DIALOGUE OF THE MOST BLESSED SYMEON, ARCHBISHOP OF THESSALONICA, IN CHRIST AGAINST ALL HERESIES, AND CONCERNING THE ONE FAITH OF OUR LORD AND GOD AND SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST, AND THE SACRED RITES AND THE INDIVIDUAL MYSTERIES OF THE CHURCH, OF WHICH THE AUTHOR ADDED NOTHING OF HIS OWN, BUT COLLECTED EVERYTHING BY SEARCHING THE HOLY SCRIPTURES AND THE FATHERS, AND COMPOSED IT ACCORDING TO HIS ABILITY, ANSWERING EACH OF THOSE WHO ASKED AT THE TIME.
A PONTIFEX. In Christ, the only-begotten Son of God the Father and our God, the living wisdom, and the Word who supplies speech upon the opening of the mouth, I am present, brothers—persuaded by what is commanded—to speak as best I can regarding those things about which you have asked us. Therefore, I shall conduct your words to us, and ours to you, in the form of questioning and answering, and in the manner of a dialogue. And the one who took the lead in the discourse from among you, as having inquired of us previously and having been the cause of the apologies shown by us, we shall set forth questioning; and thereafter, we shall provide the answers in Christ to your inquiries. In this way, perhaps, the discourse will be more easily understood by you and the rest of the brothers...
A and something beneficial will be gained.
CLERICUS. We, holy Master, having confidently made inquiries regarding the spiritual and divine matters we sought, just as to our father in the Spirit, have now returned for this same purpose as we have done before. Since, therefore, you receive our words in the charity of Christ in a fatherly way, behold, we now also ask you in Christ with readiness. We, as Christians, rightly believe in God the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit; we proclaim the holy Trinity according to the Scriptures in one essence and divinity, and likewise the incarnation of Christ, one person of the Trinity, the Word of God, from the Virgin by the Holy Spirit, and we confess the truth of [his] soul. But since there are many opinions, both ancient and recent, which are opposed to this true faith of ours, how shall we persuade the infidels, confirm the weaker ones, or heal those who inquire, seeing that we have been taught to give an account of the hope that is in us?
B Pontifex. The preaching of the truth, my brother, and the confession of piety is necessary for us before all else, and it is necessary to confess this before all; for this is the foundation of every believer. On account of this confession, blessed Peter is spoken of and is constituted the janitor of the kingdom of God; and Paul hopes to receive the crown of life, because he kept and preached the faith; and the whole choir of the saints, because they did likewise and finished their course well, is glorified. It is also necessary to edify one's neighbor according to one's ability, C but it is by no means necessary to persuade every man, since it is not possible to persuade all. Yet, you must say things according to your ability, if the discourse looks toward edification. And if you edify, great will be the gain for you and for the one you have gained; if, however, you do not edify, you will owe God nothing on this account, for you have done what was yours to do. Again, you must also guard against this: that you do not say anything beyond your strength, lest by chance, while you try to lift up one who is lying down, you collapse with him. For according to the D most divine Paul, "great is the mystery of piety," and it is necessary that he who discusses it should discuss it with prudence and the greatest circumspection; and that he be an approved man, and one who has received the grace of teaching, lest anyone, contending about things he does not know, fall through irreligious words into the snares of blasphemy, or into the nets of doubt, or into the dogmas of impiety. For we know that many of the unstable have been corrupted because of this.
Clericus. Is it safer to argue from natural thoughts or from scriptural testimonies?
Pontifex. From scriptural testimonies; for so says the Lord: "Search the Scriptures, for you think in them to have eternal life; and they are they which bear witness of me." You may also, in addition, [speak] from common thoughts and examples. But those
A things which many have spoken in the examples of the saints, and which do not in any way oppose the Holy Scriptures—for these are accepted as following as a consequence—[it is good to use], for one ought not to depart from the divine Scriptures at all, nor think outside of them.
Chapter 1. Against atheists, that God exists.
Clericus. Since, Father, as I said before, there are various opinions among many of the Gentiles concerning the Divinity, and some follow the error of many gods, others believe that there is indeed one God but not in three persons, nor do they confess the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, while others—with impious audacity—dare say that there is no God, in what manner shall we draw them to the true faith?
Pontifex. First of all, by prayer to God; then, by humility and works of spiritual charity; and by a blameless life that bears witness to the faith, as the apostles taught and demonstrated; for this is an apostolic work. Finally, by words that are not contentious, for to bicker and quarrel is alien to the Church.
Chapter 2. That God exists, first demonstration from the Holy Scriptures.
Clericus. And by what arguments shall we persuade an atheist to believe that there is a God? C
Pontifex. First, as we have said, from the Holy Scriptures, which confess God in all things—or rather, which have God as their author—and proclaim Him to be the maker of all things, who always exists with His Word and Spirit. For Moses says: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth." And God said: "Let there be light, and there was light," and the rest likewise. And: "I am who I am." And in the bush: "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob," signifying the Trinity. And concerning man: "And God said, Let us make man after our image and likeness." And everywhere Moses teaches that God exists, and that God has a Word and a Holy Spirit; and that through the Word He made all things, and by His Spirit He perfected and sanctified them. All the prophets after David taught this, and David himself calls him a fool who does not confess God. And he says: D "The fool has said in his heart: There is no God." This surpasses every impiety; for the devil himself confesses that there is a God, although the adversary and impious one opposes Him by stealing the divine glory. Therefore, he has made the atheistic Greeks to err, who were deluded by the elements of the world and by demons, and who called created things gods. Therefore, he who says that there is no God is utterly irrational, and most atheistic, and most foolish, and worse than the demons; and by what has been said, he shall first be convicted.
CHAPTER III.
AThat God exists: a second proof derived from the human being himself, who possesses the notion of God and speaks and seeks concerning God.Then, an argument is drawn from the human mind itself, which inquires concerning God; for the very act of inquiring and meditating concerning God teaches that God is the author of that mind, and that He is the eternal Mind. Our mind, B while discoursing concerning the Word of God, demonstrates that God Himself, the eternal Mind, possesses the Word. And since the one who meditates and speaks concerning God is himself alive, he also testifies that the Holy Spirit is life in God. Whence it is evident that this mind created man; for everything that has been made seeks its own author. Moreover, because the mind of man is intelligent, sharp, and agile, as well as provident and contemplative, it again testifies to the divine Mind and, as far as possible, imitates it. For if man bears such things in his own mind, then great, indeed, is that Mind, and without beginning, and eternally living, towards which all minds are drawn, which they seek, and which is the peace and rest of all intelligence. And this eternal Mind possesses the Word, that is, a living Reason, towards which all reason is elevated; for there is no mind without a word, so that the eternal Mind is God the Father and possesses the Word, through which Word alone all spiritual things are endowed with reason—both angels and souls—and are filled with wisdom and doctrine. And this Mind alone, first, and living, and always existing, possesses and bears within Itself, and proceeding from Itself, the life which is the Holy Spirit, through whom all spiritual things live a spiritual life, and are spirits from the Spirit, and participate in sanctification from the Holy One, and also receive strength and motion from that Omnipotent One who bestows power upon all things. Therefore, even he who rejects God still thinks and lives and has the Word within himself. Man, therefore, testifies to God within himself, wherefore it is written that man was created in the image of God.
CHAPTER IV.
CThat God exists: a third proof from creation itself, and from its production, good order, providence, and dispensation.Creation itself also testifies to the Architect, and it is right to behold the invisible through the visible. This is what Paul says, writing: "For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead." For who placed the heaven on high? Who placed the earth in the midst? Who moves the former without rest, and in such beautiful order, while to the latter He gave the power to produce plants according to the changing seasons? Whence are the splendor and power of the sun? By what hand is it governed and carried in a circle, and turned back again by an opposite course? Whence are the perpetual and diverse paths of the moon? Do the fire’s being carried upwards, and shining and glowing, come from chance? And does it come from chance that water tends downwards and spreads out with easy motion, while the air is moved on every side and sends forth breezes? Whence are all the elements held together both contrarily and harmoniously, and thus the world—
A constituted? What then? Are the myriads of the families of animals and their natures likewise random? Or did these come into being automatically and without any cause? And how is it that other natures do not spring up automatically according to the season, but the same ones always from animals and plants, and [only] from those similar to them? If, therefore, they are by succession, whence are the first ones and [the ones] from the beginning? Are they from nothing? No one, if he were to say this, would be free from impiety. But the Creator, God, is the cause, even of those first things, having made these from non-existent things, and those which follow from them, giving power to all both to remain and to beget and be begotten, and to produce and be produced, and [giving] that all things well-ordered and distinct and contained might consist by themselves; but He also gives understanding to minds, and life to the living, and wisdom to those who are wise, and the desire to those who seek after it, which [desire] is in fact found scattered throughout all creatures. B Is human nature, then, something automatic and unreasoning? So humble and yet sublime, earthy and incorporeal, provident and wise, mortal and at the same time immortal? Are these things, therefore, from themselves for all? And has the arrangement of the whole stood or been ordered by no one? And is it governed by no one? And who, then, having a mind, is so wretched and senseless as to think that these things exist and are governed without God? Whence are the seasons? Whence the fruits? Whence the providential good orderings and movements concerning the constitution of the whole? Do not all things manifest the power and providence of Him who made all things? From these and similar things, Abraham recognized the Maker of all things, and to all the saints, likewise, has come the knowledge concerning God. And from these, I think, every man who is senseless and rejects the Creator will recognize God, and will confess the common Lord. C And the knowledge concerning the existence of God—common, as we have said, even to the many—will confound him.
Clericus. These things are sufficient, master, against those who hold to atheism, and there is no one, I think, who would gainsay [them], unless he were perhaps worse than the demons. For they, even unwillingly, confessed the Son of the living God. But against whom shall we speak again—those who have suffered the disease of polytheism, and those who wander concerning astrology and generation, and fate, and fortune?
Chapter V. Against the polytheistic Greeks.
Pontifex. Their error is manifest and easily refuted, which has also been brightly cast down by the power of Christ, and there is no one now who struggles for it. For through fishermen, He who was crucified for us—being himself the living and subsisting Wisdom of the Father—overthrew the foolish wisdom of the Greeks. D Nevertheless, from what also Paul writes, and from creation itself, it is possible to learn that there is one God alone in Trinity, and no one else besides Him. For if, as the Greeks say, there are many and diverse [gods], then their power and energy are also diverse, and they could no longer
A be capable of holding the whole together. And because they are a multitude, they will be seditious, and contrary in power, and not gods. For the true God is the Lord of all, and the Creator of everything, and has the power to govern all things. But they are also circumscribed, if they are many and diverse. And if they are circumscribed, they are weak, and therefore not omnipotent. Their having diverse powers also shows that they are not omnipotent, and consequently that they are contrary to each other, and thus in conflict. Furthermore, if, as they have said, they are male and female, and distinguished according to sex, then they possess bodies (for body implies the diversity of sex), and are subject to passions, and decay, and flowings arising from this, and corruption, and impurity, and defilement; for each will be moved according to its own nature. If they had a beginning, there will be first and last, and others after them, as the Greeks drivel, who have thus had a starting point. And how would these be rulers? Or how would they be governors of the things of the world? And if the heaven is without beginning, as the Greeks absurdly claim, how do some rule the heaven, and how do those who were created after the heaven inhabit it? From these and similar things, those who say there are many gods are to be mocked. But if the Greeks have numbered the created things among the gods, they are even more ridiculous; for they themselves bear witness by their energies and powers that they are servile, partial, and B weak, and receive their power and motion from elsewhere; indeed, because their power and motion are known to us humans; for humans know the movement of the heaven and the stars. Therefore, neither the heaven, nor the stars, nor any of the visible things are gods, but are creatures of the God of all, having received from Him both the power to act and existence itself. Nor are certain spiritual powers gods, but are spiritual creatures of God; of whom some, seeing and praising God, are ministers of God; others, however, having withdrawn from Him by a most wicked will, are called demons, who have imposed error upon the Greeks.
CHAPTER VI.
Against those who impiously teach about fate and fortune, and concerning astrology.
But for some to drivel concerning fortune and fate, and [to engage in] birth-chart calculation and astrology, is most irrational and D also most godless. For first, they abolish the free will of the Creator, who made these things out of nothing, and governs them as He wills, both truly and justly. Next, they also abolish the free will of man; for if man is a rational animal and possesses free will, while those visible things are irrational and inanimate, how then could the soul be led by them, and be disposed and carried along by their motion? For it is impious for irrational things to move rational things. But if they do move them, then there is no longer virtue nor vice; then laws are in vain, teachings are in vain, prophecies are in vain, the old and the new [Testaments] are in vain, and finally, the incarnation of the Word of God for the renewal of men and creation is in vain; and then there ought to be neither punishment nor retribution, which the Savior demonstrates to be eternal; public affairs are overturned; this,
too, is a doctrine of impiety and irreligion. A But if some impious persons irrationally say that these are animate and rational, the argument is utterly irrational and false. First, it is proved from Holy Scripture, which says that only angels and men are endowed with reason; B then, from the operations of these [planets] and the movement of the heavens. For if, according to the Greeks, the stars are rational, and every rational being possesses free will, yet these are always moved by the same and similar motion, how then are they rational and endowed with free choice? And if they say that moving in this way is a good and simple motion, how does the operation of this motion produce evil things according to their own opinion, and the understanding and knowledge concerning the stars themselves? For if they call them gods, yet most men have not considered them gods, and if faith, as the Greeks say, and the religion of men flows from the movement of the stars, then they are moved against themselves and provide to men a knowledge that is adverse to them. Hence it is clear that they are neither endowed with free will, nor are they rational. For everything that has free will is able to move by its own volition. Furthermore, since they say, as they do, that they move with a good motion, and that this motion is one of free will, yet their motion produces wickedness in many, destroys virtue, and causes perdition—for as the Greeks imagine, it is through the stars that it comes about that one is virtuous and another wicked, unclean and chaste, a murderer and a just person, and that nations perish and increase, are oppressed and exalted, and myriad things happen to men, which are contrary and most destructive—therefore they are workers of wickedness and malice, of murder and harm, and destroyers of virtue, and are in no way good. C But these are the things of blasphemous and impious men. The creatures of God, however, are good, since their creator is good, who himself sees all things and, behold, they are very good; and they are moved in a good way to the end for which each has received power. And these are not rational, but merely inanimate bodies, moved by a sensible motion for the management of that which is beloved. And it is clear from what they operate as sensible things. But the wickedness and virtue that are in us are accomplished by our own free will—virtue being sown by God, while wickedness is not, for it has no being, but was invented by the evil one through the neglect of virtue. And things in the world and things that happen in us are brought about by Providence for our sake, some things with His approval, others with Him permitting them for our own cause. Therefore such foolish questionings are to be rejected. And let us believe that the stars were created by God according to Holy Scripture, and the sun and moon to shine upon the earth, and the one to rule the day, the other the night, and to move for the management of plants and bodies, and for seasons—spring, summer, autumn, and winter—and for signs of rain and winds and other sensible things, since they themselves are also corporeal and sensible; and for years, because at the completion of the year, at the motion of these, it again receives its beginning; D and visible things are thus ordered as God has willed and commanded, but the creatures have no certain authority, nor do they possess dominion, nor do they create opinions, nor do they compel to sin, nor do they work virtue, nor...
do A they establish kings and rulers, or make men poor or rich, healthy or sick, dying or living, lowly or honorable, foolish or wise, good or evil; for it is an impiety to believe that the stars and nativity have the power to do such things. For the Holy Scripture says: "The Lord makes poor and makes rich, he humbles and he exalts," and so on. And: "The Lord kills and makes alive; he brings down to Sheol and brings up," and this he does justly and according to the choice and movement of each, and not by force. For the Lord is just and has loved righteousness. And it says: "You will render to each according to his works." But how will he render, if one commits sin or achieves virtue by force? For if one acts by force, the wicked man does not sin, nor does the righteous man act rightly; neither is the murderer a murderer, nor the adulterer an adulterer, nor is the unclean and rapacious man unclean and rapacious, nor is the savior a savior; nor does the virgin shine by her virginity, nor the wise man possess wisdom. B How, finally, would the Lord punish? And how would he justify, as we see in so many examples in both the Old and New Testaments? But to us who are faithful, it is a conviction that visible things are moved not only according to nature, but also, and rightly so, above nature. For He who made the creatures has the power to change them as He wills. Therefore, He has wrought wonders beyond nature, both before the Law, under the Law, and after the Law, through the prayers of the righteous; and He wrought the great miracle beyond all mind and speech: the Word being incarnate for our sake, conversing among us in life, suffering in the flesh, rising again, and after the resurrection being seen, touched, and walking about, and even ascending into heaven with the flesh, and filling human nature with the Holy Spirit through the apostles. C God also wrought signs and wonders, and drew the world to the faith by preaching and miracles alone, and even up to this hour He has performed wonders; and through the dead relics of the saints and the prayers of the saints, He works marvelous things, and the power of binding and loosing is manifest—all of which are above nature, and are the works of God Almighty. Therefore, we who are infirm pray that we may receive health, and we who are tempted pray to be delivered from adversities; and when the elements are moved in a disorderly way, we ask that they be moved according to order; and many things come to pass through the prayers of holy men, such as rain after a drought, the defeat of enemies, the cessation of famine and pestilence, and many other things, including the healing of the sick and the extinction of calamities, for which D the Church prays. Therefore, the false opinion concerning fortune and fate overturns the hope set in God, and destroys God Himself, and His divine power, and all Holy Scripture, and the punishment of the wicked, and the reward of the righteous, and all the mysteries of God. Therefore, do not consider him a Christian who studies fate and astrology and the like. And if anyone says he is taught by such things, he is deluded and rejected by a demon, and is a stranger and alien to the Church. But every religious man, since he belongs to Christ—who is the power of the Father, the truth, the omnipotent Word—should place his hope in the Lord, who is now and shall be through all ages, since the figure of this
world passes away, and creation is corruptible and shall be changed. And we, in Christ, are not subject to the elements of the world as slaves, just as Paul says; but, in soul and body, we have been made superior to corruption by the grace of the incorruptible Spirit. Therefore, all things are the works of God, and none of them is God. A
CHAPTER VII. That the Holy Trinity alone is God.
There is but one only and true God, who is in Trinity, and every creature proclaims Him. For it exists from the Father who is always, and is governed by the Word—who is begotten of the Father who is always—and is held together and persists through the life-giving Spirit of the remaining and living God. The great Athanasius and the theologian Gregory, together with the rest of the Fathers, B will teach you of this.
Clericus: It is enough, Master, and we have learned the argument against the Greeks who adore many gods. It is necessary, however, to know the clearer argument concerning the Trinity, so that we may draw those who reject the Son and the Spirit of God to the knowledge of the truth. For indeed, the conflict consists precisely in this, as there are many who impiously reject the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. C
CHAPTER VIII. Against the Jews and Sabellius, and others who teach impiously.
Pontifex: There is no need of much effort for this task, since the holy Scripture everywhere bears witness to the Word of God and the Holy Spirit—which holy Scripture those who conceive of God without Word and Spirit pretend to accept. Yet they are atheists, even if they think they know God. For he says: "He who denies the Son, denies the Father who sent him," and he preaches a God to himself who is without Word and without Wisdom, and also without the Spirit who lives and imparts life to all. Wherefore, as we said, these too are atheists, and altogether impious and adversaries of God. But to us there is one God the Father, with His consubstantial Word and life-giving Spirit, just as we have received, and just as the Word of God Himself, Jesus Christ, taught us—the radiance of His glory and the image of the Father’s substance—when He sent the D disciples to teach the nations, commanding them to baptize those who believe in Him: "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." For the One of the Trinity Himself taught both the unity and the threeness of the Trinity simultaneously. For in saying "in the name," He proclaimed the unity of the Trinity; for the name is one and indivisible, just as the nature is one, and the power and activity. But He taught the three persons, saying: "of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit"; and again, he shows the same and one power and virtue of the one Trinity.
A For it is not merely about baptizing, but about renewing and remaking the one being baptized—which is accomplished by the power, virtue, and grace of the one name of the almighty Trinity, clearly setting forth the three-personed nature [Note: the Greek reads "τρισυπόστατον"] in the command: "of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."
This confession John also theologizes at the beginning of the Gospel, writing as follows: "In the beginning was the Word," announcing the Son; "and the Word was with God," teaching the Father; "and the Word was God," demonstrating the Son to be consubstantial with the Father. "He was in the beginning with God," since He is consubstantial with the Father and co-eternal. "All things were made through Him," because He co-operated with the Father in creating—for "By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established," as David says; and: "Without Him nothing was made that was made," adds the Gospel. For "All things, O God, Thou hast made in wisdom," says David. B "In Him was life," the divine Spirit proceeding from the Father, in whom we also live and move and have our being, C remaining and resting eternally in Him as Word, concerning whom He again says: "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 bear witness concerning me." By these words the Lord teaches us wisely that the Spirit also proceeds from the Father and comes to us, not by dwelling through hypostasis, but by indwelling through grace. Do you see the mystery of the one God in the Trinity?
