On the Unity of Christ

B. Albeit the all-wise Paul says, Since [64] ye seek a proof of Christ speaking in me, Who is not weak but is mighty in us: for verily He was crucified out of weakness yet lives out of the power of God. Then how will one say that the Word Himself is weak and moreover that He lives out of the power of God?

A. Do we not over and over again say that the Word of God was Incarnate and made man?

B. Yes, for how should it be otherwise?

A. Therefore He Who is weak in the flesh in that He appeared as man, This lived out of the power of God, a power not alien but inherent in Him, for He was God in flesh.

B. And verily the Father is said to raise Him, for it is written, According to the inworking of the mastery of His might which He hath inwrought [65] in Christ, having raised Him from the dead and set Him on His Right Hand in the heavenly places above all rule and authority and lordship and every name that is named.

A. Yet we say that He is the life-giving Power of the Father and it is like that He rejoices in the Dignities of Him Who begat Him even though He have been made flesh. And Himself will come in, His own witness, saying, For as the Father quickeneth whom He will, so the Son too quickeneth whom He will. And able to accomplish this full well without toil, He hath addressed the people of the Jews saying, Undo this Temple and in three days I will rear it. But He Who rose hath sat on the Right Hand of the Father in the heavenly places above all rule and authority and throne [66] and lordship and every name that is named. Is it therefore as being another son than the Word Which sprang from forth Him, honoured with mere connection, and receiving the Name of Godhead as a favour; or rather He Who is by Nature and truly Son, made in likeness of man and found in fashion as a man economically?

B. They would perhaps say that it was the man from forth the seed of David connected with Him by equality of honour, to whom the suffering death too would belong.

A. But that which is said to be of equal honour with ought, will be not one in number (as I already said) but one with one; this is I suppose two and they unequal in nature, if the honoured is in lower case than the honourer: but since one son hath sat down, let them instruct us who it is that hath been honoured with the seats on high and co-sitteth with the Father, if it be a thing most exceeding perilous to venture to bring up to equality of honour the bond with the Lord, the made with the Creator, with the King of all that which is under the yoke, with Him Who is above all that which is ranked among all.

B. You will then clear this up to us still more.

A. Albeit as I suppose a clear and sufficient discourse has already been worked out by me on these subjects, I will without any backwardness add to what I said other things also, and taking up a not ignoble advocacy of the Divine dogmas as a sort of full armour I will rear up the truth against them who think perverse things.

For that the Only-Begotten Word of God, no other son than He mediating the Economy and connected with Him accidentally, hath made void the mastery of death; but that He by His own Self hath done it, He will prove saying, God so loved the world that He gave His Son the Only-Begotten in order that every one who believeth on Him should not perish but have life everlasting. When God the Father exalteth highly His Love for the world and says that it is exceeding great and vast, why do our opponents disparage it, saying that not the truly Son has been given for us, but bring up one of those who are as we, who has the grace of sonship from adoption, into the place of the Son by Nature, whereas it was the Only-Begotten Who was given for us? and whereas John hath clearly written, The Only-Begotten God which is in the Bosom of the Father, how will not one marvel at them for their unlearning who thrust out the Only-Begotten God the Word from the Economy and bring in in His place (as I said) a certain one embellished with glories from without him and having the name of Godhead put upon him? and what great and worthy of admiration will there be any longer apparent in the Love of the Father if He hath given for it some piece of the world and that a small one? or perhaps it would be even unblameable to say that the world hath been redeemed, having nothing from God but, ministered to in this behalf by its own parts.

B. They say that the Only-Begotten has been given by the Father, that He should administer our affairs, not in order that He should suffer ought of what is human Himself in His own Nature, for it is impossible.

