1. See S. Cyril's fourth chapter, " If any one allot to two Persons or Hypostases the words in the Gospel and Apostolic writings, said either of Christ by the saints or by Him of Himself, and ascribe some to a man conceived of by himself apart from the Word That is of God, others as God-befitting to the Word alone That is of God the Father, be he anathema." Neither Andrew nor Theodoret understood this chapter; Andrew allows that the words must not be allotted to two persons, and uses the term ἄκρα of the Union of God and Man both here and on chapter 11 end, just as S. Cyril Hom. Pasch. 7, p. 102 d had said τὸ εἰς ἄκρον ἑνοῦν and in the Hom. 16 (A.D. 429) so often quoted by Andrew, p. 230 b (as well as at p. 17 above and elsewhere) had used the expression τὴν εἰς ἄκρον ἕνωσιν [Nestorius § 8, below p. 64 had called it ἄκρα συνάφεια ]; but appears to think that S. Cyril had denied any distinction of the words at all. Theodoret after an allotment to the Human nature of our Lord of words said by Him of His Human nature, shews his misunderstanding of S. Cyril's chapter by adding what is quite true, but is equally admitted by S. Cyril, "Hence, the things spoken and wrought in God-befitting sort, we will allot to God the Word, those spoken and wrought in lowly wise to the servant's form, lest we fall into the sickness of Arius' and Eunomius' blasphemy."
What S. Cyril is objecting to is the notion that He who is One with the Father is God the Son absolutely distinct from His own Manhood, that He who said. My God My God why forsookest Thou Me is, not God the Son, speaking of and through the Manhood which He had for ever united to Himself but, a man distinct and apart. But even in his quite early writings S. Cyril had never overlooked what the Eastern Bishops were (a year or two after this treatise was written) so anxious to have brought prominently forward, viz. that "as to the Gospel and Apostolic words concerning the Lord, we know that Divines make some common, as to One Person, apportion others, as to two Natures, and give to Christ the God-befitting according to His Godhead, the lowly ones according to His Manhood " (Confession of Eastern Bishops, approved by S. Cyril and incorporated by him in his Ecumenical letter to John of Antioch, Three Epistles p. 72). In his Thesaurus cap. x init., S. Cyril says, "But we must know and believe that the Word being God and Consubstantial in all things with the Father, put on man's nature and hath been made Man, in order that He may both sometimes speak as man by reason of the Economy with flesh, and may also as God utter the things above man as so being by Nature and when opportunity introduces the need of this. But if any one should wish to refer the things which are more humanly and economically spoken (as 1 said) to His Godhead and again to refer the things which are Divinely spoken to the time wherein He has been made man, such an one will wrong the nature of things and will destroy the Economy: for one while He saith as God, Verily I say to you, before Abraham was, I am, and again, I have come down from out of heaven. If one wishes to preserve to Him only the God-befitting Dignity, he will utterly take away His being made man in the last times (for He was not in human nature before Abraham was nor yet has He as man come down from Heaven): and again if one should choose to attribute to bare God the Word before the Incarnation the words and acts of the human nature, such an one will do impiously: for what will he do when Christ says Now has My Soul been troubled and is very sorrowful? will he admit that sorrow and dismay befel the Nature of God and that fear of death gat hold thereof? what when he sees Him crucified, will he admit that the Godhead of the Son suffered this just as man? or will he repudiate the blasphemy? Therefore let what is suitable thereto be kept to each time and fact and let Theology practise herself not surely in those things whence it is clear that He is speaking as man, but those whence He is from forth the Father as Son and God; and let it allow to the Economy with flesh that He should sometimes say what does not belong to the Godhead bare and by Itself." pp. 72,73. See also de Trinitate ad Herm. dial. 1. p. 398, dial. 6. p. 600 a b, 602 fin. Hom. Pasch. 7 (A.D. 420) "For as to create in God-befitting manner is not conceived of as pertaining to a man, so is to die alien from God." p. 104 b and through the Homily. These belong to the earlier years of S. Cyril's Episcopate: they do not differ from what S. Cyril wrote about this time, in explanation of his fourth chapter, and in reply to Andrew's criticisms, p. 171 a b, nor from what, in A.D. 432 when the Egyptian and Eastern Churches had explained to one another what each meant, S. Cyril wrote to Acacius Bishop of Melitene as being what the Eastern Bishops said and as being one of the essential points in which they differed from Nestorius (Epp. pp. 117, 118 a).