CHAPTER IX. Evangelical sayings opposed to Sabellius. Other things (from the Old Testament) against the Jews and the remaining impious nations.
The evangelical sayings were spoken because of the blasphemies of the Libyan Sabellius, who in fact accepted the Gospel. But I will show you those things which the old Scripture brings forth concerning God in three persons. This, not only the Gospel, but also Moses in the Law, and all the prophets have preached. For Moses preaches throughout the God who is always, and the Father, who also perceives the mystery of the Word, the Son of God, in the hearing of the divine voice and the receiving of the virtue of the living Word. For in hearing, he heard the Word, D whose incarnation he foreknew, first seeing the bush burning and yet not at all consumed, and the Word of God Himself speaking to him in the form of a man, because according to Jeremiah He has been seen on earth because of men, and has conversed among men, and said to Moses himself: "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob," because appearing as a man and called an angel by Scripture, He nevertheless calls Himself God, and makes remembrance of the three patriarchs, saying: "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob," in order that He might show in this also that He, having been incarnate from a Virgin, will manifest the mystery of the Trinity. Then Moses received the words of God on stone tablets, showing and teaching the virtue of the living Word through miraculous works.
as also that the Word is in God, and this Word shall be incarnate, and shall be thickened A later, as if written upon a tablet in the Theotokos Virgin. Moses also heard the divine voice many times in the tabernacle in the midst of the tent. Now a voice is nothing other than the sound of the word; which testified that the Word is living from the living Father. Moses also received the Holy Spirit. And God, taking part of the Spirit that was upon him, imparted it to chosen men, seventy in number, as it is written. And these indeed prophesied, so that Moses foreknew and preached both the Father, and the Son (who is the Word), and the Holy Spirit. And in saying, “God said, Let there be light,” and, “God said, Let there be a firmament,” and, “God B said, Let the earth bring forth,” he teaches the Word of God. And this Word is living and one and only-begotten, just as God and Father is one and living and alone. And concerning the Holy Spirit, he says, “And the Spirit of God was moving over the water”; and concerning man, “And He breathed into his face the breath of life”; and concerning Noah, “My Spirit shall not remain in these men”; and, “The tabernacle was filled with the Holy Spirit.” Thus clearly did Moses through many things preach concerning the living Word of God and the Holy Spirit. But also before him, Abraham, having received the three men at the oak of Mamre, whom he also clearly proclaimed as one God, proclaimed God in Trinity—appearing as three men because C of the distinctness of the hypostases, but proclaimed as one by Abraham because of the unity of nature—by which the triadic and the monadic nature of the Trinity were signified. But also Isaac knew and depicted the mystery of the Trinity and of the incarnation of the Word: born indeed when Abraham saw the three men, but declaring the incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection of Christ when he was led by his father, bearing the wood of the cross as a figure upon his shoulders, and being bound upon it so that he might become a sacrifice to God and be slain, and having heard the voice of God, which teaches of the Word of God, saying to his father, “Do not lay your hand upon the lad.” That it was the Word of God who was speaking is evident from what D He says to Abraham: “Now I know that you have not spared your beloved son for my sake.” This, then, was the Angel of Great Counsel, the Son of the Highest, who spoke to his father Abraham, and who also initiated the struggle with Jacob, and named Himself the God of his fathers, and led him to the height of contemplation through the Holy Spirit; by whom also Jacob was bidden to go into exile and to flee from Esau, and saw a ladder reaching to the heavens—and upon it, which was a figure of the Mother of the incarnate Word, God sitting. And again he was bidden to flee from his kinsman, and saw wondrous revelations. All these things preached the virtue of the Word of God and the power of the Spirit of God working in these just men. But what of Joseph? Did he not receive the Word of God through dreams? Was he not moved by the Spirit of God? Whence came that wisdom of his, by whose aid he was delivered from the Egyptians to the king and his ministers as they were passing through? Was it not by the virtue of the divine
A Spirit? Was it not by the living wisdom of the Word of God in His omni-operative power? Thus, it is written in almost all the prophets: "The word of the Lord which came to Isaiah the son of Amoz." And: "The word of the Lord which came to Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah." And so with the rest: "The beginning of the word to Hosea." And: "The words of Amos, which he saw concerning Jerusalem." And: "The word of the Lord came to Micah the Morasthite." And: "The word of the Lord which came to Joel the son of Pethuel." And: "Thus saith the Lord God," says Obadiah, which refers to the Word, just as all the prophets say: "Thus saith the Lord," preaching His living Word. And: "The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai," saying. But Nahum says: "The burden of Nineveh." Jeremiah does not receive the word "burden" to say, but "word." Nevertheless, Nahum goes on to say: "Thus saith the Lord," he says, "who has dominion over many waters." And again: "Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord Almighty." And: "The burden which Habakkuk the prophet did see." This is the same as saying that he was seized and carried by the Spirit. And that the "burden" belongs to the Holy Spirit, hear him saying: "He is terrible and manifest," that is to say, God, "Out of him shall his judgment proceed," that is to say, His Word; for the Word is judgment. And: "His burden shall go forth from him." Do you see the power of the Spirit proceeding from the Father? And again: "I will stand upon my watch, and I will contemplate to see what he will say to me," and: "The Lord answered me." Behold again, the Word. This also teaches us concerning C the dispensation of the Word of God. And: "O Lord, I have heard thy report, and I was afraid," he says. And: "God will come from Teman," and many other things concerning His incarnation. That the Word of God would take flesh he testifies, saying: "Before his face shall go the Word." And: "The word of the Lord which came to Zephaniah the son of Cushi." And: "The word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet," saying. And: "The word of the Lord came to Zechariah the son of Berechiah," saying. He also prophesied many things concerning the incarnation of the Word. And: "The burden of the word of the Lord upon Israel by the hand of his angel," that is, of Malachi. Behold also the "burden" of the Word is the power of the Spirit and of the Word, which Malachi also calls the name of God, manifest among the nations. Do you see how all the prophets preached the Word of God and the Spirit? He who does not preach these is then an atheist. D Even David himself cried out to God: "In wisdom hast thou made them all." And: "Thy word, O Lord, abideth in heaven unto generation and generation, even unto the world." And he testifies that the heavens were established by the word of the Lord, and their power by the Spirit of His mouth, which Spirit he asks to be renewed in his bowels and not to be taken from him; and rightly he preaches God the Father with the Word and the Spirit. And indeed the whole choir of the just manifest the Word of God and the Spirit.
A
Chapter X. On the Only-Begotten Son of God and the Holy Spirit.
If the adversary follows the divine Scriptures, he will be persuaded by these and similar texts to cease from contention, for divine Scripture is full of such arguments. Furthermore, he will recognize the truth from creation itself and from human nature. A For if God is the creator of all things, why then were creatures made? Why? That they might enjoy God. And which are they that enjoy God, and have the power to know God? Those that are endowed with reason. For knowledge comes through reason. If, therefore, knowledge comes through rational faculties, how much more must there be reason, or a Word, in God! And if the visible world was made for the sake of rational creatures, then for the sake of the Word and through the Word were creatures made; and the Word must all the more be in God, and the Father was contemplating Him before all things were made, as His living image, and indelible character, wisdom and radiance, and Word and power, and beloved Son, and the All-Holy Spirit as sanctification, as a fountain of love, as life from life, as life-giving, as a treasury of goodness. This is what the Theologian Gregory says, that God is moved by His own contemplation. And if creatures participate in reason in order to know God, by how much more must the Word be B in God, in whom and through whom He knew all things before they were made. And if creation has been made according to a word—the rational part of it and that which is for the service of the rational—then certainly the Word must be in God. And if rational beings perceive, and possess free will, and live eternally, by how much more does He who made them rational possess the Word forever in Himself; or rather, they are rational creatures precisely because God possesses the Word. And even those things not participating in reason exist, persist, and move according to a word, because God possesses the Word. But someone might say: if creatures are diverse, is the word of them also diverse? Let such a person hear that these many things, as creatures that had a beginning and are diverse in intent and nature, and were brought forth out of nothing, therefore possess a word that is unstable, diverse, and not substantial. But since God the Father is living and one, and always existing, and His Word is one, and living as the Father is, and always existing as the Father exists, and perfect—since the Father is perfect—therefore there are not many words in God, nor are they insubstantial, lest He should appear imperfect and changing, and being raised to a higher understanding, receiving wisdom. C But there is one, perfect, substantial, living, and co-eternal wisdom in God, His only-begotten Word, in whom all the words are from before the ages. And the Holy Spirit, who gives life to all things, is also one from the one Father, always living, and life-giving. And in the Holy Spirit rational beings also live, and are all the more immortal; for without the Spirit they could not even be rational. Rational beings, therefore, are living from the D
Holy Spirit; but they are rational from the living Word, and exist from the existing Father. A Irrational beings also have their existence from the Father who always is, and have it by the Word; and thus each thing has its nature by the living Word of the Father, and each thing possesses its motion, and its state, and its own proper power from the Holy Spirit who quickens and sustains all things. For what is there among existing things that is not according to reason? Or what is there that does not have its own proper motion and power? The author of all these is the Trinity: the Father who always is, and lives, and remains; the Word and Son, who always is with the Father, consubstantial and incorporeal, the radiance, the stamp, the wisdom, and the power; and the Spirit, who is from God and is in God, quickening, eternally existing in Him, and quickening and coadunating all things.
But since, of all these visible things, man is the most beautiful and was created to the image of God, let us consider the image of the Trinity from his very creation and nature. For he was by no means made for the sake of the visible world—since the visible world is devoid of reason and its motion is finite and known to us—but rather the world exists for the sake of man, so that by its motion the body of man might be sustained. Through his soul, man is moved spiritually and contemplates the Creator; and he above all others is written to have been created to the image of God, as many of the B saints have understood regarding this matter. For you will find the Trinity witnessed to by him also, as we have spoken more fully regarding this in other places. For by his mind the soul bears witness to the eternal Mind, the Father; by his reason, to the Word; and by his vital power, to the Spirit who quickens all things. Angels, too, being intelligences, in this way proclaim the pre-eternal Mind, the Father who is supersubstantial; and being rational and wise, they declare the Word and Wisdom who lives and remains in the great Mind. And because they rejoice in life and possess the gift of lights, they manifest the Holy Spirit—who is the fount of graces—as the living, quickening, and sanctifying, substantial power existing in the living and holy Father. Nay, even every creature devoid of reason bears witness to its Creator; for because living things are begotten of the living, and beget, even if for a short time; and because bodies consist of matter and elements, like from like; and because each of these seeks immortality, they proclaim God who is Father, and the Word who without passion begets, and the quickening and Holy Spirit from Him; and all creatures C bear witness to Him as their Creator. The sun manifests Him by emitting rays and light, and all the stars show Him as they vibrate with fire. Likewise also trees and plants, which bring forth flowers and fruits. Moreover, the earth, luxuriating in six hundred kinds of living plants. And in a word, every creature glorifies the only God in Trinity, the God of all. Especially, however, from those things which have been perfected, and are still being perfected, and [are]
are openly demonstrated by miracles, words, and deeds in the Church of Christ, the power of the Trinity is revealed and proclaimed. For who is it that spread throughout the whole world the proclamation of the Trinity, and the incarnation of Christ? And who is still spreading it and holding it together, while countless men, kings, and nations have opposed this proclamation, and persecuted it, and even to this day continue to persecute it? Whence comes the desire for virginity in the faithful? Whence the love of temperance, and the fleeing from the things in the world, and the withdrawal of many into the deserts? Whence the grace of the priests, and the things that are accomplished through the priests, the releasing and binding of sins, which God attests through sensible and dead bodies? Whence the efficacy of healings in the holy relics? Which even the impious see, and are forced against their will to acknowledge. Whence comes the sweet fragrance to them, and their remaining incorrupt? And the divine operations through the holy icons and sacred temples, and sanctified waters—whence do these come? Are these not being perfectly fulfilled even until now in the Church, which orthodoxly confesses the God in Trinity? B But also the unguents flowing from the martyrs' relics, and the prodigies, and the manifest protection and guardianship of the saints themselves, by which they defend us the faithful against the impious who persecute us, and the destruction of those godless ones—who often attack us with a madness moved by satanic cooperation—clearly reveal the divine and great mystery of the piety of the Christians. C But even this very fact, that we as faithful and orthodox are persecuted by the enemies, and are mistreated and suffer, demonstrates that the true and only God in Trinity is with us; for God does not rest in this world, nor in those things which are seen, nor in men who seek and desire the things of this world, but in those who love Him and seek His glory, and contend for His sake. These, moreover, are those who, according to the ancient just ones, were crushed, afflicted, reduced to poverty, harshly treated, killed, sent into exile, such as Abel and Noe, and Abraham and Isaac, and Jacob and his children, and further Moses and Elias and Daniel, and the three youths, and Jeremias, and before him Isaias and Ezechiel, and later the Maccabees, and whoever else is like them. D And the fact that we endure while suffering, and bear all things for Christ, proclaims His most true and only faith, and the true words of His teaching; for He foretold that we would suffer in this world, just as He also suffered for us. And His Church itself, and its institution and doctrine, teaches also virginity, and chastity and purity, and furthermore humility and patience; it exhorts us, moreover, that we give thanks to God, that we love poverty, and flee the world; nay, that we not only do no evil, nor return evil for evil, but also that we release those who have trespassed. And to love our enemies, and in no way to bear a grudge, nor to be angry, but even to do good to those who hate us, and to pray for those who offer us injuries. These and similar things, the heavenly and divine and true and only faith of the Christians
for these are the ordinances of God and Master of all. From these, I think, and from things like them, you will draw the impious toward the knowledge of the Gospel, and you will persuade them to understand the living Word of God, and the Holy Spirit, and to learn the traditions of the Church as divine and holy. From these, also, you will persuade them to understand the mysteries of the incarnation of the one of the Trinity, God the Word, Jesus Christ, even if it is no less difficult to persuade a man who has lived in impiety than it is to attempt to raise the dead, and to lead the foolish to understanding, unless God B reaches out His hand and opens their folly, as He would open the eyes of a man blind from birth. For even to know God is the work of God, and especially to persuade a man who has a carnal mind to wish [to know it]; and that the Trinity is the creator of all intellectual and rational beings, and of all things, is above mind and word; and that without the grace of God, there is no power for the creature to understand the Creator.
Clericus. You have sufficiently, Master, revealed to us in many words the doctrine concerning the Holy Trinity, and you have taught us to persuade those who almost reject the only-begotten Son of God and the Word; and [you have done so] all the more in that you have mentioned scriptural proofs and other concepts through examples, and those things which are divinely C enacted in the Church, which are necessary to be spoken to all atheists. But since there is a great multitude of heresies, and all their followers are indeed called Christians, yet they are divided by manifold opinions, what shall we do concerning these? For there are those among them who belong to individual heresies, who attempt to provoke us orthodox, or who demand an account concerning our right faith.
Pontifex. It is not necessary to give an account to all, as we have previously said, but it is proper to teach those who seek to learn, and they are to be addressed with peace; but one must depart from those who prefer to contend, for the Church of Christ does not love to contend, just as Paul says: "If anyone seems to be contentious, we have no such custom, nor do the Churches of God." D For this reason, the Church anathematizes all heretics as contentious and disobedient.
Clericus. And if someone inquires for his own benefit, what must be done?
Pontifex. Such a person ought to be received, and served in love. Moreover, if you have the grace of speaking, having invoked Christ, discourse from those things which the saints have labored to produce against heresy; for there is nothing that the Fathers have not said, since a great struggle against heresies lay upon them, which they overcame with the help of the Spirit, and they revealed their opinions to be false. But if you are unable to answer the inquirer, either because you do not have the grace or the authorization—for the law of the Church establishes that this faculty is given by the laying on of hands—do not be ashamed to bring the inquirer to a religious man who knows how to speak rightly; for there will be much benefit for both, and, God helping, even for the one who is led astray
[The English translation begins here:]
you will correct that person with zeal and divine charity, either you will secure a reward for yourself, and instead of your labor, you will find grace before God.
Cleric. And which of the heresies is worse?
Pontiff. Everything, brother, that thrusts one into the abyss of destruction is of the worst sort; and everything that harms salvation falls into the category of those being lost. But yet, just as there are differences in good things, and advancements in the degrees toward virtue, and retributions according to deeds—for which reason the Lord says: "In my Father's house there are many mansions"—so, I think, it is also among the contraries. Although all disorder is truly in them—for there is nothing of the evil ones that is in order, since the father of lies is himself an enemy of order—yet the heresy that contains more blasphemies concerning God is worse, then those that have fewer are intermediate, and the last are those that teem with the fewest blasphemies. And I consider this to be found even among the impious. For the first of the atheists are those who do not know God at all, and also those who are held by the error of polytheism. For there is no difference in impiety between them, since it is equal to not knowing God at all and to saying that one knows God, but irreligiously, as if they were gods, adoring the creatures of God, or these visible things, or the accursed demons. After these first atheists come those who indeed call God Lord of heaven and earth, but without the living Word and Spirit. Therefore these too are atheists, as they do not proclaim the true and only God. For the only true God is the Father with his only-begotten Son and the life-giving Spirit. If, then, these also are atheists in general, yet they do not worship fire, or the sun, nor do they call demons gods; and for this reason they are of lesser malice. B
Cleric. But after these, who are the ones worse than the others in impiety?
CHAPTER XI. Against Simon Magus, Manes, and those like them, and against the impious Bogomils, or Cudugeri.
Pontiff. Worse than these are the heresies from the beginning that indeed accepted Christ, but not rightly, nor as the apostolic preaching handed down; but they held diverse opinions even concerning his appearance and incarnation. And furthermore, they rejected the correct discourse concerning the holy Trinity. And some impiously called themselves paracletes and the power of God, as Simon Magus, who pursued the great Peter, and that wicked Manes—who are worse even than these atheists. Furthermore, there are that impure Cerinthus and Carpocrates, who were adversaries to the apostles of Christ; and very many others, enemies of the truth, who wickedly taught two principles. From whom even now are the Bogomils, an impious multitude, who are also called Cudugeri. Therefore it is necessary for you to be taught about them, since they live not far from you; for with much hypocrisy they feign that they are praying, and they pretend that they revere the Gospel C D
A letters and the Acts of the Apostles. Yet they reject these and all other Scriptures completely. And these irreligious people perform nothing of the evangelical and apostolic teachings; rather, they do the opposite, as they are moved by the Adversary and oppose all of the Lord’s words, deeds, and traditions. Instead, they devote themselves with all their heart to the thoughts and works of the party of the Antichrist, and are driven by certain frenzies, performing secret prayers, lascivious chants, and other impious, shameful, and most polluted acts, which it is not even lawful to commit to writing. Along with the faith, they reject all the mysteries of Christ and spew blasphemies against them: against the most divine baptism, the holy communion, the sign of the adorable Cross, the holy icons, the august temples, the divine Scriptures of the Law and the Prophets, all the righteous and the martyrs, the hierarchy, and the saints. In a word, they blaspheme against everything that is holy, as does the apostate Satan and his demons, by whose impulse these filthy people are moved to blaspheme the one God in Trinity, the Incarnation of the Word, and everything that belongs to God. Yet our Savior, who entrusted the divine baptism to the works and words of his Apostles, and the fearful communion of his Body and Blood, and the holy ministry, and the rest of his divine mysteries, has delivered these things to us. He himself also taught B us the prayer "Our Father," and other prayers as well, through which he himself used to entreat the Father. We are also bound to accept the Law and the Prophets, which were given beforehand by his grace. We must also revere the divine temples; for he showed us this from that ancient temple, from which he drove out with a scourge those who were selling nefariously, and which he called a house of prayer and the house of his Father. "And he would not allow," says Mark, "anyone to carry a vessel through the temple," by which he taught us the reverence due to divine temples. Moreover, the Savior called the figure of the Cross his own sign, and predicted that it would be seen before his second coming: "Then," he says, "will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven," that is, the Cross, which he showed from above to the Emperor Constantine, and thus, as if by hand, led him to his faith, and showed it even above Constantine at midday. In this Cross Paul also boasts, and all the saints, who honored and embraced it not only spiritually but also visibly. And Peter himself desired to suffer it, that is, to be crucified, which he obtained according to the Savior’s prediction; as did his brother Andrew, and most of the others among the Apostles and martyrs. And they called this the seal and sign of Christ. The fearful, saving, and divinely-given mysteries were also handed down by Paul, which he himself received from the Lord. Moreover, the Lord did not only teach us to pray by saying "Our Father, who art in heaven," but he also indicated other prayers, which these men consider contemptible; for example: C "God be merciful to me a sinner," by which the Publican was saved; and: "I have sinned against heaven and before thee," and the other, the prodigal son, was saved, for he was accepted by the grace of this word after his conversion and return. And: "Remember me, O Lord, when thou comest into thy kingdom," on account of which the thief received Paradise. Furthermore, we ought to ask in the name of Christ, as he himself taught. D
throughout the entire Gospel; but let us ask as praying with faith, and A we shall receive; for Christ himself, both before he confirmed the Testament by his death and in the very hour of death, asked, and promised that we would receive, if only we should ask, and he taught us to believe that we would receive whatever we should ask in prayer. This the apostles also did, who did not say only the *Our Father*, but also countless other prayers, as is shown in the selection of Matthew. And when the apostles returned, having been battered by the Jews, it is shown that they did not pray the *Our Father*, but another prayer which the Acts record, and "they were filled with the Holy Spirit, and the place where they stood was shaken," and they had also made many other prayers; and it was through the name of our Lord Jesus that they worked B divine wonders all the more. Nor did the Lord deliver only prayers and hymns; for it is written in the Gospel: "And having sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives"; but the angels and shepherds also showed this at the birth of the Savior Christ; the angels indeed, when they sang: "Glory to God in the highest," and the shepherds glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen; and the apostles did this after the Ascension of the Lord, as it is written in the Gospel: "They were," it says, "always in the temple, praising and blessing God. Amen."
