Eranist

Christological work of the blessed one. Theodoret of Cyrus “Eranist” (literally translated “beggar”, “petitioner”) was written in 447 and was directed against Monophysitism (in the form of Eutychianism). According to the blessed Theodoret, the title of the treatise should indicate that Monophysitism is nothing more than a collection of ancient heresies. The work consists of 4 books. Books 1, 2, 3 are written in the form of a dialogue between an Orthodox Christian and a Yeranist (collector of heretical opinions; Monophysite). The 1st dialogue is dedicated to the Incarnation: an interpretation is given on John 1:14 (“The Word became flesh”), and the immutability of the Divine nature of Christ is spoken of. In the 2nd dialogue we are talking about the unmerged union of Divinity and humanity in Christ. The 3rd dialogue (presented in English translation) is devoted to the impassibility of the Divine nature: the Divinity of Jesus did not suffer even when the Savior was on the Cross. Each dialogue ends with patristic quotes, the content of which confirms the point of view of the Orthodox. Book 4 (presented in English translation) consists of syllogisms in which all the teaching of the first 3 books is presented. *The title of the work in Latin is Eranistes seu Polymorphus. Contents Dialogue I. Conversation about the immutable incarnation of God the Word Dialogue II. Discourse on the unmerged union of natures in Jesus Christ Dialogue III. The Impassible Demonstrations by Syllogisms Dialogue I. Discourse on the immutable incarnation of God the Word Orthodox. Although it would certainly be better for us to remain in unanimity, preserving the apostolic teaching unchanged: but since you, I don’t know for what reason, having dissolved the union of spiritual unity, are now offering us new dogmas; then, if you like, let us seek the truth with our combined forces, however, avoiding strife. Yeranist. We have nothing to seek, for we adhere to the truth with all zeal. Orthodox. Each of the heretics claims this about themselves: for not only Jews and Greeks, not only followers of the opinions of Plato and Pythagoras, but also the disciples of Epicurus and even complete atheists and believers in nothing consider themselves to be defenders of the truth. But I think that one should not be a slave to prejudice, but rather gain knowledge of the truth. Yeranist. I accept this instruction with humility; let it be an entry into matter. Orthodox. Since you accept my instruction humbly, I also ask you to base your research on the truth not on human speculation, but to look for the traces left by the prophets, apostles and saints who lived after them: this is what travelers usually do when, having lost their way from the high road, in order to find the path, they carefully examine whether there are any traces of human or horse feet; and when they find them, then, like animals gifted with a special sense of smell, they steadily follow the tracks, and do not leave them before they have already found the right path. Yeranist. We will do the same: but you go forward, since you began the word. Orthodox. So, first we will talk about the names of God, that is, about the essence, about the hypostases, about the properties; and having determined what the difference is between them, let us proceed to other subjects. Yeranist. I really like this start; and I consider it necessary: ​​because when these concepts are explained, it will be more convenient to talk about others. Orthodox. So, since we both agree on this, then answer me, beloved: should we recognize one being in God the Father, the Only Begotten Son and the All-Holy Spirit, as the divine Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments and the fathers gathered in Nicaea teach us, or should we follow the blasphemies of Arius? Yeranist. We confess one being in the Holy Trinity. Orthodox. But does hypostasis mean anything different from a being, or is there only another name for a being? Yeranist. I do not know whether the being has any difference from the hypostases. Orthodox. The teaching of external wisdom does not find such a distinction, believing that, just as being means existing (permanently abiding), so hypostasis means that which lies at the basis of another. But according to the teaching of the fathers, essence has the same difference from hypostasis as the general concept differs from the particular. Just as the name: man is common to all human nature, so the Divine being is common to the Holy Trinity, and hypostasis means any person, that is, either the Father, or the Son, or the Holy Spirit; In asserting this, we follow the definitions of St. fathers So, what is said about the Divine Being is common to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, such as: God, Lord, Creator, Almighty and the like. Yeranist. These properties are undoubtedly common to the Trinity. Orthodox. But those properties that designate persons are not common to the Holy Trinity, but belong to one or another hypostasis, for example, the names: Father, unborn are the properties of God the Father; also the names: Son, Only Begotten, Word of God, mean not the Father and not the Holy Spirit, but the Son; also: the Holy Spirit, the Comforter indicate the hypostasis of the Holy Spirit. Yeranist. But doesn’t divine Scripture call both the Father and the Son Spirit? Orthodox. The Holy Scripture, calling both the Father and the Son Spirit, shows that the Divine nature is incorporeal and indescribable, but the name: Holy Spirit means one hypostasis of the Holy Spirit. Yeranist. And this is beyond doubt. Orthodox. So, since we said that some of the properties are common to the Holy Trinity, and others are characteristic of each hypostasis, then is immutability the name of a being, or of any hypostasis? Yeranist. Immutability is a common property of the Trinity: for it is not possible for one thing in a being to be changeable and another immutable. Orthodox. You said it beautifully: for just as in relation to people, mortality is common to them, so immutability or immutability is a common property to the Holy Trinity. Consequently, the Only Begotten Son is just as irreplaceable as the Father who gave birth to Him and the Holy Spirit. Orthodox. Why do you, citing the Gospel saying: “The Word became flesh” (John 1:14), attribute change to an immutable being? Yeranist. We do not affirm that He was made flesh by change, but we think that He was made as He Himself knows. Orthodox. But if He became flesh without taking on flesh, then one of two things must be said: either He changed into flesh, or appeared as such only in a ghost, but in reality there is an incorporeal God. Yeranist. This is the opinion of the Valentinians, Marcianists and Manichaeans, but we confess that the Word of God became incarnate. Orthodox. But what do you mean by the name incarnation? Is it that God the Word took on flesh, or that he was changed into flesh? Yeranist. We understand what the evangelist said: “The Word became flesh.” Orthodox. But how do you understand the word: “to be?” Yeranist. He who was transformed into flesh became flesh and, as I have already said, in the way he himself knows. We only know that everything is possible for Him: for He turned the waters of the Nile into blood, and day into night, and the sea into dry land, and filled the waterless desert with waters. We also hear what the prophet says: “The Lord has created all that He wills in heaven and on earth” (Psalm 134:6). Orthodox. The Creator transforms his creation according to his will, because it is subject to change and follows the mania of the Creator; but He Himself is immutable and not subject to change. That is why the prophet speaks of creation: “You create everything and change it” (Jer. 10:16): about the Word of God, the great David says: “You are the same, and Your years will not fail” (Psalm 101:28), and God himself about Himself: “I am the Lord your God, and I do not change” (Mal. 3:6). Yeranist. One should not experience the unseen. Orthodox. But one should not remain ignorant of what is open. Yeranist. I don’t know the image of the incarnation: I only hear that “The Word became flesh.” Orthodox. But if the Word was made flesh through change, then it no longer remained what it was before. This can be explained by many examples. Sand, for example, exposed to fire, first becomes a liquid substance, then is fused into glass, and with this change it changes its name: for it is no longer called sand, but