eternal, and God is also eternal, the conclusion is manifest. But the collection of all testimonies concerning the Holy Spirit, which proclaim Him to be both God and Lord, and rank Him in the same order with the Father and the Son, we leave to those who are studious: but we hasten to the end of this teaching. B
XXVIII. Summary of the Faith.
Therefore, we believe that the nature of the Trinity is one, one substance viewed in three persons, power indivisible, dominion undivided, one divinity and lordship. For thus both the unity is demonstrated in one and the same substance, and the Trinity is acknowledged, not in mere names, but in the hypostases. C For we do not say that there is one "trionymous" being, according to the contraction and confusion of Sabellius, Photinus, and Marcellus. Nor, again, do we posit three things mutually foreign and endowed with diverse substance, unequal and dissimilar, and one superior to another, which we might measure and weigh with mind and tongue, according to the division, diversity, and impious curiosity of Arius: but we confess three hypostases, yet one nature of the Trinity, incorporeal, unchangeable, immutable, having no end, immortal, infinite, incorruptible, uncircumscribed, illimitable, invisible, hidden, ineffable, indescribable, incomprehensible, impenetrable to touch and mind, living by its own nature, intellectual light, D fount of goods, treasure of wisdom, creator and governess of all things, the wisdom which guides the ship of the entire creation. This faith we hold; for we were taught this by men of theology. But to those who dispute by human reasoning, let us say: "That is your portion, that is your lot, but our portion is the Lord," following whom, the straight...
we do not abandon; for we have the divine Scripture as our teacher. Therefore we cry out rightly: "Thy law is a lamp to my feet, and a light to my paths." Illumined by this light, let us recognize the footsteps of the fathers who have gone before us, and let us follow them, until we all attain to the resurrection of the dead in Christ Jesus the Lord, to whom be glory forever. Amen. (1)
OF SAINT CYRIL, ARCHBISHOP OF ALEXANDRIA, ON THE INCARNATION OF THE ONLY-BEGOTTEN, AND THAT CHRIST IS ONE AND LORD ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURES
A A. Does the discourse on the divinity of the Only-Begotten, which we have conducted, seem to you to have been weighed and worked out well and sufficiently for us?
A
B. Entirely so.
A. I think it has not lacked a minute examination at least according to my own judgment; but what is your opinion, Hermias?
B. I could rightly praise it as being correct and polished.
A. Since we have passed over a lengthier discussion of that matter, do you wish us to speak on those things which pertain to the incarnation of the Only-Begotten, and to explain its mystery as clearly as we are able—insofar as this can be performed by those who see in a mirror and in an enigma, and who know only in part, according to the measure of the gift of the bounty that the Holy Spirit has provided, as the divine Paul says? B
B. You speak excellently. For "no one says, Lord Jesus, except in the Holy Spirit, and no one says, Anathema Jesus, except in Beelzebul." But since it seems that you wish to enter this arena and undergo so heavy a labor, know that you will provide me great utility beyond others. For I would most willingly understand the true and sincere word about Christ, which is exposed to no reproach. For some, intoxicated by various opinions, deform the beauty of those things which have been handed down concerning Him in both the New and the Old Testament.
A. There is nothing, friend, that the unskilled do not dare, and they rush most readily into the snare of hell, as it is written, C and into the net of death, not understanding what they say or what they affirm. But recount, I implore you, who among them are the notorious ones, and what are their extraordinary trifles?
B. Certainly. For some have dared to assert that the Word of God indeed appeared as man, but that He did not carry flesh from the Virgin. They invent only an imaginary appearance of the mystery. Others, feigning shame if they seem to worship a man, and refusing to decorate earthly flesh with divine honors, and laboring from excessive ignorance under a spurious and corrupted sense of modesty, say that the Word begotten from the Father was changed into the nature of bones, nerves, and flesh; these wretches receive the birth of Emmanuel from the Virgin with great laughter, and judge this excellent and divine dispensation to be unseemly. Others also believe that the God Word, coeternal with the Father, was begotten late, and that He was brought into being scarcely at that time, when the first beginnings of his birth D
A according to the flesh were received.