Therefore, those [heretics] reject all these prayers and divine hymns, and having cast the others aside, they accept only the *Our Father*. Moreover, they impiously reject the inspired words of the prophets and of Moses, and the most holy psalms of David, which the Savior approved, as the holy Gospel says of him: C "And beginning from Moses and from all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." And he himself said: "These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which are written in the law of Moses and in the prophets and in the psalms concerning me." But they impiously reject these. Furthermore, regarding the holy images, not only did Moses command that they be honored through the heavenly archetypes in the tabernacle and the ark—for those were made in the likeness of heaven—but also through the sculptured cherubim above the ark; and the divine Paul approved these, calling the first a tabernacle, and the exterior [parts] indeed holy, but the interior ones the Holy of Holies. And the sculptured works, because they were types of divine things—and not of demonic idols, or stars, or other created things, for these are D foul and most impious—but were holy images of angelic powers, which the Apostle called the cherubim overshadowing the mercy-seat, and because all these things were handed down to be venerated; [and] the divine forms
so that just as we are sanctified in our souls through confession, we may also be sanctified in our bodies through things performed sensibly, being composed as we are of body and soul. For this reason, the incorporeal Word of God was made flesh for us, and our God became man, like us with soul and body, so that He might fully cleanse and sanctify our fallen nature. A But those totally defiled ones, along with many other impieties, with singular insolence insult divine things and are altogether impious, and reject all the mysteries of the Church. Christ indeed was baptized naked so that He might hand down to us the spiritual, divine baptism, and the Spirit descended upon Him so that we might know the power of the baptism which is performed in Christ. And He says in the Gospel: “Unless one is born again of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.” And He also commanded His disciples to baptize both before the Passion and after the Resurrection: first in Bethabara, where John was baptizing, because it was fitting for the shadow to pass away and the true baptism from Christ to arrive, where there was also much water, as the Gospel writes. B And again: “Although Jesus himself did not baptize, but his disciples,” since He had given them the authority. And furthermore, He Himself said to them after the Resurrection: “Go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” And: “He who believes and is baptized shall be saved, but he who does not believe shall be condemned.” The apostles themselves also were baptized: Peter indeed by Christ, as has been handed down to many; Andrew and John by Peter; and the others by Andrew and John; Paul, however, by Ananias, as is written in the Acts. And those in Samaria by Philip; and the Eunuch by the same, as is written: “They descended into the water.” And Paul again baptizes from the beginning those who had received only the baptism of John. C But these totally defiled ones reject this, and are reckoned among the infidels, being unworthy of our renewal and regeneration which is given in Christ. Furthermore, Christ, as has been said, handed down to us [this] ministry, took bread, and giving thanks said: “Take, eat, this is my body;” and blessing the chalice he said: “Drink from it, all of you, this is my blood,” and: “Do this in my remembrance.” Paul also witnessed this, saying: “The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? And the chalice which we drink, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ?” For he took bread, and the rest. And again: “We are one body, for we all partake of the one bread and of the cup.” And: “Whoever eats the bread and drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself.” D And again: “Let a man test himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup; for he who eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body.” The Lord indeed had said in the Gospel: “He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him,” and: “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you,” and again:
A “For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.” And: “I live, and he who eats me, he also shall live because of me.” While the Gospel and the Apostles preach these things in the Scriptures, these defiled persons blasphemously speak against this divine communion of my Christ and God. They do not honor the holy images, as we said above, nor do they hold them in any honor; they utterly reject prayers to God and hymns, and also the holy Scriptures of the old Law and the Prophets, being caught by demons in their minds and darkened. And as for the prayer, “Our Father,” even though it was given by Christ, they pray it deceitfully. They see certain phantasms of demons, being mastered by a demoniacal reasoning, so that they might see something; and they even call upon the first author of evil, the wicked devil, in a barbarian tongue, that is, as the inhabitant or ruler, the prince of sin and darkness, and B the miserable wretches worship him after the manner of the Gentiles. And being deceived by him, they become difficult to detach, enslaved to error. These, therefore, even if they name Christ, are nevertheless equal to the impious—or even worse, I might say—since they minister to the devil and contaminate not only themselves but many others with their strange pollutions, as we learn, and especially at the end, they lead astray many of the faithful and cut them off from Christ. For at the time of the end they are incited toward denial. And this is to be fled from as much as possible, and their hypocrisies are to be abominated as being full of the wicked one; because impiety is a mixture of all evil. For this reason, I have set forth the matters concerning it at greater length, so that all the faithful may be secured and not provide communion to them. For they strive even toward this, so as to contaminate the pious. C
CHAPTER XII. Against Arius, Sabellius, Eunomius, Macedonius, and the impious Apollinarius.
After this, or equal to it, is the impiety of Sabellius and Arius, which are contrary to one another; the one abolishing the hypostases and leading to Judaism, the other rejecting the consubstantiality of the hypostases and introducing Hellenism. And these are the opinions of these impious men, and with them others, namely those of Eunomius, Macedonius, and the rest—for the discourse is not set out to speak of them all; they abolish the consubstantial and connatural [unity] of the indivisible and unconfused Trinity, or rather, they abolish the holy Trinity itself. After them comes another impiety, that of Apollinarius regarding the economy, blaspheming against the incarnation of the Word, saying it is imperfect. For he dreamed that the Lord became incarnate without a rational soul, imagining the Lord to be incarnate [in this way], which is not to be incarnate...
B or to take the form of a servant—for a man consists of both soul and body. He therefore also rejects A Him who said: "I lay down my life for my sheep," and: "I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again." And: "No one takes it from me." And: "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit," that is, my soul. It is also shown that He had a soul, from the fact that, having died in the body, He rose from the dead, the soul being rejoined to the body; acts which He performed so that He might raise me up entire in soul and body. Therefore, at His resurrection, many of the bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep arose as a testimony to the liberation of the souls that were formerly in Hades, and to the incorruptibility of human bodies, through the Lord's soul which descended into Hades, and after having conquered death, was then joined to the divine body, when the Lord rose according to the body.
CAPUT XIII. Against Nestorius, the adversary of Christ and worshiper of man.
B Indeed, many have taken from this heresy an occasion for their own destruction, the first of whom is Nestorius. For this man, while opposing Apollinaris, taught that the Word was to be separated from Christ, calling Christ only the human nature of the Savior, while keeping the Word, Who dwelt in Him by grace but was not joined according to person, separated from Him; whence, being bereft of his senses, he denied our salvation and our fellowship with the divine nature. For if the only-begotten Son of God had not been incarnate, and if the Word had not become flesh and dwelt among us, we would have perceived no benefit; for how could we be sanctified? Or how could we live the new life unless joined to the Life? How could we be cleansed unless He who is pure and immune from sin were with us? Therefore he was denounced for impiety and excluded from the society of the faithful; for God was truly with us, as Isaiah said: C "A virgin has brought forth a son, whose name is Emmanuel," which is, "God with us." And: "A child is born to us, a Son, and he is given to us, the Angel of great counsel, the Son of the Highest, whose government is upon his shoulder," for as the Word of God he is an admirable counselor, God strong as consubstantial with the Father, and like to us according to human nature, D a ruler, a prince of peace, a Father of the world to come, just as it is written. And "that which was from the beginning," as the beloved disciple cries out, "what we have seen, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; and the life was manifested." Therefore we indeed are of God, since "every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God." But Nestorius is of the Antichrist; for "every spirit that does not confess Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God," and this is that of the Antichrist. Thus Nestorius became the cause of the other heresies, and indeed he also became the author of impiety in some way for many.
Clericus: By what means, Lord, did he become the cause of impiety? A
CHAPTER XIV. Against the impious nations.
Archbishop: I mean the impious nations, who, having previously served the morning star, were later deceived by a certain raging and most impious barbarian, one of their own race, filthy and profligate, and who for this reason received all the energy of the evil one. They claim indeed that God exists, but they are altogether atheists, just as they were before, since they do not know the true God, nor do they confess the eternal Father of the living Word, the unbegotten, the author of all things, who always is, the progenitor of the living Wisdom, the only-begotten B and incorporeal Son, and the fount of true life, of the good and holy Spirit who vivifies and sanctifies all things.
For these senseless people reject the Son and Word of God, the incorporeal One, and the divine and lifegiving Spirit who is from Him. They practice every unclean and profane thing, and what is worse, as if it were a law given to them, they maintain the unnatural deeds of the Sodomites as a way of life, shamelessly defiling themselves and receiving the dishonor of their error in themselves, as Paul says. They gather to themselves a multitude of wives, and are full of murder and robbery. For living by the bow and the sword, they move against every race, C pursuing and slaughtering like thieves, seizing the possessions of others, tearing fathers from children and wives from husbands, having no compassion of nature, madly obsessed with riches, madly given over to all luxury and profligacy; and what is worse, these miserable wretches act as if they were righteous and faithful, not knowing that this world passes away, and that it is an abode and an exile for men, and that sinners, or rather plunderers and unjust ones, usually possess more of it.
Since even David was a sojourner on the earth, and he mourned, saying: "Woe is me! for my sojourning is prolonged." And Abraham for God's sake loved D the sojourning even more, and so did Isaac, and Jacob, and Moses with all the prophets. And they all sought poverty. Furthermore, they assert that they have a law, which is a storehouse of lawlessness, and of all impiety and atheism, and profligacy; they are deceived by a filthy and barbarian man, one who fell into demonic errors, who called himself an apostle of God, and who — alas! — claimed to have ascended into heaven to overthrow the Ascension of Christ our God, and dared in his impious arrogance to say that he himself is above Christ, and that he saw God as crystalline and clothed in splendor. He also taught prayers, as he claimed, full of a certain madness and inciting to incontinence, and proposed paradises full of all lust. And what more need I say of this irreligion, which the evil one has—
A as being irrational beyond all errors, and more unclean than all else, incited against us Christians, raging against our piety, and operating through this unholy nation against us all those things which the divine Scriptures say of the Antichrist, pursuing the true and only faith of Christ, with Christ himself permitting it, so that His own might be proved, and because this world is passing away, and because, just as He was persecuted, so we, His servants, suffer persecution. But when He arrives, we indeed shall live, and shall be with Him into the ages, and shall be with the angels; but the impious, with the evil one, since they have emulated his bloodthirstiness, his opposition to God, his uncleanness, and his rapacity, his madness, his hatred, his implacability, his falsehood, and his perjury, will be condemned together to eternal hell.
How, then, did Nestorius give them the causes of this impiety? The impure man did not wish to confess our Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and the co-eternal Word made flesh, just as the beloved disciple said: “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.” But he dogmatized that the Word was apart, and he called Christ—who was nothing but the taken-on nature of the Word—nothing more, and he named Him a man full of grace; B and for this reason he impiously called the all-holy Virgin “Christ-bearer” instead of “Theotokos.” Consequently, this most unclean author of the error of the nations, having later received his impious teachings in those regions—Nestorius having been exiled to the Oasis—while dwelling there, declared Christ to be great indeed and superior to all the prophets, while belching forth blasphemies against Him as the Son of God and our God; he also said that He ascended into heaven and sits there; but the impious man does not confess Him to be God, nor the Word of God to be God, but that He was made by the Word of God. The irreligious man does not know that if He is the Word of God, and by the Word of God the heaven and the earth and all creatures were made, the Word Himself is He who lives and remains into the ages, as David said, by whom also the heavens were established, He who was also in the beginning, as the Gospel proclaims, and was with God, and through Him all things were made, and without Him was not anything made that has been made. For David, too, sings to God: C “In wisdom Thou hast made all things.” And Solomon says: “God of my fathers, who hast made all things by Thy word, and by Thy wisdom hast fashioned man.” And He is the One concerning whom it is written: “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.”
But it is superfluous to say more concerning this impiety of these atheists, which is refuted at the same time as the impiety of the Jews, who rejected the Lord and His prophets—and His ancient holy law, which clearly preached concerning the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, and concerning the incarnation of the Word from the Virgin, and His whole dispensation. For the Gentiles are kin to the infidelity of the Jews, and they struggle equally against God; they reject the living Son of God, and His incarnation from the Virgin which took place for the sake of the world, and the Holy Spirit who quickens all things and holds together the bod-
body.
Clericus. And who are these, holy master?
CHAPTER XV.
*Against the impious Eutyches, Dioscorus, and the foolish Armenians, Jacobites, and the rest of the Acephali; and against Sergius, and Pyrrhus, and Honorius, and the rest of the Monothelites.*Pontifex. Eutyches was a certain presbyter—or rather, a most unfortunate man A and a son of perdition in his old age—and many others with him; a certain Dioscorus, by whom the see of Alexandria was defiled; and along with him many others who opened the path of impiety to the Armenians, Jacobites, and those called Monothelites later on; all these fell into insane opinions. For all of them, while supposedly opposing Nestorius, foolishly proclaimed either one nature in Christ, or—as others did—one will and energy. The leaders of the Monothelites, moreover, were a certain Pyrrhus, and Honorius, and Macarius, and Zooras, and others with them, who deemed that they were thus preaching the Word incarnate as indivisible; B ignorant, alas, the wretches, that they are overturning the things of our salvation, confusing the natures, or rather, rejecting the dispensation of the Word. For if the Word incarnated were one nature, either humanity would have been transmuted into deity—which is impious and impossible, for a creature to become uncreated—or divinity would have been transmuted into humanity, which is altogether godless and incongruous; for the nature of God is unchangeable and abiding, and is neither commingled nor subject to confusion. Therefore, those who dogmatize one nature and one will do not fall into some minor impiety (as some foolishly think), but into the ultimate C and fullness of all blasphemy. For if, according to them, the Word has not become incarnate, but appeared as if a phantom—as certain ones have blasphemed—then He was neither born of the Virgin, nor baptized, nor did He walk among men, nor did He suffer for us, nor did He rise again; and our salvation is not accomplished, and the Gospels are void, and the entire saving preaching is void. But if He has been incarnate, as is the truth, and took on flesh, and God was the one incarnate—for "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us," and He truly became man, and in one person Christ possesses D two natures; for He remained what He was, for He was the Word, and He assumed what He was not, for He became flesh; and He remained indivisible, being one from two, because within His own person the Word assumed our nature perfect, since He truly became man. If, therefore, He truly became man, how is the nature one? Is it human, or divine? And if it is human, then according to them He is not God; but if it is God alone, then it is not human. And how does he who asserts one nature honor His birth from the Virgin? Or how His baptism? Or how the laying on of hands? How the journeying of Christ? How His hunger? How His thirst? How His having labored? How His eating? How His fleeing? How His being hidden? How His being smitten? Or how His being bound, and cruci-
Afied, dead, and buried? How did He rise again? What does it mean to suffer and to rise? What is this appearance after the resurrection? Where are the marks of the nails? Where is the wound from the lance? How has He been taken up? How will He come again? For these things belong to a body. And if He bears a body, and truly underwent these things in the body, He consists of two natures, being at once both God and man, and He possesses the operations and wills of each twofold nature, not opposing one another, but the human being subject to the divine, and the whole being divine as it is united to God. But if there is only one nature, and that the divine one, then, according to the blasphemers, the entire Gospel is filled with falsehood. And why are the mysteries celebrated? And why are the body and blood of Christ offered in sacrifice? Why is the tomb revered? How did He come, and how will He come again? Do you see how absurd these things are, and that such doctrines amount to a subversion of the mystery of piety? Therefore, one must flee from those who have invented such sicknesses of doctrines, as being rejected by God. B For the Word became flesh for the sake of us who were created rational by the Word, and who fell contrary to reason, in order that the Word Himself might restore us, and refashion us who had fallen and been crushed, and grant us back our original beauty. The Word is, then, perfect from eternity, God from God the Father, as light from light and brightness, and immutable in His divinity. "For I am," He says through the prophet, "and I change not." But He later became flesh, and being in the form of God, He "did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped" (as Paul says), and He became in the likeness of men, and took the form of a servant. And being truly God as the Word of God, and truly man, C He was seen upon the earth and lived among men. He is therefore the same, both true God as the only-begotten Son of God, and living Wisdom, and the same one is truly man, incarnate from the Ever-Virgin. And He is one and the same, and twofold, and perfect according to both, the same. Because the same perfect Word of the living God has taken up within Himself the human nature from the Virgin, not being separated, but He Himself having become the beginning and subsistence for the human nature. Therefore, this is also called an "assumption," because He Himself assumed it and united it within Himself in an ineffable manner and beyond speech, having suffered nothing in the assuming, but rather having made it a participant in divinity, since His own humanity contributed nothing to His divinity, but received from it. And it was exalted by the One who took it up, yet it did not humble the One who took it up, even if it is said that by being incarnate He was humbled. This is also called the glory and the kingdom of God and the majesty, the incarnation, that is, of the living Son of God. For He says: "The Lord has reigned, He has clothed Himself with majesty." Wherefore, Christ is one, because He is one according to person; hence also one Lord Jesus Christ, as Paul says; but He is twofold in natures, D because the Word became flesh, and the Life was manifested in the flesh, and every one from God who confesses the Lord Jesus Christ as having come in the flesh, as
the beloved disciple says, and because "the children have partaken of flesh and blood, and he himself likewise partook of the same, that through death he might destroy him," and so forth. A Observe the sayings of the most divine Paul, which overthrow every heresy. "He partook," he says, "of flesh and blood," both for the sake of the fantastasts and the foolish Nestorius, who reject the incarnation of the Word, and both the Monophysites and Monotheletes. For how did he partake of the same things as the children, if there is one nature and one will? And how does he lay hold of the seed of Abraham, if there is one nature? He confounds Apollinaris, saying: "That through death he might destroy him who had the power of death." For if he did not have a human rational soul, how did he die in the flesh, and by death rise again and save? So that the Word of God and the flesh are the same; B the one Lord Jesus Christ out of two natures, and he is one in two wills; for he holds no wills contrary to each other, as we have said, but each nature of his has its own natural will, because it is perfect in him and is in no way altered. And the human will is subjected to the divine. And the voice of the Savior himself to the Father testifies to this: "Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me," speaking of the death of the flesh according to the human will. For he also teaches us to pray not to enter into temptation, on account of the weakness of nature. "Nevertheless, not my will," that is to say the human, "but thine be done," that is to say the divine, which is one of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. C You see how the human will is not contrary, but is subject to the divine? Since there is one will of the Word and of the Father and of the Spirit, as we have said, because there is one power, and volition, and counsel, and energy in the Trinity. But the natural will of the flesh is another, by which he was willing to eat and drink, and feared death; for which reason he prayed, saying, "If it is possible, let the cup of death pass." Which he again subjected to the Father: "Nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done," praying that the divine, not the carnal, will should come to pass. Therefore, those also are impious, and destroyers of the economy of the Word of God, who preach one nature and one energy and one will. D Clericus. And who are the other impious ones after these, most divine master?
CHAPTER XVI.
Against the impious Origen, Didymus and Evagrius, and the heretics who act with them; and concerning the resurrection of the dead. Pontifex. Others indeed come after these, but before them is Origen with his followers, who deny the resurrection of the dead, and bring in an end to damnation; and they dream of certain metempsychoses and migrations of souls in the manner of Plato, and attempt to overturn almost all divine things entirely. For if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has risen, and in vain are all the mysteries of his dispensationA to these impious ones to no purpose. And if there is no resurrection of the flesh, the creation of man is also in vain. For why did God fashion a body? And why was the visible world created to no effect? And if there is no resurrection, it is an injustice before God, for the soul alone to be punished, while the body has participated in the pleasures. But if, even while the body has striven, it has no share in the reward, it is rather an injustice to us from God. If, on the other hand, there is neither enjoyment nor punishment, the doctrine of Epicurus is true, and all things are automatic, and these people are godless according to him. But if there is, as they prattle, an end to punishment, then laws are in vain, admonitions are in vain, the old things are in vain, the words of the prophets and apostles are in vain, and the Gospels, and the zeal of the righteous against those who sin are in vain: Moses against the idolaters, Elijah against the false prophets, the Baptist against Herodias, Peter against Ananias and Sapphira, and Simon the Magus, B Paul against the fornicator in Corinth, and the thousands of other friends of God against the disobedient; but also the incarnation of Christ is in vain according to these impious ones. O the godless blasphemy! And if there is an end to punishment, what then did the incarnation of Christ profit? Or why then did it take place, if those who have died unrepentant and those who have lived impiously are to receive the kingdom? But they also make Him a liar who said, C “I am the truth,” and, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away,” and who calls the punishment eternal, and the kingdom eternal. Woe to the impiety! And why then was repentance given, if there is an end to punishment? And what then is the need of it? Or how will the life there be unchangeable and eternal? And how will one day be endless? And what will be the times there? And what will remain after the time of punishment has elapsed? Therefore, will the things to come not be eternal? Therefore, will life also have an end? But it is by no means so; for these are the words of the impious and the mindless concerning such things. But the Word of God calls eternal life the inheritance for the righteous, and it shall be, and for the unjust, eternal punishment, and it shall be. But may we be delivered through repentance by the mercy of Christ himself. D
Cleric. And who is this Origen, who introduced such most impious dogmas into the Church of Christ?