glass. Orthodox. In the same way, we do not call a stone thrown into a fire and crumbled a stone, but lime. Countless examples of this kind can be given. Yeranist. The matter is well known. Orthodox. So, if you say that God the Word underwent transformation into flesh, then why do you call Him God and not flesh? For a change in nature must be followed by a change in name; and it is not possible for the same name to remain even when the thing has changed. Yeranist. I have often said that the Word was not made flesh through change. Orthodox. But the word “to be,” if not explained, conveys the idea of ​​transformation and change. For if He was made flesh without taking on flesh, He was made by it by being changed. Yeranist. The word: accepted is your invention; for the evangelist only says: “The Word became flesh.” Orthodox. It seems that you either do not know the Holy Scriptures, or, knowing that you do, you are acting maliciously. In either case, I will be useful to you, either with instruction or reproof. So, answer: the teaching of St. Do you consider Paul to be inspired by God? Orthodox. Do you also agree that the same Spirit acted in both the evangelists and the apostles? Yeranist. Yes, because I learn this from the Apostolic Scripture, which says: “Divisions of gifts are, and the same is the Spirit,” and also: “But all these things work by one and the same Spirit, dividing with power as each one wills” (1 Cor. 12:11) and also: “having the same spirit of faith” (2 Cor. 4:13). Orthodox. You very opportunely cited the apostolic testimonies; if the Gospel and apostolic testimonies came from the same Spirit, then listen to how the Apostle explains the Gospel saying. In his Epistle to the Hebrews he says: “He does not receive from an angel, but from the seed of Abraham he receives” (Heb. 2:16). So, answer me, what do you mean by the seed of Abraham? Or: didn’t Abram’s seed have everything that Abraham himself had by nature? Yeranist. No: for Christ did not create sin. Orthodox. Sin is not a property of nature, but an evil of will. For this purpose, I did not say vaguely everything that Abraham had, but everything that he had by nature, that is, body and rational soul. So, tell me clearly: do you mean by the seed of Abraham a body and a soul endowed with reason? If not, then in this respect you also follow the extravagance of Apollinaris. However, I hope to convince you in another way to connect the true concept with the word “seed”. So, answer: do the Jews have a body and a soul endowed with reason? Yeranist. Obviously they do. Orthodox. So, when we hear the prophetic words about the Jews: “But you are my servant Jacob, whom I chose for Israel, the seed of Abraham, whom I loved” (Isa. 41:8), do we only imagine them in the flesh? Or rather, as people, consisting of body and soul? Orthodox. And the seed of Abraham, not soulless and devoid of intelligence, but having everything that constitutes the nature of Abraham? Yeranist. The speaker thus introduces two sons. Orthodox. And whoever claims that God the Word turned into flesh does not admit a single son. For the flesh in itself is not a son. We, on the contrary, confess one Son, who, having received the seed of Abraham, as the divine apostle says, accomplished the salvation of people. If you do not like the apostolic teaching, then admit it frankly. Yeranist. But the apostles should not contradict each other. Meanwhile, in the expressions: “The word became flesh” (John 1:14), and “Abraham received the seed” (Heb. 2:16), there is, it seems to me, a contradiction. Orthodox. Whoever sees a contradiction in things that are completely consistent with each other exposes in himself only either unreason or a passion for empty competition. The Divine Apostle clearly teaches that God the Word was made flesh not through being transformed into flesh, but through receiving the seed of Abraham. At the same time, it also points to the promises given to Abraham. Don't you remember the promises given to the patriarch by the God of all things? Orthodox. When God took him out of his father’s house and ordered him to go to Palestine, didn’t he say to him: “I will bless those who bless you, and those who curse you I will curse: and all the tribes of the earth will be blessed because of you” (Gen. 12:3)? Orthodox. Remember also those covenants that God made with Isaac and Jacob. For He gave the same promises to them, confirming the first with the second and third. Yeranist. I remember these last ones too. Orthodox. Explaining these covenants, the divine apostle thus says in the Epistle to the Galatians: “And to Abraham he made vows, and to his seed. He does not say, “and by seed, as of many, but as of one: and to your seed, who is Christ” (Gal. 3:16), clearly showing that the humanity of Jesus Christ grew weary of Abraham’s seed, and fulfilled the promise given to Abraham. Yeranist. This is what the apostle said. Orthodox. This evidence is sufficient to resolve any confusion regarding this subject. However, I will bring you another prophecy to remind you. Patriarch Jacob, the blessing given to him and his father and grandfather, gave one to Judas, his son, saying: “The prince from Judah, and the leader from his feet, will not fail, until the hope of the tongues will come: and the hope of the tongues” (Gen. 49, 10). Does this prophecy, in your opinion, not apply to Christ the Savior? Yeranist. The Jews interpret these prophecies incorrectly, but I, as a Christian, believe in the Divine Scripture, and accept the prophecies about our Savior without any doubt. Orthodox. If your words are sincere, if you believe the prophecies, and you understand the above predictions about our Savior, then pay attention to the purpose of the apostolic words. The apostle did not say with any other intention: “It is not from an angel that he receives” (Heb. 2:16), as in order to show that the promises given to the patriarchs had reached their limit. As if he had said this: the promise is not false; The Lord put an end to the promises; a source of blessing has been opened for tongues; God accepted Abraham’s seed, fulfilling through this the anciently promised salvation and confirming the expectation of the tongues. Yeranist. The prophecies are very much in agreement with the apostolic teaching. Orthodox. In the same way, the same divine apostle, reminding us of the blessing given to Judas, and showing that it has reached its end, exclaims: “It is clear that our Lord has risen from the tribe of Judah” (Heb. 7:14). The prophet (Mic. 5:2) and the evangelist (Matt. 2:5–6) did the same. For one of them wrote a prophecy, and the other confirmed his story with this prophecy. And to greater surprise, the most open enemies of the truth, according to the testimony of the Evangelist, clearly told Herod that Christ would be born in Bethlehem: “For it is written,” he says, “by the prophet: And you are in Bethlehem, the land of Judah, and you are by no means inferior among the rulers of Judah: for from you will come a leader who will shepherd My people Israel” ( Matt. 2, 5–6). We can also add that the Jews act maliciously when this testimony is presented not completely, as it is read by the prophet, but with concealment of the last words. For the prophet, having said: “A leader will come from you,” added: “Let him come forth from the beginning, from the days of the world” (Mic. 5:2). Yeranist. You have done well in bringing forth the testimony of the prophet in its entirety: for it shows that he who was born in Bethlehem is God. Orthodox. Not only God, but also man. Man, because according to the flesh he came from Judah and was born in Bethlehem: and God, because he exists from eternity. For the words: “From you shall come forth a leader for Me,” show the birth according to the flesh, which took place in the last days: and the words: “He came forth from the beginning from the days of the world,” clearly testify to His pre-eternal existence. In the same way, the divine apostle in his letter to the Romans, lamenting the disastrous falling away of the Jews from Christ and mentioning the promise and law given to them, finally adds the following: “theirs are the fathers, and from them is Christ according to the flesh, who is God blessed above all forever, amen” (Rom. 9:5). With these words the apostle shows that Jesus Christ, as God, is the Creator of everything, and the Lord, and the ruler, but at the same time that He, as a man, came from the Jews. Yeranist. I am satisfied with this explanation: but what do you say about the prophecy of Jeremiah, in which He is called only God? Orthodox. What prophecy do you understand? Yeranist. “This God is ours, it will not be imputed to Him. Find out every way of cunning, and give it to Jacob his servant, and to his beloved Israel from Him. Therefore he appeared on earth and lived with men” (Bar. 3:36–38). In these words the prophet does not speak about the flesh or about human nature; In general, Jesus Christ is not called a man, but only God. Orthodox. That the Divine nature is invisible does not require long conclusions; the apostle clearly says: “to the incorruptible, invisible, only God” (1 Tim. 1:17). Yeranist. Undoubtedly the Divine nature is invisible. Orthodox. How could the invisible nature appear without a body? Do you really not remember the words of the Apostle, by which he clearly teaches that it is impossible to see the Divine nature? For this is what he says: “But no one has seen Him (God), but he is from man, but can see below” (1 Tim. 6:16). So, if it is impossible for people, and I will add, and for angels, to contemplate the Divine nature, then tell me, how did the invisible and uncontemplable appear on earth? Yeranist. The Prophet said that He “appeared on earth” (Bar. 3:37). Orthodox. And the apostle said: “to the incorruptible, invisible, only God” (1 Tim. 1:17), “but no one has seen Him; Yeranist. So, is the prophet telling a lie? Orthodox. God save me from such thoughts! Both these and other words are the words of the Spirit of God. Yeranist. So, let us examine how the invisible one appeared? But do not present me with human opinions and conclusions. I stand on one Holy Scripture. Orthodox. You will not find a single argument that is not based on the testimony of divine Scripture. Yeranist. If you resolve my bewilderment with the Holy Scriptures, then I will agree and will not contradict at all. Orthodox. You know that above this we explained the Gospel saying with the testimony of the Apostle, and the divine Apostle revealed to us how the Word became flesh, clearly saying: “For when an angel did not receive, but from the seed of Abraham he received” (Heb. 2:16). Therefore, the same teacher will now teach us how God the Word “appeared on earth and lived with men.” Yeranist. For me, the words of both the prophets and the apostles are convincing. Show, according to your promise, how the apostle explains the prophetic word. Orthodox. The Divine Apostle, writing to Timothy, among other things, said the following: “The great mystery of godliness is that God appeared in the flesh, was justified in Dus, appeared as an angel, was preached to the nations, was believed in the world, was exalted in glory” (1 Tim. 3:16). From this it is clear that the Divine nature is invisible, but the flesh is visible, and that through the visible flesh the invisible nature was revealed, performing miracles through it and demonstrating its power. For the Divine nature in Christ with its hand produced the sense of sight, healed the man born blind, restored hearing to the deaf and loosened the bound tongue, using fingers instead of tools, and applying spitting as some kind of saving medicine. Likewise, walking on the waters of the sea, Christ revealed the omnipotence of his Divinity. In this sense, the divine apostle said: “God appeared in the flesh,” that is, through the flesh the invisible nature became visible; through the flesh a host of angels saw it: “appearing,” he says, “an angel.” So, incorporeal beings, along with us, have been granted this gift. Yeranist. Therefore, the angels did not see God before the coming of the Savior? Orthodox. The Apostle said that He, “appearing in the flesh, appeared to be an angel.” Yeranist. But the Lord said: “Be careful that you do not despise one of these little ones: for I say to you, that their angels in heaven will always see the face of my heavenly Father” (Matthew 18:10). Orthodox. But the Lord himself said in another place: “No one has seen the Father, but he who is from God has seen the Father” (John 6:46). That is why the evangelist preaches: “No one has seen God anywhere,” thereby confirming the Word of the Lord: for he says: “The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, is the one who confessed” (John 1:18). And the great Moses, when he desired to see the invisible nature, heard the following voice from the Lord God himself: “You cannot see My face: for no man will see My face and live” (Ex. 33:20). Yeranist. How can we understand these words: “Their angels will always see the face of your Father?” Orthodox. In the same way as we usually understand what is said about people who have been granted the vision of God. Yeranist. Tell me more clearly, because I don't understand. Can people really see God? Yeranist. However, in the Holy Scriptures we read: “God appeared to Abraham at the oak of Mamre” (Gen. 18:1); and the prophet Isaiah writes: “I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and exalted” (Is. 6:1). Micah, Daniel, and Ezekiel speak in the same way. About Moses, the lawgiver, history tells that “the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as if someone spoke to his friend” (Ex. 33:11). And the God of all things himself says: “I will speak to him mouth to mouth in reality, and not by fortune telling” (Num. 12:8). So, what can we say to this? Is it not that they saw the Divine nature? Orthodox. No way. For God himself said: “Shall man see My face and live” (Ex. 33:20). Yeranist. Therefore, those who claim that they have seen God are telling lies? Orthodox. God forbid! They tell the truth, but they saw what they could see. Yeranist. Do you want to say that the humane Lord proportions His revelation to the abilities of those who look at Him? Orthodox. Absolutely: God himself testifies to this in the prophet: “I,” he says, “have multiplied visions, and in the hands of the prophets we have become like” (Hos. 12:10). He does not say: “we see”, but “we have become like.” The likeness does not represent the very nature of the visible object; for example, a portrait of the King, no matter how striking the similarity of the image with the face depicted, does not represent the nature Tsar. Yeranist. This is dark and incomprehensible to me. Therefore, those who contemplated these revelations did not see the essence of God? Orthodox. What fool would dare to say this? Yeranist. However, it is said that they saw God. Orthodox. Said; and we, holding pious thoughts and believing those Divine testimonies that no one saw God anywhere, affirm that they saw not the nature of God, but certain phenomena adapted to their acceptability. Yeranist. Yes, I agree to this. Orthodox. In the same way, we should understand about angels when we hear that they “can see the face of the heavenly Father” (Matthew 18:10); for they see not the being of God, indescribable, incomprehensible, inconceivable to the mind and containing everything, but a certain reflection (glory) of it, commensurate with their nature. After the incarnation, he appeared to the angels, as the apostle says, not in the likeness of glory, but using the true and living cover of the flesh, as if some kind of veil: “God appeared in the flesh, being justified in Dus, appearing as an angel” (1 Tim. 3:16). Yeranist. I agree to this as evidence of Holy Scripture; but I don’t accept new expressions. Orthodox. What expression do you find new? Yeranist. The name “veil”: for where does the Holy Scripture call the flesh of the Lord a veil? Orthodox. Apparently, you do not read the Holy Scriptures with complete diligence; otherwise you would not reproach me for using the comparison. For, firstly, the apostle, having said that through the flesh the invisible nature was revealed, thereby allows one to think of the flesh as the veil of the Divine, then in the Epistle to the Hebrews, the same divine apostle directly used this word; he says this: “having the boldness, brethren, to enter into the holy blood of Jesus Christ, the new and living way, which he renewed for us with the veil, that is, with his flesh, and Jereia is great over the house of God: let us approach with a true heart in the declaration of faith,” and so on. (Heb. 10:19–22). Yeranist. Nothing can be said against this evidence; because it is established on the apostolic witness. Orthodox. So, don't blame me for inventing new names. But I will present you with another testimony, namely the prophetic, which the flesh of the Lord directly calls a robe and a