2. ... . S. Cyril in his second Letter to Successus bishop of Diocaesarea in Isauria, written probably about 3 years after this, explains the Term One Nature Incarnate thus, " For even if the Only-Begotten Son of God Incarnate and Made man be said by us to be One, He has not therefore been mixed up (as some please to think) nor has the Nature of the Word passed into the nature of the flesh nor yet that of the flesh into His Nature, but, while each abides and is conceived of in its natural property, H e united unspeakably and unutterably shewed us One Nature of the Son, yet (as I said) Incarnate. For not merely of things which are simple by nature is the One rightly used, but also of those which are brought together as compounded; such as is man, of soul and body: for such things are diverse in form and not consubstantial one to another; yet united, they made up one nature of man, albeit in the plan of the compounding, the difference of nature in the things brought together into Union exists." Epp. p. 143 a b c. The great estimation in which this letter was held is indicated by its frequent citations in controversies on the Incarnation. See also the Letter to Acacius Bishop Melitene, Epp. pp. 115, 116.
3. See S. Cyril's first Letter to Successus, Epp. p. 137 d.
4. The following extract from Tillemont (Hist. Eccles. Les Apollinaristes, Art 2. t. vii pp. 001, 605 ed. 2. Paris 1700), will illustrate that dread of Apollinarianism, which not only Nestorius but John of Antioch (see a letter of his to S.Cyril, Synodicon cap. 80. Baluz. Nova Collectio Conciliorum t. i. 783; iv. 346 Col.) Theodoret and the Bishops of that Archiepiscopate felt. Apollinarianism had been their last great heretical onslaught, only about 60 years previous, and Antioch its head-quarters. Tillemont says, "Car ne voulant pas reconnoistre qu'il y eust deux substances et deux natures en J. C, l'une divine et l'autre humaine, ou bien l'une de Dieu et l'autre de la chair, non seulement ils [les Apollinaristes] soutenoient, après les Ariens, qu'il avoit une seule nature mixte et composée de la divine et de l'humaine : mais ils se reduisoient à dire que sa chair estoit consubstantielle à sa divinité, qu'une partie du Verbe avoit esté changée en chair, en os, en cheveux, en un mot en un corps et en une nature toute différente de la sienne, que ce n'avoit pas esté un corps comme le nostre, qu'il en avoit seulement la forme et l'apparence extérieure, mais qu'il estoit coeternel à la nature divine, formé de la substance mesme de la sagesse éternelle et de celle du Verbe changée en un corps passible: Qu'ainsi c'estoit la substance mesme de la sagesse qui avoit creé le monde, et la divinité du Fils consubstantielle au Père, qui avoit esté circoncise et attachée a la croix ; et non un corps terrestre comme le nostre.
Ils ajoutaient, par une consequence bien naturelle de ce faux principe, que la substance de son corps n'estait pas prise de Marie, mais avoit seulement passé par elle comme par un canal [this was the ancient blasphemy of a portion of the Gnostics, see S. Iren. 3. 11. 3. p. 231 O.T.] : d'où vient qu'ils luy refusoient le titre de Mere de Dieu, et qu'ils pretendoient qu'on ne pouvoit dire que le corps de J. C. fust tiré d'elle, sans mettre une quaternité en Dieu au lieu de la Trinité ; de sorte qu'il est visible que selon eux, le corps de J. C. estoit compris dans la Trinité. Ils disaient aussi que ce corps avait esté avant Marie et que J. C. l'avoit toujours eu, ayant toujours esté fils de l'homme, qu'il l'avoit pris du ciel [S. Cyril in his Ecumenic Letter to John Archbishop of Antioch (see 3 Epistles p. 72) says that some had reported that he himself had held this very thing], qu'il n'avoit eu qu'à descendre en terre avec son corps qui luy estoit uni substantiellement, qu'ainsi ce corps estoit non seulement consubstantiel à la divinité, mais aussi céleste et increé."