Pontiff. Many indeed write about him, and from them you have an abundance to learn; but we also will declare to you concerning him in brief. This man was a man of old, Alexandrian by birth, born of Christian parents, and he arrived at the dignity of presbyter and doctor. But since he had fallen at the first by the cause of arrogance, and, through exterior wisdom, had become overconfident in pride, he fell with a terrible fall according to the one who fell first. And this man has become almost the root and father of impiety for Arius and his disciples. For he departed from God, and the wretch yielded himself to the demons, having been darkened by the passion of arrogance. Which passion is indeed for many others who do not attend to humility, and who, while seeming good and feigning piety, become the cause of impiety and falls.
Chapter 17. That the passion of pride and arrogant self-esteem is the cause for those falling into heresy.
AClericus. Is the disease of arrogance so great, Lord?
Pontifex. If you wish to learn how great this disease is, hear the Savior who says: "I was watching Satan fall like lightning from heaven," B who suffered this not for a carnal vice, but only because of his pride and his defiance against God, for which reason he is also called the enemy of God. And he was overthrown by God, and especially cast down by the dispensation of the Word, who humbled Himself even to flesh and death, and that by the cross. Therefore, by the cross, as a sign of God's humility and of the supreme love He has for us, that proud one is laid low and driven out. But those who imitate this proud one are hateful to the humbled Savior, and are despised and abandoned by Him, and for this reason they are called enemies C of God and unclean. For "Every proud-hearted person is an abomination to God," and "God opposes the proud," as if they were His adversaries. Because of this passion, Adam fell, and Cain, and Ham, and Pharaoh, and Nebuchadnezzar perished; Solomon was deceived, and his son reduced his kingdom; and many false prophets have arisen, and leaders of heresies, and even now some are apostatizing from the Church and consorting with heretics with a proud mind and by trusting in themselves, thinking themselves wise, while becoming all the more foolish, as the divine Paul says, and becoming bereft of divine grace, according to the saying: "Behold, your house is left to you desolate," and they become apostates, abandoned by God. D And what the Jews suffered in the physical sense, these have suffered in their souls, as did their father, having become a dark vessel instead of a luminous one through pride; for divine grace does not shine upon its enemy and adversary. Therefore the mind is dark and foolish, as it is godless, and a cause of impiety for those who do not take heed.
Clericus. As we learn, arrogance is a cause of great evils. And may the Lord deliver us from it by your prayers. But teach us also concerning the iconoclasts, of what order they are, and what we shall say against these lovers of contentious novelty.
Chapter 18. Against the impious Bogomils, who oppose the veneration of images.
Pontifex. There is no need for many words concerning this. For both ancient and new traditions testify that the Church's D tradition is truly from God and holy. But we too will say what we have learned from the Fathers. For it is not necessary for us to trust in our own ideas; therefore we do not speak our own words. Today, among those called Christians who are heretics, there are no iconoclasts, except for the impure sect of the impious Bogomyls, who are falsely called Christians, because they deny all the mysteries of the Church, as has been said above.
A Indeed, they think they understand mysteries, as has been mentioned, and the holy icons along with them. But the former Iconoclasts, holding almost the same views as these people, nevertheless claimed, at least ostensibly, to honor the holy sign of the cross, and holy temples, and divine baptism, and the definitions of the Fathers concerning the faith. But they impiously labeled the divine icons as idols. From this, proceeding forward into the depths of wickedness, they also attempted to reject the sacred relics of the saints, and even the miracles as well. Indeed, the impious even preached that no one should be called holy. But these things utterly overthrow the gifts of God given to us through the incarnation of the living Word, and they are a manifest rejection of the confession and proclamation of our Savior, made both by His words and His works. Since both Gentiles and Jews bear themselves against the holy icons and call them idols, we shall, in a few words, defend ourselves against all of them. And a little will be sufficient for those who understand. God is invisible, as He is incorporeal and fleshless and without form; and therefore, He cannot be circumscribed. But we know Him to be circumscribed by the prophets, and shaped, and viewed as an icon. For Abraham saw God, and Jacob [saw Him] on the ladder, and Moses in the bush and on the mountain, and Isaiah sitting upon a high throne, and Ezekiel likewise in the midst B of the living creatures, and Daniel upon the clouds as the Ancient of Days, as did many other of the prophets. Are these things, then, to be asked if they are true or false? They would certainly say they are true, since they accept the Scriptures. And if they are true, are they divine or the phantasms of idols? They will confess, I suppose, that they are divine, since they occur as visions of God from God according to the capacity of those who see them. For the divine nature is not seen at all as it is, because it is without form. But since these things are from God—for He also says: "I multiplied visions, and in the hands of the prophets I was made like"—they are visions of God. Therefore, these visions are venerable and holy and worthy of worship; and just as they are written in divine books, so do they exist holy in icons, and just as they are understood by the mind and spoken of by the word, so are they piously and well and divinely written on panels and walls and vestments, and they are piously and well fashioned; so that we too may see with our physical eyes C that those things which are painted are the images of divine things, just as they are in books and thoughts and visions, which the prophets beheld, which are the appearances and visions of God; and so that just as we are sanctified by reading with the mind, so, being fashioned of flesh and speaking with the word and seeing with our eyes, we may sanctify our senses. There are also phantasms of demons, but these are to be shunned, for they are foul and abominable, and to be rejected by every believer; and books filled with these are to be detested, and their teachings, as impious and foul, are also to be rejected together with their likenesses. Therefore, from these things one conclusion is gathered: as many things as are done in the name of God are divine, and those which are done in the name of demons are abominable and most wicked. D Wherefore also Moses, against the demons...
A of the idols, says thus: "You shall not make any likeness, neither of what is in heaven above, nor of what is on earth below," since the Greeks were deifying these things. But the figures of divine things, as he saw in the mountain, he constructed by means of the tabernacle. And he had tablets and the ark which contained these, and the rod that budded, and also the manna that had fallen. And before them he worshiped, raising his worship to God. And he also had cast images of the likenesses of angels, that he might manifest more clearly the image of the truth of heavenly things. For since the angels are living above around that divine nature, so he set up sculptured angels around the tabernacle, showing by all things and testifying that all things which are done in the name of God are holy, and those which are done in the name of demons are godless and to be rejected. And, in like manner, regarding B sacrifices, Moses ordained that senseless animals be sacrificed—a custom which the Greeks also had—but the sacrifices of Moses were divine, offered to God, and the flesh and the rest offered in sacrifice were holy; these were called sacrifices of God and were performed for propitiation and purification, and whatever was offered, was offered to God. But the sacrifices of the Greeks and the godless were defiled and profane, as being offered to demons and communicating in uncleanness; wherefore they are to be rejected by us also. And Paul says this: "But if someone should say to you, 'This is sacrificed to idols,' do not eat." And the Brother of the Lord, with the other apostles, commands those who believe from among the nations to refrain from the sacrifices of idols, and from fornication, and from what is strangled. And again Paul says: "For the nations sacrifice to demons, and not to God." Therefore, just as the things sacrificed to demons are wicked, so too are the images depicting the demons wicked and full of their malice—not that the creatures of God are wicked, since the demons are also creatures and are not evil on that account, for all things from God are good, but because they have become wicked by their own choice, and are apostates from God, willfully and by their own power, and the things offered to these by the impious are abominable, as the demons dwell in them and work through them; so also the words and dogmas and books of the impious are defiled, as being spoken and written against God. But the words and preachings and books of divine men are to be worshiped and revered, being for the glory of God and partaking of divine grace. Understand this also concerning the divine icons. And consider them worthy of worship C, whether they contain prophetic visions, or depict the Word of God who for our sake became man, and her who in the flesh gave birth to Him, descended by lineage from Abraham and David, and those who have served the Lord—whether as apostles, or hierarchs, or martyrs, or those who have lived lives of asceticism and virginity—who, while they lived, showed themselves to be vessels of God, and gained prophetic graces and the powers of healings and signs, and even after death work and have worked divine things through their relics and intercessions, and through figures and images have accomplished similar things; for that which dwells in them grants them to do such things.
A For the Word of God, living and active, lives and works through all things, and without Him was not anything made. It is He who also sanctifies waters by the divine Spirit and preserves them incorruptible, just as He does the oil and the lifeless bodies of His servants. He also sanctifies His lifeless temples. And in holy places, where the invocation of Christ or of His Mother or of His saints is made, very many miracles are performed. And it is not the wood or the stones or the springs that possess the power—for these also are creatures of God—but the divine invocation and the grace of the Spirit which dwells in them. Hence all things that are Christ’s, from every material, whether it be the cross, or a church, or holy water, work miracles by the power of Christ; and bread blessed in the name of the Trinity, and even the sign of the cross made in the air, B puts demons to flight openly and overturns all sorcery and incantation, since Christ became incarnate against the devil to destroy his power. And it is manifest that He has destroyed it. For who made the demons powerless? Who brought polytheism to an end? Who destroyed the idol temples? Who cast down the oracles openly? It is Christ who destroyed all the mysteries of the devil through His own disciples. Could the Law do this? Could the prophets? Could the deicide and faithless nation of the Jews? Could the most godless and most profligate Gentiles? Who among them stood against tyrants? Who taught the nations? Who persuaded the world to know the only true God in Trinity? And he persuaded them without weapons, without riches, without royal authority, without worldly wisdom, but with the poor, the needy, the humble, and those possessing no eloquence—was it not Christ who accomplished these things through His fishermen and servants, humble at the time, mortal, oppressed, and crucified, a fact which manifests itself openly even to this hour? This, then, is the great power of the Father, the living wisdom of God, the consubstantial Word, the incorporeal seal and image, the coeternal radiance; just as this sensible beam of the visible C sun is light from light, so that spiritual light from the incorporeal and unbegotten Light illuminates all things of His and sanctifies all things. And just as the sun also passes through all things and its power [fills all], so the power of the Sun of Righteousness passes through all things. Wherefore all things that are His are holy, and His images, and His garments, through which He once performed miracles; and likewise all things relating to Him. For He bestowed power upon them, having said: "He that believeth in me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do," which are done through Him. Again, He said to them: "Without me ye can do nothing." It is evident that they have done greater things, having turned the whole world through Him from the deceit of idols unto His divine faith by the energy of the divine Spirit. Wherefore all that is His is holy, D but that which belongs to demons is detestable, and everything of the ungodly, their temples and synagogues and books is unclean. Ask the Jews and the Gentiles alike why they hold their own books in such veneration and guard them as though they were amulets? Why do they honor skins and colors painted upon them,
all of them abominable, and all the possessions of the impious, both their A temples and synagogues and books. Yet one must ask the Jews and the Gentiles: why are the books among them held in reverence and kept as though they were amulets? Is it because of the skins? Or the colors in them—the black, or the blue, or the gold in the letters? Or why, when they build synagogues, do they gather in them, not considering them simply as ordinary houses? They will say, I suppose, that because their books are written in the name of their own religion, and their synagogues built for it, they honor them as belonging to their religion. Thus, from this, the difficulty is resolved for them. For if they honor these things not because of the material, but because of God, as they say—even though they do not know the true God—how then do they accuse us, who believe in the true and only God in Trinity, and who honor all things in His name, and who furthermore depict and honor the mysteries of the economy of the Word who was truly incarnate and appeared to men, and the remains of His saints, and who do so as it were through the letters of holy icons? They teach those who do not know the Scriptures, sanctifying for us both the mind and the sight and every sense through them, just as Moses himself B set up the tabernacle according to the pattern and image of heavenly things, as we have said, and set up forged and graven cherubim in the sanctuary, and worshipped before the wooden ark, and the stone tablets, and the other things in the tabernacle. The types of divine things, therefore, are not to be rejected. And these things are sufficient against the atheists and those who choose to contend senselessly.
*Cleric.* You have sufficiently instructed us on this matter as well, holy master. It remains to learn which of the heresies crept into the Church after the seventh Ecumenical Council, and what damage it inflicted, and how one must defend against those who are caught up in it.
*Archpriest.* We have not spoken the foregoing arguments from ourselves, brother, but as many as we have from the Fathers—and of these only some selected points; for it is neither our intention to speak on everything, nor is our power sufficient for this, but trusting in God because of your request, we approach even this, which exceeds our strength.
CHAPTER XIX. Against the Latins.
C Another universal council, then, did not take place after the seventh, except for that which is called the eighth, of which the Latins also make mention. And the Acts of this council are in part manifest, in which it is possible to learn more accurately about the innovation of the Latins, and how this council placed under anathema those who dare to say that the divine Spirit proceeds from the Son, and commanded that the articles of the sacred Symbol be kept unimpaired in every way. But I do not know why the Latins have neglected these things. I believe that they have suffered this from pride and presumption—the same by which the angels of old were cast down, and by which the leaders of our race fell and perished. This, therefore, was the cause of a great fall for the Church of the Latins, which previously was indeed rightly holding the Symbol and the traditions of the Apostles and the Fathers and D
A was perfect before all; for we do not conceal the truth. For we also wished and desired to hold it as foremost, if it had only kept the character of the Orthodox faith unstained; but now the Latins, having scorned all things, and neither considering that which says, "Whoever wishes to be first, let him be the servant of all," nor that, "Everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled," but rather desiring and seeking for the things of the Greeks as lofty—they who were believers in Christ and who formerly, through the fisherman Peter and those like him, had cast aside the atheism of the Greeks—and having envied this foolish wisdom of the outsiders after the manner of the Greek philosophers, and having thought themselves to be wiser than the other brethren, and having seemed, as Paul says, wise in their own eyes, B they have fallen by a most grievous fall. And they lie (alas!) continually sick with the disease of arrogance, an incurable and grievous malady, so that they are unwilling to be healed by repentance, nor do they obey and submit themselves to the divine Symbol, which was composed by the divine Spirit through the Fathers. And they wish rather to drag us into the same madness as themselves; and boasting in the authority of the great Peter, they walk in opposition to the repentance of Peter, who, as it may be conjectured, became a teacher and first pastor to those in Rome for this very reason: that he might teach the things of conversion and point the way to repentance, proposing himself as an example. For even he himself, having been cast down by boasting and presumption, and having been led away from the confession which he had previously professed, could not have risen again except by repentance.
But I believe that what was said to him prophetically was proven C to be the case: "Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers." This indeed happened to him at that time, when after his denial he turned and strengthened many. May the loving-kindness of Christ, through the prayers of Peter, bring it about even now for those in Rome that, having turned back from the orthodoxy from which they have fallen, they may rightly return to it through the humility of Christ and a fervent confession, and may strengthen the brethren in peace and love and the good confession of the Orthodox Creed of the Fathers, according to the love and fervent faith of Peter.
But Peter, by repentance and tears, as it has been said, and by the threefold confession of his love toward Christ, was not only reunited to the choir of the apostles, D but was shown to be their head, and was ordained as pastor of the flock of Christ. The Latins, however, boasting that they possess the preeminence of Peter, and exalting themselves above others, have become the authors of defection from the right dogmas and of many other falls, both for themselves and for others; whence they have caused greater harm to the Church of Christ than all those who have ever raged against it, having rent asunder the members of Christ, and having for so long a time now provided countless occasions of scandal for all the brethren, who were redeemed by the divine blood of Christ.
Cleric: And what are these things, master, in particular, wherein the innovation of the Latins consists? Through which they have even rent asunder the Catholic Church of Christ?
CHAPTER XX. What things have been innovated by the Latins.
A Pontiff: Firstly, they have erred regarding the faith, and have laid an addition upon the most holy Creed, concerning which the Fathers provided that nothing should be added to it, nor taken away from it. And in addition to this, very many other things have been innovated by them contrary to the ancient custom of the Church; or rather, I should say almost all the practices of the Church. For they offer unleavened bread in the mysteries for a sacrifice, which was a custom for the Jews. They abolish the fasts ordained by the apostles and the Fathers, as we learn—I mean those of Wednesday and Friday, and of the two first days of holy Lent, and of other traditional fasts—which is not the custom of Christians, nor the teaching of our holy Fathers. Concerning these fasts, the apostolic canon gives command, and the whole choir of the saints has both taught and preserved them. B To fast on every Sabbath is contrary to the canon and to the institutional laws of the Fathers. For they say it is permitted to fast on one Sabbath but not on another, since the Sabbath is a grateful memory of the creation, just as the Lord’s Day is of the resurrection; and because the Sabbath is truly the prelude to the resurrection, seeing that the Lord descended with His divine soul into Hades and brought back therefrom both freedom and resurrection. Believing this, the Church offers prayers on the Sabbath for those who have fallen asleep in the faith. C Furthermore, they sanction unlawful marriages, and a father takes his daughter, and a son his mother, and brothers adhere to the wives of their brothers. They perform ordinations otherwise than the Fathers and apostles have delivered; for these taught that they should be performed by the laying on of hands, and by no means by chrism, as is the custom of the Latins; and the successor of the apostles, Dionysius, writes concerning this matter. And their sacred rites themselves are not irreproachable, but they act against the tradition; for in the first place they use unleavened bread. D Now the Jews used to offer unleavened bread, and they kept their feasts with unleavened bread; but for us all things are new, and it is delivered that perfect bread should be offered, since the perfect Bread of Life is given to us, the Word of God, united to our nature, being perfect God and having become perfect man. Therefore, the Savior likened His kingdom and dispensation to leaven, saying, "The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven," and so forth. Furthermore, the Latins do not celebrate the liturgy together, nor do they admit the laity to the sacred feast by the cup and the bread, as the Church does and has received, but they do so according to another custom. Furthermore, they administer baptism not by three immersions, but by affusion, and without the holy chrism. And they do not impart communion to the baptized infants, and to those who have attained to several years of age. And most of these infants die without being sealed, and many of them depart from this earth without the viaticum of life—the communion of the mysteries. Moreover, they do not perform the ordinations of their bishops with the laying on of hands upon the altar, according to the ancient custom of Christ
and God and his apostles; He who, having lifted up his hands, blessed them, as it is written, and the Holy Spirit sat upon the heads of the apostles, and through the imposition—as Paul says—of the hands of the presbytery, and not through ointment and chrism. “And do not neglect the gift that is in you,” he says to Timothy, “which was given to you through the imposition of my hands.” And the seven deacons, and Barnabas, and Paul himself, and all of them received B the imposition of hands, which is truly and rightly called [hand-raising]. Nor do they perform it through many bishops, as the apostolic canon says, nor through the imposition of an open Gospel, as the great Dionysius teaches; but among them one bishop often ordains a bishop, and with the chrism of some ointment, contrary to the tradition of the apostles—and even more so because they do this based on the Law. If indeed several bishops happen to be present, they do not concelebrate with the first. For they cannot; and because they do not minister together, they do not ordain the one being ordained together. Neither is it possible for them to perform the sacred rites together with others, since they cannot break the consecrated unleavened bread and distribute it to many, just as the Savior handed it down, who blessed, and broke, and distributed it to his disciples. Therefore, it is not the custom among the Latins that many presbyters or bishops should operate together. Nor do they participate together from the one bread and the one cup, as Paul received from the Lord and taught us, the pious, to do; for this reason no one among them celebrates the sacred rite with the Pope except for a deacon alone. They innovate everything against the C tradition of the apostles and of our Savior, and of the Fathers who succeeded the apostles, just as they do regarding the habit of the monks. For while there was one habit, they divided it into many parts and made many habits, which none of the Fathers ordained, but all—as with baptism—say that the habit of the monk is one and unique, concerning which the divine Dionysius also gives instruction. But if among us a "lesser" and a "greater" habit are spoken of, we do not say that these are two, but that the greater and perfect one is the one and only habit. That which is called "lesser" is a pledge of the greater, and its beginning and preface, and it was conceived later by some of the Fathers out of weakness, given as a pledge of the former, and later brought to perfection in the very thing itself that was handed down and is one. Therefore it is also called a pledge of the greater and holy habit. The great confessor among theologians and Father, Theodore the Studite, makes a long speech about this matter. But they commit not only these things against the very ancient custom of the Church, but also D six hundred other things that are discordant for Christians. Many are steeped in luxury and lasciviousness, and there is no discourse among them about this matter, whether among monks, or priests, or laity, even though the Lord punished the one who looks with impurity and called him an adulterer, and even though Paul taught so much against fornicators, and the apostles from the beginning directed by letter that believers from the Gentiles should abstain from things sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication. We say these things, not because some of our own have not fallen into fornication; for we know that some have lapsed, and we correct these through repentance; but because among the Latins, to fornicate is almost
A unblamed, and to such a degree that it is not even a hindrance to them for the priesthood at all. For many of those among them who are ordained have concubines, and children openly from fornication; and they enter public brothels openly, and they fornicate without shame, and they are not prevented from performing holy services. And the laity also, after their example, take concubines in various places, and fornicate without blushing, not considering this to be impurity and sin. Furthermore, to touch unclean and filthy animals, and especially those that have been strangled, is not good, which are forbidden not as if they were polluted, since “every creature of God is good,” as Paul says, “and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving”; but, he says, with thanksgiving, not with indifference; and because it is sanctified, he writes, “by the word of God and prayer.” But where is there any discourse at all among the Latins about this? For they even touch their own excrement, and taste urine, as many have seen. And the divine apostle Jude says, “Hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.” But these people not only do not loathe and hate this pollution of the flesh, but they even place B polluted tunics and undergarments into the very vessels in which they prepare their food. Now the pollution of the flesh signifies the corruption received from sin, by which we learn that we were conceived in iniquities, from which we cannot be cleansed except through the help of divine baptism, and afterward again through repentance. But these men bring the waste from their own members, from which this pollution comes, to their lips and mouth (alas!). And yet we learn from the Apostle to be pious and temperate in all things. “For everyone who competes in the games,” he says, “exercises self-control in all things.” And, “If food scandalizes my brother, I will never eat meat in this age,” as he says. And that one must exercise self-control and abstain from meat, Paul himself demonstrates by fasting, saying, “In fasts often,” and, “I pummel my body and subdue it.” And Peter fed on a few lupine beans, and the other disciples devoted themselves to fasts, who also handed down to us the fast of the Savior, the Fourth Day and the Sixth Day, during which they ordained that we abstain even from meat, eggs, and milk, as we have received from of old from them and from the Apostles and the Fathers.