robe. Yeranist. If it does not seem fortune-telling and mutual, then I will not contradict it at all, and will remain grateful. Orthodox. I will try to have you yourself testify to the truth of the promise. You know that Patriarch Jacob, blessing Judah, set the birth of the Lord as the last limit of his power: “the prince from Judah, and the leader from his feet, will not fail,” he says, “until the hope of the tongues, which was set aside for him, will come” (Gen. 49:10). And this prophecy, you yourself agreed before, refers to Christ. Orthodox. So, remember the words that follow these. For he says this: “The Gentiles hope for His coming. He shall stain his garments with wine, and his garments with the blood of grapes” (Gen. 49:11). Yeranist. The patriarch spoke about clothes, not about the body. Orthodox. So tell me where or when He soaked His clothes in the blood of the grapes? Yeranist. But you too must prove that He stained His body with it. Orthodox. I ask you to answer more intimately, since there may be people here who are not initiated into the mysteries. Yeranist. I will proportion my answers to what I hear from you. Orthodox. Do you know that the Lord called himself a vine? Yeranist. I know; He said: “I am the true vine” (John 15:1). Orthodox. What is the name of the fruit squeezed from the vine? Orthodox. And when the soldiers pierced the Savior’s side with a spear, what flowed from them, according to the testimony of the evangelists (John 19:34)? Orthodox. So, the patriarch here called the blood of the Savior the blood of a thunderstorm. For if the Lord is called the vine, and the fruit of the grape is called wine, and the streams of blood and water that flowed from the body of the Lord spread down throughout the body, then the patriarch quite rightly and decently predicted: “he will perish his clothing with wine, and his clothing with the blood of the grapes” (Gen. 49:11). For just as we call the mysterious fruit of the vine after consecration the blood of the Lord, so the patriarch called the blood of the true vine the blood of grapes. Yeranist. Mysterious, but at the same time the proposed subject is clearly proven. However, I still cannot abandon what I have learned, that is, that the Word was made flesh. Yeranist. If, after all the arguments I have given and after the objections have been resolved, you remain with the same thoughts, then it is obvious that we, according to the proverb, are pouring water into a drilled barrel. Yeranist. I present to you not my words, but the Gospel. Orthodox. But did I not interpret the words of the Gospel to you through prophetic and apostolic testimonies? Yeranist. But this evidence is not sufficient to resolve the issue. Orthodox. However, I showed that God, being invisible by nature, appeared through the flesh. We learned about the affinity of the flesh itself from divine men. For He came from the seed of Abraham; The Lord God said to the patriarch: “All the nations will be blessed because of your seed” (Gen. 22:18); and the apostle: “It is clear that the Lord has risen from the tribe of Judah” (Heb. 7:14). And I have presented many other similar testimonies. Since you want to hear others, then listen to what the apostle says: “Every high priest, acceptable from man, is placed in the service of God for men, and may offer gifts and sacrifices for sins” (Heb. 5:1). Yeranist. So show what He brought by taking a body. Orthodox. The divine Apostle himself clearly teaches us this in the same place. For a little lower he says this: “Then when you entered into the world, you said: You did not desire sacrifices and offerings, but you made the body” (Heb. 10:5). He did not say: “You turned Me into a body,” but “You have made a body,” showing the structure of the body through the action of the Holy Spirit, as it is said in the Gospel: “Do not be afraid to receive Miriam your wife: what was born in her is of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 1:20). Yeranist. Therefore, the Virgin gave birth only to the body? Orthodox. It seems that you did not even understand the composition of the words, not only the meaning of them. Since Joseph, not knowing the sacrament, suspected the Virgin of adultery, he was clearly taught about the conception that followed from the Holy Spirit. The prophet also speaks about this very thing: “You have finished the body” (Psalm 39:7). The divine apostle, filled with the Spirit of God, interpreted this prophecy. So, if it is the duty of priests to offer sacrifices, and Christ is called a priest according to humanity, and did not offer any other sacrifice than his body, then it follows that Christ the Lord had a body. Yeranist. I do not say that the Word of God appeared incorporeal, which I have already said more than once before: but I only affirm that He did not take on a body, but became flesh. Orthodox. I notice that we are in dispute with the followers of Valentinus, Marcion and Manet. However, they never dared to say that the unchangeable nature turned into flesh. Yeranist. It is not typical for a Christian to reproach others. Orthodox. I do not reproach, but defend the truth, and I am very annoyed that you argue about subjects that are in no way subject to doubt. But I will try to cure this illness too. So, answer: do you remember those promises that God gave to David? Orthodox. Those that the prophet placed in the eighty-eighth psalm. Yeranist. I know that many promises were made to David. Which ones are you asking about in this case? Orthodox. About those who relate to Christ the Lord. Yeranist. You yourself remind me of the words of the psalm. For you promised to present me with arguments. Orthodox. So, listen to the words of the prophet, with which he immediately glorifies God at the beginning of the psalm. For, foreseeing with prophetic eyes the wickedness of the people, and the captivity that would follow, the prophet glorified his God, the author of false promises. Here are his words: “I will sing of Your mercy, O Lord, forever; I will proclaim Your truth with my mouth to generation and generation. Thou hast declared: mercy shall be built up forever: Thy truth shall be prepared in heaven” (Psalm 88:2-3). Through all this, the prophet teaches both that God, out of His love for mankind, gave certain promises, and that these promises are not false. Then, speaking on behalf of God himself, he adds what and to whom it was promised: “I have made a covenant,” he says, “to My chosen ones” (Psalm 88:4). He called the patriarchs the chosen ones. After this he adds: “I have sworn to My servant David.” Then he says what he swore: “I will prepare your seed forever, and I will build your throne for generations and generations.” So, answer, what seed of David is being spoken about here, in your opinion? Yeranist. Here is the promise about Solomon. Orthodox. Consequently, God decreed the covenants with the patriarchs about Solomon. For before those words in which David was spoken, God mentioned the promises given to the patriarchs. “I have made a covenant,” he says, “a covenant to My chosen.” And He promised the patriarchs that in their seed He would bless all nations. So, you must prove that the nations are truly blessed through Solomon. Yeranist. So, did God fulfill this promise not through Solomon, but through our Savior? Orthodox. Without a doubt, the promises made to David were ended by Christ the Lord. Yeranist. In my opinion, these promises refer to Solomon or Zerubbabel. Orthodox. Not long before, you expressed yourself in the words of Marcion, and Valentinus, and Manet, and now you have gone over directly to the opposite side, favoring the shamelessness of the Jews. This is characteristic only of those who have strayed from the straight path and, trying to make their own way, wander here and there. Yeranist. The apostle forbids the scolders from entering the Kingdom of Heaven. Orthodox. If they blame in vain. For the divine apostle himself, when circumstances required it, used this type of speech, and calls Galatians “foolish” (Gal. 3:1); and about others he says: “men are corrupt in mind and unskillful in the faith” (2 Tim. 3:8). And again about some he says: “Whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their cold, they who are on earth are wise” (Phil. 3:19). Yeranist. But what opportunity have I given you to reproach? Orthodox. The one that you willingly agree with the most open enemies of truth. Doesn’t this reason seem to you sufficient to arouse indignation among the pious? Yeranist. Which