ACO CHR SCO ROC SC Stud. Pat. Abbreviations Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum (E. Schwartz.) Catholic Historical Review (Washington) Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium Dumbarton Oaks Papers Epistle English Translation Greek Orthodox Theological Review (Brookline) Irish Theological Quarterly (Maynooth) Journal of Ecclesiastical History (Cambridge) Journal of Theological Studies (Oxford) NS = New Series Patristic and Byzantine Review (New York) Cursus Completus Patrologiae Graecae (J.P. Migne) Cursus Completus Patrologiae Latinae (J.P. Migne) Revue de L’Orient Chrétien (Paris) Sources Chrétiennes (Paris) Studia Patristica Texte und Untersuchungen (Berlin)
PREFACE
It is one and the same Holy Spirit that was within the Fathers at Nicaea as they defined the faith, and that was in the soul and voice of our most holy and venerable Father Archbishop Cyril when he wrote this to correct the errors that the reverend Nestorius introduced into the church.
Bishop Hermogenes of Rhinocorouros (Acclamation at the Council of Ephesus after the reading of Cyril’s writings against Nestorius)
INTRODUCTION
The city of Alexandria had long been the main supply port for imperial Rome, and from the beginnings of the Roman Empire it had therefore grown in importance alongside the capital. Its earlier glories as a world center of learning under the Ptolemies were not forgotten in its new role as provincial imperial capital, and it was always more a Greek city than a Roman one. By the time of the early Byzantine period in the fourth century, its identity as a major political and cultural force had not diminished. Provincial governors in Egypt were men of immense power whom emperors could not overlook. By the fifth century that role passed increasingly to the ecclesiastical leaders of the city, as the Christian population gained dominance over the other two major civic groups: the large Jewish community and the educated philosophical class who still made Alexandria a center for continuing pagan opposition to the Christian way of life.
In the time of Constantine the Great, the Christian bishop of Alexandria, St Athanasius, demonstrated how much power and influence a determined Christian leader could exercise in opposition to the state bureaucracy. The forces at his disposal included not only the large congregations of a very volatile population, but specially organized guilds and, not far from the city itself, large groups of men living the new forms of ascetical life that came to be called monasticism. The successors of St Athanasius built upon the role of archbishop, and soon the Patriarchate of Alexandria was known throughout the Christian world as a leading force in the formulation of Christian doctrine and a guiding hand in so many matters of canonical importance. From the third century, the Christian theologians of Alexandria were internationally famous and each in their own way developed a distinctive and coherent school of thought: thinkers such as Pantaenus, Clement, Origen, Alexander, and Athanasius. Cyril stands in a long line of distinguished predecessors, and he is very conscious of continuing their work.
Before Constantinople rose to prominence in the church during the late fourth century, the sees of Rome and Alexandria were the unquestioned leaders of Christian thought, and Alexandria had long seen itself as the guide of Eastern Christian life—a role it was reluctant to surrender to the rising power on the Bosphorus. Many of these broader political and canonical issues created great turmoil in the church’s internal and external relationships from the fourth to the sixth centuries. St Gregory the Theologian’s complaints about the scheming of the Egyptian bishops at the Council of Constantinople (381) and the condemnation of St John Chrysostom at the Synod of the Oak (403) are episodes in this long-running conflict.
One of the most dominant ecclesiastical leaders of Alexandria was St Theophilus, who served as archbishop from 385 to 412. He used the power of his position to enforce new imperial legislation that suppressed pagan temples. In Alexandria this caused massive city riots, but Theophilus enlisted bands of determined monks and through them destroyed some of the city’s most ancient pagan temples, such as the Serapeum in 391, and converted others into Christian churches. His time in office marks the point when Alexandria emerged as a predominantly Christian city. Theophilus had great ambitions for his city and his see. He maneuvered against St John Chrysostom to block the latter’s reformist efforts in Constantinople, and by bringing about the downfall of the newly appointed archbishop he protected the traditional sphere of influence of his own see, which extended from Libya to Palestine and the Roman Province of Asia (modern Turkey).
This powerful hierarch summoned his sister’s son to the city to advance his education and train him in church governance. The young boy, Cyril, was born in 378 and came under his uncle’s guidance from his twelfth year onward. He probably studied grammar and rhetoric in the city until around 397, and then went through a period of specifically Christian higher studies. His knowledge of the Bible was deep, and in his youth the school of Alexandria was at a high point under the great biblical interpreter Didymus the Blind, who died in 398. This period of formal theological and biblical study introduced him to the earlier tradition of the Church, and he always saw himself as someone who continued that tradition. In fact, it was Cyril who largely started the Christian theological method of appealing to earlier patristic writings to determine what the tradition was, citing their texts as evidence of “the mind of the saints.” His knowledge of the earlier Alexandrian theologians, especially St Athanasius, the biblical commentaries of St Chrysostom, and the doctrinal works of St Gregory the Theologian is extensive, and is put to good use in his own writings.
In 403 Cyril was ordained as a lector in the church at Alexandria, a position that involved both intellectual and administrative responsibilities in the archbishop’s court. Later that year he accompanied his uncle Theophilus to the Synod of the Oak. When he himself became archbishop, he continued to believe that Chrysostom had been rightly condemned for canonical irregularities. Only later was he persuaded to regard him as innocent, after considerable pressure from Rome and the imperial court at Constantinople.
When Theophilus died in October 412, the Byzantine administration attempted to block Cyril’s election and supported the current archdeacon Timothy. Despite his rival’s backing from the local garrison, Cyril had such strong support within the local church that he was elected as Theophilus’ successor and consecrated on October 18, 412. The election was disputed and both sides came to physical violence. This is how Cyril’s career as one of the leading church leaders of the Byzantine world began at age 34 in the troubled environment of Alexandria. The early years of Cyril’s leadership showed him as a reformer. He took action against the continuing influence that pagan religion still had on ordinary people’s thinking, but unlike his uncle he chose to confront the attractions of the Isis cult on a different, more indirect battlefield. One example of this new approach was his transfer of the relics of the martyr saints Cyrus and John to Menouthis, where a great Temple of Isis still thrived, offering healing cures to worshipers. Cyril placed the martyrs’ relics in the small church nearby and established Christian healing rites to prevent, as he said, Christians from being led astray. The Menouthis Temple was a healing center with its own staff of medical priests. Cyril’s concern to ensure the Church matched and surpassed any benefit that paganism could provide was a major influence on Christian missionary strategy, and he staffed the new Christian shrine with monastics, creating a pattern that Christianity would continue for many centuries.
Still other problems troubled him regarding the unstable political and religious factions that made Alexandria a difficult city to govern. Not least among them was the Church’s continuing friction with Judaism. The Jewish community was extensive and had a long and distinguished history in Alexandria. It enjoyed an intellectual tradition that had produced no less than Philo, and the writers of much of the Old Testament Wisdom literature. This sizeable proportion of the city was in no mood to accept the political dominance of the Christians, despite much legislation coming from the court of Theodosius II that progressively restricted their own civic rights.
At one point, the constant tension between the Jewish and Christian communities exploded in a local incident where a church was burned and some leading Christians were assassinated. In response, Cyril led a delegation from the church to the Jewish quarter to demand justice. In doing this, he was acting as the Christian archon, the ethnic and religious leader of the Christian population, and independently of the Byzantine City Governor Orestes. Orestes disliked Cyril intensely and viewed his growing power with alarm as dangerously overshadowing his own. Cyril’s delegation deteriorated into popular riots, and several synagogues were burned—supposedly those belonging to the anti-Christian agitators. The attack on the Jewish community was followed by the legal expulsion of several Jewish leaders. At this time, Cyril appears as the leader of dangerously unstable forces: leading them, but not always in control of them.
Shortly after this, a Christian mob pulled one of the leading pagan critics of the Alexandrian Church from her carriage and dragged her into the church, possibly trying to force her to accept the Gospel. The woman was one of the leading philosophers of the time, the neo-Platonist Hypatia, and when she refused the mob’s threats, she was stoned to death inside the church building. This shocking murder was carried out by a lector of the church, and although Cyril was not personally responsible, people later blamed him for it. The event brought shame on the whole Christian community, not only in the eyes of the pagan and Jewish populations of the city, but also from other Christian communities, who loudly criticized the Alexandrians’ behavior. After an official investigation into the riots and the murder, the imperial court ordered in 416 that the number of the bishop’s bodyguards be reduced, and the archbishop was told not to interfere in civic matters.
Cyril’s relationship with the Byzantine Governor Orestes continued to worsen. But within a few years of his rebuke from the court of Constantinople, all the penalties imposed on him were lifted and his bodyguard was increased, once again by an imperial edict. This not only shows Cyril’s remarkable ability to recover from political setbacks (a factor which is more than evident in his later life), it also demonstrates how the court at Byzantium recognized that he, not Orestes, was the real leader of Christian Alexandria, in practice if not in theory. The imperial court was always pragmatic in such matters.
Several commentators, especially those who have wanted to discredit Cyril’s theology, have placed these charges of racism, riot, and murder at his doorstep and condemned him as a demagogue with few, if any, principles. This is a naive reading of the events. Life in any fifth-century Byzantine city was violent beyond what most modern people can imagine or have experienced, and mob violence was almost an institutionalized part of the Roman social system. Emperors, city governors, and eventually Christian bishops, who took on more and more political power from the fourth century onward, all had to acknowledge and deal with this reality. Far more balanced than the caricature presented by Gibbon is the summary judgment offered by Lionel Wickham in Religious Controversies of the fifth century (Columbus, 1979): “The facts are not to be denied. The picture they yield is not of a fanatical priest, hungry for power, heading a howling mob, but of an untried leader attempting, and initially failing, to master popular forces.”
From 412 to 418, Cyril’s years as bishop of Alexandria had been turbulent enough. After that, his administration enjoyed a period of ten years of relative peace, during which his control over his church was consolidated, and his administrative authority over the monasteries of Egypt became increasingly established. There are several instances of Egyptian monks seeking his advice. His letters to the monasteries still survive, and two of the leading monastic ascetics had close relationships with him, especially the Abbot Victor, and the charismatic leader of the great monastery at Tabennesi, the miracle-worker St Shenoudi of Atripe, whom Cyril would later take with him to the Council of Ephesus as a member of his personal entourage.
During this relatively peaceful time, Cyril kept reading the Church Fathers and wrote doctrinal and exegetical works of considerable style and quality. These have been largely forgotten today because they were overshadowed, even during his own lifetime, by the works he wrote after 428. That year a storm broke over the universal Church whose scale could hardly have been foreseen by those involved at the time. It was a crisis that forced all of Christianity to examine the fundamentals of its beliefs about Jesus, and it set in motion no less than three ecumenical councils (Ephesus 431; Chalcedon 451; Constantinople II 553). It was Cyril’s destiny to be the one who expressed a definitive vision of Christology during this period, and his works continued to dominate the decisions of ecumenical synods long after his death.
Today, as in his own lifetime, his work was recognized in both the East and West as a standard of orthodoxy. Even his most determined opponent, Theodoret of Cyr, eventually adopted Cyril’s terminology to express his own doctrine of Christ, despite having spent most of his life opposing Cyril. The theological issues raised during this period in the fifth century have resurfaced with new relevance in the Church over the last two centuries, making Cyril’s work not only historically and canonically significant but also deeply important for contemporary understanding of the Christian tradition concerning the person of Jesus, God and Man. To this day, Cyril of Alexandria’s theology represents a definitive theological vision for Eastern Christianity’s understanding of Christ and the mystery of redemptive deification that the incarnation has accomplished. In 428, few people could have viewed the crisis from such a balanced perspective. It began with what A. Grillmeier has called “an ecumenical scandal,” as news started to spread about a new archbishop in Constantinople, his aggressive style of theology, and the unusual things he seemed to be saying about Christ.
A Syrian monk named Nestorius had been called by the emperor to take the throne of Constantinople after the death of Sisinnius. He had been recommended by the newly appointed Archbishop John of Antioch. An outsider had been sought to break through certain deadlocked factions that had formed within the capital. As might have been expected when the new archbishop was installed, he found many people on all sides who did not think he was the right fit. Almost immediately he set to work “reforming” what he considered to be a lax church.
He convinced the emperor to limit the chariot races at the circus and reduce the number of dancing girls who performed there. This earned him strong dislike from many in the crowds, who were passionately devoted to racing and exotic dancers. He soon discovered, much to his displeasure, that Constantinople had developed a new style of monastic life in which many monks lived within the city limits, and some even worked in the imperial service. Nestorius found this unacceptable and prohibited them from any involvement in local church or civic matters. By doing this he alienated a large group of ascetics, several of whom were highly respected by important and powerful aristocrats who served as their patrons. Shortly after this, he forcibly shut down the last Arian chapel in Constantinople. The congregation set fire to the building in defiance of his officers, and the resulting fire destroyed much property. The Byzantine military aristocracy viewed this as a highly dangerous act, unnecessary and foolish, since there were many German auxiliary troops then stationed in the city who were Arian in their beliefs, and whose loyalty the Empire needed to rely on.
One of Nestorius’ most serious mistakes was to alienate the Augusta Pulcheria, the emperor’s sister. Her power, working together with the monastic party, did much to cause his political downfall even before Cyril had publicly exposed his theology. Throughout the controversy, Cyril counted on the complete loyalty of his own see, as well as on strong international support. As for Nestorius, even from the beginning his own church was bitterly divided, and the support he did have at the start of the crisis soon evaporated, leaving him exposed on every side.
Shortly after Nestorius arrived, the monastic party in Constantinople was offended by the way his team of Syrian chaplains conducted a series of lectures on the nature of the faith. They were determined to teach the Constantinopolitan church the ideas of the Syrian theologians Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia, who were considered leading theologians in the Antiochene Patriarchate at that time, but who did not have the international reputation that Athanasius or the Cappadocian Fathers enjoyed. Diodore had approached Christology in a rather crude way that spoke of “Two Sons”: one the Son of God, the other the Son of Man, the human being in whom the divine Son lived in intimate association. By speaking this way, he had hoped to solve some problems in interpreting scripture, which seemed to attribute both divine and human qualities to the same figure of the Lord in a difficult way. Theodore of Mopsuestia had softened this way of thinking, recognizing that the doctrine of “Two Sons,” while explaining some aspects of scriptural language, left the Church’s belief in one Lord hopelessly compromised. However, the Antiochene theologians tended to approach Christology in a way that preferred to speak of the divine Logos “associated with” or “conjoined to” the man Jesus of Nazareth.
Nestorius had attempted to enforce this theological approach on his church, but from the beginning it encountered fierce resistance from local theologians such as Proclus (who would later become Archbishop of Constantinople himself) as well as from representatives of other churches, most notably Rome and Alexandria.
Both churches maintained a residence in the capital for their clergy who acted as local representatives to the imperial court. From the start of the controversy, Cyril was kept fully informed about what was happening. The party opposing Nestorius objected to the way his chaplain had refused to accept the orthodoxy of the title “Mother of God” (Theotokos) for Mary. Following the principles of his Antiochene logical method, Nestorius supported his chaplain despite numerous complaints. He allowed that Mary could be called the Mother of God—just as she could be called the mother of the man Jesus—but argued that both theologies were defective since “strictly speaking” she was not the mother merely of God, or merely of a man, but the Mother of Christ, and Christ was not merely God, and not merely man, but was God joined to man, or if one preferred, man joined to God.
What he thought would be a compromise again satisfied no one. His way of doing theology was excessively focused on precise definitions. He used the phrase “strictly speaking” over and over, and it was not long before some of his opponents had turned his own methods against him. In 429 they appeared in the city carrying placards that proclaimed him a heretic. They argued from the following syllogism, which they drew from their troubled encounter with him: If Mary is not “strictly speaking” the Mother of God, then Jesus, her son, is not “strictly speaking” God. And they attributed this teaching to their archbishop. It was not really his own formulation at all, but it represented exactly what many people felt to be the “implication” of his thought.
The ordinary people of the city were shocked, believing that the archbishop was denying Christ’s divinity. Others recognized that, in a more complex way, he was imposing an unacceptable christological system on his church with some dishonesty. Cyril was aware of both issues: the need to connect highly intellectual theology with the lived experience of ordinary Christians. At first he decided not to get involved. But news of the conflict had already reached the monasteries of Egypt, causing divisions there, and this convinced him to take action and bring his younger colleague into line.
Cyril sent letters to Nestorius informing him that his teaching was flawed. He also sent a collection of Nestorius’ sermons to Rome so they could examine the matter themselves. Nestorius responded to Cyril with veiled threats that he might summon Cyril to face judgment at the Church of Constantinople, and he intensified his efforts to spread his doctrine. Now he treated those who used the title “Mother of God” as outright heretics who were turning the faith into mythology and “mixing up” the characteristics of divinity and humanity by assigning them to the same person without making distinctions. He condemned terms like “the weariness of God” or “the flesh of God” as completely unacceptable confusions of language—either foolish or downright heretical. Much has rightly been written about how few people during this controversy actually listened carefully to one another (some things never change), but the dispute was far more than a simple misunderstanding of intentions. What Nestorius considered the worst theological error—carelessly attributing both divine and human qualities and characteristics to one person—Cyril considered the essential truth revealed by the mystery of the incarnation and the very principle by which the human race was saved. There were indeed deep and fundamental differences between the two schools, and with both Nestorius and Cyril claiming to represent authentic Christian tradition, an international council to settle the issues was unavoidable. There is much evidence that Cyril had indeed thought through the implications of Nestorius’ teaching very carefully. The collection of texts he presented from his opponent’s writings at the Council of Ephesus accurately reflected everything that troubled him about such a theology, and it was a concern that the vast majority of bishops at the synod shared with Cyril.
The events of the next three years were highly complex, but they led inevitably to a deeply divisive ecumenical council. This council caused years of controversy afterward and set the agenda for three major synods that followed. Two of these later synods were themselves recognized as ecumenical councils that defined the Church’s doctrine of Christ.
Nestorius was concerned that Cyril might be trying to destabilize his church at Constantinople, using the theological dispute as a cover. It appears that he thought his own theological approach was perfectly “traditional,” and so standard that anyone who spoke differently must either be ignorant or have bad intentions. As far as Cyril was concerned, the Syrian tradition (that of Diodore and Theodore) which Nestorius was spreading at Constantinople was not a genuine tradition of the Church. In turn, he regarded it as at best a sloppy and outdated way of talking about Christ, and at worst not heretical in itself but certainly tending to lead to heretical conclusions with alarming frequency, as Diodore and Nestorius were continuing to show. Nestorius’ suspicion that Cyril was only interested in attacking him for political reasons was, ironically, wrong. He, and he alone, was responsible for the massive destabilization of his own church, especially in the way he had alienated the monks, aristocracy, and imperial ladies so soon after his arrival. This political instability left him exposed to all his enemies, especially since those among the aristocracy who were inclined to support him knew all too well that in the conflict between his predecessor Sisinnius and the ascetics of Constantinople, it was the monks who had won, backed as they were by the great power and influence of the Augusta Pulcheria. It was this weakness at home that also led to his mistake in underestimating Cyril’s importance as a theologian.
Nestorius put too much trust in the idea that Cyril was mainly motivated by political rivalry, and he often dismissed Cyril’s writings as if they were poorly written sermons from a well-meaning but incompetent preacher. This was a blind spot that would cost him dearly, because he completely failed to understand the mood of bishops throughout the Christian world, who recognized and understood Cyril’s style and method but found Nestorius’s approach foreign and bombastic.
As it became increasingly clear that the disagreement within the Great Church could not be easily resolved, and as Nestorius’s growing loss of control over the governance of his church alienated the Emperor from him, he suggested to the emperor that a large synod be called to settle the matter. It seems he had in mind that it should take place in Constantinople, be presided over by himself as archbishop, and mainly deal with some disciplinary issues (chiefly to begin proceedings against Proclus and the pro-Cyrilline party that so strongly opposed his theological teaching). But Cyril had not been inactive. He had written to Nestorius, and although his exchange of letters had not been well received, his texts were destined to be given ecumenical status at the coming council as brief summaries of the dispute. He had also written several important treatises on the theological issues at stake. He addressed some works to the emperor, and others separately to the royal princesses and the empresses Pulcheria and Eudoxia, in which he gathered together extensive writings from the Fathers to support the argument that Nestorius’s doctrine was not consistent with the ancient tradition.
The Roman Church had by now also received his collection of Nestorian texts. It had its own representatives at the court of Constantinople, and through one of these, the lay theologian Marius Mercator, it had already received news that had damaged Nestorius’ reputation in Rome’s eyes. One of the main factors that earned him Roman suspicion was the fact that he was known to have welcomed the group of Latin bishops who had recently been condemned by a synod in the West for Pelagianism. It was thought that Nestorius was considering reopening the case to judge it again, a move that Rome regarded as illegitimate, since it rejected Rome’s own claim to be the supreme court of appeal for canonical investigations. When Pope Celestine received Cyril’s collection of texts relating to Nestorius’ sermons, he sent them to John Cassian in Marseilles, asking for a detailed analysis. After Cassian eventually reported on them in the most negative terms, the Pope called a synod in Rome and found Nestorius guilty of heresy. He demanded that Nestorius retract his doctrine, or face excommunication if he refused. Pope Celestine asked Cyril to communicate this news to Nestorius and the Eastern churches. This was something of a tacit collaboration between Celestine and Cyril that ignored the canons of the Council of Constantinople in 381 designating the imperial city as the primary see in the East. Both Rome and Alexandria had resisted acknowledging these canons, and the mutual collaboration of Cyril and Celestine was designed to emphasize the point that in the more ancient order of church affairs, it was Alexandria that had traditionally been regarded by Rome as the primary see of the East. Recognizing the veiled political rebuff when it was delivered to him, Nestorius reacted against it by disregarding the synodical process and appealing directly to the emperor.
I notice the paragraph appears to be incomplete – it ends mid-sentence with “Cyril had communicated the news to Nestorius in a ‘Third”.
Could you please provide the complete paragraph so I can rewrite it accurately according to your specifications?
Letter” that gave Nestorius several days in which to recant or
This was a very serious threat, but when Nestorius received it, he felt he could ignore it. He had already convinced the emperor to hold an ecumenical synod that would, in practice, take priority over the local synods of Rome and Alexandria. The emperor, moved to action by the growing urgency of the church divisions that were becoming wider and wider, set the date of Pentecost 431 for the international meeting and sent out invitations to the bishops of all the major churches to gather their representatives.