CHAPTER XXI. Against those who eat things not handed down.
C If, therefore, it is necessary to abstain from permitted meats according to the time, and this the apostles and holy ones testify, having handed down to us to fast on the Fourth Day and the Sixth Day, it is much more necessary to abstain from the meat of filthy animals and beasts, whose very nature produces horror and disgust; and thus it is a sign of incontinence, and of a bestial mind and disposition. For D not even many...
A animals eat every kind of meat, but only the cleaner and more wholesome kinds. Therefore, for one to overindulge in such foods and to have no restraint toward them—is this not even below the beasts, and, as it were, characteristic of an irrational soul? To taste even of excrement and urine is a sign of a most unclean and filthy mind, and beyond even that of the beasts themselves. For not even beasts taste their own excrement/wastes, showing that this is not in accord with nature. Yet the Latins, who partake of these things, laugh at us for being disgusted by them, as if they themselves were some kind of refined people, and clean in their minds. And this is how they behave regarding such things. But they expose the holy places to the common B crowd, and permit not only women, but also people of every age—fornicators, the unclean, and even the impious—to penetrate the very inner sanctuaries and the dreadful places, not heeding what has been said: "Do not give what is holy to the dogs"; and, "My house shall be called a house of prayer," and what follows, and the zeal that Jesus had for this, so that the meek one himself even used a whip for this sake; and he did not permit, as it is written, that anyone should carry a vessel through the temple. But that temple was legal and a shadow of what was to come; now, however, that which is greater than the temple is here, as the Savior spoke of Himself; and yet they dare such things. It is no wonder that those who have failed regarding their conscience, living indifferently and wickedly, have also made shipwreck of their faith, as Paul teaches. Or again, that I may speak further, it is no wonder that those who have turned away from the way of acting have also devised novelties regarding the faith; for faith and life answer to one another. Therefore, those among the Orthodox who know the faith correctly but are lax regarding their life are also liable to punishment, unless they are corrected by repentance and abstinence from evil. Let the inquirer consider how, when some fall into sins, they become dull and cold and sluggish, as much in the words of faith as in works, and they are not fervent regarding zeal and customs; therefore, that saying of the brother of the Lord is true: "Faith without works is dead, as are works without faith." But what have the Latins innovated regarding repentance? When this great gift has been bestowed upon us for the hope of salvation, and another, secondary C remedy after baptism has been granted to our tears through confession and abstinence from evil, through which gift of repentance and self-accusation every believer who has sinned after baptism attains the confidence of salvation, they, by acting contrary to the rules and the tradition of the Fathers, are shown to be at fault; for they do indeed run to confess, but they do not care much about abstaining from sin; nay, they even obtain and receive from the pope and their own bishops the authority to perform certain forbidden acts, and to many is given license to use meat during the time of the most holy fast, and to others to keep a concubine, and they obtain whatever other illicit things they request; and, simply put, it is not possible to say how many things they are not ashamed to do, contrary to the Christian life and the canons of the Fathers. D Cleric: How then, master, do some of our own...
people think little of the discourse regarding such things, but only inquire about the Symbol of the Faith, and say that if they only wished to state this most holy Symbol correctly, they would not cast them off for the sake of the rest? And yet, the things mentioned above are most grave and against the orthodox and pious life, and most of the holy men have exhibited a very great zeal, even unto the point of death, for certain small matters such as these. What then is the account of this?
Archpriest: I think, brother, that those among our own people do not purely know the things that are done among the Latins. And if they do know some of these things, since many also write very much regarding azymes—that it is not permitted to offer azymes—still, the majority do not know them. And even if there are some who know, they say this by way of economy, as I believe, wishing to correct them at the opportune time regarding the faith, and thus little by little to bring them to the correction of the rest. A
CHAPTER XXII. That one must be cautious even in small things.
That the apostles also cared that religious men be corrected even regarding things that seem small is clear from what they wrote to the faithful from among the Gentiles through Barnabas and Paul, that one must abstain from things sacrificed to idols, B and from fornication, and from what is strangled. Which—that regarding the strangled, clearly—seems to be a small thing to many of our own people, but to the Latins, conversely, eating things strangled is an act that is entirely unblamable, against the apostles. Furthermore, having concubines is free from blame, and fornicating is in no way worthy of shame. But these things did not seem to be neglected by the apostles; rather, they wrote what they wrote. And they said that to fornicate and to eat things strangled is equal to idolatry; C since God legislated this even before the Law to Noah. Therefore, it is not good to despise all the commandments given by God to the ancients, but it is necessary to perform them spiritually and to discern them, and to correct them for the better, and to act above the Law, but not to break the law. "For unless your righteousness shall abound more than that of the scribes and Pharisees," He says, "you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven," and, "One iota or one tittle shall not pass from the law, until all be fulfilled." D Yet, not in a Jewish manner, but spiritually above the law. For just as instead of circumcision baptism was given to us, and the life sanctified in Christ, and instead of irrational sacrifices the rational and living bloodless sacrifice, that through the bread and cup of the true body and blood of Christ; and marriage, which is honorable and pure, not polygamy or fornication, and further virginity instead of widowhood, as the higher thing than marriage and not unequal in honor to the angels; so also in foods, temperance is given instead of intemperance, and a fast higher than the legal one. Therefore, abstinence from meat is also practiced on certain days and times. The Law, therefore, is in no way to be neglected nor abolished, but to be fulfilled more sublimely and divinely and spiritually, since those legal things were a shadow and symbolic prefigurations, but our own mysteries are the truth itself; there indeed Moses, here...
Christ the Word of God B incarnate for our sake. Therefore we are the new Israel, truly knowing and understanding the Trinity, the one God who truly is, and having received the true Messiah, Christ Jesus, the Son of the living God, and having received all things spiritually and above the law—things which we are obligated to observe, and not to live lukewarmly, or just as it happens, or to conduct ourselves irrationally and barbarically; for we are no longer darkness, but light in the Lord.
CHAPTER XXIII.
That one must represent divine things piously and according to the given custom.
What else has been innovated by them against ecclesiastical custom? Holy and venerable icons are piously proposed to the faithful for the honor of the divine archetypes and for the observance, according to the measure of the saints they portray, and they demonstrate the truth by representing it iconically. For they depict the Word incarnate for our sake, and all his divine works, miracles, and mysteries performed for our benefit, and also the all-holy form of his holy Ever-Virgin Mother, and of his saints, and whatever the evangelical history and the other divine Scriptures tell; they teach these things iconically by painting them with colors and other materials, as if by other letters. C But these people, innovating everything as has been said, also paint the holy icons in a way contrary to the established custom, often adorning them with human hair and garments instead of iconic vestments and hair, which is not an icon of hair and vestments, but the actual hair and clothing of some man, and is not an icon or figure of the archetypes. And they paint and adorn them in an irreverent manner, which is rather in opposition to them, as the canon of the seventh universal council sets forth; for it says that those things which are not profitable even to the simplest should not be depicted. Furthermore, that which is done contrary to the order is not done rightly, nor do the Fathers approve it. Moreover, they perform certain things in a theatrical manner contrary to divine laws, as when they represent the mystery of the annunciation of the Virgin Theotokos, or the crucifixion of the Savior and other D things, placing men in crossways and public squares contrary to the order, one of whom represents the Virgin, while the other they call the husband of Mary; one is called the angel, and the other the Ancient of Days, upon whom they even place white hair for a beard. For since the Latins do not have this themselves, as they cut these [hairs] off delicately and against the laws of nature, they apply foreign ones, thereby showing that they act in contradiction to themselves. For if the prophets saw God having hair as a perfect image, then hair exists in us by the grace of God and for the honor of nature. Consequently, those who cut them—and especially priests and monks, who are forbidden to serve the flesh—act contrary to the will of God and to the shame of nature. Moreover, they make the Ancient of Days holding a flying dove as if it were the Holy Spirit, again showing that they believe things contrary to themselves. For indeed, if they believe that the Spirit proceeds from the Son, why does the Son render assistance to the Ancient of Days
A so that both might send forth the dove? But they ought to have sent the Son back to her whom they call Mary. For the Spirit was not incarnate, even if He did overshadow the Virgin. But all these things are contrary to reason and alien to ecclesiastical tradition, and are performed rather to the injury of the mysteries and of Christian piety. And what of the things depicted by them for the sake of Christ’s crucifixion? They introduce the blood of irrational animals, poured into the bowels of an animal [as a substitute] for the Lord’s blood, causing it to flow from the hands and feet and side of some man who is supposedly being crucified. Who, then, is that crucified one? And what is the blood? Is it the truth or an image? If it is an image, why a man and blood? For a man is not an image. But if it is in truth a man and blood, then it is not an image. And finally, who is that one, and what is that blood? And to whom must one attribute it—to the Savior, or is it common? Oh, the absurdity! These things are against the sacred icons and the Gospels, and even more so against the dread mysteries of Christ. But from where did they receive these things? Which of the saints handed down such things? Truly, these men have innovated everything. And they do such things at crossroads and in public squares, setting up men in a manner contrary to order, and displaying dramas concerning things B that are beyond reason and marvelous, from which it is not permitted [to make theater], and calling the bird, the dove, the Holy Spirit. And such people even speak and speak in opposition concerning the feasts. And the one who represents Mary receives the irrational dove in place of the Spirit. Again, indeed, as we have said, someone is crucified, called Christ by them, and the crucifixion is not real, and the flowing blood is from some animal, to the injury of the divinely-flowing blood; yet the Lord did not command the commemoration of the mysteries to be made in this way, but as He Himself handed it down, in which He Himself acts again, and offers Himself, and that very body and blood of His is what is being ministered. Are, then, the things done by them in this way not perilous, and even exceedingly perilous? If you wish, O man, to produce such things and teach them to people, minister as He has handed it down, teach with words, write in books, depict also through colors as it has been handed down; which is the true depiction, just as is writing in books, and divine grace is in them, since the things being depicted are also holy. But these men, having gone astray C once for all, run to things they should not. And if they blame us regarding the furnace of the children, they will not rejoice at all. For we do not light a furnace, but we offer candles with lights and incense to God according to custom, and we depict an angel, we do not send a man. We only present pure children singing—just as those three children—to sing their song as it has been handed down. Which children all those who are sealed and holy also represent. And indeed all the ordained, each according to his own order, portray them: the chief priest represents the Lord, the bishops represent the first apostles, having been gifted with their grace, the presbyters the seventy, the deacons the Levites, the subdeacons and the rest represent the order of the prophets. In another way also the chief priest represents the incarnate Word of God, and the presbyters the lower orders, while the deacons represent those subject to the ministry of power. D
A And the rest of the clergy also represent the final orders, taking their place along with the orthodox people. All these have their order according to their ranks and their proportion of grace. Therefore, there is nothing discordant in portraying those three children, since it is possible for them to possess their grace. But to represent the Lord in the crucifixion, and to appear to slaughter [Him], and to shed blood, is not done truly nor according to divine tradition. And for the Mother of God to be represented by a man or a woman, and to receive a bird in place of the Holy Spirit, is very absurd. And to represent the forms of the saints by means of wigs and costumes, and to adorn them in a manner contrary to piety, is not what has been handed down by the Fathers; and in a word, to show the divine mysteries as if on a stage or in a theater is neither pious, nor traditional, nor worthy of Christians. Nor let the priests say that by performing these things in them, they are able to represent the Lord and His Virgin Mother; for it is not said correctly that this should be done in them. B For they refer [to them] in those things in which it is fitting: by baptizing, by performing the sacrifice, by washing one another's feet, and in other things which the Savior has spoken, in which it is traditional for the hierarchs and priests to labor; likewise, when singers imitate [the angels] by singing hymns, but in no way when there is a crucifixion, and false blood flows, especially animal blood, unless someone desires to shed his own blood truly in martyrdom, or also if he struggles to crucify the flesh along with its passions and desires (as Paul says, who added: "To me the world is crucified, and I to the world"), and to this all should strive. But the purity of the Virgin Mother of God, or the grace by which she conceived the Lord in the flesh by the Spirit and gave birth to Him, no one is able to imitate, since these were given to her alone; C but he who lives chastely and chooses virginity, and shows himself to be worthy of receiving grace as far as he is able, imitates her; and therefore all ought to desire to imitate her in these things as far as they are able. But if they argue that these things are to be compared with the painted divine images, their reasoning is without foundation; for in a depiction there is indeed truly an image, and the image of Christ is truly painted, and blood is depicted, and the Mother of God is in an image, and an angel, and an apostle, and a high priest, and a martyr, and the Spirit in the form of a dove, and all things are represented; the images and paintings of divine things are indeed august and venerable, but for men to imitate these things is not holy. But the Latins do not hesitate to do and devise not only these, but many other similar things. D Hence, also following Origen, they decree an end to hell, proposing some purgatory—I know not what—as a cleansing place before their torments, into which, they say, those who have sinned enter and pay penalties until the final day. No one among the saints has held this, as it destroys the words of the Lord, which assert that the punishments of hell, like eternal life, are eternal, and overturns the words of the divine Paul, who asserts of the saints who died in the faith that they have not yet received the promise for our sake, nor have they attained perfection without us, and that perfection will then be when we rise, and each shall receive together with the body, with which they either sinned or did praiseworthy things, according to their works. And
A this is the consensus of all the saints, nor does anyone among them acknowledge any preceding punishment, beyond that which consists in the fact that sinful souls are in sorrow and in inconsolable places, as if in a prison, awaiting their penalty; whereas the souls of the just are in places of light and refreshment, awaiting their blessed possession together with their bodies. He also grants a certain relief from sorrow and fear to those who have departed this life with repentance, yet imperfectly, not through some punishing fire that cleanses them, as they claim, but through sacred prayers and sacrifices offered to God on their behalf—if only they departed this life holding the correct faith, and having repented at least at the end—and through good works performed for them and other righteous acts; not indeed, as they say, contrary to the mind of the Church, through a purgatorial fire. For if a fire exists now, and its pain has an end, then the end of hell will also exist; but the Lord has called the punishments of hell eternal, just as He has called the kingdom eternal. B Now, as for what He says concerning the rich man, this is the beginning of the torments of eternal punishment, concerning those who have departed without repentance, of which he had the first fruits, scorched by his own conscience, but not yet being completely punished or cleansed. For as yet, the [time of] trial [is not]. "And these shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life." Yet, in these matters, in which they ought to be ashamed, they pride themselves and are not in the least contrite, being held fast by folly. Therefore, may it be far from us to seek their communion, especially and primarily due to the great novelty in the faith, on account of which many scandals have arisen in the Church, as we have previously stated.
Cleric. But how, master, do these men boast of themselves, saying that their Pope is the first among others, and even the only first, and that all things must be submitted to him just as they were to the coryphaeus Peter himself; and that only their Church is catholic, and therefore excels all others, whence they call only themselves catholics and not others, and boast of other similar things? C
Pontiff. To boast, to vaunt, and to be exalted belongs to the vice of pride, as it has been said. Therefore, for this very reason, they are more in need of being humbled in their conduct and contrite in their faith; "For the Lord," as David says, "resists the proud." Furthermore, as for those things about which you ask, many of our own [theologians], who are good and cultivators of virtue, sublime in their words and angelic in their intellect—among whom is the blessed Nilus of Thessalonica—have truly and irrefutably taught this; and before him, the great one among pontiffs and wonder-worker, D Gregory, who also confounded and overturned the error of the impious Barlaam and Acindynus. Many others also, from among the number of God's elect, regarding these [men...]
B innovations of the Latins in matters of dogma and in the most holy Creed, and regarding the things of which they speak so haughtily, have written in a manner worthy of themselves and divine. And sufficient are those things spoken by them for the sake of the truth and for the correction of those who have fallen. Whence we also look to those things which our own [Fathers] have said, as coming from the Apostles and the Fathers, and we shall be sufficient to extinguish the darts of our opponents, keeping for ourselves the magnitude of the truth. But that we may also give you here a small understanding, we speak as we are able from the things said by the saints: that to say the Latins hold the primacy of Rome is not necessary to gainsay, nor does this harm the Church. Let them only show him to be in the faith of Peter and of the successors of Peter; and let him have all the things of Peter, and be first, and the vertex and head of all, and the supreme high priest. For this indeed is written concerning the patriarchs of Rome who have been at various times, and this throne is apostolic, and the high priest who sits upon it, holding the right faith, is called the successor of Peter; and none of those who think and speak rightly will gainsay these things. Since even the second synod, although it judged the rights of the Constantinopolitan see to be equal, said that the Roman pontiff is first, and although it thought the bishop of Constantinople could do as much as the bishop of Rome, it said that the former nevertheless excels as second after the latter. And the fourth council, in which three hundred and thirty bishops gathered, in the same renewed statute said that the rights of the Roman and Constantinopolitan pontiffs were equal. But the Fathers of the council called Leo himself, who wrote the epistles to the council, "apostolic," asserting that they received his voice as that of Peter, and they named his epistle a pillar C of the right faith; and the Fathers of the sixth and seventh synods and of the others call that same seat apostolic. And we do not take away the laws of the Fathers; provided only that the Roman pontiff professes the right faith of Silvester and Agatho, of Leo and Liberius, of Martin and Gregory, then we shall proclaim him apostolic and first of the other high priests, and we shall offer him obedience, not only as to Peter, but even as to the Savior Himself. But if he is not the heir to the faith of those saints, he will not be the heir to the throne either; and not only will he not be apostolic, or first, or a Father, but he will be an adversary, a destroyer, and an enemy of the apostles. Hence I remember, brother, having said something of this sort in Constantinople to one of the Latin party. For when he had approached me to converse, I answered his arguments with whatever God gave me to say from the sayings of His saints, and concerning Him and His divine truths. Finally, "Why," he asked, "do you enter into communion with the Eastern prelates, the so-called patriarchs, and make mention of them in the Church, even though they are barbarians and do not know what Christianity is, yet you do not accept the Pope, although he is wise and [is supported by] the learned men with whom he is surrounded?" To whom I replied that we do not in any way spurn the true Pope, nor do we reject him from our communion, but rather we are one with him as with Christ, and we call him father and pastor. He, however, D
began to ask how this can be, while we not only do not have the Pope among us as a communicant, but even call him a heretic? I truly answered him that we have an unbroken communion and union in Christ with Pope Peter and Linus, Clement and Stephen, Hippolytus, Sylvester, Innocent and Leo and Agapetus, Martin and Agatho, and popes and patriarchs similar to them, and that there is no reason for us to be separated from them; and this is evident from the fact that we celebrate all these whom we call doctors and fathers, and we keep their holy memory, and we honor them as patriarchs and fathers, since we preserve the symbol of their faith undefiled, and as they baptized, so we baptize, and as they performed the sacred rites, so we do, and as they commended their souls to Christ in the symbol, so we commend ours. B If, therefore, anyone is like these in the symbol of faith, in conduct, and in the customs of orthodoxy, this father is in communion with us. And as we have Peter himself, so too the ties of that union will remain for a long time and for ages of ages. For the affairs of orthodoxy remained with those saints for a thousand years, and their orthodox faith remains with us. For it is clear that they confessed the divine Symbol just as we do, and the councils bear witness to this in their definitions, all of them, but more explicitly the sixth and seventh ecumenical councils. But from the time that innovation occurred regarding the divine Symbol, we no longer find the Pope, nor the apostolic man, nor the Father; since those who are now called popes are not to be found even according to the faith C and confession of the apostle Peter, but only according to the denial. And just as Peter, having denied Christ, is no longer Peter, nor apostle, nor first, so also he who is called pope will no longer be pope, since he does not have the faith of Peter, which Peter, as one who loves, sealed with a triple confession after having denied Him three times; nor will he be a successor, unless he is enriched by the good confession of divine Peter and his successors, which the Father revealed from above. When we had said these things, our interlocutor marveled and grew silent. And this is the truth. And the Lord, who is the truth, says: D "No one knows the things of a man, except the spirit that is in him, and no one has known the things of God, except the Spirit that is in him." Who, therefore, will boast as if he has thought of something higher than the Spirit? For the Fathers teach the divine things in the Spirit, and in the Scriptures. And this also is true; for the Lord says: "Scrutinize the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life, and they are those which bear witness about me." Who, then, will dare to devise new things against the Scriptures, and to speak against the Fathers whom the Spirit had filled? For if the Lord said: "Scrutinize the Scriptures," and Paul: "Christ died for us according to the Scriptures, and was crucified, and rose on the third day according to the Scriptures," and the Lord, beginning from Moses and all the prophets, interpreted in all the Scriptures what was concerning himself, nor did any of the apostles
A and Fathers set forth for the faithful a teaching without witness? Who then would dare, in opposition to the Scriptures and the Fathers who possess the Spirit, to set forth another faith? And to abolish that which was revealed through the Spirit to the Fathers, just as it was to Peter? Or was it not through the Spirit that the divine Fathers who contended for the Spirit also set forth the confession of the Spirit together? I say and profess that it was through the Spirit, and he who does not speak thus is a stranger to the Holy Spirit. Do you not know, brother, who it was that set forth the sacred Symbol of the faith?