enemy of truth have I favored? Orthodox. You are now favoring the Jews. Orthodox. The Jews attribute these prophecies to Solomon and Zerubbabel in order to show that the Christians' questions have no basis. But the words themselves are sufficient to refute wickedness; for, “until eternity,” he says, “I will prepare your throne” (Psalm 88:5). Not only Solomon and Zerubbabel, to whom the Jews refer these prophecies, died after fulfilling a certain period of life, but also the entire line of David ended. For who now knows any descendant from the line of David? Yeranist. But aren’t the so-called patriarchs among the Jews from the line of David? Yeranist. Where did they come from? Orthodox. From the foreigner Herod, who was an Ascalonian on his father’s side, and an Edomite on his mother’s side. However, these too have completely disappeared and their leadership has long since ended. But the Lord God promised not only to preserve David’s seed forever, but also to continue his reign to infinity. “I will build,” he says, “your throne for generations and generations” (Psalm 88:5). And we see that his family was destroyed and his kingdom ended. Seeing this, we know, however, that the God of all things is true. Yeranist. Obviously, God is false. Orthodox. So, if God is true, as in fact He is true, and David was promised to preserve his family and kingdom forever, while we see neither the family nor the kingdom (for both have ended), then how can we convince our opponents that God is true? Yeranist. In fact, this prophecy refers to Christ. Orthodox. So, since you agree to this, let us consider together the middle part of the psalm: for in this way we will more conveniently comprehend the meaning of the prophecy. Yeranist. Begin your research; and I will follow in your footsteps. Orthodox. God gave many promises about the seed of David, such as that it would rule on land and sea and would be above the kings of the earth and would be called the firstborn of God and would boldly call God its Father; I also added the following words: “I will keep My mercy for him forever, and My covenant is faithful to him: and I will set his seed for ever and ever, and his throne as the days of heaven” (Psalm 88:29-30). Yeranist. This promise exceeds human nature. For here it is prophesied about life and glory not subject to decay, and all people are temporary: for their nature is not durable, and their power, in this life, is subject to various and varied changes. Therefore, the greatness of this promise befits Christ the Savior alone. Orthodox. Consider the remaining words of the Psalm, and your conviction will become even stronger. For the God of all again says: “I have sworn one oath about my holy one, lest I lie to David; his seed will endure forever, and his throne is like the sun before Me, and like the moon is perfect forever” (Psalm 88:36-38). And as a seal of the truth of the promise, he added: “and the witness in heaven is faithful” (Psalm 88:38). Yeranist. The promises of such a faithful witness must be believed without any doubt: for if we usually believe people who promise to speak the truth, even if they do not confirm their words with an oath, then what fool would not believe the Creator of the universe, who confirms his promises with an oath. For He who forbids others to swear, “though to show the immutableness of his counsel,” as the apostle says, “intercedes with an oath: yes, two immutable things, in which it is not possible for one to lie to God, is a strong consolation for the imams who have resorted to plead for the hope set before them” (Heb. 6:17-18). Orthodox. So, if, undoubtedly, the promise is true, and yet we do not see among the Jews either the family or the royal power of the prophet David, then we will believe without a doubt that our Lord Jesus Christ is called the seed of David, according to human nature: to Him belongs both life and the eternal kingdom. Yeranist. I have no doubt, but I recognize this as the actual truth. Orthodox. So, although this is enough to confirm the humanity of our Lord and Savior, received by Him from the seed of David, but in order to destroy all doubt by the testimony of many, let us listen to how God, through the voice of the prophet Isaiah, reminds of the promises given to David. “I bequeath,” he says, “to you an everlasting covenant.” And showing the legislator, he added: “David’s faithful saint” (Is. 55:3). And the following words of the prophecy confirm this. For he says: “Behold, this is the testimony of the nations of His prince and ruler with the tongue. Behold, the nations, who did not know You, will call on You, and the people, those who do not know You will resort to You” (Is. 55:4-5). But this does not apply to any of the descendants of David. For who from the family of David was appointed, as Isaiah writes, the leader of the nations? Further, what nations called upon any of the descendants of David in prayer? Yeranist. There is no need to reason about clear objects. For this, in truth, befits Christ the Lord. Orthodox. Therefore, let us turn to another prophetic testimony, and listen to the same prophet: “a rod will come out,” he says, “from the root of Jesse, and a flower will arise from his crown” (Is. 11: 1). Yeranist. This prophecy, in my opinion, refers to the Zorovatel. Orthodox. If you hear the further words of the prophet, you will not remain in your opinion; and the Jews themselves did not accept this prophecy in this sense: for the prophet adds: “And the Spirit of God will rest on him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and strength, the Spirit of knowledge and piety: and the Spirit of the fear of God will fill Him” (Is. 11:2-3). But no one will ever attribute this to an ordinary person. Although the great saints are given private gifts of the Holy Spirit, as the divine apostle testifies, saying: “To one the word of wisdom is given by the Spirit, and to another the word of understanding about the same Spirit,” and so on. (1 Cor. 12:8): but here the prophet affirms that he who comes from the root of Jesse will possess all the actions of the Spirit of God. Yeranist. To resist this means sheer madness. Orthodox. Listen also to what follows: for you will see here something that exceeds human nature. This is what the prophet says: “He should not judge according to his glory, he will reprove according to the words below, but he will judge the humble with righteousness, and he will convict the humble of the earth with righteousness: and he will smite the earth with the word of his mouth, and with the spirit of his lips he will kill the wicked” (Is. 11: 3-4). Some expressions of this prophecy refer to human nature, others to the Divine. So justice, and truth, and righteousness, and unshakable firmness in court belong to human properties. Yeranist. From this I understood clearly that the prophet predicted the coming of Christ our Savior. Orthodox. And that the interpretation proposed to you is correct, you will be convinced of this from the following words of the prophet: “and the wolf and the lamb will graze together,” and so on. (Is. 11:6) - through which it shows both the disagreement of morals and the unity of faith. Experience serves as a guarantee for the truth of this prophecy: for those who abound in wealth and those oppressed by poverty, slaves and masters, rulers and subordinates and the supreme rulers of the universe, are received by one font, the same gifts are given to all, one sacramental meal is offered to all, and each believer receives an equal portion. Yeranist. But all this shows that the One about whom the prophet speaks is God. Orthodox. Not only God, but also man. Therefore, at the beginning of this prophecy he said that “a rod will come out of the root of Jesse,” and at the conclusion of the prophecy he repeated the beginning of it. For this is what he says: “And in that day there will be a root of Jesse, and he who rises up to rule the tongues, in him the tongues will trust: and there will be rest for his honor” (Is. 11:10). Jesse was the father of David, and the promise was made to David with an oath. But the prophet would not have called Christ the Lord a rod that came “from the root of Jesse” if he had recognized him only as God. The prophet also foretold a change in the universe: “the whole earth is fulfilled,” he says, “as if the sea were covered with much water” (Is. 11:9). Yeranist. I listened to the prophetic predictions: I would now like to know definitely whether the divine