But I marvel that albeit he says that the Body has been connected with God and that ineffably, he does not say that it is His very own, in order that it might be conceived of as one with Him, but parts again into man and God, separately and apart, the One Christ and Lord Jesus, and feigns that he thinks aright, when he says,
"Yet not mere man is Christ (o accuser) but Man alike and God: had He been God alone, it had been right, of Apolinarius, to say, Why seek ye to kill Me, God, Who have told you the truth? This is He Who was encircled with the Thorny Crown, this He Who said, My God, My God, why forsookest Thou Me? this He Who endured the three days death, this do I worship with the Godhead as co-partner in the Divine sway."
§10. View now I pray again how he snatches at and puts around his own words the form of the truth (for "not mere man, says he, is Christ, but Man alike and God,") yet severs again and says that He is not One, and stupidly takes hold of something without foundation and constructs what pleases himself. For as though some one were saying that the Word had appeared to us upon earth bare and |70 without flesh, and had conversed with us, and wrought His Divine signs, or that He was common man and that not the Word Himself has been made Man:----he says, "Not mere man is Christ, but God also." But WE, most excellent sir (will I say), even though we say that He is Man alike and God, do not speak thus as putting them apart, but rather knowing that the Same even before the Incarnation was Son and God and Word of the Father, and after it hath become man as we and been made flesh. But he asserting that He ought not to be conceived of as mere man but God and Man, allots the Thorny Crown and the rest of the Sufferings to man severally and apart, while he confesses that he worships this man with the Godhead, and yet greater impiety, as not being (it is like) truly God and Son, but co-partner in the sway of the Word. For that he clearly severs, his confession that he ought to be worshipped along with the Godhead will clearly shew. For that which is co-worshipped with other is altogether other than that with which it is co-worshipped. But WE are accustomed to worship Emmanuel with one worship, not severing from the Word the Body That was Personally united to Him.
But it is meet to investigate what the being "advocate of the Divine Sway" means. For did our Lord Jesus Christ Himself too like one of the holy Apostles and Evangelists preach to the world another christ or son and lord, as having the Divine Sway or Authority over all, and Himself too speak for the glory of another? albeit the choir of God's heralds proclaim to the world Jesus Christ who is forth of the seed of David according to the flesh, and the plan of our faith advances through our confession to |71 Himward, and we are justified, believing not on a mere man like us, but on Him Who is by Nature and truly God. And the Gentiles indeed were living in the world without God, when they knew not Christ, as blessed Paul saith, but since they knew Him they have not remained in ignorance of Him Who is by Nature God. Let him therefore teach us Whose glory and sway it was that Christ spoke for, albeit of them that came to Him He demanded faith in Himself, and this faith in Him He attributed to the Father: and verily He said, Believe in Me and in God believe , and again, He that believeth on Me believeth not on Me but on Him That sent Me, and he that seeth Me seeth Him That sent Me.
But haply to speak for according to him may mean the same as to speak as : I concede, albeit the word has other meaning. Then how may man speak as God (according to thee) when enduring the contumelies of the Jews? For come let us view the speech befitting each. It will be meet for Him Who is in truth God by Nature to say, I am invisible, impalpable and superior to suffering, moreover Incorporeal, Life and Life-giving and above all as God: the other expounding to us his own nature how it is, will reasonably say, I am visible and palpable, passible, subject to decay and subject to God. Will then he who says such things speak as He That excels and is superior, as regards the count of His own Nature? how were this not an unlearned thing to say? for one surely will speak falsely, either that one or this. But in saying advocacy or speaking for, that it is nought else than to speak for another, you confess even against your will who tell us of connection and of One Christ and Lord: and severing them into two you worship them, yea rather you co-worship, and think that you are freeing the Church from the charge of god-making, yourself engoddening a man, and not saying One Son even though He be not conceived of apart from His own flesh: for then would you worship Him |72 unblamed, and will know where you were, as it is written , going astray from the doctrines of the truth.