Nestorius’ hope that the synod would meet on his home ground and under his control was brutally crushed, probably because of maneuvering by the empress Pulcheria. When the arrangements were finally settled, the synod was scheduled to meet in Ephesus, a city where Nestorius was not well-liked.
Cyril went to Ephesus from Alexandria ahead of the scheduled date and received a warm welcome from Memnon, the local bishop. When Nestorius arrived with troops from Constantinople, the bishops already present treated him as an excommunicate. Although he had felt able to ignore the canonical sentence from Rome and Alexandria, the other bishops applied canon law strictly and would not permit him to serve in any of the churches until his case had been heard and decided by the new synod. He was outraged by this, but nothing could persuade Cyril or Memnon to change this position. The Roman delegates were delayed on their journey from the West, as was the delegation from Syria led by John of Antioch. The latter group, which included the bishops most likely to support Nestorius, had a long and difficult journey to Asia Minor. When several weeks had passed after the date of Pentecost and they were still several days away from Ephesus, Cyril decided he would wait no longer.
He began to suspect that John of Antioch was deliberately delaying his arrival to avoid being involved in the church trial of his friend. Others have thought that Cyril was acting as a politician, wanting to start the proceedings before his opponents’ numbers increased.
Both things are probably partly true. And on Sunday, June 21, 431, despite protests from the local military supervisors, from the small party of Nestorius’ supporters (sixteen of them), and from a larger group (over fifty) who felt Cyril was being premature, Cyril claimed a sufficient majority (eventually rising to about 200 bishops) and declared that the synod would wait no longer. He claimed the right to preside over the council as the senior hierarch present, and also cited as a supplementary argument for precedence his delegation to act on behalf of the Pope, as witnessed in Pope Celestine’s letter from the previous year.
The next day, when the serious business began, Nestorius refused to respond to any summons to the council. Instead, his writings were read aloud to the assembled bishops, and Cyril’s relevant letters were also read. The writings of Nestorius were condemned by common acclamation, as was the custom at episcopal synods, and Cyril’s letters were accepted as statements of orthodox doctrine. At the end of that long and dramatic summer day, crowds gathered around the Church of Mary (its remains are still visible in Ephesus today) with torches lit against the falling night, to hear the outcome of the meeting. When it was announced that Nestorius was deposed and his doctrine anathematized, this was popularly understood as a victory for the Mother of God over those who slandered her, and the synodical bishops were escorted back to their lodgings by torchlight, with much rejoicing. The city that had once echoed with the cry “Great is Diana of the Ephesians” now echoed with the acclamations of Mary as the Mother of God. To the common people, the honor of the Virgin had been protected, and the more thoughtful among them and the bishops understood that in this title of veneration for Mary, a fundamental truth about Christ had been preserved.
A few days later, the party from Syria arrived and were furious to learn that the synod they had traveled so far to attend was already finished without them. John of Antioch convened a counter-synod, even though its quorum of 43 bishops was only a fraction of the 200 who had gathered under Cyril. It declared Cyril and Memnon deposed, and placed all the other bishops under suspension until they repented and joined the Syrian assembly.
After several attempts to reach an agreement with the Syrians, the orthodox council met again and excommunicated the Syrian bishops. At this point, the whole city was in uproar. Both sides appealed to the emperor, who finally acted by forbidding any of the bishops to leave the city until everything was resolved. He then sent out a delegate to investigate the situation on the ground. By the time he arrived in Ephesus, food supplies were running low, and several of the older bishops had died.
After the imperial delegate, Palladius, recorded the events, he left to report back to the government offices in the capital. At that point the Pope’s delegates arrived, and at another session of the synod they gave their support and votes to the orthodox council. However, when Theodosius reviewed the reports, he made the surprising decision to uphold the judgments of both parties. He ruled that Nestorius was deposed, but also that Cyril and Memnon were deposed as well. He announced his decision to uphold these sentences and exile those found guilty, and then dismissed the bishops from Ephesus. He probably intended to hold a smaller judicial hearing in Constantinople, where emotions would not run so high if it were under his personal supervision.
The emperor sent the imperial treasurer, Count John, to break this news in Ephesus, a man known to rule with a rod of iron. The bishops were properly intimidated by Count John, especially when he immediately arrested Nestorius, Cyril, and Memnon. But they refused to abandon the proceedings of a church synod to such obvious political control. John of Antioch accepted the emperor’s decision, to the disgust of several members of his own group, but the 200 bishops who had formed Cyril’s party refused to abandon their leader, especially since the whole of their doctrine had been a reaffirmation of his teaching, and they insisted that Cyril be released, demanding that their synodical decision should be recognized as the only legitimate conciliar legislation.
Count John had to go back to Constantinople to report that the emperor’s plan had failed. When he returned to the capital, he found it in turmoil too. News had spread that Nestorius had been deposed, and people generally celebrated this. But when the imperial messengers added that Cyril and Memnon had also been arrested and the council had been more or less shut down, a riot broke out. Protesters occupied the cathedral and sent a clear and loud message—not just from the crowds, but also from important aristocrats and the heads of the city’s monasteries—that this kind of action would not be accepted.
Surprised by how much support Cyril had, Theodosius summoned leading members of both sides of the dispute to debate before him in the suburbs at Chalcedon. After hearing the case over several weeks, he increasingly favored the Cyrilline position. Some have pointed out that Cyril, while under house arrest in Ephesus, arranged for lavish “gifts” to be sent to aristocrats in the capital who would argue his case. He certainly did this, much to the annoyance of his enemies, though it was fairly common practice in that era to accompany any legal case with what we would today consider distasteful bribery.
In the end, what made up Theodosius’ mind was not the money but the fact that everyone seemed to be supporting Cyril, except for the small group of Syrians, who were increasingly viewed with hostility by the local people of Constantinople. Added to this, the two hundred bishops at Ephesus, despite enduring great physical hardship, refused to leave the city throughout that summer, even though they had been ordered to do so. They would not move until Cyril had been released and the decrees of their council confirmed by the emperor. It was this loyalty, more than anything else, that impressed Theodosius and led him to recognize the majority council as having the force of imperial law.
Knowing that he had won the day, Cyril slipped away from Ephesus in the autumn of 431 and returned triumphant to his church in Alexandria. Nestorius asked the emperor for permission to return to his monastery in Antioch and was allowed to do so. A new bishop, Maximian, was appointed to take Nestorius’ place. The Syrians, however, went home refusing to lift their excommunication against Cyril or Memnon, and they spread the word throughout their great patriarchal territory that only their synodical meeting had been the true “Council of Ephesus,” where Cyril’s theology had been examined and found false.
Because they continued to regard Nestorius as having been unjustly condemned, the Syrians refused to accept the legitimacy of the new archbishop Maximian. As a result, Rome, Alexandria, and Constantinople were still out of communion with the Syrian church. This was a situation the emperor could not allow to continue, so from the beginning of 432 the imperial court started a process of reconciliation aimed at bringing about a rapprochement between Cyril and John of Antioch. It took two years, but eventually in 433 it was achieved to mutual satisfaction through the exchange of a credal statement between Alexandria and Antioch, now known as the “Formula of Reunion.” Both sides claimed the other had backed down, and many Syrian hardliners still refused to accept the reconciliation, as did several hardliners in Cyril’s own church. The former group endured until Chalcedon, and after their definitive exile then became the nucleus for the so-called “Nestorian” (Assyrian) Church, as they left imperial borders to work more and more within the boundaries of Persia. The latter group thought that Cyril had given in too much to Syrian demands that the christological doctrine should be expressed in some of their terms, and they thought the old man was losing his grip. This Egyptian party caused Cyril much trouble in his old age, and at his death would launch a determined movement that eventually rejected the Council of Chalcedon to set up a parallel “Monophysite” hierarchy.
Analysis of the Formula of Reunion shows that Cyril’s assessment of the reconciliation was the more accurate one. He felt that he had given ground on vocabulary, but had not moved on matters of principle. He made an important distinction, which has often not been maintained by commentators since, that there was a world of difference between the authentic christology of the Syrian church, represented by John of Antioch, and the perverse christology of Nestorius, which was heretical in that it divided Christ into two. With John he would negotiate and compromise, because the faith was not at issue, but with Nestorius there could be no negotiation. In the years after the restoration of peace, Cyril’s reputation was established as the leading theologian of the Christian world. He continued to write a large body of books, including theological treatises and scriptural commentaries. In 438, the emperor asked him to accompany his estranged wife Eudoxia on her pilgrimage to Jerusalem. While he was in the holy city, he was approached by a delegation from Syria who informed him that in large areas of that patriarchate the false report of Ephesus was still in circulation, and that the writings of Diodore and Theodore of Mopsuestia, the teachers of Nestorius, were still held up as the highest theological authorities, as if the condemnation of Nestorius had meant nothing at all.
When he returned to Alexandria, Cyril decided to start the fight again. This time he understood that unless he could clearly prove these writings were misleading and dangerous, the achievements of the council of Ephesus would be worthless. To accomplish this, he launched a focused campaign to discredit the works of Diodore and Theodore. His task was made much more difficult because these two men were considered the leading theological saints of Syria. When Cyril asked the new Archbishop of Constantinople, his former ally Proclus, to help him in this campaign, he was refused. The emperor had asked Proclus to use all his diplomatic skill to reconcile the differences that still existed throughout the Syrian church. Proclus believed that Cyril’s new attack would make things worse rather than better. Against his better judgment, and under significant pressure from the court, Cyril agreed to act more carefully. He continued to write treatises attacking Theodore and Diodore as the “teachers and sources of Nestorius’ heresy” but increasingly he made his arguments less direct.
Cyril’s judgment on these matters turned out to be prophetic. In the end, Proclus did not manage to create a lasting solution, and it was Cyril’s insight that was adopted at the Second Council of Constantinople in 553, when Justinian followed Cyril’s call for a definitive rejection of these works from the canon of orthodoxy, and both Diodore and Theodore were posthumously anathematized.
It was in his final years, when he could look back on the entire Nestorian controversy, that Cyril wrote the treatise “On the Unity of Christ.” It has rightly been considered one of his most mature theological works. Besides presenting a comprehensive theological explanation of why the Syrian tradition of “Two Sons” is destructive and cannot be accepted as an authentic tradition of the Church, Cyril also takes several opportunities to criticize the continuing high regard in which the Syrian church held Diodore and Theodore.
When Cyril was writing this treatise, his archrival Nestorius had been rearrested for refusing to stop a war of pamphleteering, and he was sent first to exile in the rose-red city of Arabian Petra, and finally to a lifelong exile in the penal colony of the Great Oasis in the Saharan desert. Even then the heat of the controversy was far from over. It was not even a matter of the dying embers of a fire, for the whole argument would soon flare up again at the Synod of Ephesus (449), and the councils of Chalcedon (451) and Constantinople II (553). Indeed, the effects of the divisions are still visible in the church today.
By the end of his life, Cyril’s letters to John of Antioch and Theodoret of Cyr, who had been his most determined opponents for years, show that some genuine level of personal and doctrinal reconciliation had been achieved. At this point he was an old and sick man. John of Antioch died before him. Nestorius would outlive him by six or seven years.
Cyril had suffered several illnesses during his life, and in 444 he took to his bed for the last time. He died on June 27, 444, just short of his seventieth year. Almost as soon as the funeral was over, his archdeacon Dioscorus, who was one of those who thought Cyril had been far too conciliatory in his approach to the Syrians, began a purge of his family. All their involvement in the financial and political affairs of the Alexandrian Church was brought to an end, thus ending a dynasty that Theophilus had established almost sixty years earlier. Dioscorus, a much less capable theologian and a much less skilled politician than Cyril, would soon lead one of the great churches of Christendom to a ruin from which it would never fully recover, before the Islamic invasions of the seventh century reduced it to a faint shadow of its former glory as an intellectual center of the Christian world.
Alexandria was a Christian city that had (and would continue to have) a great and honorable list of martyrs, holy monks, and teachers of the church to distinguish its history. But apart from St Athanasius, it had no one as remarkable as St Cyril holding the bishop’s office. Along with Origen and Athanasius, Cyril stands as one of the greatest theologians of the Alexandrian Church, and like his two fellow Alexandrians, one of the greatest theologians in the history of the Universal Church. For all three of them, their works were not only deeply important in themselves, but even more significant in terms of the influence they had on Christian teaching and understanding for centuries to come, and for the way they determined the very shape of what would or would not be regarded as ecumenical orthodoxy.
Cyril’s feast day is celebrated on June 9 and again on January 18, together with St. Athanasius.
His festal Troparion praises him in these words: Hail translucent star, defending warrior for the Holy Virgin who proclaimed above all the hierarchs at Ephesus that she was the Mother of God… Rejoice most blessed Cyril, spring of theology and river of the knowledge of God.
Never cease to intercede with Christ on our behalf. A Synopsis of St Cyril’s Christological Doctrine It would be no exaggeration to describe Cyril as one of the most profound and subtle of the Church’s theologians. As might be expected of someone who worked in an era when Christian terminology needed unusually careful reworking, his teaching is both technical and philosophically demanding. One of his most important contributions to Christian history is the way he developed a precise terminological system of discourse. It would be a mistake, however, to think that this makes Cyril a dull writer. There are passages where, like many another ancient rhetor, his ability to elaborate an argument through several variations sometimes exceeds the patience of modern readers, but throughout all his work there is a spirit of passion and religious fervor that communicates itself to those who have eyes to see and ears to hear, and the Dialogue presented here represents Cyril in the full flight of his theological maturity, yet in a literary style that is both fluent and elegant.
Cyril is driven by a deeply mystical understanding of God’s indwelling power, one that makes the incarnation of the Logos not just a theological detail of doctrinal history, but the primary way a Christian person experiences the Lord’s presence and the effects of his deifying grace. This practical and religious spirit is evident even in passages where our author challenges his readers’ philosophical skills. The full complexity of his theological doctrine, and that of his opponent Nestorius, has been explained in several places, and the reader may consult the works mentioned in the Select Bibliography for a fuller treatment. Here I will attempt only a brief sketch of his general christological doctrine, with minimal technical and historical digressions.
For Nestorius, language about the incarnation had to maintain a primary sense of the difference between deity and humanity: both the distance between God and his creatures, and the difference between the divine and human aspects of Christ. Once language had established these respective differences, the Christian mind could then appreciate the closeness of a God who, in the person of Jesus Christ, entered into relationship with humanity. If Nestorius’ framework was somewhat unclear on the critical question of whether this man (Jesus) was or was not God, then at least, as he saw it, it was a framework that insisted on the full integrity of all the elements that made it up: God and the creature were radically different, and Jesus was fully human in every respect. He regarded the question as too crude to be given a direct answer—but that did not stop his critics, then or now, from asking it of him, and sensing that the question was too critical simply to be dismissed as illegitimate because it was clumsily phrased. For a fuller elaboration of Nestorius’ doctrine cf. McGuckin, 1988, 1994, including human limitations of consciousness, psychology and power, while the divine Logos was fully God, unhindered by the human body of Jesus. For Nestorius, the human life of Jesus was something that the Logos was in communion with, not one that dominated or subjugated him in any way.
Cyril’s instinct about the incarnation went in the opposite direction. He found the idea of the Logos “associating” with a man to be repulsive to Christian tradition for two reasons: First, it left little difference between Jesus and one of the ancient prophets, who could also be described as having God inspiring them or “dwelling within” them; second, it did not express enough of the power and closeness of the “Union” between divinity and humanity, or its effects on human nature, which Cyril saw as the very heart and central purpose of the entire plan of the incarnation. In short, for Cyril the primary message of the incarnation was not about the separate relationship of God and man, but rather the complete reconciliation of God and Man in Jesus.
Cyril consistently used the key term “Union” (Henosis) in opposition to the Antiochenes, who preferred “Association.” Cyril insisted that the incarnation is not for God’s sake, but for the redemption of the human race. As such, it is an “economy,” or practical plan, that is meant to accomplish something. In the incarnation, God is actively at work among creatures, not merely pretending on the world’s stage, and that work is a mysterious but unstoppable transformation of human life into something radically new. This aspect of dynamic transformation (Theosis) is critical in Cyril’s thought and is one of its main pillars. Those who have accused Cyril of being too careless in his attitude toward Jesus’ real experience of human life have largely failed to grasp his point: that the divine Lord truly experiences everything that is genuinely human in order to transform what is mortal into the immortal.
Cyril understands that the incarnation of God as man is not a static event, but rather the pattern and model of a process. He points to the seamless union of God and man in the single divine person of Jesus, truly God and man at one and the same time, founded on the single subjectivity of Christ. This is not merely a sign of God’s presence among us, but a sign of how our own human lives are meant to be drawn into his divine life and transformed in a similar way. In short, for Cyril the manner of the incarnation is similar to the manner of the sanctification and transfiguration of Christ’s disciples.
This process of transformation was called “deification” (Theosis) by the Alexandrian theologians. As Saints Irenaeus and Athanasius had briefly stated centuries earlier: “He (the Word) became man, that man might become god.” Cyril teaches in his own way that “What he was by nature, we become by grace.” Theosis does not mean a pagan idea of becoming divine, which would be either crude mythologizing or one of the worst examples of Nietzschean pride, but instead indicates something fundamentally different and biblically based—something that the Western Church addressed through its theological teachings on Atonement and Beatific Vision.
Cyril believed that when the divine Logos became incarnate, he called his church to a new kind of theandric destiny. Before the incarnation, “divine” and “human” meant ontologically different categories of being. A vast gap existed between the creature and the Creator, not only morally but existentially. After the incarnation, the order of being (God’s ordering of the terms of the universe) has been radically changed. In the incarnation, two realities that were philosophically and theologically impossible to combine have been demonstrably united in Christ. This union is impossible, but it is nonetheless accomplished as a simple act of God’s infinite power: the invisible Lord is now made visible, the Immaterial One is made flesh, he who cannot be limited accepts the limitations of an earthly life, the Immortal One comes willingly to his own death. Cyril loves to use such strong paradoxes of language. The contrasts give his thought a religious energy and vigor that he knows how to use effectively in preaching. He accuses Nestorius of being too quick to judge what is or is not fitting for God by the standards of human logic, which he has mistakenly elevated as an absolute measure of truth. As Cyril sees it, Nestorius has forgotten that human logic is flawed because of sinfulness and the limited vision that results from our corruption. The argument over theological method was very intense between Cyril and Nestorius, and in turn developed into an important debate over the right interpretation of scriptural texts. In both cases, Cyril resisted the use of logic alone as a guide to the Christian mind, and appealed to a sense of tradition as expressing a common inner spiritual experience through several generations of theologian-saints.
But in spite of his appeal to represent traditional belief, does not his language involve the Church in a semi-pagan concept of God, where, like Zeus, a divinity can descend to earth and change his form to live in a physical fashion? Far from it, Cyril argued. The incarnation does not limit or remove the infinite power of God. It is simply an expression or act of that infinite power, one which pushes the limits of our understanding but which is not contradictory or illogical (as Nestorius had accused him of being). To imagine that the Logos’ divine omnipotence is compromised by the human life he now leads is to regard him as having “laid aside” his deity when he became man. Cyril rejects this idea and argues that he who was eternal God became man while always remaining what he was, that is eternal God. But was this, in turn, merely making theology a meaningless puzzle? Or making the human life of the divine Jesus merely a pretense, or a factor almost wiped out in the face of the overwhelming presence of a deity taking it over? Cyril argued that this followed only for those who had failed to understand that the incarnation was fundamentally a time-bound act of rescue for the human race, one that had to be placed within a larger scheme of God’s eternal philanthropy and providence for the world. The physical incarnation was a specific divine philanthropy of healing addressed to physical creatures, and meant to have an effect that began at the physical level and brought material creaturehood back up into a divine communion that transcended material capacity, while never rejecting materiality. This position of being a transcendently immanent creature was for Cyril a mystery, but not an illogicality—on the contrary, a promise held out to the world in the doctrine of the glorified resurrection body.
As Cyril saw it, divine power in the incarnate Lord did not try to express itself in opposition to other forms of life, including human consciousness. Instead, it was the very context that allowed all other life forms to exist and develop. For Cyril, then, the deity and humanity were not like two weights on a pair of scales, balanced uneasily in Christ. Rather, one was the nurturing matrix of the other. Just as the deity of Christ did not suppress or distort his own humanity, Cyril understood this to be a model showing that for the redeemed person, union with God would not restrict individuality but would instead free personhood and enhance it. As far as Cyril was concerned, even an ordinary human life showed at its core a sense of spiritual longing and transcendence that often tried to use its material condition as part of its spiritual ascent—or, to put it another way, to express its spiritual identity through its material consciousness. For Cyril, what was true of the whole human race, that it ontologically existed within the sphere of God’s powerful presence, was most particularly focused in the case of the Christ, whose humanity was a unique, direct, and personal expression of the divine presence.
Cyril used the image of a dual capacity—spirit animating flesh (the soul in the body)—as an example of how he understood the union of God and man in Christ. The Godhead lives without restriction in the incarnate form, just as it enjoys omnipotence in its eternal state before the incarnation. Once within the incarnation, however, the divine Logos lives by choice within the human material conditions of incarnated life. The two modes of life are like the closeness of soul and body in an ordinary human being.
In the case of an ordinary person, the different “natures” of both realities does not prevent their union, and it does not require that both be reduced to one or the other. Instead, both can keep their integrity while at the same time sharing a complete union that allows new conditions and new possibilities of existence to develop. Cyril points out that a human being results from the very fact of the union of body and soul. For Cyril, the full deity of the Word unites with a perfect human existence, and from the closeness of that spiritual and material union, the one Christ results.