Cleric: By no means, master, I do not know.
Archbishop: Then listen carefully. When peace was restored to the Church, he who sows tares, acting to the detriment of the Church, just as he had earlier acted to the detriment of the Savior while He conversed among men, stirred up the Jews against Him; and after His Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension, and the coming of the divine Spirit, he again stirred up the Jews and a multitude of antichrists and false apostles against the Spirit-filled apostles, to destroy their preaching; B such as that magician Simon, Demas, and Hermogenes, Hymenaeus and Philetus, Cerinthus and Carpocrates, a certain Manes and Paul of Samosata, and Sabellius with Arius and Origen, and many other deceivers, among whom were later Eunomius and Macedonius and Apollinarius, and others like them who devised new things against the truth.
CHAPTER XXIV.
Concerning the first synod.
But after piety had shone forth more brilliantly, and with the help of God the All-Good had flourished again through the sincere faith of the pious Constantine, just as Christ had shattered like the gates of hell all those apostates and devastators C and, while the cruel persecution of the most impious tyrants pressed upon them, had preserved the integrity of the faith through the apostles and their successors, so also in the time of the pious Constantine He crushed the enemies of piety; by the most unshakeable confession of the true faith of the divine Peter, He guarded it through the Fathers as one unshaken. And having cast down the impious Arius together with many other ungodly men, He has preserved from that time even to this hour the dogmas of His orthodox faith intact for us, His pious servants. For with the help of that first Christian Emperor, by a divine council of holy confessor Fathers and pontiffs, who were numbered as three hundred and eighteen, impiety was overthrown, and Arius was struck with anathema, D he who with most impious audacity, blaspheming, preached that the Son and the Spirit of God and Father were creatures, whereas the three divine persons were called consubstantial by the Fathers, which had been preached by the prophets and the Gospel
For this is how it was proclaimed by the prophets and the Gospel, as we have demonstrated through the prophets—among whom the illustrious forefather of God, David, is preeminent, saying: “By the word of the Lord the heavens were established, and all their power by the Spirit of his mouth.” A And the Saviour himself says in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, that all are to be baptized into this. And, “The only-begotten Son (the Gospel says), who is in the bosom of the Father”; and, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”; and, “All things were made through him”; and, “In him was life”; and, “I and the Father are one,” and all such things. And over these, the Fathers set forth the holy Symbol, or sign of the faith, subjecting to anathema those who thought otherwise.
CHAPTER XXV.
Concerning the Second Synod.
B But because nothing had been set forth in clear terms concerning the Holy Spirit—for at that time the accursed Arius was blaspheming concerning the Son, while later the impious Macedonius taught those things which pertain to the Spirit, and called him a creature and a work of the Son—again a gathering of the priests of God is convened, and this is summoned by him who is called great and is truly the God-given emperor, Theodosius. And while the place of the first synod was Nicaea, that of this second one was the city of Constantine, beloved of Christ, which was fittingly to seal the truth of the Trinity, as one founded and built up in the Trinity, C and as one that proclaimed the mystery of the Trinity purely, and always struggled and contended for the Trinity, and was warred against by the enemies of the Trinity, and was one that ordained the heralds of the Trinity and established them in the Spirit, and sent them out into the whole world as apostles. The greatest, then, of the confessors and Fathers also gathered in this synod; for there was Gregory, the voice of theology, and the other Gregory, the luminary of Nyssa, or rather of the whole world, the brother and companion of Basil the Great; Amphilochius of Iconium, and before him Meletius; and moreover Eustathius of Antioch, and Timotheus of Alexandria; and with them many others who shone in theological doctrine and signs. D Their number was divided into three fifties, and this number signified the perfection of the divine Trinity, and provided a true and perfect confession of the Spirit, whom they taught should be adored as consubstantial with the Father and the Son. Three fifties, indeed, in honor of the Trinity, and they are perfect and equal because the Trinity is consubstantial and alone perfect. And the fifties are united, because the Trinity is indivisible; and they are fifty, because in the divine Pentecost the Spirit appeared more clearly to the apostles. Therefore, this second divine general synod set forth a clearer discourse concerning the Spirit, having composed this exposition from the Scriptures. And the first synod had said only, “And in the Holy Spirit,” which the prophets and the Gospel proclaim, since David indeed said: “Do not take your holy Spirit from me”; Evan-
and the Gospel says, A “Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” But these others add: “The Lord, the life-giving, who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified together, who spoke through the prophets; in one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.” And as for “the Lord,” they take this from the epistle of the divine Paul, who says: “Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” And “the life-giving” they take from the holy Gospel, which writes: “It is the Spirit that gives life.” In like manner, they also take “who proceeds from the Father” from the Gospel, nor do they dare to add anything of their own. For the Savior himself said: “The Spirit of B truth, who proceeds from the Father.” And by saying “of the truth,” he showed that the Spirit is his own, as being consubstantial and inseparable, and perpetually abiding in him; but by saying “who proceeds from the Father,” he testifies to the principle and cause of the Spirit himself, namely, that he is from the Father, just as the Son himself is. For he says even concerning himself: “I proceeded from the Father and have come”; and again: “I came out from the Father and have come into the world.” If, therefore, it is necessary to understand this according to the economy, yet also “in the beginning he was, and was with God,” the Truth testifies that the Father is the cause of himself and of the Spirit; since the Father alone is the fountain and principle and root and cause of the Word and of the Spirit. Since, moreover, the Father is himself the Father of lights. And lights from light, the one by generation, the other by procession, are the Son and the Spirit. “In your light we shall see light,” sings David. And the Father is the only fountain-head divinity, says a certain theologian. Thus, the Fathers have added nothing contrary to the Scriptures. Whence also, the phrase “who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified C together” the Fathers gathered from the holy Scriptures. For David says: “Let us worship,” and “Glorify him.” That the Trinity is glorified is apparent also from the hymn of the Seraphim: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord Sabaoth; heaven and earth are full of his glory.” Do you see one glory of the Trinity preached? For the word “Holy,” said three times, as the Fathers have stated, signifies the Trinity. But “Lord,” said once, manifests the unity of its glory and nature. “Full,” he says, “are heaven and earth of his glory,” not “of their” glory, since the glory and nature and power of the three persons are one, and the holy Trinity is one God and Lord having one glory and worship. Therefore, the holy Spirit is worshipped and glorified together with the Father and the Son by the angels themselves, since David says: “And let all his angels worship him,” but also by us ourselves, D since David says to us: “Come, let us worship and weep before the Lord who made us.” Therefore, the Trinity is one Lord, and the angels say: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord”; and there is one name of the Trinity of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, in which we have been baptized, since the Trinity is one and the only God, in that the Father is God and the Word was God, who was in the beginning with God. And: “Why have you lied to the Sp—
And to us, David says: "Come, let us worship and weep before the Lord who made us." The Trinity is therefore one Lord, as the angels also say: "Holy, holy, holy, Lord." And one is the name of the Trinity of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in which we are baptized, since the Trinity is one and the only God; because the Father is God, and the Word, who was in the beginning with God, was also God. And, "Why have you lied to the Holy Spirit?" A Peter teaches concerning the Spirit. And there are not three gods, but one God in Trinity. For the essence and nature, and the power and counsel and movement and energy and providence and kingdom and lordship and glory of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one and indivisible. For the Father was never without the Word or the Spirit, nor the Word without the Father and the Spirit, nor the Spirit without the Father and the Son, because the Trinity is indivisible and inconfusible. Inconfusible, indeed, because in it there is truly Father, truly Son, truly Holy Spirit; but indivisible, because the Father is one and without beginning, B and the things which are from Him are without beginning and eternal and proceed without passion. For the Father is the fountain of the supersubstantial Godhead, and the Son and the Spirit are, as Dionysius says, like flowers and supersubstantial lights, possessing one radiance, just as they have one nature and power and counsel and energy, and they do not differ in any opinion or wisdom after the manner of angels and men. "For 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." But he will reveal as much as he who gives wills, and as much as he who receives through the Spirit is able. And, "The Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God." And, "No one knows the things of God except the Spirit who is in Him." Do you see how, according to their capacity, the mystery of the indivisible and inconfusible Trinity, of the only God of all, was revealed to the saints? C Henceforth, do not seek further; let what has been said and given by God suffice you, since Peter also recognized the Son by revelation from the Father, and again, taught by the Son, he learned from Him the Father, saying: "I manifested Your name to men, and I have made Your name known to them, and I will make it known." And things which are fearful and unknown even to the angels have been revealed to us through the Spirit. Paul says: "But these things God revealed to us through the Spirit." Let us therefore keep what has been revealed to the saints, and let us not introduce our own ideas. The Spirit of truth, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of the Father, the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of the Son—these denote consubstantiality, the equality of service, the one principle, energy, and power. D "By the Spirit of His mouth," who proceeds from the Father, the Spirit who is from God—these things demonstrate the one cause and source and the one principle of the Father, who is the author of the Son and of the Spirit. For it is also written concerning the Son: "I and the Father are one." "He who has seen me, has seen the Father." "All things that the Father has are mine." "All things that are yours are mine, and mine are yours." As the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son gives life to whom He wills. And similar things, by which the unity of nature and power and counsel and the indivisibility are shown. And again: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was in the beginning with God, and the Word was God"; and likewise the utterances: "Father," "Only-begotten," "He who is in the bosom of the Father," "He who is the radiance of glory"—all these things demonstrate that the Son is consubstantial, just as these things are stated again concerning the Spirit: "He will take of mine, and will announce it to you," indicating
B the revelation and instruction given to us. For Paul says that He revealed these things to us through the Spirit. And David says, "The hidden and secret things of your wisdom you have made known to me," openly by the Spirit. Since also, "Take not your Holy Spirit from me," he asks for, and David spoke in the Spirit. And the command, "Receive the Holy Spirit," is a bestowal of grace. For the Spirit did not then begin to exist, nor did He receive a beginning of being, seeing that He is always with the Father and co-eternal with the Son. And that it was a bestowal of grace is evident. "Whose sins you remit," He says, "they are remitted," and so on.
That the gift given through the Word incarnate for our sake in the Holy Spirit was one of the gifts is evident from this: "A rod shall come forth from the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise from the root, and the Spirit of God shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and strength, the Spirit of knowledge and piety; the Spirit of the fear of God shall fill Him." Who is this? The one who is from the seed of David (if you truly confess with us), Jesus Christ. He, indeed, being indivisible with the Father and the Spirit, and having all things from the Father, and working with the Spirit, having become incarnate, received and corporeally took that which is of the Spirit. But He who has the Spirit receives gifts, not just some portion, but the entire fullness of the Godhead, that is to say, all its powers. Since the Word, who is God, possessed these things with the Spirit; and He alone having become incarnate (for neither the Father nor the Spirit is incarnated), He had all the operations of the Spirit and the Father even in His flesh. C Therefore Paul also says, "For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily." Do you see that he said "bodily"? And since that most holy body became the temple and tabernacle of all glory, and for our sake was a first-fruits and sacrifice from our nature, we receive grace from Him. We do not participate in the nature of God, but we receive the gifts of His grace. That which John, the son of thunder, said: "And of His fullness we have all received." We did not receive the fullness, but *of* the fullness, so that we obtain not the nature, but grace; for that which we each receive is a part and is suited to our capacity; but there is the fullness, because it is the incarnate person of the Word who has the fullness of the Godhead.
What then did we receive? Grace for grace. Do you see that we received grace, not nature? For that divine temple of our Savior alone had the person of the Word in inward union, because the Word became a person to His humanity, and alone appeared as God-man, and alone by person remained one from two natures, while being at once God and man. Nor has anyone among the angels or mortals been made a participant of the nature of God, but individuals partake of graces in a measure suited to them, and of divine illumination, and many became gods, but only according to grace. If, therefore, the Lord's body remains a creature, even if united to the Lord, it becomes a participant D of the Godhead only in that it is intimately conjoined to the Word
and subsists in His Person, how could anyone dare to say that it has received the Person of God? For if the thing breathed upon A were a person and not a grace, then the disciples would have participated in the person of the Spirit, and it would have begun to exist only at that time; which is the most impious of blasphemies. Since, therefore, we have received grace from His fullness in place of grace—that is, God Himself with us in place of the Law, and the truth in place of the shadow—as it is said: "The law," he says, "was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ"; let us run to grace and truth, let us confess the gifts of grace, and let us preserve the grace for ourselves, and let us follow the Fathers whom the divine Spirit moved, for the prophets proclaimed what they said: "In one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church." Zacharias, too, the father of the Forerunner, said this concerning the Father: "As He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets, who have been since the world began, that we should be saved from our enemies." And the Mother of the Word of God according to the flesh also sang: "As He spoke to our Fathers," saying, "to Abraham and his seed forever." And it is written in the Acts: "Whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began." B The Spirit, therefore, whom God poured out in the last days upon all flesh, as Joel said, has spoken and has built up the catholic Church, which has as its foundation the confession of Peter, instituted by revelation, on account of which he was named Peter, namely: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." For this is our true foundation of confession, on account of which Peter himself is called blessed as having received it from the Father, and we, having received it, are placed in safety, being super-edified upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone, whose habitation in the Spirit we are. "In whom you also are being built together," Paul says, "for a habitation of God in the Spirit." Do you see? This Church is erected in the Trinity; "in whom you also are being built together in Christ Jesus," Paul says, that is, in the Son Himself, "for a habitation of God," that is, of the Father, "in the Spirit." C For in this the Trinity is clearly confessed, and the Holy Spirit speaks within this Church. Wherefore, the three gathered in the name of Jesus Christ have Him in their midst; and whoever loves Christ, loves in the Spirit; "for no one can say that Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit," D and he is with the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and the Trinity is in him, not by nature, indeed, but by grace. "For I," He says, "and the Father will come and make our home with him." Therefore, the Church is catholic; it is not Roman, nor Jerusalemite, nor Constantinopolitan, nor Antiochene, nor Alexandrian, but it is catholic and one; which is at once holy and apostolic, having holiness indeed from the Holy Spirit, but apostolic dignity from the preaching of the apostles. Since it holds the word of truth entire, and is powerful in apostolic discourses, and rejoices in the sanctification of the Spirit, it is itself one and holy and apostolic, or ma-
- A re truly, it is of Jesus Christ, who chose the apostles and strengthened them with the Holy Spirit. In this Jesus Christ, as in a living and elect cornerstone, every building is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord, just as Paul says: "For other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ," and, "If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be anathema." B Therefore, this faith must be guarded, brothers—a faith which indeed has Christ as its foundation, but has as its honorable stones the apostles and prophets, and the entire divine chorus, I mean, of pontiffs and martyrs, of heralds and righteous men, and the whole crown of saints. Let us beware of injuring the sincere and irreproachable confession of this faith, which, as has been said, was derived from the prophets, apostles, and Fathers, since it has been sealed in the Spirit. For the first council indeed began the Symbol and announced it; but the second clarified it, or rather perfected it regarding the incarnation of the Word and the Holy Spirit. Since the discourse on religion has been abundantly handed down, and the sign of the faith has been sealed by the divine Scriptures and the most holy Gospel, it was deemed by all the pious to be firm and altogether shaken in no respect down to the smallest detail. And this sign was confirmed by the Fathers as being that of a true and orthodox confession, and it was declared that those who dare to propose another faith to those who are turning [to the truth] are to be held subject to the anathema. C
CHAPTER XXVI. On the Third Synod.
Therefore, the third of the ecumenical synods, consisting of two hundred Fathers, with Cyril presiding, did not at all bring forth another faith, but considered as firm and alone divine that faith which had been signed by the Fathers both in the first council at Nicaea and in the second at Constantinople; and it established by its own decree the truths for which they had been summoned—those concerning the incarnation of the Only-Begotten—while adding absolutely nothing to the Symbol; and it cast out the impious Nestorius, who fruitlessly spread godless dogmas and denied our intimate union with the divine nature and our salvation.
CHAPTER XXVII. On the Fourth Synod.
The great fourth council at Chalcedon, at which six hundred and thirty Fathers were present, discussing this divine Symbol more clearly, added nothing to it. It honors it, and, in another definition, explains the points for which it was gathered, acting as a collaborator through a letter
A having divine Pope Leo as its supporter, through those who represented him, and overthrowing Dioscorus of Alexandria and Eutyches the presbyter and their followers.
CHAPTER XXVIII. De synodo quinta.
And the fifth, of the one hundred and sixty holy Fathers, to which Pope Agapetus was the exarch in the city of Constantine, gathered against Origen and Didymus and Evagrius, men of ancient malice, both concerning the resurrection of the dead and many other questions, decreed the same things as those before it regarding the divine Symbol.Chapter XXIX. De synodo sexta et septima.