"But yea (saith he) he hath said to the leper, I will, be thou cleansed, and to the ruler of the synagogue's daughter, Maid, arise, and to the sea, Peace, be still, and herein was he a co-partner, for he uttered the Divine words whereby it was possible to achieve all things easily." Two then are they that command, and let us grant that the words on all matters belong to both. When then it says, Why seek ye to kill me, a man which have told you the truth, whose words (tell me) do you say that these be? or dost thou allot those to the Word, these to a man born of a woman as other than He? Where then wilt thou put the most holy Paul who says clearly, But to us One God the Father out of Whom all things and we unto Him, and One Lord Jesus Christ through Whom all things and we through Him. But he, over and over saying, "One Son and not one and other, nor yet Christ and a second christ," contends against his own words, and to two persons and distinct hypostases allots the expressions of the Divines and His own.
Yet not regardless of his own notions, he puts forth again,
"I venerate him as image of Almighty Godhead; for He highly exalted Him and gave Him a Name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus Christ every knee should bow, of heavenly and earthly and beneath the earth and every tongue should confess Lord Jesus Christ. "
§11. And who again will be conceived of as he whom (as he supposes) he confesses he venerates and pretends to honour with likeness to God, save surely him whom he but now mentioned to us, calling him an advocate or co-worker of the Divine sway? whom he foolishly said ought to be co-worshipped with the Godhead, as son other and severally than |73 the Word of God: he says that he has also been exalted by God the Father, that he moreover received the Name which is above every name, that to him should both every knee how, of heavenly and earthly and neath the earth and every tongue confess Lord Jesus Christ.
If therefore the Father hath placed Him, being God by Nature, on high even before the here-mentioned exaltation: on investigating the mode of the intervening abasement, we shall find some wise Economy in regard to which dishonoured meanwhile, He had become again in the exaltation wherein He ever was, exaltation essentially inexisting and verily Proper to Him. If this be not so (as he deems and says) but He made some other than the Word of God, the man connected with Him, an object of worship by heaven and earth and those lower yet:----He hath engodded a man like us: no longer will He meetly blame us as though we desired to engod him that is not God, whereas one must fasten on God the Father Himself the charge of the transgression hereto pertaining. He that is studious for learning sees therefore in what direction his words burst forth, and the inventions of his untempered miscounsel at what a word they terminate. For WE say that the Son being by Nature God, i. e., the Word out of God the Father, descended unto voluntary emptying, ascended again with the flesh too unto the God-befitting Dignity of His inherent Excellence: for He is worshipped with flesh too, as being an object of worship even before it, for He was even yet by Nature God, both before the emptying and when He is said to endure the emptiness, made as we. But this man disdaining so august and spotless doctrines connecteth a man with God by mere outward accident, and is not ashamed to co-worship him as in equality of dignity and as one with another, and maintains (he says) that he received as somewhat unwonted and strange and as a matter of favour that to him every knee should bow, and besides that |74 every tongue should confess Lord Jesus Christ. And shouldst thou say that he was made God by Nature, he hath blasphemed openly saying that the Nature of the Godhead is generate; and if not by Nature but he receive the dignity of gift and from outside and by mere title, how is he not openly saying that we worship him who is not by Nature God? And together with us (it is like) the gravity of the spirits above too is in error. And the Father Himself is the beginning and plea to us of these things. How then will He yet find fault with them who have chosen to worship the creature rather than Himself? and why does He indict and punish those that have erred, if the error have been by the will of Himself, in exhibiting to us as an object of worship him who is not by Nature God?
But since citing here this word, I mean the one before us, that to Him shall bow every knee and every tongue shall confess Lord Jesus Christ, he (I know not how minded) pretermitted what remains and was of necessity added in order by the blessed Paul, come let us adding it say this, for every tongue confesses Lord Jesus Christ to the glory of God the Father. Hence if He be not by Nature God, but he says that on account of accidental connection, I mean with the Word out of God, he is worshipped both by ourselves and by the holy angels:----some mode of honour has been invented by the Father, so that the creature should be engodded along with Himself, and to no purpose has He displeasure against any for having done this: and if this thing were to His honour, how should He not deem worthy of recompense, praise and glory them who have chosen to do this?
But haply they will say this, How is it any honour to the Father that every knee should bow to Emmanuel?