Cyril believed that the soul-body image was the best attempt he could make to portray an irreducibly mysterious reality of the divine human relation within Christ, which he understood as a uniquely personal act of God. He offers supplementary images for the relationship in the form of the lily and its perfume, the fire within a coal, a jewel and its radiance. What he was searching for was a concept of natural interpenetration where the two realities (for example, deity and humanity) both remained perfectly intact, but not in any parallel association. Instead they existed in a dynamic interpenetration and mutuality that brought about new conditions and possibilities because of that intimate union. This is why he was very concerned to insist that the Word of God, deity in all its fullness, united with a human existence. The Word did not unite with a man, but with humanity. What this means is that he wanted to avoid any sense that there was a human being (Jesus, a Jewish rabbi from Nazareth) alongside a divinity (the Word of God), or any suggestion that a man was seized by the Spirit of God, in the way the Adoptionist heresy of earlier centuries had taught. But what does it mean to say that the Word united with humanity? Is it not a fundamentally abstract conception poorly suited to express such a personal theological mystery? For Cyril the criticism did not hold at all. He regarded humanity as a way of being, a manner of expressing identity in and through the material circumstances of bodily life. He did not define humanity as personal being in itself. In other words he distinguished personhood both from the condition in which personhood arose and from the manner in which it was expressed. If, as he would argue, even ordinary human beings could never be reduced in their spiritual identities merely to that bodily condition, then this was true (and even more so) for the Word of God Incarnate. His person was divine and could not be reduced to the bodily life, yet it chose to express itself through that bodily manner. As a result even the bodily life became a direct vehicle of the revelation of the divine.
Cyril knew that at the heart of this vision lay a great and serious question about his understanding of Christ’s subjective unity. If he rejected the entire Nestorian scheme as too divisive of Christ’s personal unity (he accused it of inevitably suggesting “Two Sons,” or a man Jesus existing alongside a divine Logos), then how did he himself explain Christ’s inner subjectivity? This was the central question of all his writings after 428, and it is a dominant theme within the present treatise, providing its main thesis as expressed in the work’s very title: “On the Unity of Christ.” His task was not easy. Earlier tradition had suggested approaches but had not clearly defined them. In addition, Cyril’s generation had reached a crossroads between two very different theologies, both of which had proved, or were proving, unacceptable to Orthodox consensus: the Syrian doctrine of Two Sons, and the Apollinarist doctrine which explained Christ’s subjective unity by teaching that the divine Logos did away with a human mind or consciousness in Christ, because the superior replaced the inferior. The latter position had rightly been rejected as a poor account of the incarnation that turned out to be a destruction of humanity, not an assumption of it.
Cyril knew that his task lay in a different direction from both extremes. He had to account for the integrity of the deity and the humanity while demonstrating their integral communion and the results of it. He settled on the key term henosis (union). From deity and humanity a union has taken place—not an overlap, or a co-habitation, or a relationship, or a displacement, or an association. None of the things his opponents had proposed. He argued for a union in the strict sense of the word, yet a union that was of the type that did not destroy its constituent elements. It was thus in the manner of the soul-body union in humans, a union that effected new conditions and capacities for both constituents while preserving their basic elements intact, and not, for example, in the manner of a union of sand and sugar (one that did nothing to either element and did not really combine either part for any positive end), or union of fire and wood (one which only worked by destroying the basis of the elements so united).
In the case of Christ, Cyril speaks of this union of deity and humanity as a “Hypostatic Union.” The person of the Logos is the sole personal subject of all the conditions of his existence, divine or human. The Logos is, of course, the sole personal subject of all his own acts as eternal Lord (the creation, the inspiration of the ancient prophets, and so on), but after the incarnation the same one is also the personal subject directing all his actions performed within time and space, embodied acts which form the context of the human life of Christ in Palestine. The phrase “the selfsame” appears over and over in his writings as a way of insisting on this doctrine of single-subjectivity as the foundation of the entire Christology debate. Cyril would certainly argue that Christ was fully human in every possible sense, but in the twentieth century new problems have arisen over his understanding of what that might mean, because today, unlike all the ancient thinkers on all sides, we tend to see the whole issue of subjectivity and personhood in terms drawn from the analytical psychology of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. As a result, we approach the concept and the problem as it relates to the doctrine of incarnation in terms of what could be called “psychic consciousness.”
Cyril, however, refused to reduce the concept of person to these psychological experiences. For him, personhood (whether in Jesus or in humans generally) was not a product of material-based consciousness. Rather, consciousness was the result of a divinely created personhood. Modern psychology finds this perspective difficult to accept, but Cyril was firm in rejecting the Aristotelian empiricist view that identity could be reduced to brain activity. He approached personhood as a God-given and transcendent mystery, with the full destiny of such an identity lying in another age and another condition: the Kingdom of God.
For Cyril, then, there was only one personal subject and one personal reality in Christ, and that was the divine Logos. But Christ was not simply the Logos of God. He was the Logos as he had chosen to enter fully into human life. And insofar as the Logos lived a human life directly and personally, within all the historical and material limitations imposed by that form of life (constraints that applied within his life in history as man, but not within his simultaneous life outside time as God), then Christ was at once divine and human—inseparably so. Cyril regarded this “at once” as a synchronized experience of two life-forms, neither of which prevented the other from operating, but both of which were enhanced by the intimate experience provided by the other. In other words, neither the deity nor the humanity of Christ was diminished by the incarnation, but both were, in a real sense, “developed” by the experience: the humanity ontologically and morally, the divinity economically.
His critics wanted him to explain more clearly what this enhancement meant. An “enhancement” in the manner of Apollinaris was not considered acceptable at all. Cyril argued that this was far from the only way to describe the benefits the divine presence gave to the human nature of Jesus. Instead, he presented a picture of Jesus’ humanity that was filled with divine light and grace: a divinization of the flesh of Christ that made it uniquely powerful and health-giving, while it remained essentially human flesh. The fact that Christ’s touch brought healing was explained by Cyril on the basis that it was the human finger of none other than God, and therefore human flesh, but by no means ordinary human flesh—rather the life-giving flesh of God. He was thus presenting an image of something that remained whole and intact but not unchanged; on the contrary, it was enhanced. To those who would argue that this “change” destroyed the essential human condition, Cyril argued instead that it fulfilled the essential human condition, whose destiny was not to resist divine transformation but to be called to an ever deeper communion with God’s transforming grace. This is why Cyril saw the Logos’ enhancement of Jesus’ flesh as the first fruits of his transformation of the humanity of all disciples. For Cyril, the incarnation was a fundamental “process” of such transformation. If this explains how the deity can enhance the humanity, how could it possibly be said that humanity can enhance divinity? Nestorius accused Cyril particularly on this point, arguing that his way of thinking could only lead to a reduction of the status and capacity of the deity. In response, Cyril developed what he meant by the divinity’s “economy of salvation.” Cyril argued that while the deity considered in itself—that is, considered outside the incarnation and outside time or space—could never change, since it was already absolute and perfect, this did not mean that the deity could never act in different ways: otherwise there would be no relationship between God and his creation. God acted within time and space, not because this was his own way of acting, but because it was his creation’s way, and for the sake of his loving relationship to the world God was prepared to do the impossible: the Timeless One engages with history. For Cyril, if one denied that, one denied the whole validity of a Creator God who worked out his covenant with the human race within history. In the case of the incarnation, the same paradox was witnessed again, yet in a more intimately unique manner. The incarnation, as Cyril saw it, was an act of all-powerful strength, in which the eternal Lord directly and personally chose to experience the conditions of an historical and material life. If that life was a mere sham, Cyril says, and he did not really experience limitation, doubt, suffering, and all the knocks and blows that human life is subject to, then why bother to engage in the incarnation at all? The answer, for Cyril, is not far behind—he chose to engage personally in all the range of human experience in order to set new terms for the transformation of that condition. In particular, Cyril discusses human suffering and death. He used a recurring phrase which his opponents mocked, interpreting it as an indication that Cyril did not take Christ’s human experience seriously; he spoke of how Christ “suffered impassibly” (apathos epathen). The catchiness of the slogan was typical of Cyril’s apologetic style, and as with other catch-phrases he chose terms that most shockingly set out the lines of his thought while flatly contradicting the main premises of his opponents. In other words, the phrase is a densely apologetic one that has to be carefully unpacked in order to appreciate what he meant by it. One thing is undeniable: Cyril is no docetic who is denying the reality of Christ’s sufferings. On the contrary, he points to the whole experience of incarnation as adding a unique aspect to the divinity: the personal experience of human suffering and death. This “adding to” the deity is impossible if considered in terms of natures: divine nature cannot be added to or subtracted from in terms of its essence; but it is possible, Cyril argues, in terms of personal experience of a life form. And in the incarnation Cyril sees the eternal God directly experiencing suffering and death—insofar as like other men he too is brought under the terms of the human life form.
Cyril sees this aspect of the incarnation as the key to redemption. Although God experiences suffering and death, just as he experiences all other human realities, he does not become controlled by suffering or death. It is the same with his deity as with his humanity: the conditions of one do not erase the distinct realities of the other, even though there is a dynamic mutual exchange happening between the two.
Cyril emphasizes this point with a decisive linguistic move that has since become known as the doctrine of the “Exchange of Properties,” or the “Communication of Idioms” (Antidosis Idiomatum). Like the other Fathers, Cyril excludes the experience of sin from Jesus, which he sees as not essentially “human” anyway, but merely a corruption of true humanity. He argued passionately that, based on this direct personal sharing of experience grounded in the single divine hypostasis of the Logos who possessed both conditions or lifeforms, it was legitimate to attribute the experiences of both natures to one and the same person—always understanding that one’s language referred to the incarnate condition. So Cyril drove his point home in his characteristic vivid and paradoxical linguistic style: God wept. God died. God sat on the Virgin’s lap and nursed. To his opponents, especially Nestorius, this language shattered the very foundations of their christological framework, and they attacked it fiercely as similar to mythology. For Cyril, it was the one truth—that the divine Logos was the only personal subject experiencing all the acts of the incarnation—that saved the doctrine of incarnation from mythology, and at the same time explained why the incarnation was necessary. Before the incarnation the Immortal God could not possibly die, in any sense of the words. Now, in the conditions of the incarnation, it is perfectly true to say that God has willingly died, yet being God has broken the chains of death in the very act of submitting to them.
This redemptive system of exchange and transformation in Cyril is called “Appropriation Theory,” and in some ways it stands at the very heart of his christological argument. Whenever he insists, as he does repeatedly, on pushing the logic of phrases like “the death of God” or “the Mother of God,” he is appealing to this larger theological framework. This is why, as has often been noted, Cyril’s vigorous defense of the title Theotokos was fundamentally a christological and soteriological statement rather than a statement about Mariology as such. Beyond using this kind of “Exchange of Properties” language, Cyril also employs a favorite phrase, “One Incarnate Nature of God the Word,” to summarize and express the transformative element at the heart of the incarnation. Like his other terms, this was deliberately meant as a provocation to his opponents. Some critics have suggested that Cyril’s habit of using such bold language in his arguments made the controversy more intense than it needed to be. Cyril believed that only such sharp terms could force his opponents out of a mild theological vagueness that concealed their fundamentally unacceptable assumptions. His contemporary opponents, such as Nestorius, Theodoret of Cyr, Andrew of Samosata, and others in the Syrian patriarchate, simply read them as examples of extreme Apollinarist heresy. In this they were wrong. There are reasons to think that some truth exists in both of the other two views expressed: that Cyril made the argument sharper and more urgent than it might otherwise have been, and that perhaps there was a negative as well as a positive side to that.
The same pattern holds when we look at how Cyril dealt with Nestorius as an opponent. It is certainly true that Cyril was stubbornly opposed to everything Nestorius stood for, and that he may not always have read his opponents’ works with proper attention to the subtlety of their arguments. However, there are no grounds for thinking that Cyril did not understand Nestorius’ theology. What he felt was at stake was an underlying tendency that troubled him deeply. If he was unwilling to compromise over the doctrinal disagreement with Nestorius, seeing it as turning on the fundamental issue of single subjectivity, this does not mean he was a rigid or inflexible thinker. When he was convinced that the central issue was secure, he was quite willing to go the extra mile to meet the Syrian theologians’ concerns. It was his willingness to compromise once the central facts had been established that cost him some popularity at home in his final years.
Over the last century, in our own time, the issues he fought for so passionately—the subjective unity of the incarnate Lord and the difference between Christian theology of incarnation and pagan mythological religious schemes—have once again become subjects of large-scale dispute. This has led to considerable christological revision in the Western churches, and it is not surprising to see a corresponding review of Nestorian theology in the process and, one might deduce, something of an attempt to revive it in terms of popular dogmatics. It is certainly the case that in the European literature of the last hundred years Cyril has been criticized both as a thinker and as a person in ways that suggest unspoken doctrinal battles are being fought behind the front of historical scholarship. In several influential modern studies, the Antiochene tradition that Cyril attacked—that of Diodore, Theodore, and Nestorius—has been presented as a legitimate and ancient part of an authentically pluralist Christian vision, and Cyril has been condemned as one who arrogantly crushed it. Given that these old arguments are far from dead, and given the importance of the debate in terms of what constitutes the Church’s doctrine of Christ and how it articulates its authentic tradition, it should prove both timely and instructive to present this translation of Cyril to a new generation of readers. It is one of Cyril’s most elegant and accessible writings, and it explains at the end of a long battle from which he emerged successful why in his own time he utterly rejected such a relativistic and inclusive approach to the nature of Christian Paradosis—that tradition of Christianity which is not merely a historical-theological matter but an enduring question of the articulation of the church’s spiritual experience of its redeeming Lord.
ON THE UNITY OF CHRIST’
People with true and good sense, who have mentally grasped the life-giving knowledge, never grow tired of the sacred sciences. Indeed, Scripture says: “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Mt 4:4; Dt 8:3). The word of God is food for the mind and a spiritual “bread that strengthens the heart of man,” as the
Book of Psalms sings (cf. Ps 104:15).
B. How right you are.
A. The wise and eloquent men among the pagans are full of admiration for a well-turned phrase. One of their main concerns is elegance of expression. They are filled with the greatest enthusiasm for good style and take great pride in verbal skill. The content of their poets is merely lies dressed up in rhythms and meters for grace and harmony, but they have little if any regard for the truth. I would say they are sick from the lack of any true or proper understanding of the nature and reality of God. Or rather, as the most holy Paul puts it: “They have been mistaken in their reasonings and their insensible hearts are darkened. Thinking themselves wise, they have become as fools, and have exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and birds, and beasts and reptiles” (Rom 1:21-23). B. Quite so. And God said of them through the voice of Isaiah: “Know that their hearts are but dust, and that they have erred” (Is 44:20).
Then so much for them. As for the inventors of impure heresies, those profaners and apostates who have opened their mouths wide against the divine glory, those who have uttered perverted things, we could accuse them of having slipped in their madness as low as the foolish pagans, perhaps even lower. It would have been better for them never to have known the way of truth than to have known it and then turned away from the sacred commandment that was handed on to them. What the Book of Proverbs so rightly speaks of has indeed come about: that the dog has returned to its vomit, and no sooner has it washed than the pig returns to wallow in the slime. They have circulated among themselves blasphemous accusations against Christ, and like wild ferocious wolves they ravage the flock for which Christ died. They pillage what is his very own, bloating themselves on what is not theirs, as it is written, and stuffing their gorge to the full. How aptly does that saying apply to them, that they came out from us but were not part of us.
B. Indeed they were not.
Some people are foolish enough to drag the Word and Only Begotten Son of God down from his supreme position. They reduce him from equality with God the Father by denying his consubstantiality and refusing to acknowledge that he possesses a perfect identity of nature with the Father.
Nestorian position in the following sentence, as something that is logically similar to Arianism. Linking heresies together was a common approach among the church fathers in the 5th century, but Cyril’s emphasis on this point suggests he genuinely believed this was the logical analysis of Nestorianism. Others more or less follow the same path as those we just mentioned. They fall into the traps of death and “into the pit of hell” (Pr 9:18 LXX) as they distort the mystery of the incarnate plan of the Only Begotten, teaching a foolish idea that is in a way the twin of their predecessors’ error. In fact, the first group, as much as they are able, drag down the Word born from God the Father from the heights of divinity even before his incarnation, while the second group have decided to fight against the Word even in his incarnation. These shameless people even dare to criticize his loving grace toward the human race, because they think that the fact that he took on flesh and accepted the limitations of this self-emptying, that is, became man and “appeared on earth and engaged with men” (Bar 3:38) even though he was God by physis and seated with the Father, all shows a lack of wisdom.
B. How rightly you put it.
A. Nevertheless, Scripture inspired by God will speak out against both kinds of madness. It serves as the spokesman for truth and exposes the weak and disgraceful system of these people. It sets firmly on the paths of the Godhead all those who carefully and thoughtfully fix the eyes of their mind on this mystery. Still, I would like to ask you about these people who have wickedly degraded the honored and inexpressible economy of the Savior. Surely this matter troubles you to some degree?
B. You understand correctly, “for I have been consumed with zeal for the Lord” (1 Kg 19:10), and I am so upset by all this that I am deeply disturbed. I feel afraid when I consider where their teaching will end up, because they have corrupted the faith that was handed down to us through the inventions of that serpent who has recently appeared. They are injecting their cold, twisted, and foolish ideas like poison into the souls of simple people.
A. But please tell me, who is this serpent who has appeared so recently? And what are these idiotic things he sets against the teachings of the truth?
B. The serpent who has recently appeared is that crooked one whose tongue is drunk on venom. He not only rejects the tradition of all the initiates throughout the world (or rather the tradition of all the God-inspired scriptures), but he also innovates as he sees fit. He denies that the holy virgin is the Mother of God and calls her Christ-Mother instead, or Mother-of-the-Man, not to mention the other shocking and absurd ideas he introduces into the orthodox and pure teachings of the catholic Church.
You’re talking about Nestorius, I think. I already know something about his ideas, but as to their exact nature, my friend, I’m not so sure. How can he say that the holy virgin is not the Mother of God?
B. He maintains it is because she did not give birth to God, since the Word existed before her—or rather, the Word exists before every age and time, being coeternal with God the Father.
In that case, they must also deny that Emmanuel is God. If so, it would seem the evangelist interpreted the term pointlessly when he said, “And being translated this means God-with-us” (Mt 1:23; Is 7:14). Yet because he is God made man, this is exactly how we ought to name the one born of the holy virgin according to the flesh, just as God the Father clearly teaches through the voice of the prophet.
B. But this is not how these people see it. They say that God, or rather the Word of God, has been with us in the sense of helping us. For he saved everything under heaven through the one who was born of a woman. A. But tell me, was he not with Moses delivering the Israelites from the land of Egypt and from their tyranny, as it is written: “With strong hand and outstretched arm”? (Ps 136:12). And after this do we not find him saying to Joshua quite clearly: “As I was with Moses so shall I be with you”? (Jos 3:7).
B. This is true.
Then why are neither of them called Emmanuel? Why does this name apply only to the one who was so wondrously born of a woman according to the flesh in these last times of the world?
B. Then how should we understand that God was born of a woman? Does it mean that the Word received his existence in her and from her?
Reject this horrible and disgusting idea. These are the teachings of someone who has wandered off, of a sick mind that has strayed into territory it should never have entered, thinking that the ineffable being of the Only Begotten could ever be the product of flesh. Rather, as God he was ineffably begotten by nature from the Father and was coeternal with him. For those who want to understand clearly how and in what manner he appeared in a form like ours and became human, the divine evangelist John explains when he says: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, glory as of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).
B. But they claim that if the Word became flesh, he no longer remained the Word, but instead ceased to be what he was.
This is nothing but foolishness and stupidity, the frenzy of a crazed mind. It seems they believe that the term “became” inevitably and necessarily means change or alteration. They say this is the case, and they support their teaching based on the God-inspired scriptures themselves. For they claim it is said somewhere about Lot’s wife that “She became a pillar of salt” (Gen 19:26), and again about Moses’ staff that “He threw it upon the ground and it became a serpent” (Ex 4:3), and that in all these cases a change of physis took place.
Well then, when people sing in the psalm, “And the Lord became my refuge” (Ps 94:22), and again, “O Lord you have become my refuge from one generation to the next” (Ps 90:1), what will they say about this? Has the one we sing about laid aside his being as God and changed into a refuge through some transformation? Has he changed by physis into something else that he was not at first?
Surely this approach is incongruous and unfitting to one who is God by physis. Immutable by physis, he remains that which he was and is forever, even if one says that “he became a refuge” for various people.
What you have said is excellent and perfectly true. So when we are considering God, if someone uses the word “became,” isn’t it completely impious and absurd to assume it means change? Instead, shouldn’t we try to understand it in a different way, applying some wisdom and turning to what is far more fitting and appropriate for the unchangeable God?
B. If we are to preserve immutability and unalterability as innate and essential to God, in what sense, then, should we say that the Word has become flesh?
A. The all-wise Paul, steward of His mysteries and sacred minister of the Gospel proclamations, explains this for us when he says, “Let each of you have among yourselves that same mind which was in Christ Jesus who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, assuming the form of a slave, coming in the likeness of men; and being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself becoming obedient even to death, death on a cross” (Phil 2:5-8). Indeed, the Only Begotten Word, even though he was God and born from God by physis (nature), the “radiance of the glory, and the exact image of the being” of the one who begot him (Heb 1:3), became man. He did not change himself into flesh. He did not undergo any mixture or blending, or anything else of this kind. But he submitted himself to being emptied and “for the sake of the honor that was set before him he counted the shame as nothing” (Heb 12:2) and did not reject the poverty of human physis. As God he wished to make the flesh which was held in the grip of sin and death clearly superior to sin and death. He made it his very own—not soulless as some have said, but rather animated with a rational soul—and thus he restored flesh to what it was in the beginning. He did not consider it beneath him to follow a path that fit this plan, and so he is said to have undergone a birth like ours, while all the while remaining what he was. He was born of a woman according to the flesh in a wondrous manner, for he is God by physis, and as such invisible and incorporeal, and only in this way, in a form like our own, could he be made manifest to earthly creatures. He thought it good to be made man and in his own person to reveal our physis honored in the dignities of the divinity. The same one was at once God and man, and he was “in the likeness of men” (Phil 2:7) since even though he was God he was “in the fashion of a man” (Phil 2:8). He was God in an appearance like ours, and the Lord in the form of a slave. This is what we mean when we say that he became flesh, and for the same reasons we affirm that the holy virgin is the Mother of God.
B. Would you like us to compare their arguments to yours and undertake a more thorough examination of these matters, or should we simply accept your word that the question has been fully addressed? A. In my opinion the argument is flawless, spoken with wisdom and learning, and in complete agreement with the God-inspired scriptures. But by all means speak your mind, because a counter-argument may produce some useful results.
B. Well, they say that the divine Paul writes about the Son as if he had become a curse and sin, for he says: “He who did not know sin, became sin for our sakes” (2 Corinthians 5:21); and again: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law when he became ‘a curse for us'” (Galatians 3:13). But they would maintain that this does not mean he really became a curse and sin, but rather that here the holy scripture clearly means something else. In exactly the same way, they argue, we should understand the phrase: “And the Word became flesh” (John 1:14).
