On the Christian Faith (De fide)

The objection that Christ, on the showing of St. John, lives because of the Father, and therefore is not to be regarded as equal with the Father, is met by the reply that for the Life of the Son, in respect of His Godhead, there has never been a time when it began; and that it is dependent upon none, whilst the passage in question must be understood as referring to His human life, as is shown by His speaking there of His body and blood. Two expositions of the passage are given, the one of which is shown to refer to Christ's Manhood, whilst the second teaches His equality with the Father, as also His likeness with men. Rebuke is administered to the Arians for the insult which they are seeking to inflict upon the Son, and the sense in which the Son can be said to live “because of” the Father is explained, as also the union of life with the divine Life. A further objection, based upon the Son's prayer that He may be glorified by the Father, is briefly refuted.

118. There are not a few who raise this further objection, that it is written: “As the living Father has sent Me, and I live by the Father; so he that eats Me, lives also by Me.” “How,” ask they, “is the Son equal with the Father, when He has said that He lives by the Father?”

119. Let those who oppose us on this ground tell us first what the Life of the Son is. Is it a life bestowed by the Father upon one lacking life? But how could the Son ever fail to possess life, He Himself being the Life, as He says, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” Truly, His life is eternal, even as His power is eternal. Was there a time, then, when (so to speak) Life possessed not itself?

120. Bethink you what is read this day concerning the Lord Jesus, that “He died for our sakes, to the end that whether we wake or whether we sleep, we may live with Him.” He Whose Death is Life, is not His Godhead Life, seeing that the Godhead is Life eternal?

121. But is His Life truly in the Father's power? Why, He showed that even His bodily life was not in the power of any other, as we have it on record: “I lay down My life, that I may take it again. No man takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and again I have power to take it. This commandment have I received of My Father.”

122. Is His divine Life then to be regarded as depending upon the power of another, when His bodily life was subject to no other power but His own? For it would have been the power of another, but for the Unity of power. But just as He gives us to understand that His laying down His life was done of His own power, and of His free Will, so also He teaches us, in laying it down in obedience to His Father's command, the unity of His own with the Father's Will.

123. If, then, there has neither been a time when the Life of the Son took a commencement, nor any power to which it has been subjected, let us consider what His meaning was when He said: “Even as the living Father has sent Me, and I live by the Father”? Let us expound His meaning as best we can; nay, rather let Him expound it Himself.

124. Take notice, then, what He said in an earlier part of His discourse. “Verily, verily, I say unto you.” He first teaches you how you ought to listen. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His blood, you shall have no life in you.” He first premised that He was speaking as Son of Man; do you then think that what He has said, as Son of Man, concerning His Flesh and His Blood, is to be applied to His Godhead?

125. Then He added: “For My Flesh is meat indeed, and My Blood is drink [indeed].” You hear Him speak of His Flesh and of His Blood, you perceive the sacred pledges, [conveying to us the merits and power] of the Lord's death, and you dishonour His Godhead. Hear His own words: “A spirit has not flesh and bones.” Now we, as often as we receive the Sacramental Elements, which by the mysterious efficacy of holy prayer are transformed into the Flesh and the Blood, “do show the Lord's Death.”

126. Then, after calling on us to take notice that He speaks as Son of Man, and frequent repeated mention of His Flesh and His Blood, He adds: “Even as the living Father has sent Me, and I live by the Father, so he that eats Me, he also lives by Me.” How then do they suppose that we are to understand these words?— for the comparison can be shown as a double one. The first comparison being after the following manner: “Even as the living Father has sent Me, I live by the Father;” the second: “Even as the living Father has sent Me, and I live by the Father, so also he that eats Me, he too lives by Me.”

127. If our adversaries choose the former, the meaning is this, that, “as I am sent by the Father and have come down from the Father, so (in accordance therewith) I live by the Father.” But in what character was He sent, and came down, save as Son of Man, even as He Himself said before: “No man has ascended into heaven, save He that has come down from heaven as Son of Man.” Then, just as He was sent and came down as Son of Man, so as Son of Man He lives by the Father. Furthermore, he that eats Him, as eating the Son of Man, does himself also live by the Son of Man. Thus, He has compared the effect of His Incarnation to His coming.

128. But if they choose the second method, do we not infer both the equality of the Son with the Father, and His likeness to men, together, though in clear mutual distinction? For what is the meaning of the words, “Even as He Himself lives by the Father, so we also live by Him,” but that the Son so quickens a man, as the Father has in the Son quickened human nature? “For as the Father raises the dead and quickens them, so also the Son quickens whom He will,” as the Lord Himself has already said.

129. Thus the equality of the Son to the Father is established simply upon unity in the action of quickening, since the Son so quickens as the Father does. Acknowledge therefore the eternity of His Life and Sovereignty. Again, our likeness with the Son is discovered, and a certain unity with Him in the flesh, because that, like as the Son of God was quickened in the flesh by the Father, so also is man quickened; for thus it is written, that as God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, so we also, as men, are quickened by the Son of God.

130. According to this interpretation, then, immortality is not only applied to our condition by grace of bounty, but is also proclaimed as the property of Godhead— the latter, because it is the Godhead which quickens; the former, because manhood is quickened in Christ.

131. But if any would apply the force of either comparison to Christ's Godhead, then the Son of God is put on one footing with men, so that the Son of God lives by the Father just as we live by the Son of God. But the Son of God bestows eternal life by free gift, we cannot so do. If then He be placed on a level with us, He too does not bestow this gift. Let Arius' disciples then have the due reward of their faith— which is, not to obtain eternal life of the Son.