apostles confess that Christ the Lord came from the seed of David according to the flesh? Orthodox. It is very convenient to fulfill your desire. Listen to what the chief of the apostles says: “That prophet (David) and the one who knew, as God swears to him with an oath, to raise up Christ from the fruit of his loins according to the flesh, and to set Him on his throne, foreseeing the word about the resurrection of Christ, for His soul would not remain in hell, nor His flesh in the form of corruption” (Acts 2, 30–31 ). From this you can conveniently understand that Christ the Lord according to the flesh came from the seed of David, and had not only flesh, but also a soul. Yeranist. Did any of the other apostles say this? Orthodox. Although to prove the truth, the testimony of the great Peter alone would be sufficient: for the Lord, accepting the confession of truth from him alone, greatly approved of it. But since you want to hear other witnesses about the subject of our study: then listen to what Paul and Barnabas say when they preach in Antioch of Pisidia. They, having mentioned David, added the following: “from this seed God, according to the promise, raised up to Israel the salvation of Jesus,” and so on. (Acts 13:23). And the divine apostle, writing to Timothy, among other things stated the following: “Remember the Lord Jesus Christ, who rose from the dead, from the seed of David according to my gospel” (2 Tim. 2:8). And in the letter to the Romans, at the very beginning he mentioned the relationship of Christ with David. For this is what he says: “Paul the servant of Jesus Christ, called an apostle, was chosen for the gospel of God, having first promised by his prophets in the writings of the saints concerning his Son, who was of the seed of David according to the flesh,” and so on. (Rom. 1:1–3). Yeranist. Lots of evidence, all of it true. But tell me, why did you leave out the other half of Pavlov's testimony? Orthodox. Because you are arguing about human nature, and not about Divine nature. If you doubted the Divinity, then I would present you with proof of this too. For when teaching in general about the nature of man, I do not say: “this Son” is “according to the flesh,” but I simply say “son.” In the same way, the divine evangelist, describing the genealogy: “Abraham,” he says, “begat Isaac” (Matthew 1:2), and did not add “according to the flesh,” since Isaac was only a man. He speaks in the same way about others: for they were people, and had nothing except human nature. But preachers of the truth, speaking about Christ the Lord, and showing to the inexperienced the union of the higher nature with the lower, they add “according to the flesh,” distinguishing with this expression human nature from the Divine, and teaching that Christ the Lord is not only a man, but also the eternal God. Yeranist. Although you presented a lot of apostolic and prophetic testimonies: but I believe the words of the evangelist: “The word became flesh” (John 1:14). Orthodox. And I believe this divine teaching, but I understand it piously, meaning by the word: “there was flesh,” not only flesh, but also the rational soul. If God the Word had not borrowed anything from our nature, then the promises given with an oath from God to the patriarchs would have remained false, the blessing of Judah useless, and the promise to David not true. There is also no need for the Virgin, who did not communicate anything from our nature to the incarnate God. Likewise, prophetic predictions do not deserve faith. Therefore our preaching is vain, our faith is vain, and our hope of resurrection is vain. For the words of the Apostle are apparently false: “Rise up with Him, and make us sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6). So, if the Lord Christ had nothing of our nature, then he is falsely called our firstfruits; the nature of the body was not raised up from the dead and was not seated at the right hand in heaven. In fact, if nothing of the kind happened, then how did God resurrect us and make us sit with Christ, while we, by nature, do not belong to Him at all? But to speak thus is wicked; for the divine apostle, when there was no general resurrection yet, nor the kingdom of heaven had been given to believers, cries out: “Rise up with Him and make us sit in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:8), teaching us that if our firstfruits has risen from the dead and is seated at the right hand of God the Father, then we will certainly receive the resurrection and, as partakers of one with the firstfruits of nature, we will partakers of His glory through faith in Him. Yeranist. You have presented me with many and true testimonies; but I would like to know the meaning of the Gospel saying. Orthodox. You don't need any outside interpretation. For the evangelist explains himself. Because, having said: “The Word became flesh,” he added, “and dwelt in us” (John 1:14); that is, by the word: “flesh became,” he means the construction of a tabernacle in us and the wearing of the flesh received from us, as if some kind of church. And teaching that He remained unchangeable, he added: “And we saw His glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father, filled with grace and truth.” For having clothed himself in flesh, He showed the properties of His Father, shining with the rays of Divinity and the brilliance of Divine power, revealing, through miracles, His Divine nature hidden under the cover of flesh. Similarly, the divine apostle wrote in his letter to the Philippians: “Let this be the wisdom of you also in Christ Jesus: that he who is in the form of God is not equal to God by admiration; but he made himself a little lesser, and received the form of a servant, being in the likeness of mankind, and being found in the likeness of a man, he humbled himself, becoming obedient even to the point of death, even the death of the cross” ( Phil. 5, 8). Look at the agreement of the sayings: the evangelist said: “The Word became flesh and dwelt in us”; the apostle says: “I have taken on the form of a servant.” Again the evangelist said; “we have seen His glory, the glory as the only begotten of the Father”; the Apostle: “Whoever is in the image of God is not equal to God by admiration.” In short, both of them teach that Jesus Christ, being God and the Son of God, and clothed with the glory of the Father, having the same nature and power with Him who begat Him, and being in the beginning and with God and God and having created the world, took on the form of a servant. Apparently, He was only that which is subject to our feelings: on the contrary, He was God, clothed in human nature, and arranging the salvation of people. This is what these sayings mean: “The Word became flesh”, and: “Being in the likeness of mankind, and being found in the likeness of man.” The Jews saw only this outer side, and therefore they said to Him: “We will not lay stones against you for a good deed, but for blasphemy, because you are a man, make for yourself God” (John 10:33). And again: “This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath” (John 9:16), Yeranist. The Jews, due to their unbelief, were blind, and therefore spoke in this way. Orthodox. If you find out that the apostles said the same thing even before the resurrection, will you agree with my opinion? So, after the storm was tamed in a supernatural way, I hear them saying on the ship: “Who is this, for both the winds and the sea listen to him” (Matthew 8:27)? Yeranist. This has been clearly proven: but then explain to me how He, in the words of the Apostle, was “in the likeness of mankind?” Orthodox. What He took on is not the likeness of man, but the nature of man. For by the image of a slave is meant the nature of a slave, just as by the image of God the nature of God is meant. Because, being God, He, through the adoption of human nature, apparently became a man. The evangelist expresses the words: “become in the likeness of humanity” with the words: “became flesh.” And in order to know that those who do not allow the flesh in our Savior are disciples of the Antichrist, then listen to what the great John says in his conciliar epistle: “Every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. And every spirit that does not confess Jesus Christ in the flesh is not from God: and this is the Antichrist” (1 John 4:2-3). Yeranist. You explained this plausibly. I would like to know how the ancient teachers of the Church understood the saying: “The Word