It is true that he has introduced this idea: just as we say “He became curse and sin,” so in the same way he “became flesh,” and this notion holds a leading position among his followers.
B. What do you mean? When someone says of him, “He who knew no sin became sin for our sakes and redeemed from the curse of the Law those who were under the law, becoming a curse for their sakes,” how could anyone doubt that this clearly refers to the time when the Only Begotten was incarnate and made man?
Well, when someone speaks of the incarnation, they also include all those other things that are economically connected to the one who willingly underwent this “emptying out”—things like hunger and exhaustion. How could he who possesses all power ever have been exhausted, or how could anyone say that he who is the food and life of all beings was ever hungry, unless he had taken to himself a body that by its very physis was subject to hunger and exhaustion? In the same way, he could never have been counted among the lawless (which is what it means to say he became sin), nor would he ever have become a curse by enduring the cross for our sake, unless he had become flesh—that is, incarnated and made man for our sake—submitting to a birth like ours, though it was from a holy virgin.
B. I agree. Your opinion is right.
A. Moreover, it is foolish to think or to claim that the Word became flesh in exactly the same way as he became curse and sin. B. Tell me why. A. Did he not become accursed in order to lift the curse? And did not the Father make him sin so that he might bring sin to an end?
They would agree with this too.
A. In that case, if it is true that the Word became flesh in exactly the same way that he became curse and sin, which is how they understand it, then surely he must have become flesh for the suppression of flesh? But how would this serve to exhibit the incorruptibility and imperishability of flesh which he achieved, first of all in his own body? For he did not allow it to remain mortal and subject to corruption, thus allowing the penalty of Adam’s transgression to continue to pass on to us. Rather, since it was his own and personal flesh, that of the incorruptible God, he set it beyond death and corruption. B. How well you put it.
Somewhere in holy scripture it says that the first man, Adam, was made “a life-giving soul,” while the last man, Christ, was made “a life-giving spirit” (1 Cor 15:45). Should we then say that just as he became curse and sin to destroy that curse and sin, he likewise became a life-giving spirit in order to suppress the state of being a living soul? These people absurdly twist the meaning of the word “became” and then insist that he became “flesh” in the same way as he became curse and sin. This is how the incarnation, or rather the enmanment of the Word, is destroyed. For if this approach is accepted as truth, then the whole meaning of the mystery is lost to us, since Christ is not born, did not die, and was not raised, according to the scriptures. In that case, where is the faith? That “word of faith which we proclaim” (Rom 10:8)? How did God raise him from the dead if he did not die? And how could he die if he had not been born according to the flesh? And “if Christ is not raised” (1 Cor 15:17), then where is that resurrection of the dead which inspired in the saints the hope of eternal life? And where is that revitalization of human bodies which is achieved by participation in his holy flesh and blood?
B. This is why we affirm that the Word became flesh with respect to that birth from a woman according to the flesh, which is said to have taken place in the last times of this present age, even though, as God, he exists before every age.
Exactly so. For it was in this way that he “became like us in all things except sin” (Heb 4:15). The all-wise Paul bears witness to this when he says: “Since the children have a common share in flesh and blood he himself equally participated in these things so that through his death he could reduce to powerlessness the one who held the dominion of death, that is the devil, and that he might liberate those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death. For he did not take his descent from the angels, rather from Abraham’s line, and thus it was fitting that he should be made like his brethren in all things” (Heb 2:14-17). And this likeness in all things has as a kind of beginning, or as the starting point of the matter, his birth from a woman; his appearance in the flesh, even though according to his own physis he is invisible; his lowering to the human condition for the plan of salvation, even though he has the supreme name; his humbling to humanity, even though he is exalted above the Thrones; and his taking on of the limits of a servant, even though he is by physis the Lord (Phil 2:6f). And all this because “The Word was God” (Jn 1:1).
B. Your thinking on this is absolutely correct. However, you should understand that in their view it is unacceptable and even inappropriate either to think or to state that the Word who was ineffably and incomprehensibly born from God the Father needed to experience a second birth from a woman. They insist that it was sufficient for him to have been born from the Father just once, in a manner appropriate to God.
In that case they are criticizing the Son and saying that his decision to undergo a voluntary self-emptying for our sake was a mistake. If this is true, then the great and holy mystery of godliness is thwarted and made pointless, because they are implying that the Only Begotten’s marvelous economy in the flesh accomplished nothing for the people on earth. The word of truth does not let the nonsense of such people prevail. Instead, it exposes their completely foolish ramblings that show no understanding whatsoever of the mystery of Christ. God the Father generated the Son from himself in one single act of generation, but it pleased him to save the entire human race in him through the incarnation—or rather the enmanment—which obviously and entirely required birth from a woman. The purpose was that through the likeness the Word born from God shared with us, the law of sin in our fleshly bodies could be condemned, and so that through the likeness of the death of the one who did not know death, death itself might be destroyed. As Scripture says: “If we have been conjoined with him in the likeness of his death, so also shall we be in the likeness of his resurrection” (Rom 6:5). It follows, then, that He Who Is, The One Who Exists, must necessarily be born of the flesh, taking everything that is ours into himself so that all who are born of the flesh—that is, we who are corruptible and perishing—might find rest in him. In short, he took what was ours as his very own so that we might have all that was his. “He was rich but he became poor for our sake, so that we might be enriched by his poverty” (2 Cor 8:9). When they say that the Word of God did not become flesh, or rather did not undergo birth from a woman according to the flesh, they destroy the economy of salvation. For if he who was rich did not impoverish himself by lowering himself to our condition out of loving compassion, then we have not gained his riches but are still in our poverty, still enslaved by sin and death, because the Word becoming flesh is what undoes and abolishes everything that came upon human nature as our curse and punishment. If they uproot our salvation in this way and remove the cornerstone of our hope, how can anything else remain standing? As I have said, if the Word has not become flesh then the dominion of death has not been overthrown, and sin has not been abolished in any way, and we are still held captive in the transgressions of the first man, Adam, deprived of any return to a better condition—a return which I would say has been gained by Christ the Savior of us all.
B. I understand what you are saying.
A. Then how should we define someone who shares in flesh and blood along with us even though in his own physis he is different from us? We would hardly say that it was fitting for any human being to take a share in humanity, for how can one speak of something assuming a reality that is different from it if that reality was already its own physis in the first place? Doesn’t my argument make perfect sense?
B. Yes, absolutely.
Look at it from another perspective. Is it not wicked and shocking to try to take away from God the Word his birth from a woman according to the flesh? For how could his body possibly give life to us if it were not the very own body of him who is Life? And how could it be that “the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin” (1 Jn 1:7) if it was in reality only that of an ordinary man subject to sin? And how has “God the Father sent his Son born of a woman, born subject to the law” (Gal 4:4)? Or how has “he condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom 8:3)? To condemn sin does not belong to someone with a physis like ours, under the tyranny of sin, an ordinary man. But because it became the body of the one who knew no transgression, it was able to shake off the tyranny of sin and enjoy all the personal riches of the Word who is ineffably united with it in a way beyond all description. This is why it is a holy and life-giving thing, full of divine energy. And we too are transformed in Christ, the first-fruits, to be above corruption and sin. What the blessed Paul says is true: “Just as we bore the image of the earthly, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly” (1 Cor 15:49), that is to say, of Christ. Christ is understood as the Heavenly Man, not because he brought down his flesh from on high and out of heaven, but because the Word who is God came down from heaven and entered our likeness—that is, he submitted to birth from a woman according to the flesh—while always remaining what he was, that is, one from on high, from heaven, superior to all things as God even with the flesh. This is what the divine John says about him: “He who comes from above is above all” (Jn 3:31). He remained Lord of all things even when he came, for the economy, in the form of a slave, and this is why the mystery of Christ is truly wonderful. Indeed, God the Father said to the Jews through one of the prophets: “Look on this you scoffers, be struck with wonder and disappear, for I am doing a work in your days, a work in which you will not believe even if one were to explain it to you” (Hab 1:5, Acts 13:41). The mystery of Christ runs the risk of being disbelieved precisely because it is so incredibly wonderful. For God was in humanity. He who was above all creation was in our human condition; the invisible one was made visible in the flesh; he who was from the heavens and from on high was in the likeness of earthly things; the immaterial one could be touched; he who is free in his own physis came in the form of a slave; he who blesses all creation became accursed; he who is all righteousness was numbered among transgressors; life itself came in the appearance of death. All this happened because the body which tasted death belonged to no other but to him who is the Son by nature. Can you find fault in any of this, or in any of my other arguments?
B. None at all.
There are other things you ought to consider as well.
B. What do you mean? A. Christ said somewhere to those who wanted to deny the resurrection of the dead: “Have you not read that he who made ‘man in the beginning made them male and female?'” (Mt 19:4), and the divine Paul also wrote: “Marriage and the undefiled bed is an entirely honorable thing” (Heb 13:4). If that’s the case, when the Only Begotten Word of God wanted to become like us, why didn’t he allow the laws of our human nature (physis) to apply in forming and generating his own flesh? He didn’t choose to take on flesh through the marriage bed, but rather from a holy and unmarried virgin, who conceived from the Spirit when the power of God overshadowed her, as it is written. So if God didn’t dishonor marriage but actually honored it with a blessing, then why did the Word, who is God, make a virgin the mother of his own flesh through conception directly from the Holy Spirit? B. I’m unable to say.
Won’t the reason become completely clear to anyone who thinks about it? As I’ve said, the Son came, or rather was made man, to restore our condition within himself—first of all in his own holy, wonderful, and truly amazing birth and life. This is why he himself became the first one to be born of the Holy Spirit (I mean according to the flesh, of course) so that he could open a path for grace to come to us. He wanted us to have this spiritual rebirth and spiritual transformation into the likeness of himself, who is the true and natural Son, so that we too could call God our Father and remain free from corruption, no longer belonging to our first father, Adam, in whom we were corrupted. All this happened “not from blood, not from the will of the flesh, or the will of man” but from God through the Spirit. Christ himself once said, “Call no man on earth your father, for you have but one Father who is in heaven.” And because he came down into our condition solely to lead us to his own divine state, he also said, “I am going to my Father and your Father; to my God, and your God.” In his case the Heavenly One is his natural Father; in our case he is our God. But insofar as this true and natural Son became as we are, he speaks of the Father as his God, using language appropriate to his self-emptying. Still, he gave his very own Father even to us, for it is written: “Yet to those who did receive him, those that believed in his name, he gave them authority to become the children of God.” But if we foolishly deny that the Word of God the Father became like us through such a birth, the very one who has dominion over all as the most wise Paul says, then how else could we be so transformed as to be called the children of God by the Spirit? Who should we then consider as the first-fruits of this process? Who, in short, would bring this dignity to us?
B. I am sure that even they would say it was the Word made Man.
But how could that be the case unless he himself became flesh, that is became man, taking a human body to himself in such an unbreakable union that it must be considered as his own body and no one else’s? This is how he passes on the grace of sonship even to us so that we too can become children of the Spirit, since human nature first achieved this possibility in him. It seems to me that the divine Paul was thinking about such things when he wrote so correctly: “For just as we have borne the image of that which is earthly so shall we bear the image of the heavenly, for the first man was from the earth and earthly, but the second is from heaven.” All those who belong to the earthly one bear the character of the earth, but all those who belong to the Heavenly One bear a heavenly character (cf. 1 Cor 15:47-49). We are earthly beings because the curse of corruption has passed from the earthly Adam even to us, and through our corruption the law of sin entered the members of our flesh. Yet we became heavenly beings, receiving this gift in Christ. He is from God, from on high, and by nature God, yet he came down to our condition in a strange and most unusual way, and was born of the Spirit, according to the flesh, so that we too might remain in holiness and incorruptibility like him. Clearly grace came upon us from him, as from a new rootstock, a new beginning.
How excellently you put it.
So why does it say that “He was made like his brethren in all things” (Heb 2:17), which means like us? How can we possibly understand him as taking up our likeness unless he is not in our condition and different from us in nature? For whatever is “made like” certain other things must necessarily be different from them, unlike them, indeed of a different form or physis from them. The Only Begotten, therefore, was by physis unlike us, and then he is said to have been made like us when he became as we are, that is man. There was only one way, however, that this could properly happen, and that was by a human birth, even though in his case it happened so marvelously since the one who became flesh was God. We must admit, of course, that the body which he united to himself was endowed with a rational soul, for the Word, who is God, would hardly neglect our finer part, the soul, and have regard only for the earthly body. Quite clearly in all wisdom he provided for both the soul and the body.
I agree. Your way of thinking is correct.
A. In that case, if our opponents insist that the holy virgin must never be called Mother of God, but Mother of Christ instead, then their blasphemy is obvious, because they are denying that Christ is truly God and Son. If they really believed that he was God, to the extent that the Only Begotten became as we are, then why would they be afraid of calling the woman who gave birth to him “the Mother of God”—I mean according to the flesh?
B. Well, they say that the title of Christ is the only proper designation for the one who is born of a woman from David’s lineage, since he was anointed by the Holy Spirit. But the Word of God needs no such anointing in his own physis, for by nature he is holy. Is it not true that the title Christ presupposes that some kind of anointing has taken place?
A. You are right to conclude that he is called Christ only because of the anointing, just as an apostle is called that because of his apostolic function, and an angel from his office as messenger. Names like these clearly indicate certain functions rather than individual realities or specific persons. Even the prophets are called Christs, as the Psalms say: “Do not touch my Christs, and do no harm against my prophets” (Ps 105:15). The prophet Habakkuk also said: “You came forth for the salvation of your people, to save your Christs” (Hab 3:13). But tell me this: is it not true that even they would admit that there is only one Christ and Son, who is the Lord made man, the Only Begotten of God made flesh?
B. They might admit this, but they really do not want the title Christ applied to the Word born of God the Father, since in his own physis, as God, he was never anointed. They would also maintain that this is one of those names which we cannot use for the Holy Spirit or the Father himself. A. The logic behind this is not very clear. It would be a good thing if you could explain it.
There are many different titles that the inspired scriptures apply to the Son. He is called God, Lord, Light, and Life, as well as King, Lord of Hosts, Holy One, and Lord of All. If someone wanted to apply all these titles to the Father himself or to the Holy Spirit, he could do so without error. This is because in a single physis there can only be one excellence of dignities. They argue from this that if the title Christ is truly appropriate to the Only Begotten, then it should be, like the other titles, equally applicable without distinction to the Father himself and to the Holy Spirit. Given that it is entirely inappropriate to apply this title to the Father or to the Holy Spirit, then neither can it be right to apply it to the Only Begotten, and on the contrary, they say, it ought instead to be attributed to the one who is of the line of David, for in our arguments and discourses we can quite properly attribute to him an anointing by the Holy Spirit. We ourselves also admit that the titles of the divine perfections are common to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and we crown the Begetter with equal glories to the One Begotten from him, and the Holy Spirit too. Nonetheless, dear friends, I would say that the title Christ, and what it signifies (that is, an anointing), really do apply to the Only Begotten, after the manner of his self-emptying. It indicates quite clearly to those who hear it that he has undergone an incarnation, for it signifies wonderfully well that he has been anointed in being made man. If we were not considering this issue of the economy in the flesh, but rather were to direct our thoughts to the Only Begotten Word of God considered outside all the limitations of the self-emptying, then yes, it would indeed be entirely unfitting to name him Christ when he has not been anointed. Since the divine and sacred scripture says that he has become flesh, however, even the anointing is appropriate for him, referring to the incarnation which is his own. The all-wise Paul puts it this way: “For the Sanctifier and the sanctified all have the same origin. This is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers when he says: I will announce your name to my brethren” (Heb 2:11-12; Ps 44:7-8). He was sanctified along with us when he became like us. The divine David also testifies that the one who is truly Son was also anointed in accordance with his becoming flesh, which is to say perfect man, when he addresses these words to him: “Your throne O God is from age to age; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness, and so God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above all who participate in you” (Ps 45:6-7 LXX). Take note, then, that while David calls him God and attributes to him an eternal throne, he also says that he has been anointed by God, evidently the Father, with a special anointing above that of his participants, which means us. The Word who is God has become man, therefore, but has retained all the while the virtues of his proper physis. He is perfection itself, and as John says: “full of grace and truth” (Jn 1:14), and while he himself has everything that is fitting to the deity, we on our part “have all of us received from his fullness” as it is written (Jn 1:16). Nonetheless he made the limits of the manhood his own, and all the things that pertain to it, and for this reason he is called Christ even though he cannot be thought of as anointed when we consider him specifically as God or when we speak about his divine physis. How else could we consider that there is one Christ, One Son and Lord, if the Only Begotten had disdained the anointing and had never come under the limitations of the self-emptying?
But they move along completely different lines from us and interpret the holy mystery foolishly. They maintain that God the Word assumed a perfect man who was from the line of Abraham and David, as the scriptures say, and who was of the same physis as his ancestors, a man complete in his physis, composed of a rational soul and human flesh. They say that this man, of our physis, was fashioned by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the virgin and “was born of a woman, born under the law, so that he could redeem us all” from the law’s slavery as we received the sonship long destined for us. They say that God the Word joined this man to himself in an entirely new way, bringing him to death as is the law among men, but raising him from the dead and taking him up to heaven and sitting him at the right hand of God so that he was “above every Principality and Authority, every Power and Dominion, and every name that can be named, not only in this age but even in the age to come.” They say that he received the worship of all creation insofar as he had an inseparable connection with the divine physis, as all creation rendered its worship to him with intellectual reference to God. It is for this reason that one does not speak of two Sons or two Lords, because God the Word, the Only Begotten Son of the Father, is the Son by physis, and this man is connected with him and participates in him and thereby shares in the very title and honor of the Son. The Lord, who by physis is God the Word, communicates the honor to this man who is joined with him, and this is why we do not speak of two Sons or two Lords since it is obvious that he who is Lord and Son by physis has, for the sake of salvation, assumed a man into an inseparable connection with himself which thereby elevates him to the title and honor of both Son and Lord. My goodness. I cannot imagine how stupid and intellectually superficial they must be who hold to such a view. The whole thing is faithlessness and nothing else. It is the novelty of wicked inventions, the overthrowing of the divine and sacred proclamation which has proclaimed One Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, truly the Word of God the Father who was made man and became incarnate so that the same one is equally God and man, and that to him alone apply all the divine and human characteristics. For he who is and exists from all eternity, as he is God, underwent birth from a woman according to the flesh. This means that it pertains to one and the same both to exist and subsist eternally, and also to have been born after the flesh in these last times. He who as God was holy by physis has been sanctified along with us in terms of his appearing as man, for it befits man to be sanctified. Both he who exists in lordly glories, and he who took the form of a slave as his own, calls God his Father. He who as God is Life and Life-Giver is said to have been brought to life by the Father in terms of his appearing as man. This is why all these characteristics pertain to him. He did not reject the plan which even God the Father had praised, if what Paul taught is true, who said somewhere, “He made him who knew not sin into sin for our sake so that in him we might become the righteousness of God”; and in another place, “He did not spare his own Son but gave him up for the sake of all so that with him he might grant us all things.” Surely our explanation follows the mind of the scriptures?
Most certainly, A. Our opponents have chosen to hold and teach that the Only Begotten Word of God assumed a man from the line of the divine David and Abraham, took care to form him in the holy virgin, then joined himself to him, made him undergo the trial of death, raised him from the dead, took him up to heaven, and seated him at the right hand of God. But if this is the case, then it seems to me that the holy Fathers and all the God-inspired scriptures, and we ourselves, are speaking pointlessly when we say that he became man. Still, I think that this is exactly what the all-wise John meant when he wrote: “The Word became flesh” (Jn 1:14). It seems to me that they have completely turned the mystery of the economy in the flesh upside down, because in their argument one cannot now see how God the Word, born of God and God by physis, lowered himself to a self-emptying and humbled himself to assume the form of a slave. Instead, according to their view, a man is exalted into the glory of the Godhead and into supremacy over all things; he receives the form of God and is raised on high and comes to be enthroned alongside the Father. Or am I not speaking the truth?