When therefore S. Cyril insists on the Word having been made flesh, the Eastern Bishops thought that while using S.John the Evangelist's words, he was pressing the γέγονε to mean hath become, been actually turned into : and the "One Incarnate Hypostasis of the Word" seemed to them to mean not Union but the mixture and confusion of the Apollinarians. Theodoret, in his objections to the 12 chapters which S. Cyril and his Council had drawn up for Nestorius to sign, does not in general use language that differs very much from S. Cyril's own mind ; but sets out with the conviction that S. Cyril was an Apollinarian and so reads and interprets the chapters as really intended to bring in Apollinarian error secretly by use of veiled language. Thus in reply to S. Cyril's "for she [the blessed Virgin] hath borne after the flesh the Word from out of God made flesh " (chapter 1), Theodoret remarks, "we say that He has not been made flesh by nature nor was God the Word changed into flesh," "it is plain therefore that the Form of God was not turned into form of servant:" in objection to Chapter 2, "Superfluous therefore is Personal union, which as I think he is putting forward instead of mixture :" the objection to chapter 3 ends with the words, "he who is teaching us mixture by means of other names:" in objection to chapter 5, "but that the Word has been made flesh by any turning, we not only do not say, but we accuse of impiety them that say so:" the objection to chapter 6 closes, "for not by being turned did God the Word become flesh, but assumed flesh possessed of an intellectual soul;" in the objection to chapter 8 occur similarly the words, "For neither did God the Word receive transformation [ τροπὴν see S. James i. 17] nor again did man lose what he was, and become changed into the nature of God:" the objection to chapter 10 begins, "Not into nature of flesh was the Unchangeable Nature turned :" in the objection to chapter 11 occur the words, "for first of all, he nowhere mentioned flesh endowed with mind nor confessed that he which was assumed is perfect man, but everywhere he says flesh, following the doctrine of Apollinarius; next he intersperses in his words the notion of mixture, infusing it by means of other words." Hence it is clear that Theodoret's objection was not to the chapters themselves but to the chapters in that he approached them possessed with the notion that S. Cyril was an Apollinarian and was endeavouring to disseminate their error by dishonest use of apparently orthodox language.
5. Nestorius means that whereas it was the object of the Arians and Eunomians to assert that God the Son was inferior to God the Father, supposing all the lowly actions that are recorded of God our Saviour and His purely Human actions, His hunger and thirst and weariness and sorrow and pain, could be referred to His Godhead, it would go to make out their case. Whereas the actions are not referred to the Godhead considered by Itself, but all the actions recorded of our Lord after His Birth in the flesh, whether Divine or Human, are referred to One Person, God and Man in One, of God the Son. Just as (to use our little comparisons to help our frail understanding) no distinction is made in human actions; we say, he ate, he slept, he read, he wrote, he thought: we do not distinguish and say, his body ate, his body slept, his soul read, or wrote, or thought. Part of this passage is quoted by S. Cyril in his defence of his fourth chapter against Andrew. For the last portion of the extract compare serm 2, p. 68, Bal.
6. One is added on the authority of a Syriac citation in a MS. in the British Museum, Cod add. 14533 fol. 9and again fol. 30. The Roman editors had given it in their margin as a conjectural emendation.
7. i.e. as one of the things not imparted to it, but so part of its own being, that it may not lose it without ceasing to be what it is.