Because the Word being by Nature God and out of Him, that is, out of His Essence, has been made flesh, and is worshipped (as I said) as One and Alone and Truly Son with His proper Flesh. And the Father is glorified as God, |75 having Very Son Him who was begotten from forth His Essence, whom made flesh also He hath given for us, in order that He having suffered in the flesh might save all under Heaven, that every one who believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life, that every one that seeth Him might see the Father. Now that this too is to us verily a life-giving thing, the Son Himself hath shewn: for He said, This is Life Eternal that they might know Thee, the Only Very God and Jesus Christ whom Thou sentest.
And this and none other is the way to the right and most unerring line of thought, but he utterly confounding every thing says,
"Because of the wearer I reverence the worn, because of the hidden I worship him that is seen."
§12. View again (I pray) how he every where shuns the union and fears the truth and refuses the rightness of the Divine doctrines. Not other than the worn was He who weareth, but rather the same conceived of in concurrenceof Godhead and manhood, and One and Alone in truth Son of God the Father. Worship therefore the Word out of God as One with His own Flesh. For tell me, if I do not seem to thee to think aright, thrusting aside as feeble thy slow speech herein. For suppose one should choose to say of any man such as we are or of any one of the kings of the earth, Because of the king's soul I reverence his body, because of the hidden I worship him that is seen, would not one straightway chide him and say, O sir what are you doing? one man surely is the Ruler, even though he be evidently compounded of two, soul I mean and body. Why then are you idly blabbing to us, speaking of a wearer and a worn, a hidden and an apparent, and confessing that you co-worship as one with another and dishonouring the |76 mode of union, whereas the God-inspired Scripturs reveals to us One Christ and Lord, the Word out of God the Father with His own Body? Knowest thou not that He healed in Jerusalem the blind from his birth, afterward finding him in the temple, He engrafted into him a firm and stablished faith in Himself? for He came to him and asked, Dost THOU believe on the Son of God? and when to this he cried out, Who is He, Lord, that I might believe on Him? He again said, Thou hast both seen Him and it is He that talketh with thee . Thou seest how He hath shewn him not the wearer, not the hidden within, but rather Himself as One with the flesh? And verily the wise John says, That Which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we viewed and our hands handled, of the Word of Life. Albeit the Godhead is impalpable, yet the Word has been made palpable through His own flesh; invisible by Nature, He was yet manifest through the Body; but Thou again completely severest and dealest subtilly with the truth, parting the natures, uniting (as you say) the worship. But if you part the natures, along with them will diverge the natural properties too of either, the count of their difference will speed apart: hence two are they confessedly.
But tell me who ask, what is it that severs the natures one from another and what will be the mode of their difference. You will (I suppose) surely answer that one thing by nature is man or the manhood, another God or the Godhead: and the one exalted incomparably above the other, and it as much inferior as is man less than God. How then (tell me) dost thou deem right to honour with one worship things of so unlike nature and parted, as regards their mode of being, by incomparable differences? For would you, if you put about a horse a man's glory, be doing anything praiseworthy? would you not rather be insulting the superior, dragging down the better nature into dishonour? |77
But he has invented something clever in his defence, for he subjoins:
"Not by itself God is that which was formed in the womb, not by itself God that which was formed forth of the Spirit, not by itself God that which was buried in the tomb; for so should we have been man-worshippers and very worshippers of the dead. But since God is in that which is assumed, from that which assumeth is the assumed co-named God, as connected with the assumer."