B. Yes, exactly right. A. But if their argument is true—that the Only Begotten rejected the economy—what was so shameful about it that made him despise it (Heb 12:2)? And how could he have become “obedient to the Father even unto death, death on a cross” (Phil 2:8)? And if it’s true that he assumed a man, brought him to the trial of death, raised him to the heavens, and made him sit alongside the Father, then where would the Only Begotten place his own throne after this? Their argument includes the claim that there are not two Sons, only one enthroned with God, and he seems clearly to be the one from the line of David and Abraham. But if this were true, how could the Only Begotten be called the Savior of the world? Wouldn’t he instead be the Patron and Promoter of that man through whom we were saved? In that case, the fulfillment of the law and the prophets would turn out to be a man, someone different from him, because the law speaks about the mystery of Christ, and Moses wrote about him and became our teacher leading us to him (Gal 3:24). I’m afraid that the faith has been emptied out and drained away, so that our entire sacred mystery is made completely worthless. The excellent Paul has already clearly stated this when he said: “Do not say in your heart, Who will go up to heaven to bring Christ down? or Who will descend to the abyss to bring Christ back up? For what does scripture say? The Word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart. It is the word of faith which I preach; for if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, then you will be saved” (Rom 10:6-9). If we are to believe what these misguided people say about a man who was assumed and united to God the Word through a relationship, who died and came back to life and was lifted up to heaven, then how is the mystery of religion still great or admirable or extraordinarily wonderful? It’s completely unbelievable that such a man, who is not God truly or by physis, should present himself in a divine position (obviously having pushed aside the one who is the Son by physis) and that the angels and archangels, or even the Seraphim who are higher still, should stand before him ready to serve someone who is not truly Son or God, but in reality is a man who has received the title of sonship and divine honors in the form of great benefits in which he shares just as we do. Our opponents say such things without the slightest bit of shame. Surely their teaching represents the ultimate sacrilege and impiety? Because anything that is given or granted can be taken away, and it’s obvious that anything introduced from outside can be lost. I’ll pass over the other blasphemies and nonsense in their arguments, but why do they drag down the most wonderful part of the economy to a disgraceful level and reduce our most holy worship to nothing more than the idolatry of a man? They steal the worship from the one who is really the Son and persuade us to worship someone joined to him in some kind of relationship instead, someone (they say) who has risen above every Principality and Authority and Dominion. In this way they’ve implicated not only everyone on earth, but even the rational heavenly powers in the guilt of deception, if they, like us, are found to be worshiping not the true and natural Son made man, the Word who came forth from God the Father’s very being, but rather some other person apart from him, a man from the line of David, a man who has only been given the outward appearances of deity by God’s will as if they were external decorations, but who is not God in truth. B. They would say that even though he might be personally understood to be a man, he nonetheless receives divine worship from the whole creation through an intellectual reference to God. A. But tell me please how we can understand or explain this business of “reference” that they’re always talking about? Come, let’s investigate the divine and sacred scripture and seek the solution there. Well, the Israelites showed little respect for God and bitterly attacked Moses and Aaron, so Moses said to them: “Who is Aaron that you complain against him? Your complaining is not against us but against God” (Num 16:11; Ex 16:8). They had apparently offended Moses and Aaron, but what they had done touched the divine glory, and the deeper motive of those who slandered them “had reference” to this glory. Moses and Aaron, however, were not gods, nor did creation ever worship them “in reference” to God. God ruled over the fleshly Israel through the prophets. Then they came to the divine Samuel and said: “Make us a king like the rest of the nations” (1 Sam 8:5). When the Spirit-bearer heard this he was upset, and rightly so, but he heard God speaking: “It is not you they have rejected but me, that I should no longer rule over them” (1 Sam 8:7). Here we see again, quite clearly, that this rejection has God as its reference. Even the Lord and Savior of all says this about the wretched: “Whatever you do to one of the least of these, you do to me” (Mt 25:40). Should we conclude that if someone worships the one who is from the line of David, he can be said to have worshiped the Son? And if someone refuses to believe in such a son, should we think he has really offended the natural Son whose only desire is that we should honor and believe in this man in exactly the same way and to the same degree that we do him? If this were the case, wouldn’t the slave be held in the same honor as the Lord since he is elevated to the height of the deity? But then “God is increased” as the scriptures say (Ps 81:10 LXX), and surely something of an unequal nature must have been added to the holy and consubstantial Trinity, to receive worship along with it and share in the same glory? B. They would say that this “reference” should be understood something like this: that insofar as we understand that the Word of God is inseparably joined to the descendant of David, we worship him as God.
But is this mere conjunction with the Word enough to allow him to grasp the proper glory of God and rise above the limits of the created order? Does this make him an object of worship even though he is not God? I notice, for example, how someone in the Psalms sings this to God: “My soul is bound to you” (Ps 63:8), and the blessed Paul also writes: “Whoever is bound to the Lord is one spirit with him” (1 Cor 6:17). So tell me, should we also worship such people, since they too have a bond “in reference” to God? But even so, the term “bond” surely has a stronger and much more fitting meaning than the word “conjunction,” for doesn’t someone who has a bond experience an extreme form of conjunction?
B. So it would seem.
Then why do they abandon the term “union,” even though it is the word customarily used among us and has indeed come down to us from the holy Fathers, preferring to call it a conjunction? The term “union” in no way causes confusion between the things it refers to, but rather signifies that those things which are understood to be united come together in one reality. Surely the term “unity” is not reserved only for things that are simple and uniform? It can also apply to things composed of two, or several, or different kinds of things. This is the considered opinion of experts in such matters. How wicked they are, then, when they divide in two the one true and natural Son incarnated and made man, and when they reject the union and call it a conjunction—something that any other man could have with God, being bonded to him in terms of virtue and holiness. One of the prophets rightly spoke of this in relation to those who had fallen into negligence: “Be gathered again and tied back together, you undisciplined nation, before you become like a flower that passes away” (Zeph 2:1-2 LXX). A disciple can also be said to “attach” himself to a teacher in terms of a love of learning, and we too can attach ourselves to one another not in just one way but in many. In short, when someone assists another in a task, should we not consider that he has been conjoined by will to the one who receives his assistance? It seems to us that this is exactly what these innovators mean by conjunction. You must have heard how they stupidly maintain that God the Word assumed a man, as if he were a different son from himself, and then presented him as a kind of assistant to his plans so that he underwent the trial of death, came to life again, rose up to heaven, and even sat upon the throne of the ineffable Godhead. With arguments such as these, have they not completely and utterly proven that this man is altogether different from the true and natural Son?
B. I would say so.
But once they have slipped down to this level of stupidity and say that the Only Begotten Word of God did not himself become as we are, but rather assumed a man, then in what way do they want us to understand the terms of such an assumption? Would it be as if he had foreordained that someone should accomplish a desired task, in the way that one of the prophets talks about: “I was no prophet, or son of a prophet. I was a goatherd and dresser of sycamores, and the Lord took me from among the flock, and the Lord said to me: Go prophesy to my people Israel” (Am 7:14-15). From being a goatherd, God made him into a prophet and appointed him as an assistant in his own plans.
B. They would also say that the “assumption” was certainly not of this kind, but that we should understand it in terms of “taking the form of a slave” (Phil 2:7).
In that case, it would seem proper to conclude that the one assumed in this inseparable union has become the personal property of the one who assumes, and while Jesus is God, the one and only true Son of God, the Word of God the Father born of God before all ages and times, nonetheless this same one, in these last times of the present age, has been born of a woman according to the flesh, for the form of a slave belongs to no one else but was his very own.
B. What do you mean? A. Well, tell me this: what does the phrase “taking the form of a slave” properly refer to? Does it refer to something that was already a slave by nature, or to something that was truly free and naturally above the condition of slavery? B. I would assume it refers to something that was free, because how could anything begin to be what it already was by nature?
A. In that case, notice that the Only Begotten Word of God, even though he had become as we are and had come under the limitations of slavery according to his human nature, still testified that he was naturally free when he paid the drachmas together with Peter and said, “And so the sons are free” (Mt 17:26). Doesn’t it follow that he takes on the form of a slave and makes the characteristics of this self-emptying his own, without rejecting this likeness to us? For there was no other way to honor the slave except by making the characteristics of the slave his very own so that they could be lit up by his own glory. What is superior will always win out, and the shame of slavery is thus carried away from us. He who was above us became as we are, and he who is naturally free entered into the limitations of our life. This is why honors passed even to us, for we too are called the sons of God, and we regard his own true Father as our Father as well. Everything that is human has become his own. And so, saying that he took on the form of a slave expresses the whole mystery of the economy (divine plan) in the flesh. But if they confess One Lord and Son, the Word of God the Father, yet say that a simple man from the line of David was joined to him as a companion in his sonship and his glory, then it is time for us to speak to people who choose to think like this with sorrowful compassion. We will say, “Who shall give water for my head, and a spring of tears for my eyes, that I might weep for this people day and night?” (Jer 8:23) for they have turned to an evil opinion and “denied the Lord who redeemed them” (2 Pet 2:1; Rom 1:28). It seems to us that in this argument there are two sons, who are unequal in nature, and that a slave is crowned with the glory that properly belongs to God, and that some illegitimate son is dressed up with the very same dignities as the one who is really God’s natural Son, even though God says quite clearly, “I will not give my glory to another” (Is 42:8). How can someone who has only been honored with a mere conjunction fail to be “other” than the true and natural Son when he has just been taken on for the role of servant, given the honor of sonship just like us, and sharing in someone else’s glory which he gains by grace and favor?
B. So must we not avoid separating out the Emmanuel into a man considered as distinct from God the Word?
A. Absolutely not. I say that we must call him God made man, and that both the one and the other are this same reality, for he did not cease to be God when he became man, nor did he consider the economy unacceptable by rejecting the limitations involved in the self-emptying.
B. They would argue that if this were the case, then his body must be consubstantial with the Word. For only in this way, and no other, could he be regarded as one single Son. A. What nonsense that is. Surely it is the clearest proof of a confused mind. How could anyone claim an identity of essence in things that are so different in the rationale of their respective natures? Godhead is one thing, manhood quite another. So, what are these things which we say have come into unification? One cannot speak of things “united” when there is only one thing to start with; there must be two or more.
B. This is why they argue that the things we are naming are separate realities.
However, as I have already said, they are not separated in terms of individual distinctnesses so that they exist apart and distant from one another. Instead, they are brought together into an indissoluble union, for as John says: “The Word became flesh” (Jn 1:14).
B. In that case both natures must have been confused and have become one. A. But who would be so misguided and stupid as to think that the divine physis of the Word had changed into something which formerly it was not? Or that the flesh was changed by some kind of transformation into the physis of the Word himself? This is impossible. We say that there is one Son, and that he has one physis even when he is considered as having assumed flesh endowed with a rational soul. As I have already said, he has made the human element his own. And this is the way, not otherwise, that we must consider that the same one is at once God and man. B. Then he does not have two natures? That of God, and that of man? A. Well, Godhead is one thing, and manhood is another thing, considered in the perspective of their respective and intrinsic beings, but in the case of Christ they came together in a mysterious and incomprehensible union without confusion or change. The manner of this union is entirely beyond conception.
B. But how can we understand that there is a single Christ from these two things, that is, Godhead and manhood? A. I think there is no other way except as things that come together with each other in an indivisible union that is beyond all human understanding, as I have already said.
B. Such as what? A. Well, do we not say that a human being like ourselves is one, and has a single physis, even though he is not homogeneous but really composed of two things, I mean soul and body?
B. We do.
A. And if someone takes the flesh by itself, separating it from its unity with its own soul, and divides what was one into two, have they not destroyed the proper understanding of what a man is?
And yet the all-wise Paul writes: “For if our outer man is being destroyed, nevertheless the inner man is being renewed day by day” (2 Cor 4:16).
You speak rightly, for he knew perfectly well what the constituents of the one man were, and he makes a distinction between them as only theoretically conceivable. He calls the soul the inner man and the flesh the outer man. I am reminded of the holy scriptures where we sometimes find the whole living being signified by referring to a part. For example, God says: “I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh” (Joel 2:28), and again when Moses addresses the Israelites: “As seventy-five souls did your fathers go down into Egypt” (Deuteronomy 10:22). We will find that the same thing has happened with regard to Emmanuel himself. After the union—I mean with the flesh—even if anyone calls him Only Begotten, or God from God, this does not mean he is thought of as being separated from the flesh or indeed the manhood. Similarly, if one calls him a man, this is not to take away the fact that he is God and Lord.
B. But if we say that the Son (even when we consider him as incarnate) has a single physis, then we would be absolutely forced to admit that there is confusion and mixture involved, as if he had absorbed a human physis into himself. For what could the physis of man amount to when confronted with the supremacy of the godhead?
My friend, if anyone says that when we speak of the single physis of God the Word incarnate and made man we imply that a confusion or mixture has occurred, then they are talking utter rubbish. No one could convict us of saying this by the force of proper arguments. But if they intend to impose their own preferences on us, like a law, then “they have devised a plan which they cannot secure” (Ps 21:11) for we must pay attention to the God-inspired scripture rather than to them. If they think that because the nature of man is as nothing before the divine pre-eminence, this means it must be “hidden away” and overwhelmed, as they keep saying, then once more we reply: “You are mistaken, for you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God” (Mt 22:29). It was not impossible for God, in his loving-kindness, to make himself capable of bearing the limitations of humanity. And he foretold this to us in riddles when he instructed Moses, depicting the manner of the incarnation in types. For he came down in the form of fire onto the bush in the desert, and the fire played upon the shrub but did not consume it. When he saw this, Moses was amazed. Why was there no compatibility here between the wood and the fire? How did this flammable substance endure the attacks of the flame? Well, as I have already said, this event was a type of a mystery, of how the divine physis of the Word supported the limitations of humanity, because he chose to. Absolutely nothing is impossible to him (Mk 10:27).
B. As you well know, they refuse to think about it this way.
Surely we will find that their way of thinking is offering us two sons and two Christs?
No, not two. They say that the Word of God the Father, who is Son by physis, is one; but that the man who is assumed is by physis the Son of David, and is the Son of God insofar as he is assumed by God the Word. They say that he has come to such dignity and has the sonship by grace, because God the Word dwells within him.
What has happened to the brains and intelligence of people who hold such opinions? How can they possibly say there is not a duality of sons when they split man and God apart from each other? If, as they claim, one is truly the Son by physis, but the other has sonship by grace and came to such dignity because the Word dwells within him, then what more does he have than us? For the Word also dwells in us. The most holy Paul confirms this when he says: “For this reason I bend my knees before the Father, from whom all fatherhood is named in heaven and on earth. May he grant that you are strengthened in power through his Spirit, according to the riches of his glory, that Christ may dwell in your hearts” (Eph 3:14-17); and he is within us by the Spirit, “in whom we cry out Abba, Father” (Rom 8:15). And so, if we have been granted the same dignity by God the Father, our position is in no way inferior to his. For we too are sons and gods by grace, and we have surely been brought to this wonderful and supernatural dignity since we have the Only Begotten Word of God dwelling within us. It is completely wicked and foolish for them to say that Jesus has been granted the dignity of Sonship and has won this glory as a matter of grace.
Will you explain why? Indeed I will. In the first place, as I said earlier, this implies that he must be considered as a different and separate Son and Christ and Lord from the one who is truly and naturally such. And secondly, another impossible consequence is introduced which clearly contradicts right reason. Will you say what it is? The all-wise John said about Christ: “He came to what was his own and his own did not receive him, but as many as did receive him he gave them the authority to become the children of God” (John 1:11-12). Well then, if he has the sonship by grace and has come to be what he is by winning this extra dignity, will he be led to grant to others the riches it cost him so much to gain himself? Don’t you think that the whole scheme is highly unlikely?
B. Most certainly so.
A. When something does not arise from a physis, but instead is added on from outside, is there not always the possibility of losing it?
How could it be any different?
If that were the case, it would be possible for the Son one day to fall from his sonship, since whatever is not established by physis is not completely secure against loss.
B. This is true.
We can see from another point of view how ill-conceived their doctrine is, and how it really proceeds from the worst kind of evil intent. If it is true that whatever exists by adoption or grace must always be in the likeness of that which exists by nature and truth, then how can we be sons by adoption in reference to him who is truly the Son, if even he stands alongside us in the number of those who have sonship by grace? How is it in the Gospel parable that he is sent as the Son after the servants? “And when they see him the vineyard tenants say: ‘This is the heir; come let us kill him'” (Mt 21:38)? The one who appeared in the flesh, therefore, and suffered the wickedness of the Jews, is truly the Son, and is free, since he is born of a physis that is free. Insofar as we consider him as God he is not in the ranks of those who are under the yoke, and even though he became son under the yoke of slavery, just like us, still, as I have said, he is truly the Son by physis who is beyond any yoke, and above all creation. It is in relation to him that we too have been fashioned as sons by adoption and grace.
They argue that we don’t speak of the man as being the Son of God by physis, and that this prevents us from speaking of two sons. Just as the Word, who comes down from heaven, is not by physis the Son of David, so likewise the one who is of the line of David is not Son of God by physis.
But in this case they have split him into two sons, and both of them turn out to be claiming the title falsely. I think we can conclude that if things are really as our opponents foolishly maintain, then the mystery of Christ is a useless pretense. Where would the union be? And what would be the point of it? Perhaps even the fact that the Word became flesh is now shown to be either false or unnecessary, if the Word of God the Father cannot be called Son of David insofar as he became his descendant according to the flesh? But I think we need to tell them what Christ himself said to the Jewish teachers: “What do you think of Christ? Whose son is he?” (Mt 22:42). And if they answer, “David’s son,” then we will tell them: “How then did David, in the Spirit, call him Lord, when he said: The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand while I make your enemies a footstool for your feet? If David, therefore, in the Spirit, calls him Lord, then how can he be his son?” (Mt 22:43-45). Tell me, does someone who is not truly and naturally the Son sit alongside God on the same throne as him who rules over all things? This is what our opponents are saying. But, as the all-wise Paul says, the Father “has never said to any of the angels: You are my Son (Heb 1:5), nor has he said: Sit on my right” (Heb 1:13). How, then, can a man born of a woman be in these supreme honors, on the very throne of the godhead, and “above every Principality, Dominion, Throne, and Authority, and every name that can be named” (Eph 1:21)? Notice how the Lord says: “If David, therefore, in the Spirit, calls him Lord, then how can he be his son?” This persuades all who want to search out the truth to maintain that the Word, even when he came to participate in flesh and blood, has remained one Son. He bears witness that he is God from a divine pre-eminence and dominion, and he clearly indicates that he has become man by also being called the Son of David.
B. I would suppose that they will reply to this: “But are we, then, to admit that he who is of the very being of God the Father is exactly the same as he who is of the line of David?” A. Well that is a stupid question, is it not? It is unworthy of the power of the mystery and unworthy of anyone who delights in the truth. B. Explain why. A. You must not divide him who is of David’s line by saying that he is someone different from the one Christ and Son and Lord, for the correct position is that the Only Begotten Son who is born from God the Father is himself, and no other, the Son of David according to the flesh. They must not maintain, therefore, in a boundless folly, that just as the Word of God who came down from heaven is not by physis David’s son, so too he who is of David’s line is not the Son of God by physis. As I said earlier, when the Word of God, who in nature and truth shone forth from God the Father, had assumed flesh and blood, he remained the same—that is, truly and naturally the Son of the Father. He is the one and only Son, not one son alongside another son, considered in this way to be one prosopon. In this way we can gather into a true unity, though one that transcends speech and understanding, realities which were unlike one another and separated because of their respective natures (physeis). This is how we can make progress along the infallible path of faith. For we say that the one and the same Jesus Christ is from God the Father as God the Word, and also of the line of godly David according to the flesh. Or do you think that I have not considered these matters correctly?
B. Oh, entirely so.
A. But I have another question for our opponents.
B. And what is it? A. Don’t they take it as a basic principle that the Only Begotten Word of God has his being from God the Father, while at the same time they claim that the man who is taken up into union is born from the line of the divine David? B. This is what they say.
Then the Word, being God, will surely surpass in every conceivable way—in physis and in glory—the man who is of David’s line, and will have the advantage over him to the same extent that there is a difference in their natures. But if I am right in what I say, why do they make a distinction and present one who bestows the glory and authority and the other who receives it so as to gain what he is as a gift or as a reward? The one who receives is surely inferior and subordinate to the one who gives, and the same applies when one glorifies and the other participates in the glory that comes from him. B. I think that they too would admit the vast difference between God and man.
Then how is it that the all-wise Paul, the priest of the divine mysteries, who had dwelling within him the very one he preached, when he speaks in the Spirit calls by the name of God the very one who is from the Jews according to the flesh, and says that he is “blessed for all ages, Amen”? What is there that is above “God who is over all” (cf. Rom 9:5)? What can we discern that is greater in God the Word born of the Father than the one born of the Jews according to the flesh, if he is different from him and not truly and actually the Son?
B. But they would say that the one who descended from David’s line was joined to God through a conjunction, and because God the Word dwelt within him, he shared in his dignities and honors. The most holy Paul teaches this when he says about him: “He became obedient to the Father even to death, death on a cross. So God has highly exalted him and granted him the name above every name” (Phil 2:5-9), and this name is God.
Do they claim that God has given “the name above every name” separately to the Son of David, as if to a completely different son?
B. Yes, this is what they say. For how could the Only Begotten, who is from God by physis, ever be given what he already possesses?
A. In that case, if this gift does not apply to him, we must examine very carefully what the divine Paul himself has written about him: “Let each of you have that same mind which was in Christ Jesus, who even though he was in the form of God did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, assuming the form of a slave, coming in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself becoming obedient to death, death on a cross. And so, God highly exalted him and granted him the name above every name” (Phil 2:5-9). So if they maintain that the one who received the name above every name is the man from David’s line, considered separately on his own, then let them prove how he existed beforehand in the form of God and did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, and how he took on the form of a slave—clearly implying he did not already have it and did not exist in this way before he took it on—even though (as they themselves prefer to say and think) he himself was the form of the slave. But if this were true, how could he have taken on that form as if he did not already have it? Or how could this man be understood as “coming in the likeness of men” and “being found in fashion as a man”? The very force of these arguments must surely bring them around, however unwilling they might be, to recognize the truth.
B. Which is? A. That it is none other than God the Word, who exists in the form of God the Father, the impress of his very being (Heb 1:3), who is equal in all things to the one who begot him, who has emptied himself out. And what is this “emptying out”? It is his life in the form of a slave, in the flesh which he assumes; it is the likeness to us of one who is not as we are in his own nature, since he is above all creation. In this way he humbled himself, willingly submitting himself through the incarnation to the limitations of humanity. But even so he was God, for he did not have as a gift what belonged to him by nature. This is why he also said to God the Father who is in heaven: “Father, glorify me with that glory I had with you before the world was” (Jn 17:5). I don’t think they would say that it was David’s descendant, born in the last times of this age, who was reclaiming as his own a glory that existed before the world, at least if he is a different son and distinct from the true and natural Son? No, surely this is a statement which belongs to the godhead? It was necessary, yes necessary, that he should be conformed to us in the limitations of humanity while at the same time he authentically possessed transcendent divine status within his own essential being, just as it is with the Father. How can the saying be true: “You must not introduce another god among you” (Ps 81:8). B. How right you are, A. And how can we correctly understand what is so wisely said in that text of Paul’s: “For even if there are many gods and many lords in heaven and on earth, yet for us there is One God, the Father from whom are all things; and we too are through him” (1 Cor 8:5-6). And since there is One Lord Jesus Christ, through whom all things have been brought into being, as has been said so well, what shall we do, my friends, when you make a distinction between the Word of God the Father and the “assumed man,” as you call him? Which one of these shall we say was the creator of the universe? B. Surely it was the natural Son of God the Father, that is, the Only Begotten? A. But our priest of the divine mysteries tells us that all things have come into existence through Jesus Christ, and that this same Jesus is one and single. I remember that when we investigated the title “Christ” we said that it introduced the notion of anointing, for someone is called a Christ on account of having been anointed. So either let them confess that the Word of God the Father has been anointed in his own nature, and thus stood in need of the communion and sanctification of the Spirit, or let them teach us how someone who has never been anointed can be understood as Christ, or how the Only Begotten Word of God can be independently called Jesus, as when the blessed Gabriel said to the holy virgin: “Do not be afraid Mary, for behold, you shall conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins” (Lk 1:30-31; Mt 1:21).
B. So should we say, then, that all things were made through a man, and that the one who is born from a woman in these last times of this age is the Creator of heaven and earth and everything they contain?