8. Nestorius in the fourth of the sermons which Mercator has published (preached after he had received from S. Cyril the Great Letter of the Alexandrine Synod with the 12 Chapters appended, accompanied by Pope S. Celestine's Letter), preached against opponents of his and re-affirms what he had said before, repeating a few words here and there from the older sermon from which these extracts were taken: a sermon not perhaps belonging to the volume which was first published (see above p. 4) but preached (as was certainly the next piece, p. 51) to oppose S. Cyril's letter to monks, p. 13 b. In this sermon 4, p. 82 Nestorius says, " God sent His Son, a name common to the natures, i. e., of man and God. He did not say, God sending God the Word." See too further on where other similarities or re-capitulations are referred to in margin. The passage which stands at the head of § 13 (see below p. 77) is from serm. 2. p. 65 Bal. and some of it also in serm. 1. p. 55.
The whole passage as cited here and in the Council of Ephesus (see next note) is given by Mercator with the title, From the book of Nestorius himself, out of the 16th quire, on dogma. In the volume from which the extracts were taken for the Council of Ephesus, the sermon on dogma seems to have nearly followed that which Mercator gives us complete pp. 56-70, and which is there called sermon 2: for the extracts from this sermon 2 are extracted from the 15th and 10th quires, see Mercatoris opera pp. 205, 207, 210 Bal.: while the two extracts given from the sermon on Dogma are from the 16th and 17th quires, viz. this one from the 16th (Merc. p. 201, or 17th as Greek edd.) and the extract at the head of § 8 below from the 17th quire (Merc. p. 205). The Greek editions of the council however agree with Mercator in styling this extract εἰς δόγμα , but omit the words in the title to the other extract, appending it instead to two citations from the 15th quire; one of which is, in part, at the head of § 14, the other is given by S. Cyril both there and in his letter to Acacius of Melitene written after the reconcilation with the Eastern Bishops, Epp. p. 115. 1.5-9.
9. i. e. S. Cyril himself: for Nestorius looked not kindly on S. Cyril's Letter to the monks, to which (p. 13 b) he is here referring, see note on book 4 § 6 below.
10. The present text as it now stands is ταῦτα που καὶ σαυτὸν , the Roman Editors conjecture κατὰ for καὶ , but it is just as likely that the difficulty is occasioned by omission from homoeoteleuton, from which even a good MS. (as is the one in which the Greek text of these books is preserved) is rarely exempt.
11. i. e., the tribute money of half a shekel which was the acknowledgement of God's sovereignty appointed in the first instance by God, Exod. xxx. 12-16. (It does not appear to have been a regular tax, though there seems an allusion to it in 2 Kings xii. 4, the money of every one that passeth the account. This tax our Lord paid, S. Matt, xvii. 24-27, yet told S. Peter that He was free, as a Son.) Every male who had attained the age of 20 was to pay: it amounted to a hundred talents, 1775 shekels of silver: with the hundred talents were cast a hundred silver sockets for the sanctuary and the vail, the 1775 silver shekels were used in making hooks for the pillars and in overlaying the chapiters (Exod. xxxviii, 25-28).
Dr. Edersheim, learned in Jewish customs and deeply versed in their books, tells us, " It had only been about a century before [our Lord's payment for Himself and S. Peter], during the reign of Salome-Alexandra (about 78 B. C), that the Pharisaical party, being then in power, had carried an enactment by which the Temple-tribute was to be enforced at law.....It is a matter of doubt whether the half-shekel had ever been intended as an annual payment. Its first enactment was under exceptional circumstances, and the mode in which, as we are informed a similar collection was made during the reign of Joash(2 Chron.xxiv.6-11) suggests the question whether the original institution by Moses was not treated rather as affording a precedent than as laying down a binding rule. At the time of Nehemiah we read only of a self-imposed ordinance and at the rate of a third, not a half shekel (Neh. x. 32-34). But long before the coming of Christ very different views prevailed." The Temple, its ministry and Services pp. 49, 50 (Religious Tract Society). Dr. Edersheim tells us that the money was paid in the month previous to the Passover, pp. 47, 48.