A. He will suffer in His own Nature nothing at all (for being unembodied as God He will full surely be external to suffering), but since according to His own voice, I mean that through the Psalmist's lyre, a body has been prepared for Him by the Father, He came, embodied, to do His Will. And this was the redemption through the Precious Cross and the summing up anew of all things, full well accomplished through Him and in Him. And the most excellent Paul will aid to what I said, having written on this wise, Be ye thus minded each one of you as was also Christ Jesus Who being in the Form of God deemed not the being equal with God a thing to seize [67], yet emptied Himself taking bondman's form, made in likeness of men, and found in fashion as a man abased Himself, made obedient to death, yea the death of the cross: wherefore God also highly exalted Him and gave Him a Name which is above every name, in order that at the Name of Jesus Christ every knee should bow of heavenly and earthly and neath the earth and every tongue confess Lord Jesus Christ to the glory of God the Father. For whom dost thou say is He Who is in the Form of God the Father, and when He might have remained in Equality with Him deemed the so pre-eminent and God-befitting Dignity and the excellency above all to be not a thing to seize? is it not God the Word Who beamed forth from Him? how is this not obvious to all? But this He Who was in the Form and Equality of the Father, taking bondman's form, not by an accidental connection, made in likeness of men and found in fashion as a man (for He was together herewith God too) abased Himself and became obedient also unto death, yea the death of the cross.

B. But it is said (they say) of Him that God gave Him a Name which is above every name, in order that at the name of Jesus Christ every knee should bow. That which the Word was, i.e., God, how will He be conceived as taking? need therefore is it to say rather that to the assumed man has been given the Name which is above all, that we be not caught deeming ought incongruous respecting the Only-Begotten.

A. Then how were it not incomparably better to say that it has been given by the Father to the by Nature Son made man for our sakes, in order that He may be conceived of as God even in human nature and in supremest heights He Who endured abasement as we, in order that no new and late-appearing god may be introduced to both angels and men, having the glory of the Godhead not essentially inexisting but come in from without and as it were at the mere Will of God the Father.

B. To the Word Himself therefore which sprang from forth God the Father do we say that the Name which is above every name has been given.

A. Full surely; and our argument will not err from its course, if it is not false that He deemed the being Equal with God to be not a thing to seize, but hath descended unto the not being in glory in that He appeared as man. Therefore He also said, The Father is greater than I, although He had the right, in that He ever existeth in Him (as He is conceived of and is God) and hath been begotten from forth Him by Nature, to have exactness with Him in every thing and to rejoice in the glory of the Godhead. One must therefore not suppose that He Who for our sakes descended into the measure of the human nature, fell from His inherent Natural splendour and Excellence, but that in emptiness that belongs to us He has fullness Divinely and in abasement loftiness, and that which belongs to Him by Nature, to be worshipped by all, [He has] as a gift by reason of His human nature: for to Him boweth every knee of things both in Heaven and upon earth and every rank praiseth, for Christ Jesus is believed to be Lord unto the glory of God the Father. And verily He said to God the Father which is in Heaven, Father glorify Me with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was. Was then (tell me) the man prior to the world [68], whom they say has been assumed by the Only-Begotten by a non-essential connection?

[64] ^l The syriac translation has If, in place of Since given by the Manuscript in this place. If is also S. Cyril's reading elsewhere, and four passages of Origen are quoted for the same: there is a trace of the reading ἥ in S. Cyril (in xii Proph. 10 c, hom. 2 on Hebrews among fragments, v. 431) and ἥ and εἰ are often convertible. Just below the syriac translation gives is not weak in you but is mighty, the Greek manuscript gives as here translated.

[65] ^m S. Cyril's chapter 7 is, "If any one say that Jesus as man has been in-wrought-in by God the Word and hath put on Him the glory of the Only-Begotten, as though Another than He, be he anathema." Both Theodoret and Andrew in their reply, quote this text, Theodoret apparently overlooking the words, as though Another than He, Andrew agreeing with the Chapter, yet fearing that the words used by the Apostles of the human nature, should haply be overlooked. The word in-wrought-in (ἐνηργῆσθαι) is the same that S. Paul uses when he says, For He that wrought effectually (ἐνεργήσας) in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the Same was mighty (ἐνήργησε) in me toward the Gentiles (Gal. ii. 8).

[66] ⁿ The Syriac translation omits Throne.

[67] ^o See above p. 165, note j.

[68] ^p see above, in this treatise, p. 273; also above p. 161, and the exegesis of this verse against Arian objections in the short chapter 30 of the Thesaurus, pp. 258 sq. S. Cyril speaks of its being to the Glory of God the Father that His SON is consubstantial with Him, above pp. 74, 75, 139. See too de recta fide to the Empresses § 33, p. 169 d e, comment. on S. John, p. 674 O.T.