So then, you answer these questions for me: Didn’t the Word become flesh? Hasn’t he been called the Son of Man? Didn’t he take on the form of a slave? Didn’t he ’empty himself, coming in the likeness of men and being found in appearance as a man’? If they deny the economy, then the divine disciples will stand against them, saying: “And we saw, and we bear witness that the Father has sent his Son as Savior of the world, and whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, then God abides in him and he in God” (1 Jn 4:14-15).
If they deny the economy (divine plan of salvation), the divine disciples will stand against them saying: “And we saw, and we bear witness that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world” (1 Jn 4:14). They add to this that every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit which does not confess Jesus is not of God (1 Jn 4:2-3). Besides, what sense does it make to think of a man as “coming in the flesh”? To come in the flesh and thereby to come into the world while always remaining what he was applies rather to someone who is outside flesh and who is not of our nature. And so, even if he did become man, there is nothing in this to prevent us from understanding that all things come into being through him, insofar as he is considered as God and coeternal with the Father. God the Word did not change even when he assumed flesh endowed with a rational soul. This does not mean that he connected a man to himself as these innovators of the faith say, but that he himself became flesh—as I said, that is, he became man. In this way the anointing applies to him and is free from all objection. He is called Jesus because it is he himself who truly undergoes birth from a woman according to the flesh. In this way he saved his own people, not as a man conjoined to God, but as God who has come in the likeness of those who were in danger, so that in him first of all the human race might be refashioned to what it was in the beginning. In him all things became new (cf. 2 Cor 5:17).
So then, are we supposed to refuse to think or say that a man has been joined to God the Word in such a way that he shares in his dignity and enjoys sonship by grace? Is that what you’re saying?
Exactly right. The meaning of the holy scriptures doesn’t allow anything like this. Instead, this is an invention of a weak and feeble spirit that loves novelty and has no understanding of the depth of the mystery. Where do the divine scriptures speak of anything like this? On the contrary, the divine Paul clearly and brilliantly describes the mystery of the incarnation of the Only Begotten when he says: “Since the children share the same flesh and blood, he too equally shared in these things so that by his death he might bring to nothing him who had the power of death, that is the devil” (Heb 2:14). And in another place he does the same when he says: “For God sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh for the sake of sin so that he might judge sin in the flesh, something the law could not do because it was weakened by the flesh; and he did this to fulfill the righteousness of the law among us who walk no longer according to the flesh but according to the spirit” (Rom 8:3-4). We follow the meaning of the divinely inspired writers, and for this reason we say that the one who participated in flesh and blood is not someone who had flesh and blood as his proper nature and could not be otherwise, but rather someone who did not have this kind of existence but was of a different nature from us. We say, therefore, that he came forth from a woman, and in the likeness of sinful flesh—he who for our sake became as we are, and yet is above us insofar as he is understood as God. The Word became flesh, but not sinful flesh; rather “in the likeness of sinful flesh.” He lived as a man among earthly beings and came in our likeness, but he was not subject to sin like us. Instead, he was far beyond any knowledge of transgression. The same one was at once God and man. I cannot understand how these people, who pillage this wonderful and noble economy (divine plan) of the Only Begotten, connect a man to terms of a relationship adorned with external honors and radiant in a glory which is not his. For then he is not truly God but someone who has fellowship and participation with God, and is thus a falsely-named son, a saved savior, a redeemed redeemer—all of which contradicts what the blessed Paul wrote: “For the grace of God which is the salvation of all men has been revealed so that, renouncing unrighteousness and worldly desires, we might live soberly and religiously in the present age, waiting for the blessed hope and revelation of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” (Tit 2:11-13).
B. But they would agree, saying that since he was judged entirely worthy of conjunction with God the Word, he was called Great God even though he came from the line of David.
What madness this is! As it is written: “flattering themselves they are wise, they have become as fools” (Rom 1:22). As I have said, they have completely reversed the meaning of the mystery of Christ into its total opposite. To say that he has been judged worthy is nothing other than to call him an ordinary man, and foolishly to divide him into complete separation so that we must think there are two sons to worship—one who is the true and natural Son, and the other an adopted, illegitimate son who has nothing of his own. We could say of him just as well as of ourselves: “What then do you have which you have not received?” (1 Cor 4:7). What did the very wise Paul mean when he said: “For Jesus Christ, the Son of God, whom Silvanus, Timothy and myself preached among you, was not Yes and No; there was only Yes in him” (2 Cor 1:19)? If someone says that he was God and that he was not God, or that he is only falsely called Son and Lord, then what is this except to make him Yes and No? If things really are as they claim, then I think this saying rightly applies to him: “I am what I am by the grace of God” (1 Cor 15:10). For whatever is not a natural property but is given by someone else as an external addition does not belong to the one who receives it but to the one who gives it as a gift. But if this were true, how could he possibly say “I am the truth” (Jn 14:6) if there is nothing true about him? And if he had lied, he would have been “overcome by the darkness” (cf. Jn 1:5), but in fact, as it is written, “He did no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth” (Is 53:9).
B. Certainly not.
Where then is the self-emptying? To whom should we attribute it? One cannot see anyone emptied out there, but instead someone fulfilled, even though he does not possess this fullness in his own nature. For if he had an intrinsic self-perfection and was sufficient in all things, he would not have needed what belonged to another, and it would have been completely unnecessary for him to receive it. Yet, from the fullness of Christ all of us have received, and the preaching of those who were divinely inspired does not lie. Christ, however, was fullness itself, and there is absolutely nothing given to him insofar as he is considered—and indeed is—God, even if it became his role to receive because of the limitations of the manhood, and insofar as he was revealed like us, to whom it was rightly said: “For what do you have that you did not receive?”
B. But they would agree that there is one Christ, and Son and Lord, and joined together with him is one who comes from the line of David.
But, my excellent friends, let me tell you this: if someone has another added to him, he cannot be considered one. How could he be? He would be one plus one, or rather one plus someone different, and without any question this makes two. The Son can be truly understood to be one only if we confess that one and the same God the Word is divinely begotten from God, and mysteriously is man born of a woman according to the flesh. But if they set apart and separate out him who is of the line of David, then they surely dismiss him from being Son and God in truth, and maintain instead that he participates in the sonship and shares in a glory not his own. In that case I think we will find that the objections the Jews made about him were quite appropriate, for they said: “We do not stone you because of a good work, but because of blasphemy, for you who are a man make yourself God” (Jn 10:33).
B. Yet they say that the one Christ is both true God and Son, that is the Word of God who assumes by a conjunction the one who is of David’s line. A. But if the Word of God the Father is not himself the one who is born of a woman according to the flesh, but is different alongside another different person, then how can he be called Christ if he has not been anointed, as we have already said?
On the other hand, if the one who is of David’s line is not different from the Word of God the Father, we must admit that he is “before the ages.” But how then does the all-wise Paul reject such an opinion when he says, as if asking a question: “Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today, and even to the ages?” (Heb 13:8). To put it another way, what he means is that this Jesus who is the same yesterday and today will always remain the same, that is “recent,” of yesterday and today, whereas God the Word coexists with his own Father.
How wrong it is for them to twist the truth to fit their own absurd personal opinions and to corrupt the proper meaning of the sacred scriptures. If anyone should say that Christ Jesus is before the ages, he would not have departed from the truth, at least if it is true that there is one Son and Lord, the Word who is before the ages who underwent a birth from a woman according to the flesh in the last times of this age. The Word was made man as we are but was not changed, and the Spirit-bearer testifies to this when he says: “Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today, even to the ages” (Heb 13:8), where the term “yesterday” signifies time past, “today” signifies present time, and “to the ages” signifies the future and what is to come. They think they have thought up something clever when they take the “yesterday and today” as referring to someone of recent time, and argue forcefully: How can someone who is “yesterday and today” also be “even to the ages”? But we will simply turn the force of the argument around to its direct opposite and ask in reply: How can the Logos, who is “even to the ages,” possibly take on something that is “yesterday and today,” if it is true that the Christ is one and has not been divided, as the divine Paul tells us (1 Cor 1:13)? As you will understand, this is how he wished to be made known to us. Even when he was visible in the flesh and had entered into the limitations of the manhood, he bore witness to his own eternal existence when he said: “Amen I say to you, before Abraham came into being I am” (Jn 8:58), and again: “If I speak to you about earthly realities and you do not believe me, how will you believe me if I tell you of heavenly realities?” (Jn 3:12), and also: “No one has ever gone up into heaven except him who came down from heaven, the Son of Man” (Jn 3:13). So it is as the Word who exists eternally and before the ages, the Word come down from the heavens, the very same who appeared as a man like us, that he says these things, as one Christ and Lord, even when he has become flesh. They have discovered another argument, however, which is the following. They maintain that he who is of the line of David should be considered as Son of God in the same way that the Word of God the Father is himself called Son of David, for neither of them are so by nature (physis).
Let us now explain the manner of the true union so we can show what faith teaches about how the Word became flesh—that is, man—and was therefore called the Son of David. This was not in any false sense, but because he descends from David according to the flesh while remaining what he was, namely God from God. This is what the preachers of the gospel have taught us about him, for they knew that the same one was both God and man at once. So it is written about the blessed Baptist: “The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and said: ‘Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is the one I spoke about when I said: After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me. I myself did not know him, but I came baptizing with water so that he might be revealed to Israel'” (Jn 1:29-31). Notice how he calls him a man and calls him a lamb, yet says he is none other than the one who takes away the sin of the world, and indeed assigns to him this great and truly immense dignity that belongs to God. He also says that Jesus came before him and existed prior to him, even though Jesus was born after him—I mean in terms of the date of his birth in the flesh. And so both the recent characteristics of humanity and the eternal characteristics of deity apply to him. The most noble Peter looked upon the Logos not naked or without flesh, but as he was revealed in flesh and blood, and he made his confession of faith in him clearly and correctly when he said: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” and he heard in response: “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father in heaven” (Mt 16:16-17). But if the mystery were not as profound as this, and he were not in the flesh but rather, as they claim, only a man who had sonship by grace, then why would Peter have needed such a revealer, implying that no one on earth could reveal this to the disciple and the Father himself had to be his teacher? The divine disciples were amazed at the miracle when they saw him walking on the surface of the sea, and they confessed their faith saying: “Truly you are the Son of God” (Mt 14:33). But if he was brought into sonship and is a counterfeit and falsely-named son, then our opponents are accusing the disciples of giving false testimony, for they used the word “truly” to emphasize that he is the Son of God the Father.
B. You put it very well indeed.
How can the Son of Man have his own angels and shine out in the glory of his Father? For he says, “The Son of Man will come in the glory of his Father with his angels” (Mt 16:27), and again, “And the Son of Man will send his angels” (Mt 13:41). But if they still refuse to believe when they see him crowned in divine dignity and in these radiant and sublime honors, then let them listen to him as he says, “If you do not believe me, believe in my works” (Jn 10:38), and again, “If I do not do the works of my Father then do not believe me, but if I do them, then even if you do not believe me, believe in my works” (Jn 10:37-38). When we see the greatness of this ineffable glory in a man who does not hold it as something belonging to another, nor is it offered to him as a grace, but has it as his very own, then how can we fail to be convinced that he was God in our likeness and truly the Son of God who is over all?
They would say that he spoke of the angels as his own and was able to perform such signs because of the Word who dwelt within him and gave him his own glory and power, as it is written: “Jesus from Nazareth, whom God anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power, who came doing good works and curing all those who lay under the power of the devil” (Acts 10:38). So it was from his anointing with power and Spirit that he was a wonder-worker.
Since the Word is God, however, and is holy by nature and essentially omnipotent, it follows that he will never need either power from someone else or an imparted holiness. In that case, who is it who is anointed with power and the Holy Spirit? They would doubtless say it was the man assumed into conjunction.
If that’s the case, then he is certainly Jesus Christ, considered separately and distinctly, about whom the very wise Paul says: “But for us there is one God, the Father from whom come all things, and we too come from him, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom come all things, and we too come through him” (1 Cor 8:6). But then tell me, how can all things come through a mere man? And why is he placed as Son immediately next to the Father with no one in between? Or where will we place the Only Begotten once we have put a man in his position—a man who, they tell us, is moved by him and honored because of him? Hasn’t their argument gone beyond what is reasonable? Hasn’t it crossed the line? Hasn’t it become completely absurd since it has entirely missed the truth?
He would reply that the Word of God is called man in this way: just as the man he assumed was born in Bethlehem of Judah and is called a Nazarene because he lived in Nazareth, so too God the Word is called man because he dwelt within a man.
What a slavish mindset from a deranged mind that knows nothing but to babble nonsense. We must say to our opponents: “Wake up from your wine, you drunkards” (Joel 1:5). Why do you assault the truth so violently? Why have you distorted the meaning of the divine teachings so that you have been carried away from the Royal Road? It seems that according to you the Word has not become flesh as the scriptures say, but rather has become an inhabitant of a man. It follows from this that he should not be called man but should be called “manish,” just as someone who lives at Nazareth is called Nazarene and not Nazareth. But if they think their foolish ideas are correct, then in my view there is absolutely nothing to prevent us from calling the Father and the Holy Spirit a man along with the Son. For the fullness of the consubstantial Trinity dwells within us through the Spirit. This is why Paul says: “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells within you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16). Indeed Christ himself says: “If anyone loves me he will keep my word and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him and make our abode with him” (John 14:23). But neither the Father nor the Holy Spirit has ever been called a man because they dwell within us. These people are making a mockery of the mystery of the incarnation. Church teachings which are so right and worthy of being heard are twisted by them to the point of deformity. Nevertheless, let our discussion proceed once more on its course, saying farewell to this disgusting mess they have spewed out. For if he became a worker of wonderful signs because the Word was within him, are they not simply saying that he was one of the holy prophets? The Word also worked divine signs through the hands of the saints. If they argue that it is the Son who is in these signs then they have reduced him to the status of the apostles or prophets.
B. They would reply: “But has he not been called Prophet and Apostle?”
Well, you are not mistaken. Moses said to the people of Israel, for example: “The Lord your God will raise up for you from among your brethren a prophet like myself” (Acts Dt 17:13). And the divine Paul has also written: “And so, holy brethren, sharers in this heavenly calling, consider Jesus the Apostle and High Priest of our confession” (Heb 3:1). However, they must answer this question which I shall pose: Would it be an honor for any man to have the grace of prophecy, or to be given apostolic privileges, or to be called a priest? I would say so. Some might say that considering Christ as God these things are small and not worth accepting, that they are the way he is revealed as having been emptied out, and the things he takes up along with his humanity. Since he is God and truly Lord by physis, he assumed the form of a slave and took on our human condition, and then gave the Spirit of prophecy, designated apostles, and established priests. By doing this he was “made like his brethren in all things” (Heb 2:17), and this was why he is named prophet, apostle, and priest.
B. But even if they grant that he was a prophet, they insist that he was not merely one among the prophets, but that he greatly surpassed their level. The prophets had grace measured out to them as God saw fit, and it was added to them gradually over time. But Christ was full of the Godhead all at once, from his very birth, because the Word who is God was with him.
If that were the case, Christ would have exceeded the holy prophets who came before him only in the quantity of grace and how long it lasted, and this would be what makes him superior. But the question we need to address is whether he was a prophet at all, not whether he was greater or lesser, or even the best prophet. The very fact that he was a prophet and did not go beyond our human limitations would itself constitute his lowliness. This would be true even if he is understood to have been this way from the very beginning, since this would also apply to the divine Baptist, about whom the blessed angel said: “And he shall be filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb” (Lk 1:15). So how was one a servant and the other honored with all the dignities of a Lord? Blessed John said this about himself: “He who is of the earth speaks of the earth,” but about Emmanuel he says: “He who comes from above is over all” (Jn 3:31).
B. Perhaps they would reply that the Word who came forth from God the Father is from above and certainly over all things, but they are afraid to attribute human characteristics to him in case he might somehow be dishonored by them and brought down to a dishonorable condition. This is why they claim that he took on a man and joined him to himself, and that it is to this man that all the human characteristics belong and can be attributed, while absolutely no damage is done to the physis of the Word himself.
If this were so, the one assumed must certainly be understood and confessed to be different from the Word. Still, we will not get involved in the nonsense of these people, nor will we make these innovators the judges of our faith, since they set the sacred scripture aside and dishonor the tradition that comes from the holy apostles and evangelists. We ourselves should not go astray just because a weak and ignorant mind has taken hold of them, one that cannot look into the depth of the mystery, or else we might become as foolish as they are, refusing to follow the straight path of the truth. We know that the all-holy Paul has written that it is necessary “to cast down reasonings and every lofty thought which is raised up against the knowledge of God, and to reduce all conception to captivity in the obedience of Christ” (2Cor 10:5). Now then, can you tell me which things scandalize them? Or what stumbling block have they fallen over like the Jews (1 Cor 1:23)? Indeed I can. How could I not have things to tell? And how many things too, although I will recount them one by one. They say, for example, that Christ has been sanctified by the Father, for it is written: “And John bore witness saying: I have seen the Spirit descending from heaven and it remained upon him. And I did not know him, but he who sent me baptizing in water, he it was who said to me: On whoever you shall see the Spirit descending and remaining upon him, he it is who shall baptize in the Holy Spirit. And I have seen, and I have borne witness that this is the Son of God” (Jn 1:32-34). Paul has also written about him: “For the one who sanctifies and those that are sanctified are all of one [origin]” (Heb 2:11). However, since the Logos, who is God and holy by nature, has no need of sanctification, then it only remains to attribute this sanctification to the man assumed by the Word in a conjunction.
How does the one who was baptized and received the visible descent of the Spirit himself baptize in the Holy Spirit or do things that belong to and are proper to the divine physis alone? He is the one who gives sanctification, and to show that this was his own proper gift, the Word-made-man physically breathed on his holy apostles and said: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whoever’s sins you forgive they are forgiven, whoever’s sins you retain, they are retained” (Jn 20:22-23). And why did John the Baptist testify by saying “This is the Son of God,” using the singular and the definite article, when he was clearly referring to the one who had been sanctified? He stood as the initiator of the whole world, and if this was a different son alongside the real Son, John knew well enough how to indicate the truth and would have said clearly: “This is one who has been made a son by gift and grace through his connection with the one who is the true and natural Son.” He said nothing like this, because John knew that he was one and the same person, the Word of God the Father and also from David’s line according to the flesh. He says that he was sanctified insofar as he was man, but sanctifies insofar as he is understood as God. As I have said, he was both the one and the other in the same person. If he had not become man and had not been born of a woman according to the flesh, then we should remove all human characteristics from him. But if it is true that he humbled himself in an emptying-out to become as we are, then why do they deny him all those things through which he is understood as being emptied out? In this way they have foolishly dismantled the great plan of the fleshly economy.
B. So, if he is said to have received glory and to have become Lord, to have been exalted by the Father and established as King, would you attribute even these things to God the Word? If you did, would you not completely dishonor his glory?
How could anyone doubt that the physis of God the Word is filled with true and regal dominion? Certainly we must understand this physis as being in the very heights that are fitting for God. However, since he appeared as a man—a being upon whom all things are given as gifts—he received as a man, even though he is full and gives to all from his own fullness (Jn 1:16). He made our poverty his own, and we see in Christ the strange and rare paradox of Lordship in the form of a servant and divine glory in human lowliness. What was under the yoke in terms of the limitations of humanity was crowned with royal dignities, and what was humble was raised to the most supreme excellence. The Only Begotten did not become man only to remain within the limits of the emptying. The point was that he who was God by physis should, in the act of self-emptying, take on everything that went along with it. This was how he would be revealed as ennobling the physis of man in himself by making it participate in his own sacred and divine honors. We will find that even the saints call the Son of God the “Glory” of God the Father, and King, and Lord, even when he became a man. Isaiah, for example, says in one place: “Just as a man gleans an olive tree so shall they be gleaned, and when the harvester leaves off they will raise a shout. Those that are left upon the earth shall rejoice with the glory of the Lord” (Is 24:13-14). And another one of the saints says: “Shine forth Jerusalem for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. Behold, darkness and gloom may cover the earth, but over you the Lord shall be made manifest and his glory shall be seen upon you” (Is 60:1-2). James, his disciple, says: “Brothers, do not confuse personal preferences with faith in Jesus Christ, our Lord of glory” (Jas 2:1). The divine Peter also says: “If you are reproached in Christ then you are blessed, because the Spirit of God, the Spirit of glory, rests upon you” (1 Pet 4:14).
B. My friend, that is enough on these matters. Now tell us how we should understand the following text that is written about Christ: “Who in the days of his flesh offered prayers and supplications with a great cry and with tears to the one who was able to save him from death. And he was heard because of his godliness, and although he was son he learned obedience from the things he suffered, and being made perfect he became for those who obey him the cause of their everlasting salvation” (Heb 5:7-9). I will add to this another saying: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46). They say that such things do not apply at all to God the Word, and one might even argue that they fall far short of his inherent excellence.
I am also aware that these things are not at all appropriate for God the Word who comes from God the Father, at least if we set aside the form of the economy and do not accept that he “became flesh,” according to the scriptures. But since we take our stand on this point, and since doubting it would surely convict us of impiety, come and let us examine the depth of this economy as far as we are able. The Word of God the Father appeared to us in our likeness, bringing help to our human condition in countless ways and brilliantly showing us the path that leads to everything admirable. But since temptation attacks all those who are endangered because of their love for God, it was necessary for us to learn how people should behave once they have decided to live an honorable life with exemplary conduct. Should we, for example, relax our grip and fall into carelessness, with inappropriate partying and living for pleasure? Or should we devote ourselves to prayer, standing in tears before our Savior, seeking and thirsting for his help, and even asking for courage in case it is his will that we should suffer? Besides, it was also necessary for us to have the beneficial knowledge of how far the limits of obedience should extend, by what wonderful means it comes, how great its reward is, and what form it takes. This was the reason Christ became our model in all these things, and the divine Peter confirms this for us when he says: “What is so wonderful about enduring persecution if you have done wrong? But if you have done good and still must endure, then this is acceptable to God, for Christ also suffered for you leaving you an example that ‘you might follow in his steps.'” And so the Word of God became an example for us in the days of his flesh, but not nakedly or outside the limits of the self-emptying. This was why he was quite properly able to employ the limitations of the manhood. This was why he extended his prayer and shed a tear, at times even seemed to need a savior himself, and learned obedience, while all along he was the Son. It was as if the Spirit-bearer in this passage was almost astonished at the mystery—that he who was truly and naturally the Son, and preeminent in the glories of the Godhead, should bring himself to such humiliation as to undergo the complete poverty of the human state. Yet the beautiful and helpful example of this action was for our sake, as I have said. It was intended so that we should learn something from it, an easy lesson: that we must not rush down another path when the occasion calls for courage. For this reason Christ once said: “Do not be afraid of those who can destroy the body but cannot destroy the soul; be afraid rather of him who is able to destroy both soul and body in Gehenna,” and again: “If anyone wishes to come after me let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.” What else is involved in the duty of following him except overcoming temptations courageously by asking for heavenly help? We will not do this negligently or carelessly, but only through the most intense prayer when we let the tears of godliness fall from our eyes.