became flesh.” Orthodox. Although you should have been convinced by the testimonies of the prophets and apostles; but since you still require explanations from the holy fathers, then I, with the help of God, will offer you this kind of medicine. Yeranist. Do not introduce unknown or dubious husbands to me: I will not accept their explanations. Orthodox. In your opinion, does the most famous Athanasius, the most brilliant luminary of the Alexandrian Church, deserve trust? Yeranist. He certainly deserves it, as a man who imprinted the teaching of truth with the disasters he endured. Orthodox. So, listen to what he writes to Epictetus. “The meaning of the saying of the Evangelist John: “The Word became flesh,” is determined by comparing this place with another similar one. Ap. Paul says: “Christ was made a curse upon us” (Gal. 3:13). As in the words: “there was an oath,” it does not mean that He became an oath; but the fact that He accepted the curse for us: so the expression: “he became flesh” does not mean His transformation into flesh, but the taking on of flesh for us.” These are the words of the most divine Athanasius. And Gregory (Nazianzen), who was in great glory among everyone, who once ruled the reigning city at the mouth of the Bosporus and later lived in Nazianzu, wrote to Kledonius in this way against the temptations of Apollinaris. Yeranist. He was a famous husband and a champion of truth. Orthodox. So listen to his teaching. “Therefore, I consider the saying: “The Word became flesh” to be similar to those sayings in which it is stated that Christ was made “sin” and “a curse for us” (Gal. 3:13): Christ did not become sin and curse, but only took upon himself our iniquities and bore sickness. Yeranist. Both interpretations are similar. Orthodox. So, having shown you that both the northern and southern shepherds agree in their opinions, I will now lead you, as a guest, to the most famous Western teachers, who left us interpretations, although in a different language, but not in a different sense. Yeranist. I heard about Ambrose, the famous Bishop of Milan, that he fought valiantly against all heresies and wrote beautiful works in agreement with the teachings of the apostles. Orthodox. I will present you with an explanation of it. Here are his words in a book about faith: “It is written, they say, that “the Word became flesh.” It is written, I do not reject this. But pay attention to the next words. “And dwell in us”; that is, he lived in human flesh. So, one should not be surprised that regarding the taking on of flesh by God the Word it is written: “The Word became flesh,” when about sin, which He did not have, it is also written: “That He was made sin for us” (2 Cor. 5:21). That is, he did not become the nature and action of sin, but in order to nail our sin in our flesh to the cross. So, let those who claim that the nature of the Word has changed because it took on the flesh be silent. For one thing is the one who has received, and another thing is the received (flesh).” After this, we must listen to the eastern teachers, for this is only one side of the globe left. We had to make them the first witnesses of the truth, as the first heirs of the apostolic teaching: but since you have sharpened your tongues against these firstborn sons of piety, uttering slander against them, I gave them the last place, so that you, having first listened to others and then compared the teaching of the first with the words of the last, would be surprised at the general unanimity of all and tame the insolence of your tongue. So, listen to the explanation of the Gospel words of Flavian, who for a very long time wisely ruled the Antiochian Church and protected the Churches that were under his control from the disasters of Arianism. “The Word,” he says, “became flesh and dwelt in us.” It did not turn into flesh and did not cease to be God: but It was last from eternity, and became first according to its economy, building a church for itself and dwelling in a creature subject to suffering.” If you want to hear the ancient Palestinian teachers, then listen, first of all, to Gelasius, who carefully cultivated the Church of Caesarea. This is what he says in the word on the Epiphany of the Lord: “learn the truth from the words of John the fisherman: “The Word became flesh,” not itself changing into flesh, but dwelling in us as in the tabernacle; another is the tabernacle, and another is the Word: another is the church, and another is God who dwells in the church.” Yeranist. I am very surprised at this agreement. Orthodox. And John Chrysostom, oh, great luminary of the universe, who first filled the Church of Antioch with great glory with teachings, then cultivated the Church in the reigning city, don’t you consider him the guardian of the apostolic canon of faith? Yeranist. I consider this teacher worthy of admiration. Orthodox. This glorious man explains this Gospel passage as follows: “When you hear: “The Word became flesh,” then do not be embarrassed or lose heart. For it was not nature that turned into flesh (this opinion is extremely wicked), but remaining unchanged, it thus took on the form of a slave. Like the words of the Apostle: “Christ redeemed us from the legal curse, being a curse against us” (Gal. 3:13), do not mean that His nature, leaving its own glory, changed into the nature of damnation (this would not have been invented either by the demons themselves, or by people extremely stupid and devoid of common natural meaning; such a thought is so crazy and wicked!), but they mean that Having taken the oath upon himself, he did not allow the curse to weigh on us any longer: so here, by the words: “flesh,” we do not mean the transformation of the being of God into flesh, but the perception of it, in which the being suffered nothing.” If you want to hear Severian, the shepherd of the Gabals, then I will offer you his teaching, and you listen carefully. “The saying: “The word became flesh” does not mean a departure from our nature, but the perception of our nature. For if by the word “became” you mean change: then when you hear the words of the Apostle Paul: “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, a curse has become for us,” will you really understand the nature and transformation into the curse itself? Therefore, just as the words: “being an oath,” mean nothing more than the perception of our curse upon oneself: so here, under the expression: “The Word became flesh and dwelt in us,” nothing else is understood as the perception of the flesh.” Yeranist. I am amazed at the unanimous testimony of these men. For they all explained these Gospel words as if, having gathered in one place and with common consent, they wrote their opinion together. Dialogue II. Discourse on the unmerged union of natures in Jesus Christ Yeranist. I came to invite you to choose one of two things: either resolve my questions, or agree to our teaching. Orthodox. I accept the challenge, finding it fair. But we must first remember where we interrupted our speech on the past day, and what the end of our conversation was. Yeranist. I’ll give you this as a reminder. We agreed, as far as I remember, that God the Word remained unchanged; He took on flesh and did not become flesh. Orthodox. From the fact that you so faithfully retained in your memory the content of our conversation, I conclude that you like the teaching with which we ended it. Yeranist. I have already said before that it would be a clear sign of madness to contradict so many and such great teachers. Orthodox. So we agree that God the Word took flesh? Orthodox. But what do we mean by the name flesh? Is there one body, as Arius and Eunomius understand, or body and soul together? Orthodox. What soul? Is it intelligent, or plant and animal, as some call it? I would not have proposed this question, as inappropriate, if the extravagant writings of Apollinaris had not prompted me to do so. Yeranist. Does Apollinaris really believe there is a difference between souls? Orthodox. According to the teachings of Apollinaris, a person has three components: the body, the animal soul, and the rational soul, which he calls the mind. But divine Scripture recognizes only one soul, not two. This is clearly shown by the story of the creation of the first man, where it is said: “God created man, took dust from the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life: and man became a living soul” (Gen. 2:7). The Lord himself in the Gospels says this to his