Chapter V.
This faith is
Therefore, faith is the foundation of the Church: for it is not said of the flesh of Peter, but of faith, that the gates of death shall not prevail against it; but confession has conquered hell (Ibid.). And this confession has not excluded one heresy alone; for when the Church is often buffeted by many waves like a good ship, the foundation of the Church must prevail against all heresies.
The day will fail me sooner than the names of heretics and various sects; yet a general faith opposes all of them, because Christ is the Son of God, everlasting from the Father, and born of the Virgin Mary. Whom the holy prophet David describes as a giant, because he is of two natures and shares in divinity and corporeality: who, like a bridegroom, proceeds from his chamber and rejoices like a giant to run his course (Psalm 19:6). The bridegroom of the soul according to the Word: a giant of the earth, because he traversed the duties of our usage, always being the eternal God, he received the sacraments of the incarnation, not divided, but one, because he is one in both, that is, in divinity and in body: for he is not one from the Father and another from the Virgin, but the same from both, although in different ways.
Generation does not prejudice generation, nor does flesh prejudice divinity; for neither does the pledge belong to the Father, nor does the will belong to suffering, nor does suffering belong to the will. For He both suffered and did not suffer; He died and did not die; He was buried and did not remain buried; He rose again and did not rise again, because He raised His own body; for what fell, rises again, and what did not fall, does not rise again. Therefore, He rose again according to the flesh, which had died and risen again; He did not rise again according to the Word, which had not been dissolved into the earth, but always remained with God.
Therefore, He both died according to the nature He assumed, and did not die according to the eternal substance of life. And He suffered according to the assumption of the body, so that the truth of the assumed body might be believed. And He did not suffer according to the impassible divinity of the Word, which is devoid of all pain. Finally, the same One said: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (Psalm 22:1) Because according to the flesh, He was forsaken, He who according to His divinity could neither be forsaken nor forsake.
He also says the same thing: Far be it from my salvation to speak words of my sins (Ibid.), that is, let not one say, 'Why have You forsaken me?' but let him understand that these things are spoken according to the flesh, which are far from the fullness of divinity. For words of sins are foreign to God, because sins of words are foreign as well. But since I have taken on foreign sins, I have also taken on the words of foreign sins, so that I may say that I am forsaken by the Father God, even though I am always with God.
Therefore, he was immortal in death, impassible in suffering. For as though death did not capture him like a god, and the underworld saw him as though he were a man. In the end, he gave up his spirit (Matthew 27:50), and yet, as though an arbiter of stripping off and taking on a body, he gave up his spirit, he did not lose it. He was hanging on the cross, and he shook everything. The world trembled at the wood, whom the whole world trembled in fear of. He was amidst the torments, receiving wounds, and giving the kingdom of heaven. He became the sin of all, he washed away the sins of the human race. Finally, he died and, rejoicing and exulting a second and third time, I say, he died; so that his death might become the life of the dead.
But even his tomb did not lack a miracle. For when he was anointed by Joseph and buried in his tomb (Luke 23:53), he himself, who was dead among the dead, unlocked the graves of the dead with a new work. And indeed, his body lay in the tomb, but he himself, free among the dead, giving remission to those in hell and breaking the law of death, was granting forgiveness. Therefore, his flesh was in the tomb, but his power was working from heaven. He was shown to all through the truth of his body that he was not just flesh, but that the Word was flesh. Indeed, flesh tasted death, but the impassible power of God: and if it stripped off the body, nevertheless God suffered no loss from the body.
Why do you attribute the sufferings of the body to divinity, and connect the weak pain of human nature with divine nature? Now the soul, he said, is troubled (John 12:27). The soul is troubled, not wisdom; for wisdom remained unchanged, although it was surrounded by the garment of flesh. For in that servant form was the fullness of true light: and when he emptied himself, he was the light. Finally, he said: Walk while you have the light (John 12:35). And when he was in death, he was not in the shadow. Finally, even in hell, he poured out the light of eternal life. There the true light of wisdom shone, illuminating hell, but hell was not closed. For where is wisdom? Finally the righteous one says: But where is wisdom found? But where is discipline found? Man does not know its way, nor is it found among humans (Job 28:12-13).
Therefore, Wisdom is neither in time nor in place, as it indicates the existence of time. But how can it be in time, that which was in the beginning? How can it be in place, that which was with God? The Only Begotten Son is sought after, and is found in the bosom of the Father by the evangelical spirit. Do you think the bosom of the Father is a place? And you inquire how he was born, when the prophetic man says: 'No man knows her way' (Job 28:13)? And do you estimate his origin according to men, when Job says that it has not been found among men? And you attribute death to Wisdom, about which the abyss says: It is not in me; and the sea says: It is not with me (Ibid., 14). It does not say heaven, It is not in me, but the abyss says, It is not in me. For he did not say to the abyss, but to the Father: Into your hands I commend my spirit (Luke 23:46). Although the soul was once in the abyss, it is no longer; because it is written: For you will not abandon my soul in Hades, nor will you allow your Holy One to see corruption (Psalm 16:10).
Therefore, the sea says: He is not with me, that is, my life says that it is restless amidst the waves of the world. For his flesh is not among men, because according to the flesh we no longer know Christ (II Cor. V, 16). The earth says: He is not with me, because he has risen. Finally, the Angel says: Why do you seek the living among the dead (Luke XXIV, 5)? And the sea rightly said: He is not with me; for he was above the sea. Finally, he walked on the sea and on physical footsteps, when he commanded Peter to walk on the sea (Matt. XIV, 29); although Peter faltered, he faltered not because of the weakness of the one commanding, but because of the obedience of the weak.
Therefore, do not allow the stain of our human nature to corrupt the splendor of glory, nor pour the fog of human flesh onto the light. Furthermore, by preaching passion, if you do not acknowledge what is capable of suffering, you have denied the piety of the Lord and rejected your own salvation. Therefore, we must consider those who, upon hearing the Son of God say, 'Why do you hit me?' (John 18:23), deemed subject to injury the one who is subject to the nature of divinity, as mentally deranged. For he said: 'Why do you strike me?' but the divine nature did not feel the blow. He said: 'I have given my back to the lashings, and my cheeks to those who pluck out the beard: I did not turn away my face from the insults and spitting.' (Isaiah 50:6). He spoke of his back and cheeks and face, that is, parts of the human body. For just as the flesh suffered in the Word, remaining in the flesh, so the Word of God suffered in the flesh, as it is written: 'For Christ suffered in the flesh' (1 Peter 4:1); he referred this to himself in relation to the assumption of the body; so that he might take upon himself what is ours, and clothe himself with the human.
Therefore, rightly according to its own nature, the flesh suffered, and its nature was not changed by the suffering of the body; for in truth, our resurrection is real, and therefore the passion of Christ is preached in truth.