12. In this passage as cited before the Council of Ephesus are given the words which S. Cyril also (see de Trin.dial. 6. p. 589 e and elsewhere,) with the Alexandrine MS. of the LXX. reads, ἡγιασμένοι εἰσιν , they have been sanctified (corresponding to My sanctified ones in our version) and I lead them. These words are required to explain Nestorius' assertion that the Babylonian was called holy.
13. See this at greater length in S. Cyril's Glaphyra on Exodus, lib. i. cap. 4. pp. 305 sq. and especially 306 c; also lib. iii. 3. pp. 327 sq.
14. This contrast between our Master and our fellow-servants to whom He had delegated His authority before His own Advent, is argued on by S. Cyril below, Schol. § 26, also Thes. cap. 12 p. 108 c d and often.
15. S. Cyril in his Thesaurus, cap. 25 p. 238 d says, " He is therefore Only-Begotten by Nature, as Only out of the Father, God out of God, and Light beaming forth of Light: First-Begotten for our sakes, in order that all the creation engrafted as it were in a certain immortal root and springing up out of Him Who ever is (for all things have been made through Him and consist) might itself too be preserved for aye." (... is Aubert's text slightly emended from the beautiful Munich Codex 331, written in the tenth century). See also De Trin. ad Herm. dial. l.p. 405 c: and 7th Paschal homily (A.D. 420) p. 103; 10th Paschal homily (A.D. 423) p. 159 e.
16. This is given differently in Marius Mercator's collection of extracts made by S.Cyril from Nestorius'writings. The 17th extract is as follows, " Also from another tractate quire 25. Wherefore I would have you secure in your assent or acclamation [..., no doubt rightly]. There is no severance of the connection and of Godhead [ deitatis, perhaps, dignitatis, dignity ] nor of the sway. In that the Son is Christ, there is no severance in these, but in regard to Godhead and manhood there is severance. In that He is Christ, the Son is undivided, in that He is Son, He is undivided. For we have not two christs and two sons, nor is there with us a first christ and a second, nor one and another, nor again one son and again another son, but Himself the Same, Himself a twofold Son, not in respect of dignity but of nature." p. 117 ed. Baluz.
17. flesh and body. Thus I heave translated, following the translation given of this piece of S. Cyril hy the Syriac MS. in the British Museum (Add. 17154 fol. 21 v) written in the seventh century. The MS. contains a correspondence betweeh Severus Archbishop of Antioch and Sergius the Grammarian on the controversy about the two Natures in the Incarnation. Severus quotes S. Cyril throughout his writings, and this passage is cited in Severus' reply to Sergius' second letter. The Greek has the more usual phrase, flesh and blood.
18. S. Cyril had looked on these words of Nestorius as replete with gravest untruth, for S. Cyril's seventh chapter is, "If any says that Jesus has been in-wrought-in as man by God the Word and that the good glory of the Only-Begotten has been put around Him as though He were other than He, be he anathema." They may belong to one of Nestorius' earlier sermons. Mercator (p. 110 ed. Bal.) cites them as being out of the second volume, first quire (i. e. of one of the volumes of published sermons, see above p. 48 note n). Mercator tells us that this volume began, "I have yet much to say to you." (Mercator has apparently only three extracts out of the first volume, i.e. two on the Creed, and the one given above p. 51.) In the extracts made for the Council of Ephesus, part of the passage is also cited and there too as taken out of the first quire: see Merc. p. 207, top of page, and the corresponding place in the different editions of the Council of Ephesus.
19. S. Cyril in his sixth Dialogue to Hermias explains that "Hence He is glorified by the Father not as though He needed glory while conceived of as apart from flesh, and believed God forth of God : but since He was man, which does not possess as fruit of his proper nature, the power of working God-befitting acts, He receives the power by the Union and Concurrence (...) Unspeakable such as is conceived to be that of the Word with His human nature." De Trin. ad Herm. dial. 6. p. 601 a b.
20. See this also in the Quod Unus Christus, below.