§13. Lo again is he who every where telleth us of connection, and feareth the charge of man-worship, caught in the act of being a man-worshipper, and is holden in the meshes of his own mis-counsel and is detected falling into a reprobate mind. 'For (says he) that which is born from the womb is not by itself God.' How I marvel at thy shrewdness and thy so subtle mind: for who ever is there who hath dared to say this? or who that knows not that that which is born of the flesh is flesh? yet was it the own flesh of the Word and He is conceived of as one with it, just as we said but now that the soul of man too is one with his own body. If therefore one should choose say of us too, The body by itself is not man, would not such an one reasonably be called superfluous in his words and a random talker? for none will deny that the body by itself is not man, but it will be rather called the body of a man: natheless one will not severing them asunder and putting soul and body apart say that the body is co-named with the soul in order to signify a single man, for such a speech would not have been made orderly but would rather be replete with unlearning; but on bringing both together by physical union unto the condition of one man, he will |78 then style him a man, and will not in this way seem to say what is paltry and uncomely. One must therefore if one would be in all wise and sensible say, A body which is from forth a woman, and confess that conjoined by personal union to the Word, it has rendered the Same, God and Man, One Christ and Son and Lord. But now pretermitting this, falling quite away from the straight road he thinks...... the perverted way, and proclaims unto us two gods: one, as if by Nature and in truth, the Word forth of God the Father, and other than He, him who is co-named with Him. For just as no one of us would be said to live (for example) with himself alone, but rather he would live with another, and if any one were to say that any of the kings of the earth co-reigned with himself, such an one would reasonably incur ridicule, and would be blabbing , putting and saying what belonged to one only, as though [he were speaking] of two: just so is it exceeding lack of understanding to suppose that to be co-named can have place in respect of one only. For they will surely be two; and the one is God by Nature, the other having (it seems) the mere being co-named [as something] from without and accruing to him, is exhibited to us as a new god. Does therefore He That is by Nature and truly God of all lie in saying to us, If thou wilt hearken unto Me, there shall be no new god be in thee, neither shalt thou worship an alien god? Then how have we worshipped Christ and how to Him shall every |79 knee bow? how dost thou confess that thou veneratest Him? albeit thou fearest (as thou saidst) to be called aman-worshipper.
But he has as he thinks some clever answer to this, "he is co-named god as connected with the assumer:" how was he assumed (tell) or what the mode of the connection? If therefore by true union, I mean of Person, cease dividing what has been united; for seasonably (I deem) by us too shall be said to thee who art severing the inseverable, What, therefore God joined together let not man put asunder. But if thou say that the assumption or the connection is extraneous and of accident, how knowest thou not that in us too is God and WE are connected to Him relatively and have been made partakers of His Divine Nature? yea the Divine-uttering David singeth, My soul is fast joined after Thee. Shall WE too therefore be co-named with God by Nature gods according to him, to us too shall every knee bow? What God the Father hath enjoined to the spirits above let the Divine-uttering Paul come forward and teach; For when (saith he) He bringeth the First-begotten into the world He saith, And let all the Angels of God worship Him. Since therefore herein thy wise word has not been added, but He has enjoined rather that He should be worshipped as of a surety One and not one along with another: who is He who is worshipped by the Angels, albeit the Divine Scripture calls Him First-born? We say that the Word out of God the Father has been called First-born albeit He is God by Nature and Only-Begotten Son and not reckoned with the creature, as far as regards Godhead, because He was made Man and First-born among many brethren .
One therefore is He Who is worshipped by the spirits above, the Word forth of God the Father with His own flesh: for then did He bear Him and, as having the preeminence in all things, is He conceived of as First-born. And |80 the God-inspired Scriptures wholly proclaim One Christ and Son and Lord: but this too-curious man says Two and he is not ashamed to add a worshipped man to the Holy and Consubstantial Trinity: for he says again,
"But this kinsman after the flesh of Israel, man according to what is manifest, begotten according to Paul's voice of the seed of David, is by connection Almighty God" and then adds, "Hear Paul proclaiming both, he confesses the man first and then deifies what is manifest by connection with God, that none may suspect the Christian of being a man-worshipper. Keep we therefore unconfused the connection of the natures, confess we One God, reverence we the man who is co-worshipped by a Divine connection along with the Almighty God."
§14. If therefore on naming Man thou knowest that He is with this God by Nature, it is well and I will stop: but if severing the natures, not merely in respect of knowing which is the human, which again the Divine, but rather parting them from their concurrence unto unity, confessedly thou art a man-worshipper, and it shall be said to thee by us, Thou shalt eat the fruit of thy labours : and being hard and spurning admonition, go alone on the perverted way. But WE, tracking the pious and blameless path of the holy fathers, instructed full well in the writings of the Apostles and Evangelists, will honour together with God the Father and the Holy Ghost, with one worship, the One Lord Jesus Christ, through Whom and with Whom to God the Father be glory with the Holy Ghost unto ages of ages.
[A small selection of footnotes and marginalia, omitting all biblical references, follows]