B. You put that well, A. So if he said: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me” (Mt 27:46), how do these people understand it? B. They would interpret these words, I suppose, as coming from the man who was assumed.
A. From a broken man, no doubt, who found the attacks of this trial so difficult that it seemed unbearable? Or what else? B. They would regard them as the words of someone who was disturbed because of human weakness, or so it would appear. For he also said to his disciples: “My soul is sorrowful even to death” (Mt 26:38), and he fell down before the Father himself saying: “Father, if it is possible, let this chalice pass from me, but not my will, but yours be done” (Mt 26:39).
A. But isn’t this exactly the same as what we discussed earlier? Namely: “Who in the days of his flesh offered prayers and supplications with a great cry, and with tears, to the one who was able to save him from death” (Heb 5:7)? Yet if anyone thinks that Christ had fallen so low into such weakness of spirit that he was so “sorrowful and cast down” (Mt 26:37) that he could no longer endure his sufferings but was overcome by fear and conquered by weakness, then that person certainly proves that he was not God, and also shows that he apparently had no right to rebuke Peter. B. What do you mean?
Well, Christ said: “Behold we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man shall be betrayed into the hands of sinful men, and they shall mock him and shall crucify him, and on the third day he shall rise again.” But then, this lover of God said: “May he be merciful to you Lord, that this shall not happen to you” (cf. Mk 10:34; Mt 16:22). Then what did Christ say to him? “Get behind me Satan for you are a stumbling block to me; for you do not think the things of God but the things of men” (Mt 16:23). How did the disciple make an improper suggestion in wanting this trial to be removed from his master if it was going to prove too much for him to bear, and so completely overwhelming that it would certainly throw him into cowardice and break his spirit? After all, Christ himself had commanded his disciples to stand firm against their fears of death and treat suffering as nothing while fulfilling God’s will. I am amazed that such people can say this man has been joined to the Only Begotten or claim that he has shared in the divine dignities when they then subject him to the fears of death and expose him as vulnerable just like any one of us. Apparently he gained no benefit at all from his divine dignities?
How can we understand the pattern of God’s plan in these matters? It is mystical, profound, and truly wonderful for those who correctly know the mystery of Christ. Look at the sayings that refer to the self-emptying and are adapted to the limitations of his humanity. Notice how they come at exactly the right time, when they are needed, so that he who is above all creation might be revealed as having become like us in every way. Another conclusion follows from this. Tell me what it is. We had become accursed through Adam’s sin and had fallen into the trap of death, abandoned by God. Yet all things were made new in Christ (2 Cor 5:17) and our condition was restored to what it was in the beginning. It was completely necessary that the Second Adam, who is from heaven (1 Cor 15:45) and superior to all sin—that is Christ, the pure and spotless first-fruits of our race—should free human nature from judgment and once again call down upon it the heavenly favor of the Father. He would undo our abandonment by his obedience and complete submission. “For he did no sin” (1 Pet 2:22), but human nature was made rich in all blamelessness and innocence in him, so that it could now cry out with boldness: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46). Understand that in becoming man, the Only Begotten spoke these words as one of us and on behalf of all our nature. It was as if he were saying this: “The first man sinned. He fell into disobedience and neglected the commandment he received, and he was brought to this state of rebellion by the tricks of the devil. Then it was completely right that he became subject to decay and fell under judgment. But you Lord have made me a second beginning for everyone on earth, and I am called the Second Adam. In me you see human nature made clean, its faults corrected, made holy and pure. Now give me the good things of your kindness, undo the abandonment, rebuke decay and set a limit on your anger. I have conquered Satan himself who ruled in the past, for he found in me absolutely nothing of what was his.” In my opinion this is the meaning of the Savior’s words. He did not call upon the Father’s favor for himself, but rather for us. The effects of God’s anger passed into all of human nature from the original root, that is Adam: “For death has had dominion from Adam up to Moses, even on those who committed no sin in the manner of Adam’s transgression” (Rom 5:14). In the same way, however, the effects of our new first-fruits, that is Christ, will again pass into the entire human race. The all-wise Paul confirms this for us when he says: “For if many died because of the transgression of one, how much more” (Rom 5:15) shall many come to life because of the righteousness of one. And again: “As all men die in Adam, so shall all be made alive in Christ” (1 Cor 15:22).
B. Do you mean it would be foolish and completely contrary to the sacred scriptures to think or say that the assumed man spoke these human words as someone who had been abandoned by the Word who was united to him?
My friend, this would be blasphemy and a clear sign of total madness. But it would obviously fit those who don’t know how to understand the matter correctly. They split up and completely divide his words and actions, assigning some things as belonging only to the Only Begotten, and other things to a different son from him who was born of a woman. In this way they have missed the straight and accurate path to knowing the mystery of Christ clearly.
B. So in the case of the evangelical and apostolic preaching, one must not divide the words or the acts in this way?
Certainly not, at least not as referring to two persons or two hypostases that are divided from one another and completely split into distinct and separate categories. For there is only one Son, the Word who became human for our sake. I would say that everything—both words and deeds, both those that are appropriate to deity and those that are human—refers to him.
B. So even if he is said to have been wearied by the journey (Jn 4:6), to have hungered (Mt 4:2), and to have fallen asleep (Mt 8:24), would it be right, tell me, to assign these things that are trivial and degrading to God the Word?
Such things would not be at all fitting to the Word if we considered him nakedly, as it were, not yet made flesh, or before he had descended into the self-emptying. Your thoughts are right on this. But once he is made man and emptied out, what harm can this do to him? Just as we say that the flesh became his very own, in the same way the weakness of that flesh became his very own in an economic appropriation according to the terms of the unification. So he is “made like his brethren in all things except sin alone” (Heb 2:17). Do not be surprised if we say that he has made the weakness of the flesh his own along with the flesh itself. He even attributed to himself those external outrages that came upon him from the brutality of the Jews, saying through the voice of the Psalmist: “They divided my garments among them, and cast lots for my clothes” (Ps 22:18), and again: “All those who saw me sneered at me, they wagged their tongues, they shook their heads” (Ps 22:7). Even if perhaps he should say: “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. I and the Father are one” (Jn 14:9; Jn 10:30), and then says to the Jews: “Why do you seek to kill me, a man who has spoken to you the truth which I heard from God” (Jn 8:40), then are we to apply both sets of sayings to one and the same subject? Indeed so, for the Christ is in no way divided, but is believed by all those who worship him to be the one and only and true Son. “The image of the unseen God, the brightness of the glory of the Father’s hypostasis, the impress of his being” (Col 1:15) “assumed the form of a slave” (Phil 2:6), not as if he joined a man to himself, as they would say, but rather that he himself came in that form, while even so remaining in likeness to God the Father. This was why the all-wise Paul wrote: “Because it is God, he who said that light should shine from darkness, who lit up our hearts for the enlightenment of the knowledge of his glory in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor 4:6). Notice how the radiance of the divine and ineffable glory of God the Father shines “in the face of Jesus Christ.” The Only Begotten, even when he has become man, shows forth in himself the glory of the Father. Only in this way, not otherwise, is he understood and designated as Christ. If this is not so, let our opponents teach us how one could ever see in an ordinary man the radiance, or even the knowledge, of the divine glory. We do not see God in the form of man; only in the Word who is made man and has become as we are, while ever remaining the true and natural Son (and thus considered in his deity), can we see that this strange reality has come about. Moreover the steward of his mysteries calls him Christ Jesus, since he became as we are and was made flesh, but he knows that at the same time he is naturally and truly God. He says as follows: “I have written to you more boldly on some points so as to serve as a reminder for you, by virtue of the grace which God gave me that I should be a minister of Christ Jesus for the gentiles in the priestly service of the Gospel of God” (Rom 15:15-16). And Zechariah also prophesies to his own child, that is the Baptist, as follows: “And you, little child, shall be called a prophet of the Most High for you shall go before the face of the Lord to prepare a people for him” (Lk 1:76). Thereafter the divine Baptist pointed out the Most High Lord saying: “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. This is the one of whom I said: after me there comes a man who came before me, because he was before me” (Jn 1:29-30). And so, can it be lawful to doubt that the one and only true Son is the Word of God the Father with the flesh he united to himself? This is not a soulless flesh as some would have it, as I have said earlier, but flesh animated with a rational soul, and in all respects one prosopon with it. I do not doubt it in the least, for there is “One Lord, one faith, one baptism” (Eph 4:5). But if Jesus is said to “advance in stature and wisdom and grace” (Lk 2:52), then who is the subject who is “becoming” in this instance? The Word of God the Father is complete and perfect in himself, so what could he progress or advance to? He himself is wisdom, so he cannot be said to receive wisdom [Manuscript lacuna]. This is why they say that we must seek to discover who it is to whom these things apply.
Then it seems that a different Son and Christ and Lord has been introduced, simply because certain people cannot understand the depths of the sacred scriptures. When the wise evangelist introduces the Word as having been made flesh, he shows him economically, allowing his own flesh to obey the laws of its own nature. It belongs to humanity to advance in stature and wisdom, and one might say in grace also, since understanding develops in a certain way in each person according to the body’s limitations. It is one thing in infants, something else in older children, and something different again for adults. It would not have been impossible, or impractical, for God the Word who came from the Father to have made that body which he united with himself rise up even from its swaddling clothes and bring it straight to the stature of perfect maturity. One might even say that it would have been easy for him to have displayed abundant wisdom in his infancy; but such a thing would have looked like wonder-working and would have been out of tune with the plan of the economy. No, the mystery was accomplished quietly, and for this reason—that is, economically—he allowed the limitations of humanity to have power over himself. This was arranged as part of his likeness to us, since we advance to greater things little by little as circumstances call us to take on greater stature and a corresponding mentality. The Word who is from the Father, then, is entirely perfect and needs nothing whatsoever, since he is God, yet he makes what is ours his own since he became as we are. Even so we know that he is above us, as God. In some places, even though he knows that he became flesh, yet with an eye to the excellencies of the Godhead, Paul even goes so far as to say that he was not even a man. He writes to the Galatians, for instance: “Paul, an apostle, not from man or by a man, but through Jesus Christ” (Gal 1:1). And elsewhere he says: “I declare to you the Good News which I announced, that it is not according to man; for I did not receive it from a man, nor was I taught it. It came by the revelation of Jesus Christ” (Gal 1:11-12).
B. Then should we apply to him statements about advancing in wisdom and stature and grace, just as we do with references to hunger and tiredness and similar things? Perhaps even if he could be said to suffer or be raised to life by the Father, we should attribute those things to him as well?
We say that these human things belong to him through an economic appropriation, and along with the flesh all the things that belong to it. We recognize no other Son apart from him, for the Lord himself has saved us, giving his own blood as a ransom for the life of all (Is 63:9 LXX). “We were not bought with a perishable price of silver or gold, but with the precious blood of the spotless lamb without blemish, which is Christ, who offered himself on our behalf as a sweet-smelling offering to God the Father” (cf. 1 Cor 6:20; 1 Pet 1:18-19). And Paul, who was most learned in the law, confirms this for us when he writes: “So become imitators of God as beloved children and walk in love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a sweet-smelling offering and sacrifice to God” (Eph 5:1-2). Since Christ has become a sweet odor for our sake, and has revealed in himself the nature of man possessed of sinlessness, then we have gained boldness through him and in him toward our God and Father in heaven. It is written: “So brothers, we have the boldness through the blood of Christ to enter into the holy places by a new and living way which he has opened for us through the veil, that is his flesh” (Heb 10:19-20). Understand then how he says the flesh is his, and the blood is his, which he also calls “the veil,” and rightly so, for what the sacred veil did in the Temple, effectively covering up the Holy of Holies, this is what we can understand the flesh of the Lord does. The Word is made one with it, and in turn it conceals the transcendent excellence of the greatness and glory of the Word from being looked at as if exposed to the inspection of all. This is exactly why some thought that Christ was “Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets” (Mt 16:14). But the Jews who completely misunderstood his mystery spoke badly of him when they said: “Surely this is Jesus, the son of the carpenter? (Mt 13:55) How can he now say: I have come down from heaven” (Jn 6:42)? The deity is invisible by nature, yet he, who in his own nature is not visible, was seen by those on earth in our likeness, and God who is Lord appeared to us. This, I think, is what the divine David teaches us when he says: “God, our God, shall come openly and shall no longer be silent” (Ps 50:3 LXX).
B. You think correctly. They would maintain, however, that things are not like this at all, far from it. They think it is not at all right to attribute the suffering upon the cross to the Word born of God. They would argue instead that he prepared the man who was conjoined to himself in terms of equal honor to undergo the insults of the Jews, and the sufferings on the cross, and even death itself, and that in this way the man became the “leader of our salvation,” returning to life and crushing the dominion of death by the power of the Word who was with him.
Do they have anything from the sacred scriptures to show us that their teaching on these matters is true? Or are they introducing new ideas into the faith? They are “speaking things from their own hearts and not from the mouth of the Lord,” as it is written (Jer 23:6). Perhaps they find themselves unable to say: “As for me, let me never boast except in the cross of Christ, through whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal 6:14).
They would claim they do have such proofs, since the all-wise Paul supports this when he writes: “It was fitting for him, because of whom are all things, and through whom are all things, to perfect the leader of their salvation through many sufferings, thus leading many sons to glory” (Heb 2:10). They argue that the one in whom all things exist and through whom all things exist can only be the Word born of God the Father, and that he therefore perfected the leader of our salvation through sufferings—that is, the one who comes from the line of David.
If that’s the case, then God has not redeemed us at all—how could he have? Instead, we’ve been redeemed by someone else’s blood. Some ordinary man, a fraud and falsely called a son, died for us. The great and sacred mystery of the incarnation of the Only Begotten turns out to be nothing but empty words and lies, since he never actually became human. We certainly couldn’t consider him our Savior who gave his blood for us—we would have to credit that to some other man. Yet the most holy Paul wrote to certain people: “It was necessary, then, that the copies of the heavenly realities should be purified by these things whereas the heavenly realities themselves should be purified by greater sacrifices than these. For Christ did not enter into holy places made by human hands, the figures of the true realities, but into heaven itself, to appear now in the presence of God on our behalf. Nor does he offer himself many times, as the High Priest enters the holy places every year with another’s blood, otherwise he would have suffered many times since the foundation of the world. No, he is now made manifest once and for all, in the consummation of the ages, for the abolition of sin through his sacrifice” (Heb 9:23-26). So if the type or copy makes its entrance with someone else’s blood and purifies the people, then the true form—or rather the truth itself—is superior in every way, and the Son enters with his own blood not into some temporary tent made by human hands, which is only shadows and types, but into what is above and real, that is, into heaven itself: “For it was necessary that the copies of the heavenly realities should be purified by these things” (Heb 9:23). The former clearly refers to things that were symbolic and not his own, “whereas the heavenly things themselves should be purified with greater sacrifices than these.” This is why we need to determine what is greater than the types—I mean what is true, which is in his own blood.
B. You put it well.
They have set up the apostolic saying against us as though it referred only to an ordinary man. Now let us take the quotation from its beginning to the point relevant to our case. “Thus it is written: ‘For we behold Jesus, who for a short time was brought lower than the angels because of the suffering of death, now crowned with honor and glory. It was fitting for him, because of whom are all things, and through whom are all things, to perfect the leader of their salvation through many sufferings, thus leading many sons to glory. For the one sanctifying and those that are sanctified are all of one origin, and this is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying: I announced your name to my brethren, or again: Behold, I and the children which God gave me… And since the children have fellowship in flesh and blood he too equally shared in these things so that through death he could destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil, and should deliver those who through all their lives had been held in bondage by the fear of death. He did not take his descent from angels but from Abraham. Hence in all things he ought to be made like his brethren’ (Heb 2:9, 10-17).” So notice then, observe how very clearly he says that he was brought lower than the angels through the suffering of death, and that he has thereby “been crowned with honor and glory,” and yet he makes it obvious to whom his words refer, clearly the Only Begotten. He tells us that “he shared in flesh and blood equally with us” and that “he did not take his descent from angels but from Abraham,” because it pleased God the Father, “because of whom are all things, and through whom are all things,” to perfect the Son through sufferings when he descended into the self-emptying and was made man, that is when he took the form of a slave and consecrated his own flesh as a ransom for the life of all. The Christ has been sanctified for us as a spotless offering, and “by one offering he has perfected those who were to be sanctified for ever” (Heb 10:14) and has restored the physis of man into what it was in the beginning. “In him all things are made new” (2 Cor 5:17). The all-wise Paul confirms that God the Father has given his own son for our sake when he writes: “He did not spare his own son but gave him up on behalf of us all, so how could he not grant us all things along with him” (Rom 8:32)? We say, then, that the Word who shines forth from God’s ousia is his proper Son, but that he is not given on behalf of us nakedly, as it were, or as yet without flesh, but rather when he became flesh. To say that he suffered does no disgrace to him, for he did not suffer in the physis of the godhead, but in his own flesh. God the Father, as I said earlier, “made him who knew no sin into sin for our sake, in order that we might become the righteousness of God along with him” (2 Cor 5:21).
B. Should we think that he actually became sin itself, or rather that he was made similar to those who are under sin, and for this reason is called sin?
A. You express it correctly. Just as “he made him who knew no sin into sin for our sake that we might become the righteousness of God in him” (for the physis of man has been justified in him), so in the same way he caused him who knew not death (since the Word is life and life-giver) to suffer in the flesh. But insofar as he is considered as God he remained outside suffering so that we might live through him and in him. For this reason the suffering of Christ has been called “the likeness of death.” So it is written: “If we become one being with him in the likeness of his death, so shall we be of his resurrection” (Rom 6:5). The Word was alive even when his holy flesh was experiencing death, so that when death was defeated and corruption trampled underfoot, the power of the resurrection might come upon the whole human race. It is a fact that “Just as in Adam all men die, so all men shall be made alive in Christ” (1 Cor 15:22). How else should we say that the mystery of the economy (divine plan) of the Only Begotten in the flesh brought help to the physis of man, except that he who is above all creation brought himself down into a self-emptying and lowered himself to our condition? How else could it be except that the body which lay under corruption became a body of life so as to become beyond death and corruption?
B. Is this why we say that the Word of God the Father himself suffered in the flesh for our sake?
Yes, absolutely—if we can trust what Paul says: “He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation, for all things were created in him, visible and invisible, whether Thrones, or Dominions, or Principalities, or Powers; all things were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in all things he might be pre-eminent” (Col 1:15-18). So pay attention and notice how clearly he says that the image of the unseen God, the first-born of all creation both visible and invisible, through whom and in whom all things exist, has been given as head to the church and is also the first-born from the dead. As I’ve already said, he made the characteristics of his flesh his own and “endured the cross, despising the shame” (Heb 12:2). We don’t claim that some ordinary man who was somehow honored alongside him (I don’t know how) was handed over for our sake. Rather, the Lord of Glory himself is the one who was crucified, just as Scripture says: “If they had known they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory” (1 Cor 2:8). He suffered in the flesh for us and on our behalf, “who is of the Jews according to the flesh, God over all blessed forever” (cf. Rom 9:5). This is what the most holy Paul wrote—that herald and apostle who had Christ himself living within him. But tell me this: when Christ says to the Samaritan woman, “You worship what you do not know. We worship what we do know, for salvation is of the Jews” (Jn 4:22), how do these people understand such a text, given that “it was no elder or angel that saved us, but the Lord himself” (Is 63:9), and not through someone else’s death or through the mediation of an ordinary man, but by his own blood? How right the all-wise Paul was when he said: “Anyone who sets aside the law of Moses is put to death without mercy at the hands of two or three witnesses. How much more severe do you think would be the punishment of anyone who tramples underfoot the Son of God, considers the blood of the new covenant a common thing, and scorns the spirit of grace in which he was sanctified” (Heb 10:28-29)? Yet if it wasn’t really the precious blood of the true Son made man, but rather the blood of some illegitimate son different from him—someone who holds sonship only by grace—then how could anyone avoid concluding that it really was just a common thing? So even if he is said to suffer in the flesh, he still remains impassible insofar as he is understood as God. The divine Peter also says: “Christ died for us once and for all, on behalf of our sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might lead us to God. Put to death in the flesh, he was made alive in the spirit” (1 Pet 3:18). Someone might ask why the spirit-bearer didn’t simply say outright that he suffered, but instead added the words “in the flesh.” The reason is that he knew—he knew—he was speaking about God, and so he attributed impassibility to him insofar as he is understood as God, while adding, very skillfully, “in the flesh,” which is of course where the suffering takes place.
They argue that having to say the same person both suffers and does not suffer sounds like a fairy tale and borders on the unbelievable. Either he did not suffer at all as God, or if he is said to have suffered, then how can he be God? For these reasons, they claim the one who suffers must be understood as only the one who is from David’s line.