The sixth, of the one hundred and sixty-five, and the seventh, of the three hundred and sixty Fathers—the former in the New Rome of Constantine against Honorius of old Rome and Sergius and Pyrrhus of Constantinople and other remaining Monothelites, the latter at Nicaea, the second in order, against the impious iconoclasts—more clearly and with much zeal set forth matters concerning the divine Symbol. B And the sixth sets forth in their very words both the Symbol of the first council and that of the second, and commands that nothing be added to this. But the seventh, while having that of the first and second, which we also proclaim in church, writes it out in their very words. And it subjects those who add to or take away from this, if they be priests, to deposition, and if they be clerics or laymen, to anathema. Thus was this august Symbol confirmed from every side, sealed by the Fathers, proclaimed, and confirmed by their miracles and words and writings and by the end of their lives. For this, as we have said, those being baptized confessed in the church, and those receiving the priesthood proclaimed, and those dying acknowledged as viaticum, and offered to God as a final gift; their relics, and the healings and miracles C fulfilled through them even to this day, bear witness to this divine Symbol, through which the Church attained peace, and the members of Christ were joined to one another, and Christ, our peace, was united as Head to His members in all things and took delight in them. But to love primacy, and to insult and pride oneself over one's brothers, and to seem to sit not on the throne of Peter but upon the clouds and even higher, and this likeness to God—just as it once brought death into the world, so now it has affected many with a death far more grievous. Hence the Church has been endangered with destruction, the members of Christ have been torn apart, and enmity has been set between the sons of peace whom God, who is love, gathered in love, pouring out His charity. Alas! what ruin from the demon! and arguments regarding this matter worthy of the Greek atheists—who formerly worshipped many gods or rather, it is better to say, no god—and depravations of Scriptural words, and false interpretations of the sayings of the Fathers, only to protect their pride! O man, all with one mindA the Fathers were in agreement, and not once or twice or thrice, but even seven times over, as you know. And God has borne witness to them. But you, do you steal some divine utterance, corrupting the word of a holy Father, necessarily for the sake of another question, and not the one for which it was spoken by him, and according to a different sense, and do you force this to be understood and to be thought according to your own erroneous opinion? You are therefore deceiving yourself. And if you bring forward Cyril or Basil, or Athanasius who is truly great, and Augustine and Ambrose—I myself also bring these forward before you, and even many more, since I rather boast confidently in them, and I reject from my mind your Hellenic arguments upon which you yourself B pride yourself. But I will add for my part, besides those already mentioned, other saints: I speak of Dionysius, and Hierotheus with him, and the wonder-working Father Gregory, and the philosopher and martyr Justin, and those before him and with him, furthermore Gregory and Gregory, John the Chrysostom, and Maximus and John the philosophers, and with them the whole choir of the Fathers. But you indeed will stand contending, and swelling with syllogisms; I, however, will say that you corrupt and spurn the Scriptures and the Fathers with false explanation, and that you are a disciple of the Greeks and not of the Fathers. Yet if I wanted, I possess arguments that are superior to yours against your sophisticated reasonings. But I reject these, as not entering through the door, and I will compose my proofs from the Fathers and their words. And you indeed will oppose the words of Aristotle and Plato, and also those of your new teachers, but I will oppose the fishermen to you, and the sincerity of their preaching, and the true wisdom which you judge to be folly; and also the mystery of piety which Paul rightly proclaims to be great, and I will make your wisdom foolish, and I will say: "No one has seen God at any time"; remain in the things which you have learned and of which you have been assured, knowing from whom you have learned them; avoid foolish questionings; I charge you before Christ Jesus, keep the good confession; and "no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid"; and "if anyone preaches a gospel to you other than what you have received, let him be accursed." And thus you will depart empty, but I will be glorified in the glory of my Fathers. For never will the cross of Christ be emptied, even if the preaching seems to some to be foolishness. From whence did we receive what we have received? From the Spirit. And "as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God," and it is not permitted to move the boundaries of these [sayings]. See, therefore, that you do not become a blameworthy child, having been born out of those who were born in the Spirit, and that you do not appear as a crooked and perverse generation, among those who pursue not the things of the Lord, but their own, and who walk not unto edification, but unto destruction. But what does this great contention mean for you? To know God? Know Him as you have learned. To know Him as He is? Yet you will never be able to learn that; for He is incomprehensible, and not to you only, but also to the angels, as the doctor of the golden tongue shows you; if [you look] to him and those like him...
hold anything above these in your own mind. But who knows the nature of God, or has declared it? Be persuaded, then, by the friends of God, to whom He Himself appeared as far as it was possible, as He did to Moses before, to whom He was revealed, as He was to Peter, to whom He became manifest, as to Paul and those like Paul. And be persuaded by this Paul, who, though he ascended even to the heavens—I dare to say—higher than you, and heard ineffable things more than you, said: "Obey your leaders and submit to them." The leader of our souls is He, as are all the Fathers of piety, who all together set forth the Symbol of the faith, who confessed it, and who together sealed it. If, then, by disobeying them and rejecting them, you reject Christ, as Christ Himself said, you disobey Christ and will be judged worse than the Pentapolitans there. For it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah, He says, in the day of judgment than for those who did not receive the preaching—that is, the preaching of Christ, when it was made by the Apostles and the Fathers. And if he who scandalizes one of the little ones is guilty of such great condemnation, what of him who scandalizes and leads astray so many? May you be humbled in imitation of the peaceful and meek Savior, return to those who are brothers according to God, and become one with Christ, with them, and with the servants of Christ, our Fathers, confessing rightly the Symbol which was set forth by them, as they set it forth, so that here and there we may be one in Christ Jesus, as Christ prayed. D
Clericus: Thanks be to God, master. For we have sufficiently learned the things regarding the Latin innovation, and that it stumbles not only concerning the faith—since it is directed against the sacred Symbol of the faith—but also against almost all the customs and traditions of the holy Church. It remains for us to be instructed regarding their communion, and we ought diligently to examine that which is called "union."
Pontifex: It is necessary, brother, since the separation did not occur simply for our predecessors. For you know, as the book of union also reveals, how, on account of a second and third, and even a fourth marriage, a certain schism arose for many years, as we learn, and about certain other questions which seem minor, some have shown great zeal. If, therefore, for the sake of the good order of our pious conduct, great effort has often been made—since the rule of action is preached among us just as the rule of faith—how much more should we be concerned about the faith.
Clericus: Thus it is in truth, Father. But we still beseech you, teach us if any other weed has sprouted against the orthodox faith after this one of the Latins.
A
CHAPTER XXX. Against Barlaam and Acindynus and their like, who impiously reject the divine grace of the all-holy Trinity.
Pontifex: Indeed, brother, various heresies have arisen which, like evil coals, have been extinguished by the dew of divine grace. But the last conflagration, more grievous than that idolatrous furnace of Nebuchadnezzar, was kindled by the impious Barlaam and Acindynus, who, by thinking in the manner of the Greeks, revived their errors and renewed a false wisdom, which you would better call folly.
Clericus: We would gladly hear you discourse on this heresy, Master. We desire to learn what it is and how it began.
Pontifex: It is not for us to say what it is and how it began; but he who wishes to read the sacred monuments of the annals which the orthodox Church of Christ has raised up, will know everything precisely: first, those which were established against that impious Barlaam the Calabrian; B second, those against Acindynus, who was endangered in the same matter as Barlaam and was most dangerous; and third, those against a third, who—because the Church of Christ has many times suffered tumults through him and other various similar heresiarchs—was many times (I speak of the man who was utterly dead in his soul and possessed by the heavy stupor and deep sleep of impiety) prepared against [the Church]; indeed, he who reads will understand how diverse, how deceitful, and at the same time how impious and damnable this heresy was, and who was its orchestrator, and who were the branches that grew from it—not only barren and exhausting the soil of piety, but also thorny and very rough, troubling and tearing apart the plantations C of the Church.
CHAPTER XXXI. On St. Gregory of Thessalonica, the Wonder-Worker.
Whoever, however, wishes to know the matter more clearly will learn better from the writings of him who, like another sun, rose upon the earth at that time, capable of putting to flight the dark night of impiety by word and example. This is that wisest Gregory who later presided over the Church of Thessalonica, a great light placed upon a shining lampstand, a great luminary of piety visible even before his episcopate. For, clinging to God from his youth, having left behind his native royal city, and having abandoned also his kin, his training, his wisdom, and the imperial palace, [and] seeking God in the wilderness, he first D dedicated his kin to God, and by obedience and integrity of life reached the summit of contemplation; and, illuminated by the intercession of the most pure Mother of God, whom he held in great love and from whom he prayed to be illuminated, having received from thence the pledges of the future age, by the power of this illumination, he would now contend eximiously, as if testing this blessed gift, and now, turned to other things, he entered into the light together with the angels, into whose company he came.
A He therefore, being worthy of this contemplation and illumination, wrote with great erudition, and by his most clear works, every seeker shall attain to knowledge, as well as by those of many others who labored with him, but especially by the works of Philotheus, beloved of God, that most illustrious patriarch of Constantinople, and of Neilos, who succeeded him and most wisely governed that same Church; and also of that other Neilos, a most divine man, who had received the primacy of the Thessalonians, though he attempted to decline it, and who wrote most illustrious, most true, and very powerful treatises against the innovations of the Latins, as well as against this miserable heresy of Barlaam and Acindunus. B Whose most divine writings indeed, as well as those of that blessed Nicholas Cabasilas, who attained a noble victory through his piety and the purity of his life, and of that other Theophanes of Nicaea, a wise man and a new confessor, and of Isidore of Thessalonica, who in no way yielded to his wise namesake of Pelusium in theological doctrine—all these fully recount the deeds of the aforementioned heresy. Therefore, it is from the works of these men that the studious man must learn the things he seeks; and having confidently read them through, he will recognize how exitious the heresy of Barlaam was, and how damnable the most dangerous ineptitudes and dangerous blasphemies of Acindunus are. C For Barlaam, to speak briefly, being imbued with the errors of the Greeks, and imagining that there is nothing beyond those things which fall under the senses, that wretched man believed the only illumination, knowledge, and wisdom of God to consist in the contemplation of things that are made and are visible. Furthermore, he believed and declared that to know the course of the sun and moon, and the shapes and influences which the foolish observation of profane philosophers teaches, was knowledge and illumination; he also impiously called divine knowledge and illumination the proportions of numbers, the multiform and varied theorems of geometry, the harmony and tones of music, and that sophistic folly which the Greeks falsely call by the name of logic. D He called anyone who was ignorant of the principles of these things, or who possessed no knowledge of profane doctrines, insane and darkened, especially if he were ignorant of that stolid science and doctrine which concerns the movements of the stars—which the Greeks, who rank creatures among the gods and attribute to the creature the honor due to the Creator, call "theology." In these things, therefore, that most unwise man placed theology and wisdom; and he claimed that their comprehension was the gift of God and true illumination. The blinded man, and creature himself, unwillingly wicked, even called that true contemplation which anyone who wishes can enjoy—even the most impure mind of men—which the human mind appears more precious and more sublime than the stars that move, since it can comprehend and perceive these things; nay, since man has been made the lord and spectator of visible creation, since for his sake creation itself was made, and because of him it was subjected to corruption, just as Paul teaches, saying: "Vani-
vanity," not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope." Now, that foolish man Barlaam, in his extreme wickedness, called a mind that is unversed in the technical disciplines a mind irrational and dark—not knowing, empty man, that these things were made for our sake B and that our bodies might be governed and put to the service of our present life; whereas other things, prepared for us by God before the foundation of the world, are different, as He Himself will say at that time: "Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." The goods of that kingdom, says Paul, are such that "eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for those who love Him." And the Lord instructs that "heaven and earth will pass away." Paul also forbids us from being anxious about the things that are seen; for the things that are seen are temporary, but the things that are not seen are eternal. And: "The heavens shall be folded up as a scroll." And Peter says: "The heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with heat, and the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up." Seeing then that all these things are to be dissolved, what manner of persons ought we to be? In holy conduct and godliness, waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, concerning which we ought to be anxious. For what is the benefit from the contemplation of created things? How much the soul grows sluggish from it! How much it is worn down by it, unless there also grows from it presumption, and an impious opinion of the proud spirits of darkness is sown into insane minds! It is not that the creatures themselves do this—for they are good, being created by a good Creator—but the anxious consideration of them, which, as some say, the apostate contemplated (for he was not worthy of a higher contemplation, being from the beginning arrogant and haughty, even though he presided over the highest order of angels); and looking upon this, he became proud and boasted that he would set his throne above the clouds and the stars, and be like the Most High, C ignoring Him who is truly the Most High. It is He whom every mind ought always to contemplate as the eternal Mind, the Father with the Word and the Spirit, and to have desire for Him, and always to be stretched toward Him, the Maker of creatures, and to glorify Him unceasingly as the angels do. And to act according to the angels, perceiving what the works of God are, one ought to celebrate Him with hymns and praises. For He says: "When the stars were made, all my angels praised me with a loud voice and adorned me with hymns." Do you see? They are humble, and they immediately set their mind toward the contemplation and glorification of God; for He Himself is the producer of all, and the creatures were not made because of Him, but because of us, that our bodies might be governed. But the things pertaining to our souls are incomprehensible. What need, then, is there to be anxious about corruptible things, which do not benefit those who study them—unless one contemplates them only so as to render thanks and praises to God, as is the custom of the saints, and as David testifies in many D psalms by proclaiming the works of God. But that unclean man, having entirely forgotten this, [pursues] the inanities of the Greeks.
and the teachings and opinions of Plato, and what they call "Ideas," which the impure man considered to be illumination, knowledge, and purification. Yet these are inferior to human understanding, as they are grasped and measured by it, and are found to be subject to examination, especially those things concerning the motion of the stars, none of which provides any benefit to man. For what is the point of knowing where the sun, the moon, and the rest of the stars move, unless for some fleshly need, as sailors use them? And yet, such people often understand the affairs of the stars more crudely than those who are considered more subtle among the wise. But if he discourses on the origin of things—alas, what a blind aberration! How impiously he speaks, offering divine honor to created things! For he does not believe that our affairs are governed by the providence of God, but by fate, fortune, and spontaneity, as Epicurus teaches, or by the influence of the stars, which is the height of impiety. And Barlaam, another Ptolemy, while appearing to accept the divine oracles—just as that man accepted the holy books of the Hebrews, which he deemed worthy of interpretation—composed his own four-fold B book according to the opinions implanted in his soul; thus, while he claimed to accept the institutions of the Church and wrote against the Latins, he actually introduced Hellenism.
But if someone should oppose us with that passage of Paul: "For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made" (Rom. I, 20), or that of David: "The heavens declare the glory of God" (Ps. XVIII, 1), one must understand this as they themselves have handed it down: as a call to bless the Lord and to praise Him from the things that are seen, saying: "Bless the Lord, O my soul" (Ps. CIII, 1); and: "O Lord, how manifold are thy works! In wisdom hast thou made them all" (Ps. CIII, 24); and: "Your knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain C it" (Ps. CXXXIX, 6); and: "If I ascend to heaven, thou art there! If I make my bed in Sheol, thou art there!" (Ps. CXXXIX, 8), and the rest of the things which David says, proclaiming His foreknowledge. He boasts, like the fisherman-apostles and the Father who was called such according to the flesh by the illiterate Word, in simplicity and not in wisdom: "For I have not known letters" (Ps. LXXI, 15), he says; and: "He took me from the sheepfolds" (Ps. LXXVIII, 70). And Paul says: "I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom" (I Cor. II, 1), and: "For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified" (I Cor. II, 2); and: "But now," he says, "how can you turn back again to the weak and beggarly elemental spirits, to which you want to be enslaved once more?" (Gal. IV, 9); and: "For the creation was subjected to futility" (Rom. VIII, 20); and: "For the form of this world is passing away" (I Cor. VII, 31); and: "They became fools, and worshipped D and served the creature rather than the Creator" (Rom. I, 22, 25). Do you see that we ought not to study these things? "Set your minds on things that are above," he says, "not on things that are on earth; seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God" (Col. III, 1-2), where "the forerunner has entered on our behalf" (Heb. VI, 20); and: "But our commonwealth is in heaven" (Phil. III, 20). What need is there, then, for us to be concerned and to study things that will be changed, and not [study] the eternal things? And these, indeed, are the teachings of Barlaam, contrary to true wisdom.
A which the fishermen preached to the world, not in wisdom of speech, lest the cross of Christ be emptied, but in the divine Spirit; and they were exalted above the wise men of the world, just as the Fathers also were exalted above Barlaam in the grace of the divine Spirit. That wretch Barlaam blasphemed even more against holy prayer in what he wrote; and as for the grace and illumination of God, he did not understand, nor was he able to understand, the precept, "Pray without ceasing"—for how could he, whose mind was subject to vanity and who was united by the fantasies of his intellect to the angel of pride? Nor did he better receive the following: "I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the mind"; or, "Singing and making melody in your hearts to the Lord"; or that, "God has sent the Spirit of his Son" (that is, his grace) "into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father"; or even, "In the church I would rather speak five words with my mind than ten thousand words in a tongue." Through this he forbade mental prayer, and especially the invocation of the Lord, whom Peter confessed openly when he said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." And it is the Lord’s own tradition: "Whatever you ask the Father in my name," he says, "you will receive." And, "In my name they will cast out demons," and the rest; since his name itself is eternal life. "For these things," says John, "are written, that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have eternal life in his name." Furthermore, the invocation of Christ pours forth the Holy Spirit: "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord'," says Paul, "except in the Holy Spirit," and there are six hundred other things written to this same effect. But what darkened things that blinded man brought forth against the divine light—things dark, indeed, and gloomy, and far removed and contrary to that unsetting, B radiant, and divine illumination of which even the light-bearing choirs of the angels partake ravenously and rejoice—because this divine brightness is a delight to such beings, and those among men who are pure in heart participate in it. For since he was acting against those who are in holy stillness like some other demon, envying those who withdraw from the tumults of the crowd and desire to be at leisure for God alone—to whom the wicked, envious, and accursed demons very often bring C afflictions—he brought deceits upon them against the grace of God and divine illumination; for, being darkness, they transform themselves into angels of light, wishing to turn them away from their good intention, and from being with God, since they themselves have been made far from God, lest human nature, endowed with a material body, should excel their own spiritual nature. For the demonic race is envious by reason of the pride through which they fell from the grace of God and were thrown down from heaven; and they always envy those who wish to adhere firmly to God through solitude, purity, and prayer. D Therefore, as we have said, they attack them, struggling with six hundred assaults, and although they are darkness and have fallen from heaven like lightning, they transform themselves into angels of light in order to deceive some.
And this Barlaam, like an angel of those orders, pretending to be a dark light, took his stand against those godly men who were equal to angels, and against the divine light itself. And consequently, B as was necessary for them, this was planned and executed by the demons, and they, having themselves become and being called darkness, moved their initiate, who was equally darkened, foolishly against the divine light and the blessed illumination of the angels. For they do not even know what that light is, since they do not partake of it, but being much further away and sent into the outer darkness along with those like them, who are also moved by them; he, like a madman, C raved that it is either not a divine illumination, or, if it is one at all, that it is the very nature of God—alas!—the invisible, and the incomprehensible, and the inaccessible. And turning again, as one who is truly demented, he said: "If a light appeared, it was visible; but if it was visible, it was not God; and if it ceased to be seen, it did not even exist, and for this reason it was something like a phantom." And if it were truly an illumination, that impious man dogmatized that it was a creature coming into being at times, appearing and disappearing, and that the grace of God and the intelligible illumination was a created thing, or nothing at all. In these impieties D and absurdities, he had as his successor that wretch Acindynus; and furthermore a certain Dexius, who turned to the left side; and Argyrus, full of poison, who was greatly enriched by the perverse nonsense of the Greeks; and before them that apostate Gregoras; who denied the grace of God entirely, and rejected His natural power and energy, saying that no power resides in God, nor does any gift or grace proceed from Him, walking in opposition to the Gospel and to the words and deeds of the disciples of Christ and the rest of the choir of our holy Fathers. All of them together say that the Lord Himself, the only-begotten Son and Word of God, was indeed incarnate in His own person, and became man, truly remaining God and persisting in immutability; but [they say] that we by no means receive God according to substance, nor are we united according to nature; for that which the only-begotten Word of God assumed for Himself was one thing, and to it He is tightly joined, from which He remains indivisible as well as unconfused. Since each nature possesses its own—the divine, divine things; the human, human things, sins excepted—and in the former are the uncircumscribed immensity, the incomprehensible infinity, immutability, eternity, and omnipotence, while in the human are being circumscribed, visible, tangible, mutable, and the having begun; therefore the incarnate Word was seen, and handled, and suffered, and died, and arose, not by the nature of the divinity, but by the nature of the body. Whence also the Beloved disciple says: "That which was from the beginning, which we have looked upon, which we have seen with our eyes, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life; and the life was manifested; and we declare unto you the eternal life which was with the Father, and ap-
- A pointed unto us.» This, therefore, is the true God and eternal life, Jesus Christ alone, perfect God from God, the Word and only-begotten Son of the Father, truly incarnate, and He became perfect man for us men; the same is God and the same is man in one person; one and the same known in two natures and wills and energies. And the same was working miracles, and walking on foot, and hungering and being fed, and multiplying loaves, and sleeping, and restraining the motions of the winds, and raising the dead, and dying as mortal, and being sealed in the tomb, and raising His own body from the dead, and being touched after his resurrection, and entering when the doors were shut, just as He had gone out of the tomb with the seals unbroken. Since He was both God and man, the same one, the former having been eternally and the latter having come to be afterward, and suffering some things as man, but performing others as God. For this reason, He alone is God, and no one else, even if He became man. And of Him alone, by nature, is the Father the Father, who is God over all, but He is our Father by grace. Who is also His God for our sake, inasmuch as He assumed the assumption of our nature, the first-fruits, and is our God as our Creator, since we are creatures, but not sons. And if we also are sons, it is by adoption and through the One who is Son by nature, who is united to us by extreme kindness. B Therefore, so also regarding our participation in grace: because He indeed, as Son by nature, has by nature those things which belong to the Father and the Spirit, and common to them is both the nature and the one power and gift; and the body, being supremely united to Him, has all things that are according to the nature of the Word who assumed it, and the charisms of the Father and the Spirit, since they are inseparable from the Word. And for this reason, all the fullness of the Godhead is in Christ; but in us, the gifts are partial and proportional, insofar as we are able. For out of His fullness we all have received, and grace for grace, and greater. For instead of the shadow of the law, we have received those things which are of the truth. And this was the true light, which lightens every man that comes into the world, Jesus Christ our God, who says: «I am the light of the world; C and he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.» Who also, having become like us, that He might sanctify us who are of a twofold substance, employed mysteries and doubly bestowed grace upon us. First, indeed, He gave baptism as the beginning of the gifts; then mirth, with oil and the laying on of hands, and the gifts of healings, and of prophecy, and of the apostolate, and of preaching, and of the priesthood through the laying on of hands, through the arrival and the indwelling of the Spirit in tongues of fire, the operations of powers, D and interpretations and varieties of tongues, and the charisms of ministries, and very many other ineffable gifts, all of which are the operations of the same and one Holy Spirit. And for this reason, the charisms are diverse and their operations are in many, and to one is given this, and to another that,
as Paul says, speaking: A "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 the operations of powers, to another prophecies, to another discernings of spirits, to another kinds of languages, to another interpretations of languages. And all these things the one and the same Spirit operates, distributing to each individually as He wills." For this reason it is even one, yet distributes to each the charisms as He wills. And Paul says: "But to us there is one God and Father of all, and one Lord Jesus Christ." And similarly concerning the Spirit: "But one and the same Spirit [does this], distributing to each individually as He wills."
Chapter 32. Against the Latins, that the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone.