There are others who have impiously rushed into such madness that they deny that the Word from the Father subsists hypostatically, but contend that the word is something merely uttered, as it is understood when spoken by a man. Such are Marcellus and Photinus. Others, however, it seems, believe that the Only-Begotten was truly made man and became incarnate, but they do not believe that the flesh which He assumed was perfectly animated by a rational soul possessing a mind such as ours. Rather, B by forcing the Word of God and the holy temple of the Virgin into a certain most absolute unity—as they suppose—they say that the Word dwelt in it, and that He made the flesh He assumed His own body, but He Himself occupied the place of the rational and intellectual soul.
Others again establish opinions altogether contrary to those of these men, affirming that Emmanuel is constituted and woven together from the Word of God and a rational soul and body, that is, simply from a perfect humanity; yet they have not kept his glory and honor entirely whole and uninjured. For they divide the one Christ into two, and by introducing a coarse sort of division among them, they show Him as though separated into two parts—declaring that the one who was born of the Virgin is one, a perfect man, and that the Word from God the Father is another. C They do not merely distinguish what the nature of the Word is and what that of the flesh, nor are they willing to dwell only on the differences between these (for in this they do not stray from the correct sentiment), but they constitute this one as man, and that one, indeed, they name the Son naturally and truly as God. Yet they wish to be called Christians, and indeed, by writing certain little treatises on this matter, they have dared to speak in these very words: "For the Word from God the Father is the Son by nature and in truth. But the other is Son only homonymously with the Son." And after other things, again: "The Word of God is not flesh, but has assumed a man. For the Only-Begotten is primarily and in Himself the Son of God, the Creator of all; but the man whom He assumed, not being God by nature, is called by the same name as Him, on account of the One who assumed him, who is truly the Son of God." D For that saying: "No one knows the Son except the Father" (Matt. xi. 27), signifies the one who is the Son from the Father by nature and in truth. But that which was said by Gabriel: "Do not fear, Mary; for you have found grace with God, and behold, you will conceive in your womb, and will bring forth a son, and you will call his name Jesus" (Luke i. 30), applies to the man.
But these things are theirs. We, however, shall never think in this way. For the Word will never persuade us to abandon the direct path and cross over into another, to go astray into ways that lead us away from the truth. But do you explain to us your own sentiment, for I am eagerly waiting to hear it, and to recognize the very truth of the matter.
A. O difficult thing, and a task most heavy. For do you not know, my friend, that if anyone were to choose to make a long discourse upon each of these points, and a thorough investigation...
he would consume no small amount of time, and with difficult labors and inescapable toils, would he with difficulty accomplish it? B. It is true.
A A. Let us, then, omitting if you please long arguments, and examining each point very briefly, come, let us say, and before other things to the Docetists: "You err, not knowing the Scriptures," nor indeed the great mystery of godliness, that is, Christ, "who was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen by angels, preached among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory." I judge that those who think otherwise must either condemn the opinion of the ancients and call the teachers of the whole world liars—to whom Christ himself said, "Go, teach all nations"—or, if they shrink from this crime, they must embrace the true and sincere doctrine concerning Christ, and, bidding farewell to their own rashness and ignorance, cling tenaciously to the Holy Scriptures, and, insisting upon the straight and in no way erroneous path of the holy ones, strive toward the truth itself. For I think the mystery of godliness is nothing other than the Word from God the Father himself, who was manifested in the flesh. For he was born of the holy Virgin, having taken the form of a slave. And he was seen by angels, who sang praises to the one born, saying: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will among men." And indeed, they also announced to the shepherds the Word of God who was born in the flesh for us: "Behold," they say, "there is born to you today a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, in the city of David. And this shall be a sign to you: you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger."
B If, however, the birth through the Virgin occurred, and the manifestation in the flesh took place, how is this not a futile babbling, and how is it not to be considered madness and insanity to assign the name of "phantasm" to such a manifest incarnation? For if it were a shadow and an imaginary appearance, and not a true incarnation, then neither did the Virgin give birth, nor did the Word from God the Father take hold of the seed of Abraham: he therefore has not become like his brethren. For we do not consist of a shadow or some imaginary appearance, but we dwell in bodies that can both be touched and seen, and, clothed in this earthly flesh, we are subject to corruption and the passions. If, therefore, the Word has not become flesh, he cannot even be of assistance to those who are tempted in that in which he himself suffered when he was tempted. For a shadow could not suffer any contrary affection. The whole profit of his passion for us truly vanishes into nothing. For what kind of back did he offer for us, or what kind of cheek did he present to those striking him, that he might endure the lashes of the Jews? Or in what way could anyone believe that he had his hands and feet transfixed with nails, if he did not appear in the flesh? Or what side, I pray, did Pilate’s soldiers pierce, showing to those who were watching blood mixed with water flowing out? And if anything more must be said, he did not die for us, nor indeed has Christ risen. For if this is not admitted as truth, faith is made void, and the cross is gone.