A. Isn’t this an obvious proof of the weakness of their thinking, that they choose to say and believe this? God the Father didn’t give us some ordinary man elevated to the position of mediator and artificially granted the honor of sonship through a relationship by connection. No, he gave the one who is above all creation, who for our sake came in our likeness—the Word who comes forth from his own being—so that he could be recognized as the life of all. In my view it’s utterly absurd, as I’ve already said, to criticize the Only-Begotten because he didn’t reject the economy and became flesh, and to accuse him of working against his own glory by inappropriately choosing to suffer in the flesh. My friend, this was about the salvation of the whole world. And since he wanted to suffer for this reason, even though he was beyond the reach of suffering in his nature as God, he clothed himself in flesh that was capable of suffering and made it truly his own, so that even the suffering could be said to be his because it was his own body that suffered and no one else’s. Since the manner of the economy allows him to choose blamelessly both to suffer in the flesh and not to suffer in the Godhead (for he was at the same time both God and man), our opponents clearly argue pointlessly and foolishly undermine the power of the mystery when they think they’ve constructed a proper explanation. It appears that the fact he chose to suffer in the flesh was somehow shameful for him, but in another way it was glorious, because the resurrection proved that he is greater than death and corruption. As God he is life and life-giver, and so he raised up his own temple. This is why the divine Paul said: “I am not ashamed of the Gospel since it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes” (Rom 1:16), and again: “The message of the cross is foolishness for those that are perishing, but to those of us who are saved it is the power of God, and to those who are called, Jews as well as Greeks, it is Christ, the power and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor 1:18, 24). When the Son himself was about to go up to his saving Passion he also said: “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him, and God shall glorify him in himself and shall glorify him straightway” (Jn 13:31-32). Indeed, having plundered Hell he returned to life, and not after a long time but “straightway,” so to speak, immediately following the Passion. B. Doesn’t the all-wise Paul also say: “Yet you seek a proof that it is Christ who speaks in me, he who is not weak but powerful among you. Though indeed he was crucified out of weakness he lives now from the power of God” (2 Cor 13:3-4). A. Don’t we say repeatedly that the Word of God was made flesh and became man? B. Yes, and how could it be otherwise?
Well then, it is the one “who is weak” in the flesh, to the extent that he appeared as a human being, who “lived from the power of God”—a power that was not foreign to him but inherent, since he truly was God in the flesh. Yet the Father is said to have raised him, for it is written: “According to the working of that power of his might which he worked in the Christ, raising him from the dead and sitting him at his right hand in the heavenly places, above every name that can be named” (Eph 1:19-21).
We say that he is the life-giving power of the Father, and that he naturally shines forth in all the glories belonging to the one who begot him, even when he became flesh. He can testify to this himself when he says: “For just as the Father gives life to whomever he wills, so does the Son give life to anyone he wills” (Jn 5:21). And he is fully able to do this without effort, for he spoke to the Jewish people as follows: “Destroy this temple and in three days I shall raise it” (Jn 2:19). Yet the one who rose again sat “upon the right hand of the Father in the heavenly places, above every Principality, and Authority, and Dominion, and every name that can be named” (Eph 1:20-21). So is this a different son from the Word who came forth from him? Someone who is honored because of a mere conjunction, who receives the title of Godhead by the gift of grace? Or is it not rather the one who is truly and naturally the Son, the one who “came in the likeness of men and was found in fashion as a man” (Phil 2:7) in an economic (dispensational) manner?
B. They would say, perhaps, that it was only the man from David’s line who was joined to him in equality of honor who could properly suffer death. A. But as I have already said, something that is said to be “equal in honor” to something else cannot be numerically one with it; rather it is one thing alongside another. This, I think, makes two things that are unequal in nature, at least if the one being honored is less than the one doing the honoring. Given that only one son sat down at the right hand, let them teach us who it is who has been honored with these heavenly thrones and sits alongside the Father, since it would be a most dreadful thing to dare to place a slave in the same honor as the master, or a creature in the same honor as the Creator, or one under the yoke with the King of all, or one ranked among all with the one who transcends all.
B. Then explain this for us a little further. A. Well, I think our discussion has already dealt with these matters sufficiently and clearly enough, but alright, I will add a few other things without hesitation to what I have already said. I will not fight for the sacred dogmas in a petty way; no, I will raise up the truth in full battle array against those who think wrongly. He himself confirms that it was the Only Begotten Word of God who destroyed the dominion of death—not a different son joined to him in some kind of relationship to accomplish this economy, but he himself, personally. He confirms this when he says: “God so loved the world that he gave his Only Begotten Son so that everyone who believes in him might have eternal life” (Jn 3:16). When God the Father so exalts his love for the world, explaining how immensely great and vast it is, then why do our opponents so belittle it, saying that it was not the true Son who was given for us? They introduce in place of the natural Son someone else who is like us and has the sonship as a grace; but it really was the Only Begotten who was given for our sake. John wisely wrote: “The Only Begotten God, he who is in the bosom of the Father” (Jn 1:18), so how can we not marvel at their stupidity when they cast out the Only Begotten Word of God from the economy in order to bring in, as I have said, someone alien, endowed with external glories, who has the title of godhead laid upon him?
What will be left of the Father’s great and admirable love if he only gave up a part of the world for its sake, and a small part at that? Perhaps it would not even be wrong to say that the world was redeemed without God’s help, since it was served in this respect from its own resources? B. They say that the Only Begotten has been given by the Father to put our affairs in order, not that he should suffer the things of man in his own nature, since this would be impossible. A. In his own nature he certainly suffers nothing, for as God he is bodiless and completely beyond suffering. However, according to his own testimony—I mean what he said through the Psalmist’s lyre—a body was prepared for him by the Father, and then he came in that body to do the Father’s will (cf. Ps 40:6-8 LXX). This will was nothing less than redemption through the honorable cross and the recapitulation of all things, something that was perfectly accomplished through him and in him. The most excellent Paul supports what I have said when he writes: “Let each of you have this mind among you which was in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself out, assuming the form of a slave, and coming in the likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient even to death, death on a cross. For this reason God has highly exalted him and granted him the name above every name, that in the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven, on the earth, and in the underworld, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2:5-11). So who would you say is the one who is in the form of God the Father? Who could have remained in equality with him yet did not think this preeminent and divine dignity and this transcendence of all things something to be grasped? Is it not God the Word who comes from him? If so, how is the matter not obvious to everyone? It is he who was “in the form of God,” the one who was equal with God, who assumed the “form of a slave,” and not in the manner of a conjunction of relationship but rather as “coming in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man.” Yet even so he was God and “he humbled himself and became obedient to death, death on a cross.”
They would argue that scripture says of him: “God granted him the name above every name so that in the name of Jesus every knee should bend”; but how could the Word ever be understood as receiving something which he already was, being God? And this is why it is necessary to say that the name above every name was given instead to the man who was assumed, and then we will not be guilty of thinking anything inappropriate about the Only Begotten.
A. In that case wouldn’t it be far better to say that the name was given by the Father to his natural Son who became man for our sake, so that even in his humanity he could be understood to be God, and though he took on the lowly condition of our nature, he remains in the highest place? This way we won’t introduce some new or recently-made god among angels and human beings—one who doesn’t possess the glory of the Godhead essentially in his own being, but only as something added from outside, as if merely by the will of God the Father.
B. Then should we conclude that the “name above every name” was given by God the Father to the Word who was born from him? And our argument makes sense if it’s true that “he did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped” but descended into a condition without glory when he was revealed as man. This is why he said: “The Father is greater than I,” even though he had the right to have exact equality with him in all things and to enjoy the glory of the Godhead since he has existed with God eternally insofar as he is conceived as, and actually is, God. We must not think that he who descended into the limitation of manhood for our sake lost his inherent radiance and that transcendence that comes from his physis. No, he had this divine fullness even in the emptiness of our condition, and he enjoyed the highest eminence in humility, and held what belongs to him by nature (that is, to be worshipped by all) as a gift because of his humanity. Every knee bends before him, “those in heaven and those on earth,” and every rank proclaims his praise, for Jesus Christ is believed on as Lord “to the glory of God the Father.” This is why he said to God the Father in heaven: “Father glorify me with that glory which I had with you before the world was.” So tell me, did this man whom they say was assumed by the Only Begotten in a conjunction of relationship pre-exist the world? B. Not at all. A. Who is it then who is asking for the glory which he says existed in himself before the very foundation of the world, since he was always and ever with God? Was it not God the Word who is co-eternal with the Father, who shares his throne and co-exists with him? The all-wise evangelist John said of him: “The Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
B. How could it be any different?
Just as he is the Lord of Glory and then humbles himself to the lowly condition of a slave’s form, so he asks to receive again his eternally inherent glory, and he does this in a manner fitting for a man. Since he is eternally God, he ascends from the constraints of our human condition to the supremacy and glory of his own Godhead, so that every knee should bow before the one true and natural Son—though, as I have said, one who is made flesh and has become like us. In my view, if we think and believe this, we will remove from heaven and earth every accusation of worshiping a mere man. For it is written: “You shall worship the Lord your God and adore him alone” (Mt 4:10).
B. This argument needs much more support, so please go on and explain the mystery to us through some other considerations.
I will certainly do so, and very gladly. I would say that they have missed the truth when they join together a different son who is descended from David with the true and natural Son, that is the Only Begotten. Does not sacred Scripture clearly proclaim: “The first man is of the earth, and earthly, the second is from heaven” (1 Cor 15:47)? And does not the Son himself say: “For I have come down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me. And this is the will of the one who sent me that of all that he has given me I should lose nothing, but that I should raise it up on the last day” (Jn 6:38-39)? Who then do they say is this one who has come down from heaven? For as far as the body was concerned, it was clearly born of a woman.
B. Obviously it was the Word begotten of God the Father, since I don’t suppose they would choose to think anything different from this.
Exactly right, my friend. Yet the all-wise John writes somewhere: “He who comes from above, is above all” (Jn 3:31). So, if the Father wishes to raise up all that he has given to him—an act which is both good and godly, since it is fitting to God to save—then why does he say he came down not to do his own will but that of the Father? Should any of us think that the Son who is born from God the Father falls short of him in mercy or is so much poorer than him in goodness that it does not please him to abolish corruption from humanity? I can see the danger in that. We should quite properly argue that since he is the genuine offspring of the Good Father, he himself ought to be understood as good, or rather as goodness itself: “For from the fruit you shall know the tree” (Mt 12:33), as he himself said. So, what he says is proven true: “He who has seen me has seen the Father. I and the Father are one” (Jn 14:9; 10:30).
B. You put it well, but please explain what seems unclear here.
We say that the Son certainly wanted to destroy death and banish corruption from human bodies. As it is written: “He takes no delight in the destruction of the living, but the generations of the world are preserved” (Wis 1:13-14). Yet through the envy of the devil death entered into our world” (Wis 2:24). There was no other way to shake off the gloomy dominion of death except through the incarnation of the Only Begotten. This is why he appeared as we are and made his own a body subject to corruption according to the inherent system of its physis. Since he himself is life, for he was born from the life of the Father, he intended to implant his own benefit within it, that is, life itself. Once he had chosen to become like us, out of his compassion and loving-kindness toward us, it was also necessary for him to submit to suffering when the wickedness of the Jews was unleashed against him. The shamefulness of his Passion was nonetheless a burden for him, and when the time came when it was necessary to endure the cross on behalf of the life of all, he approached it in a way befitting a man, in the manner of prayer. This was to show that he did not look forward to the passion, and so he said: “Father, if it is possible, let this chalice pass from me; but not my will but yours be done” (Mt 26:39). He is saying that he who is from heaven did not descend unwillingly to do what would cause him grief, but descended so that he might restore the resurrection to those on earth, something he alone had fashioned anew for human nature since he became “the first-born from the dead” according to the flesh, and the “first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep” (cf. Col 1:18; 1 Cor 15:20).
B. Are we, then, to attribute the suffering to him and to no other, insofar as he appeared as a man, even if he remained impassible insofar as he is understood as God? A. That is exactly what I am saying. Remember that the God-inspired scripture says: “The first man, Adam, was made a living soul; the last Adam a life-giving spirit” (1 Cor 15:45).
B. Should we say, then, that the Word of God has been called the Last Adam?
This is true, as I have said, not in the bare sense, but rather when he has come in our likeness. Then we say that he is the Last Adam insofar as giving life is not a human act, but rather something that belongs to God. He also has this title since he came from Adam according to the flesh, as a second beginning for those on earth, to transform the physis of man in himself into a newness of life in holiness and incorruptibility through the resurrection from the dead. This was how death was destroyed since life naturally did not allow its own body to endure corruption since it was not possible for the Christ to be under its dominion according to the words of the divine Peter (Acts 2:24). This was how the benefit of this achievement passed over even to us.
B. How excellently you put it.
A. But now consider this fact as well. B. What are you saying?
A. Somewhere Christ said to his holy apostles: “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” (Mt 28:19). So we are baptized into the holy and consubstantial Trinity—I mean into the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Or is what I have said incorrect? B. How could it be otherwise?
A. Don’t we consider the one who has begotten to be the Father, and on the other hand consider the Only Begotten Word of God, who is born from him by nature, to be the Son?
Indeed so, A. Then how are we baptized into his death, as the blessed Paul says: “For those of us who were baptized into Christ were baptized into his death” (Rom 6:3)? Yet “there is one Lord, one faith, one baptism” (Eph 4:5), and Paul certainly would not say we were baptized into someone who was a completely different son from the line of David. Since he is God by physis, he is understood as beyond suffering, yet he chose to suffer to save those under corruption. He became like those on earth in every way and was born from a woman according to the flesh. As I said, he made his own a body able to taste death and able to come back to life, so that he himself could remain impassible yet be said to suffer in his own flesh. In this way he saved what was lost (Mt 18:11) and clearly said: “I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down his own life for the sake of the sheep.” And again: “No one takes my life from me; I lay it down of my own accord. I have the authority both to lay it down and to take it up” (Jn 10:11,18). It does not belong to any of us, or to any ordinary man, to have authority to lay down his life and take it up again. Yet the Only Begotten and True Son laid it down and took it up again, pulling us out of death’s snares. You can also see this very clearly in the books of Moses, shown there as if in shadows for people of ancient times. Then the sacrifice of the sheep rescued the Israelites from death and corruption and turned away the Destroyer. This was a type of Christ: “For Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us” (1 Cor 5:7) so that he might destroy death’s gloomy rule and might possess all that is under heaven by his own blood. “We were bought at a price” and “are not our own” (1 Cor 6:19, 20) because “one died on behalf of all” (he who is more worthy than all) “so that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for the one who died on their behalf and rose again” (2 Cor 5:15). Paul confirms this when he says: “Through the law I died to the law that I might live to God. I am crucified with Christ. Now it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me. And the life that I now live in the flesh, I live in the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal 2:19-20). So we are all Christ’s, and through him who suffered in the flesh for our sake we are reconciled to the Father so that he might reveal us as having been purified. Thus it is written: “For this reason Jesus suffered outside the gate so that he might sanctify the people through his own blood” (Heb 13:12), and again: “We who were once estranged and enemies in our mentality and our evil works, he has now reconciled in his own fleshly body through his death, to present us as holy and blameless before him” (Col 1:21-22). Notice how he says it was “his own body” and “his own flesh” that was given up for us. We must not say, then, that the flesh and blood belonged to another son apart from him, understood as separate and honored by a mere conjunction, having an alien glory, someone who did not have pre-eminence substantially but only as if the name of sonship and that of Godhead which is above every name were thrown over him like a mask or cloak. If he were like this and had such a physis as our opponents have imagined, then it would be completely unfitting for him to say: “I am the truth” (Jn 14:6). How can that be true which is not what it is said to be, but is really something falsely named and illegitimate? But Christ is truth, and as God, is over all. The Word remained what he was even when he became flesh, so that he who is over all, and yet came among all through his humanity, should keep in himself his transcendence over all and remain above all the limitations of creation.
B. We would argue that claiming the Word of God suffered inflicts a terrible dishonor on him, and this brings our noble mystery into disrepute.
According to Scripture, “despising the shame” he chose to “suffer in the flesh” for our sake (Heb 12:2; 1 Pet 4:1). In my opinion, anyone who thinks the suffering on the cross was something to be ashamed of must clearly have either the mindset of a Jew or the blameworthy foolishness of the Greeks. The divine Paul wrote about this: “Though the Jews ask for signs, and the Greeks search for wisdom, yet we proclaim a crucified Christ; a stumbling block for the Jews, and foolishness to the gentiles, but to those who are called, Jews as well as Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God; because the foolishness of God is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Cor 1:22-25).
B. How can this be? I really don’t understand. A. Doesn’t he say that the suffering on the cross became a stumbling block for the Jews and foolishness for the Greeks? When they saw him hanging on the wood, the Jews shook their murderous heads at him and said, “If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross and we will believe in you” (Mt 27:40). They thought he was defeated by their power and had been seized and crucified, but they were wrong, because they didn’t think he really was the Son of God. They were looking at the flesh. The Greeks, on the other hand, are completely unable to grasp the depth of the mystery, since they think it is foolishness for us to say that Christ died for the life of the world. Yet this very thing that seems to be foolishness is what is “wiser than men.” This plan concerning Christ the Savior of us all is very deep and truly full of heavenly wisdom. What the Jews consider weakness is far stronger than men, for the Only Begotten Word of God has saved us by taking on our likeness. By suffering in the flesh and rising from the dead, he showed our nature to be greater than death or corruption. What he accomplished was beyond the ability of our condition, and what seemed to have been worked out in human weakness and through suffering was actually stronger than men and a demonstration of the power that belongs to God.
But they ask, how can the same one both suffer and not suffer?
He suffers in his own flesh, and not in the nature of the Godhead. The method of these things is completely beyond words, and there is no mind that can grasp such subtle and transcendent concepts. Yet, following these most accurate conclusions and carefully considering the most reasonable explanations, we do not deny that he can be said to suffer (otherwise we would be implying that the birth in the flesh was not his but someone else’s), but this does not mean that we say the things relating to the flesh happened in his divine and transcendent nature. No, as I have said, he should be understood as suffering in his own flesh, though not suffering in any way like this in the Godhead. The power of any comparison fails here and falls short of the truth, although I can think of a weak image of this reality that might lead us from something concrete, so to speak, to the very heights and to what is beyond all words. It is like iron, or some other such material, when it is placed in contact with a blazing fire. It receives the fire into itself, and when it is in the very center of the fire, if someone should strike it, then the material itself takes the blows but the nature of the fire is in no way harmed by the one who strikes. This is how you should understand the way in which the Son is said both to suffer in the flesh and not to suffer in the Godhead. Although, as I said, the power of any comparison is weak, this brings us somewhere near the truth if we have not deliberately chosen to disbelieve the holy scriptures.
If the flesh that is united to him ineffably and in a way that surpasses thought or speech did not become the very flesh of the Word directly, then how could it be understood as life-giving? He himself says: “I am the living bread which has come down from heaven and gives life to the world. If anyone should eat of this bread he shall live forever, and the bread which I shall give is my flesh for the life of the world” (Jn 6:51,33). But if it is the flesh of a different son than him, someone appropriated by him in a relational union, called to an equality of honor as a grace, then how can he call this his own flesh if he is without any deceit? And how could the flesh of anyone else ever give life to the world if it has not become the very flesh of Life, that is, of him who is the Word of God the Father? The divine Scripture said of him: “And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding that we might know him, and we are in his true Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and life everlasting” (1 Jn 5:20).
B. I suppose they would reply that he also clearly said: “Amen, Amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you shall not have life within you” (Jn 6:53). They say we should understand from this that the honorable body and blood are not those of God the Word but those of the man assumed by him.
Then where do they place “the great mystery of piety” (1 Tim 3:16)? It seems they destroy the self-emptying of God the Word, who though he existed in the form and equality of the Father chose to take on the form of a slave for our sake, came in our likeness, shared in flesh and blood, and blessed everything under heaven with the economy (divine plan) of the incarnation. This is how salvation happened, with the Father gathering all things together in him—”things in heaven and things on earth,” as it is written (Eph 1:10). If they say that the One who speaks in both human and divine ways when he says “And the bread which I shall give is my flesh for the life of the world” (Jn 6:51) is not the Only Begotten, but rather some Son of Man thought of as different and separate from him who saved us, then it is no longer “the Lord himself who saved us,” as it is written (Is 63:9 LXX), but one of our own kind. In that case, all those who are subject to corruption are not brought to life by God (who does have the power to give life) but by someone who is himself subject to corruption, someone who receives life as a gift along with us. On the other hand, if it is true that the Word became flesh according to the scriptures and “appeared on the earth and lived among men” (Bar 3:37), taking the form of a slave as his very own, then he can also be called the Son of Man. If certain people are ashamed of this, they expose themselves to the charge of foolishness. There was no other way for the flesh to become life-giving—even though by its own physis it was subject to the necessity of corruption—except by becoming the very flesh of the Word who gives life to all things. This is exactly how it accomplishes his own purposes, working through his own life-giving power. There is nothing surprising here, for if it is true that fire interacts with materials that are not hot by their own natures and yet makes them hot by abundantly transferring to them the inherent energy of its own power, then surely to an even greater degree the Word who is God can transfer the life-giving power and energy of his own self into his very own flesh. We can see that this is his very own flesh since he is united to it without confusion and without change and in a manner he alone knows.
B. Then must we confess that it has become entirely the personal body of the Word of the Father, with no one else intervening, even though it is understood to be animated with a rational soul?
Yes, absolutely. This is the case if we are to define the teaching of the faith correctly and without error, and if we are lovers of true teaching who follow the path of faith taken by our holy fathers. In this way we will not be led away from the right path, and we will not leave the royal road by being swept away into corrupt thinking through the empty stories of certain people. Instead, we will be built on the foundation stone itself, which is Christ. “For no one can lay any other foundation besides the one already in place” (1 Cor 3:10-11), as the wise builder and priest of his mysteries has written so truly. This is why we believe that there is only one Son of God the Father. This is why we must understand our Lord Jesus Christ as one prosopon. As the Word, he is born divinely before all ages and times, but in these last times of this age, the same one was born of a woman according to the flesh. We attribute both the divine and human characteristics to the same one, and we also say that both the birth and the suffering on the cross belong to the same one, since he made his own everything that belonged to his own flesh, while always remaining impassible in the physis of the Godhead. This is why “every knee will bend before him, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2:10-11).
Amen, a prosopon.
- 1 Tents: Quod Unus Sit Christus, PG 75:1253-1361; Ed, P.E, Pusey, ↩
- 2 Cyril applies the Septuagint version to distinguish Crist (who has the ↩
- 3 CF. Socrates, Church History 7: ↩
- 4 Jesus as notionally being honored with the divine titles. ↩
- 5 Cyril’s text differs from all known mss. of the N.T. ↩
- 6 This defends Cyril’s 12th “Anathema’ attached to his Third Letter (Ep. ↩
- 7 Lit. “as something prosopic.” ↩
- 8 At first he had the ear and sympathies of the Emperor Theodosius, but ↩
- 9 Cyril’s Letter 17. For available English versions of this and other ↩
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- For available translations see Bibliography, section A.