Whence it is manifest that the divine Spirit is one, and from the one, the Father. The Spirit is one, as proceeding from Him, just as the Lord and Only-begotten is one, being begotten from the Father alone. And for this reason it is impossible for one and the same thing to have its origin from two, as the Latins say, since even the Only-begotten is one from the One. And He is only from the only one begottenly, just as the divine Spirit is one, and only from the only B Father processionally. And one is the cause of these, because those things which are from Him are referred back to Him. And for this reason the monarchy is what we worship, because all things are referred to the one cause, the Father—the only begotten Son, not altered at all, and the only proceeding Holy Spirit, not altered at all. The begotten and the proceeding does not denote nature, as the Fathers say, but only property. For there is one nature to the three, keeping their own idioms, because the cause of the Only-begotten and of the proceeding Spirit is one, C His Father, the one begetting ineffably and incorporeally, the other emitting. For this reason there is also one Godhead in the Trinity, and the Trinity is indivisible. "For the union of the Son and of the Spirit is the Father," the theologian says. And the fruits of the Spirit are diverse, which are operations and powers. And Paul says this too, "The fruit of the Spirit," saying, "is joy, peace, long-suffering, goodness," and the rest, which the remainder of the apostles testify to, John saying: "And God is love." And Paul again: "Rejoice in the Lord," and, "Christ is our peace." And David: "The Lord is good to all who call upon Him." And, D "Taste and see that the Lord is good." And, "Confess to the Lord, for He is good because of [His] goodness." And, "Faithful is the Lord in all His works." And the Savior: "Learn from Me, that I am meek and lowly." And the fruit of the Spirit is meekness. And, "You, O Lord," David says again, "are long-suffering and merciful." And, "As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God," because of temperance. So that even the fruits of the Spirit are seen in the Father and in the Son. And our adoption becomes in the Spirit,
A seeing that the charismata of the Trinity are common, and there is one power and one operation of the Trinity. Therefore, those who do not glorify the operations of the Trinity, or who indeed acknowledge them but call them creatures, are atheists. For if they are creatures in us, what is it that we have in excess? But if we possess the nature of God, as these men babble, then we too will be gods—men and God-men, others like Christ—not having a grace, but the hypostasis of the Son, or of the Father, or of the Spirit. And what else could ever be worse than this blasphemy? But if we have a creature within ourselves, then we do not have God; so how is God with us? And how did we receive the Spirit who is from God? And how do we have the Spirit of Christ? And how did we receive the gift of the Spirit? And what is the promise of the Spirit in us? And what is the power that came upon the apostles from on high? And what is the Holy Spirit that came upon Cornelius and those with him? What did those baptized by Philip receive, when Peter and John laid their hands upon them? B What did those baptized by Paul receive, who formerly did not even know or hear if there is a Holy Spirit? What are the operations of powers? The charismata of healings? The better charismata? What is the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ? And the, “Grace be to you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ”? Why is the invocation of divine grace made during ordinations? Is it said in an empty sense? Alas for the deception and blasphemy of those who approach the grace of God without grace! But what is the gift of the Holy Spirit? Is it the three-hypostasized nature? By no means. For no one receives the nature of God. Is it, then, a creature? But how do we have God in us? And how do we carry Christ? And how did we truly receive the Holy Spirit in our hearts? Therefore, it is the grace of the Trinity in us, which is imparted to us from the Father through the incarnate Son in the Holy Spirit. C For this reason, it also operates in us in various ways. In one, it perfects and regenerates him through baptism; another it anoints and seals with the myron; another it ordains as a priest—and this, too, in diverse ways. For one is established as a reader for the people, another as a subdeacon, another as a deacon, another as a priest, and finally another as a pontiff; and one is an apostle, another a prophet, another a teacher, and another has powers or charismata of healings, or other things. And to one, through the Spirit, is given a word of wisdom, to another a word of knowledge according to the same Spirit, and the rest, as we have said. So the hypostasis of the Spirit is not in us, but in the Spirit is the common grace of the Trinity and the diverse operations. Therefore, neither does he who receives baptism straightway become a priest, nor does he who has become a deacon receive the power of the presbyterate, nor does the ordained presbyter receive the grace of the bishop; D but each received what he received, and one is in a lesser, another in a greater power. For the deacon ministers, the priest performs the sacred rites, and the bishop performs ordi
sacrifice, the high priest ordains and dispenses the charisms of God, and enjoys the power of binding and loosing sins. What, then, is this power? What is the authority to ordain? What is ordination? Is it a human creature within us? And what, then, can a creature do? How A does it make gods? How does it cleanse? And how does it perfect? And what is the invocation of the grace of God? Does it have no power? Is the Spirit of grace, therefore, not in us? Alas for such blasphemy! Far from the grace of God is he who does not proclaim the grace of God, and such a one is an alien to the Spirit of God, devoid of grace, and having no communion with the divine Spirit, but rather is full of an alien spirit—namely, the spirit of iniquitous power—whose nefarious and dark operation has caused the wretched man to deny the grace of the Trinity, as one who is senseless, crazed, and whose meditations on divine things are empty. And he does not know the light of God, because he has rejected it. And by not willing, he has not been willed. And he did not know how to sing with David: B “And let the brightness of the Lord our God be upon us,” and, “Lighten my eyes, lest I sleep unto death.” Nor did he desire to appear an heir of the kingdom of God according to those of whom it is said: “There are some who shall not taste of death until they see the kingdom of God coming in power,” which they saw on the mount, as much as they were able, namely, the light without evening by which the just shall then shine like the sun, just as the Sun of Justice taught. Regarding which brightness, the son of thunder also, having seen that light, writes: “Now we do not know what we shall be. But we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him.” And Paul, though not at first clean, seeing that light, and falling, arose purified; C thereby demonstrating his rising from his fall, his illumination from the darkness, and the illumination of the whole world through him; and later, caught up into heaven as one entirely cleansed, he saw this even more splendidly. And he cried out saying: “The grace of God our Savior has appeared to all men,” and: “Now we see in a mirror and in an enigma, but then face to face.” Of this light Moses had the pledges on the mount, for which reason the children of Israel could not look upon his face. And Stephen saw this light even more clearly. And being illuminated, his face was as the face of an angel, as it is written. For toward that beauty was the brightness D that was leaping forth upon his body directed. For the divine and immaterial flash and grace of the Spirit, which had been poured into his soul, was radiating upon his body, just as it did upon that of Moses. But this light was not seen by those who beheld it as it is, but as it was possible for them, just as in the prophets it was seen, not as it was, but according to the capacity of those who saw, and it dazzled their eyes. And why should I say many things about that divine brightness, by which the just shall shine like the sun in the presence of their Father (as Christ said), partaking of the rays of the inaccessible sun? This is the true light which enlightens every man coming into this world, says John in his Gospel. And in the Apocalypse it is written: “For the just there shall be no splendor
of the sun, but the Lamb shall be their light, A never-failing.” For the Lamb is the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, who is also the Lord of glory. And David says of Him: “The Lord of glory has thundered.” And Paul: “They would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” Therefore, it is written in the Gospel: “And we saw his glory, glory as of the Only-begotten from the Father,” and this glory is not a person composed of the three Persons, but grace; “full of grace and truth,” he says. And Peter also most clearly testifies to this, saying: “For we have not followed fables when we made known to you the power and presence of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.” And he calls this both glory and honor. For he says B that He received from God the Father honor and glory, a voice being brought to Him by the magnificent glory. Do you see that he calls the Father "glory" because He is the fountain and beginning of glory, and the Son the King of glory? But Paul also calls Him the “splendor of glory,” saying: “Who, being the splendor of glory…”—naming the Person by the same name as the grace, just as he also calls the operations of the Spirit by a different word, and calls the Person of the divine Spirit the Spirit, from whom the charisms descend. Therefore, the glory of the Trinity is common; hence: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord Sabaoth: heaven and earth are full of His glory.” And the divinity of the Trinity is one, and therefore they are gods whom He deems worthy C of such great honor. For this reason, God has stood also “in the synagogue of gods.” One also is the splendor of the Trinity, regarding which David prays, as we have said: “And let the splendor of the Lord our God be upon us.” And: “In the splendors of your saints,” he says. Observe that there is splendor in God, and splendor in the saints as well; for Peter says: “He called us into his marvelous light.” And another theologian teaches concerning this, having himself seen and suffered the splendor of God; and the shepherds also saw it before Him. For “the glory of the Lord shone round about them.” But this also shows the angels to be luminous. For “He makes,” he says, “His angels spirits, and His ministers a flame of fire.” And His appearance D was as lightning, and His garment white as snow. But He Himself, who sheds light, shone forth much more when He was made flesh. And as much as the disciples were able to behold, He was seen by them on the mountain. “And He shone,” he says, “as the sun, and His garments became white as snow,” and another of the Evangelists says: “as light,” not as He is, but as they were able to contain the sight. Again, the divine women and Peter in prison saw angels shining in the sepulcher. But for the angels, the light was by participation, and therefore they are a secondary light, ministers of the primary light, as a certain theologian said; but the Lord, who is the true light by nature, has splendor, for which David was praying when he said: “Send forth thy light and thy truth,” which elsewhere he identifies as the illumination of the face of God. Likewise, concerning the illumination that is given to the saints: “It has risen,
A in darkness a light for the upright,” B for the sake of which light and eternal divine illumination the whole choir of the saints has struggled, and has received according to its power the pledges of that splendor and illustration. For they know how to pray with David: “And you, O Lord my God, will light my lamp; you will light my darkness.” He who is thus enlightened and filled with joy by this, said: “Light is risen to the righteous, and gladness to the upright in heart,” in which, exulting, he said: “I will be glad when your glory appears.” But as a C forefather of God, rather, he received the pledges and proclaimed the glory and brightness of Christ, through whom we are children of light and sons of light. Therefore the Theologians have written that we are sons of light, and they have called this light a consolation, a grace, a kingdom, a pledge, and the first-fruits of the world to come; not that they tasted it with the senses, since that illumination is not sensible. Yet, because we are twofold, that true light of the Sun of Righteousness and the spiritual flashing of the Deity, shining upon us spiritually from the Holy Spirit, illuminates not only the mind, but also fills the body with light. D This was revealed first, as we have said, by Moses; then by the Truth itself, the fountain of this light, Jesus Christ our God; and by Stephen, the greatest, who first struggled for Him; and by the most divine Paul, who, while not yet pure, had his eyes blinded until he was cleansed by baptism; but afterwards, having the light within himself, he burned, saying: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” and: “God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts.” And: “If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His,” speaking of the grace of the Spirit, which is common to the Trinity. Peter also, in prison, having seen this light, was strengthened, and the chains fell from his hands. Many also of the divine disciples enjoyed this illumination, among whom were Luke and Cleopas, who received the heat of that light, and their heart was burning within them; for the true light is itself the fire which it came to cast upon the earth, of which He said: “I came to cast fire upon the earth, and what do I wish if it be already kindled?” And David was warmed by this fire, saying: “My heart grew hot within me, and in my meditation a fire shall be kindled.” Antonius also, seeing this light in the tomb, received consolation and cried to God: “Where were you before?” as the great Athanasius relates. Many other saints also, while distressed in darkness, were deemed worthy of the same grace, since they were children of light, deified by God, always beholding God while praying, and having become gods according to grace, since all were participants of grace, because Christ promised that He would dwell in His own, and His Spirit dwells in us. Therefore Paul said: “Do you not know that Christ dwells in you? Otherwise you are reprobates,” and: “God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, in which we cry: Abba, Father.” Christ dwells with the Father and the Spirit, and makes His mansion in us, not indeed according to person, but according to grace. And Paul cries:
B “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God and the Father, and the communion of the Holy Spirit.” And, “Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ.” And he says this in almost all his epistles. And, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.” And in the Acts, “And they received the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Therefore, we receive the gift and grace of the holy Trinity, and not the nature, nor the persons, or one of the three persons. But only that divine assumption, as we have said, is united to the person of the Word, indivisibly and inconfusedly, in whom also all the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily, and from that fullness we all receive grace in proportion. From this divine fullness, as from a fountain, all who belong to Christ draw, and especially those who fight and suffer for His sake; even when they are in darkness and prison, they are lifted up by that radiance. Therefore David said: “According to the multitude of my sorrows in my heart, thy comforts have refreshed my soul.” Therefore also those who live in Christ as being pure in heart shall see God, not indeed according to what He has by nature (for no man has seen God at any time), but according to grace. Do you see the common grace of the Trinity? “God sent forth the Spirit of His Son,” “Of His fullness have we all received.” And what did we receive? Clearly the grace of the Spirit; and grace for grace; and, he says, He poured out upon us the gift of the Holy Spirit. And in Him we cry, “Abba, Father.” But this word “Abba” signifies Father, since we have become sons by grace. For we have been adopted by the Father through the Only-Begotten, who was incarnate in the Holy Spirit. And through all things in this way, I say, both of the ancient divine Scripture and of grace, the matters concerning the grace of God are witnessed. Or rather, that which was poured out upon us abundantly through the dispensation of the Word has filled the whole world. Hence therefore, the dispensation of the Word is also called grace. But those who are devoid of grace, as being unworthy to receive the gift, reject the gift, the operation, and the grace of the Spirit; they are dark concerning the light, and having not received the light, they have not tasted the sweetness of divine illumination. Whence, being ignorant, they despise it and, being impious, they blaspheme. Who shall declare to them the sweetness of the divine light who have not tasted it, nay rather, who wander and sleep in darkness, and converse with dark and wicked demons, who desire a delicate and soft life, and engage in vain pursuits concerning the contemplation of visible and mutable creatures, who, almost like the senseless Greeks, serve the creature rather than the Creator, as Paul said; for by holding the contemplation of creatures in higher esteem, they say that there is nothing divine in faith, but they trust only in the knowledge of vanity, and foolishly opine that there is nothing above sense, and that the mind of men is of a kind with demons who stand far distant from the spiritual rays and the ineffable radiance of God, and are therefore covered in gloom, and arrogantly and foolishly busy themselves only with the air and the earth.
A For this reason, these men, busy only with these visible, circumscribed things, which move either locally or in imaginary ways through mathematical calculations, think in their wretchedness that there is nothing beyond the heavens and these things that can be perceived by the senses and by our own finite mind. And they define piety as if it were some mathematical and technical discipline that transcends reason, existing only by faith and the grace of God. And they say that he who does not know the movements of the stars, the logical methods of discourse, numbers, and the positions of geometric shapes, does not know God, thereby rejecting altogether the preaching of the simplicity of the Gospel, through which God has made foolish the wisdom of this world.
But among us, the entire system of those who have lived saintly lives has been perfected through faith. Abel wrestled B by faith. Enos hoped in God by faith. Enoch was translated by faith. Noah built the ark by faith and was saved through it. Abraham believed God by faith, and by faith he saw God. And likewise Isaac and Jacob—who saw God more clearly when he beheld the ladder upon which the Lord was leaning—he also wrestled with the angel who said he was the God of his fathers; but he was the Word of the great counsel, the Angel for our sake. Moses, too, saw God in the flame of the bush and in the thick darkness and in the light upon Mount Sinai, and was illuminated. Elijah was snatched up in a chariot of fire; and Isaiah saw God upon the throne of glory; and Ezekiel, and Daniel, and others alongside them were all illuminated through faith. C And the apostles served God in the flesh, it is manifest, by faith. And having been called the light of the world by the true Light, they saw His light by faith. First upon the holy mountain, and later in the tongues of fire in the upper room, and they carried it about within them everywhere. All the choirs of the saints, as they were able to behold, contemplated and saw. I omit setting forth the individual holy doctors and Fathers, lest I create a weariness in this discourse; it is enough that the truth has been manifested clearly through the prophets and apostles, who are the foundations of piety. Therefore we, to speak according to Paul, walk by faith, and we receive the things of faith as a pledge. D For now, Paul says again, we know in a mirror and in an enigma, but then face to face. Therefore, let those who do not receive the light and do not perceive the grace, being as they are reprobate, be ashamed and wrapped in darkness; but we, who receive grace upon grace from the divine fullness, let us praise Jesus Christ, the true Light who illuminates every man coming into this world, as it is written. To Him be glory unto the ages. Amen.
Clericus. And what is the aim of the heretics, Lord? [index: entries preserved]
For we have learned, as you have demonstrated and as we have learned from the saints, that we should glorify the divine nature as infinite and incomprehensible, but that grace flows forth to us from that nature A. But what do these people say concerning this matter?
Pontifex. The inventions of the heretics, being diverse and full of impiety, are to be despised; for they are insipid. For they say that God is in no way capable of being participated in, and therefore, by the force of their own opinion, they claim that God is not in us; or if He can be participated in, they assert that He is communicated according to essence, whence they preach another incarnation, namely, the incarnation of the Trinity, which no impious person has vomited forth throughout the centuries. But they impiously assert that the grace, power, and operation of God, which proceeds from His nature, neither are nor can be.
But we, piously, confess the Trinity of persons in one Deity, and we piously proclaim one God, the Trinity, in one power and operation, and kingdom and grace; and we confess that the nature is indeed entirely invisible and can in no way be communicated to us or to any creature, just as the Only-Begotten says: B "No one has ever seen God," which is to be understood according to essence. Therefore He said to Moses: "No man shall see my face and live." But we believe that it is possible to see and receive His glory and brightness, which is derived from the nature, as well as His grace and power according to our strength; whence the visions of the prophets, and the illuminations given to the saints, and the enlightenments within them, and the ministrations and operations of virtues, and divine grace, we all receive—not the nature. We believe, however, that only that divine assumption was hypostatically united to the Word, so that through it, as much as is possible, we might be partakers of God.
Truly, we participate in grace in Him, since in Him resides the entire fullness of the Godhead bodily, which dwells in Him, just as Paul teaches, saying: "For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily," not of the person of the Spirit; for only one of the Trinity, the Word, has been incarnate, and His humanity alone is divine, perfect, and elevated to divine dignity, inasmuch as it was joined to Him closely, indivisibly, and inconfusibly, and became His own. Wherefore we believe we participate in the gift of God and the grace proceeding from Him, but not in His nature, as C the impious Messalians and Bogomils dream. Of this, the one is witness who rested upon the divine breast, and from there received the abundant grace of theology; and he alone is sufficient for testimony, for "his testimony is true," and he knows as a disciple of truth that he speaks the truth, so that we may believe.
He indeed said thus concerning the divine nature: "No one has seen God at any time." And he brings forth the Lord as a witness, saying, "The Only-Begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has made Him known." But concerning His grace: "And we beheld His glory." And so that no one might say that he speaks only of the incarnation, he adds: "Glory as of the Only-Begotten from the Father." And so that no one might D say it refers to the nature of the Godhead, he speaks again: "Full of grace and truth."
A Do you see the truth clearly proclaimed in the Gospel? And that the saints behold the glory of God, He Himself declares again in the Gospel concerning Isaiah, saying: "These things Isaiah said, when he saw His glory, and spoke of Him," that is to say, of Christ. And the Savior Himself also proclaims the kingdom and power and glory of the Father, which is common, as it is also the Father’s, and the Son’s, and the Spirit’s. And He Himself in the prayer says: "For Yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen." The Church also proclaims the commonality of the kingdom, and power, and glory of the three Persons, saying: "For Yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." And she does not say this arbitrarily, but having learned it from the divine Scriptures. For the grace of the Trinity, and the glory, and the power, and the energy, and the kingdom are preached as common. Since even "the heavens declare the glory of God," and these "were established by the word of the Lord, and all their host by the Spirit of His mouth." And of the Thrice-Holy God of glory "the heaven and the earth are full," as the angels theologize. Wherefore, let those who reject the grace of God and the illumination turn backward; but we, having received from the B fullness, light from light, and grace for grace, let us give thanks to Him who has graced and enlightened us, and who has prepared for us the eternal kingdom before the foundation of the world, which we also hope, by His mercy, to attain; and from this life, let us supplicate to be accounted worthy of this in the manner of a pledge. And it will be for us, if we become pure, to hasten to draw near to Him who is most pure. For thus David also exhorts, saying: "Draw near to Him and be enlightened, and your faces shall not be ashamed." C And that the power and energy of God is within us by His mercy is clear from this. How are we baptized? And what do we receive in baptism? We are born again. "Unless you are born again," He says, "you cannot enter the kingdom of God." We put on Christ. "As many of you as were baptized into Christ, have put on Christ." How then do we put on [Him]—as a Person, or by grace? By grace, evidently. Since "I and the Father," He says, "will come, and We will make our abode with him." But the Father is not incarnate; therefore He dwells [in us] according to grace. And the Son, having been incarnate—if we share in His flesh, we certainly do not share in the nature of the Godhead, but we participate in the grace. For we receive from the fullness of the Godhead that is in Him bodily. Similarly also with the gifts of the Holy Spirit. And this is clear from those who are ordained. He who is appointed as reader is signed and, having received grace, possesses the grace of a reader; for he is not able to perform the duties of a subdeacon. And likewise, the deacon is not able to perform the duties of a priest, nor, as we said before, is the priest [able to perform] the duties of the episcopal grace. So that it is a gift (charisma) and not a substance that is imparted. D