and the salvation and life of the world is undone, and the hope of those who have fallen asleep in the faith is destroyed entirely. A For it seemed to the blessed Paul to be so, who says: “For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. After that He was seen by above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to this present, but some have fallen asleep. After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles, and last of all He was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time.” And after other things, again: “Now if Christ be preached that He rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ be not risen, then our preaching is vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God B that He raised up Christ, whom He did not raise up, if so be that the dead rise not.” For tell me, in what way could a shadow die? How then did the Father raise up Christ, if He were a shadow and a phantom, and not subject to the bonds of death? Away then with their vomit; rather, let us consider it a fable and the foamings of an unholy mind. For the disciple of our Savior forewarns us of such people, writing: “Many false prophets have gone out into the world. Hereby is the Spirit of God known. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God. And this is that spirit of Antichrist, whereof you have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.” For if He did not become man, nor ascended in the flesh to the Father and God in the heavens, C He could not return from heaven to us, clearly as man and in the flesh. Or do I not seem to you to speak the truth? B. Quite so. A. But to think and to hold, out of immense dullness, that the Word begotten of God refused to be born of the holy Virgin, and rejected our nature, but rather contends that He was changed into earthly flesh, is the mark of those who blaspheme the dispensation and are determined to find fault with the divine counsels. For the Creator of the whole universe, and the Word of God who is abundant in mercy, emptied Himself, having become man for our sake, D born of a woman, in order that, since the children—that is, we—are partakers of blood and flesh, He also Himself likewise might partake of the same, “that through death He might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.” For so the holy Scripture says. But they, this most excellent and most glorious counsel of God, as if of little
value, condemn, and as though they themselves were able to devise better things, they reject the decrees of his wisdom. For they do not think that the Word born of the Virgin ought to be believed, but rather imagine that the nature of the Word was transformed into this weak body, and they picture a change to him in whom no change can fall. A For the nature of God is firmly rooted and established in its own goods, and it remains immutably in its own state. For created nature, which was brought into being in time, is subject to change, and this can truly be said of such a thing. For whatever has received an origin of existence, it is also in a way innate to it that it can be changed. But God, who surpasses all understanding, and possesses an existence free from birth and death, is superior to all change; and just as he far exceeds all created things by the reason of his own nature, B and that, too, incomparably, so also in the things that are wont to happen to creatures established by him, he far surpasses them; and he is subject to nothing that could bring him harm. Therefore, the goods of the Divinity are firm and stable. Those of creatures, however, are subject to alterations and changes, and are close to corruption. And the prophet Jeremiah, understanding this perfectly and reflecting upon it most rightly, exclaims thus to God: “Thou sittest for ever, but we are perishing for ever.” For God sits as if on his own throne, always ruling and commanding all things, and no affection has power over him. We, however, since we are gifted with a nature most prone to alteration and change, perish for ever, that is, we are corruptible C and mutable in every time and age. The Divinity, therefore, can never be changed at any time, nor be moved from its firmness by any affection; on the contrary, corruptible and mutable nature—that is, created nature—cannot be endowed with essential immutability, nor boast in the possession of the goods of the divine nature. For it will rightly hear: “For what hast thou that thou didst not receive?” Now, that the nature of the Word is altogether immutable, while created nature is altogether mutable, anyone can most easily understand from David singing in the Spirit: “The heavens shall perish, but thou shalt remain, and all shall grow old as a garment: and as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed. But thou art always the same, and thy years shall not fail.” D Where, therefore, did the Word of God remain, if it is truly said that, having laid aside his firmness and stability, he was translated to what he was not, and was transformed into the nature of flesh and a corruptible state? Is this not rather delirium and madness, that having abandoned that which is firmly and immovably established, it has descended into what it was not, and has been transformed into the nature of flesh, and into that which is corruptible? B. It is indeed. A. For it will be possible with equal rashness to say, which is not inconsistent, that earthly nature also can ascend to the nature of the Divinity, and into one