holy disciples: “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but are not able to kill the soul; fear rather than him who is able to destroy both body and soul in Gehenna” (Matthew 10:28; Luke 12:4-5). And the most divine Moses, determining the number of persons who entered Egypt along with their ancestors, says: “all the souls who entered Egypt” were seventy-five (Gen. 16:26). And the divine apostle, being in Troas, said about Eutychus, whom everyone considered dead: “Speak not, for his soul is in him” (Acts 20:10). Yeranist. You have clearly proven that each person has only one soul. Orthodox. And Apollinaris says that there are two, of which one, that is, the one that is not involved in reason, is perceived by God the Word, and the place of the rational soul is supposedly taken in Him by the Divine. That is why I asked which soul was received along with the body. Yeranist. Following the divine Scripture, I affirm that the rational soul is accepted. Orthodox. So, we must agree that God the Word took on the perfect form of a servant? Orthodox. That's how it should be. Since the first man was entirely under sin, and lost the features of the Divine image, and the ancestor was followed by his descendants: it was necessary that the Creator, wanting to renew the darkened image, took on the whole nature in order to depict on it features that were much better than the previous ones. Yeranist. This is fair, but I ask you first to accurately define the meaning of the words, so that our conversation can proceed without hindrance, and so that our research does not stop because of some mutual word. Orthodox. Your point is very valid: ask whatever you want. Yeranist. What should Jesus Christ be called: man or God? Orthodox. Neither one nor the other name, taken separately, expresses the essence of the subject, but both together: for the God-Word made man is called Jesus Christ, as it is said: “And you will call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21), and also: “Today Christ the Lord is born to you in the city of David” (Luke 2:11). These are the words of the angels. Before His incarnation He was called God, and the Son of God, and the Only Begotten, and the Lord, and God the Word, and the Creator, as it is said: “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was to God, and God was the Word” (John 1:1), and also: “all things were, in Him was the life, the true Light, which enlightens every man coming into the world” ( John 1, 3–9). These and similar names mean the Divine nature, but after His incarnation He was called Jesus Christ. Yeranist. Therefore Jesus Christ is only God? Orthodox. Do you hear what is said about God the Word “made man,” and do you call Him only God? Yeranist. Since He became incarnate, without turning into humanity, but remaining what He was before His incarnation, He should be called as He was called before His incarnation. Orthodox. God the Word was, and is, and will be immutable, but He became man, taking on human nature; therefore we must confess in Him both the nature that was received and the one that was received. Yeranist. But I think that names taken from the better side are preferable. Orthodox. Man as an animal, is there a simple creature or a complex one? Yeranist. Complex: because it consists of soul and body. Orthodox. Which of these natures is the best? Yeranist. Obviously, the soul: for it is both rational and immortal, and has received the power to control this animal, but the body is both temporary and mortal, and having lost the soul, it loses its mind and becomes a corpse. Orthodox. Therefore, it would be necessary for Holy Scripture, in naming this animal, to borrow its name from its best part? Yeranist. That’s what he calls it: for those who entered Egypt were called “souls.” Orthodox. But does the Divine Scripture name anyone from the body? Yeranist. This is what he calls those who are enslaved to the flesh. For example, the Lord says: “My spirit shall not abide in these men forever, for they are flesh” (Gen. 6:3). Orthodox. And without condemnation he calls no one flesh? Orthodox. So, I will remind you and show you that even people of high holiness are called flesh by Scripture. Tell me, what should the apostles be called: spiritual or carnal? Yeranist. Not only spiritual, but top spiritual and teachers. Orthodox. Listen, then, to what the inspired Paul says: “When God was pleased, having chosen me from my mother’s womb and called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him to the nations, except that flesh and blood were not united to him, nor did he go up to Jerusalem to those who were first among me as an apostle” (Gal. 1, 15–17 ). Is it really possible that St. Does Paul call the apostles flesh and blood to condemn them? Orthodox. He borrows the name from the visible nature of man, and compares heavenly knowledge in the office of apostleship with the title that comes through the ordinary way, that is, through men. Orthodox. Listen also to the songwriter David, how he sings to God and says: “All flesh will come to You” (Psalm 64:3); In a similar way, Isaiah the prophet foretells that “all flesh will see the salvation of our God” (Is. 52:10). Yeranist. You have clearly proven that divine Scripture, without any condemnation or reproach from the flesh, borrows a name for human nature. Orthodox. But I will show you something else. Orthodox. That the same Scripture, reproaching some, borrows a name for them from one soul. Yeranist. Where will you find this in divine Scripture? Orthodox. Listen to what God says through the mouth of the prophet Ezekiel: “The soul that sins will die” (Ezek. 18:4); We find the same thing in the great Moses: “and the soul, even if it sins...”. (Lev. 5, 1) etc. Yeranist. I consider this proven. Orthodox. So, if it is characteristic of Divine Scripture to call that living being in which there is a natural connection and connection of the parts created, co-serving and modern, not only from the best side, but equally from the lesser as well as from the best: then why do you condemn us when we, confessing the Lord Christ as God, call together man, especially when we have strong motivations for this? Yeranist. What prompts you to call Christ the Savior a man? Orthodox. Various and completely contradictory dogmas of heretics. Yeranist. Which dogmas are disgusting and in what way? Orthodox. The Aryan dogma contradicts Savelli's: the first divides the being, the second merges the hypostases. Arius introduces three beings, and Sabellius preaches one hypostasis instead of three. Tell me how we can heal this and that ailment? Is it the same medicine to give to both, or to each his own, which is suitable for him alone? Orthodox. Therefore, we will try to convince Arius to confess the essence of the Holy Trinity, and we will provide evidence for this truth from Divine Scripture. But arguing with Sabellius, we will do the opposite of this; We will not discuss the essence with him: for he also recognizes one thing. But we will heal only that side of his opinion that suffers from illness. Orthodox. Remember what illness he suffers from. Yeranist. He does not rightly teach about hypostases. Orthodox. So, since he claims that the Holy Trinity has one hypostasis, we will show him that the Divine Scripture preaches three hypostases. Yeranist. This, of course, must be done, but we have left the main subject of discussion. Orthodox. Not at all. On the contrary, it is for him that we are collecting evidence, as you will now see. So, tell me, do you think that all heresies, no matter how many there have been since the incarnation of Christ, confess both the Divinity of Christ and His humanity? Orthodox. But should one profess one Divinity, and the other one one humanity? Orthodox. Still others - some part of humanity? Yeranist. I think so. But in order to bring the desired subject into greater clarity, it is necessary to show how those who think in one way or another are called. Orthodox. I'll explain it. Simon, Menander, Marcion, Valentinus, Basilides, Vardisanus, Cerdon and Manes clearly rejected the humanity of Christ. But Artemon, Theodotus, Sabellius, Paul of Samosata, Marcellus and Photinus fell into blasphemy that was completely contrary to this: for they preach that Christ is only a man, and deny His Divinity, which existed before the ages. Arius and Eunomius call the Deity of the Only Begotten created and say that He took upon Himself one body; and Apollinaris, although he admits that He took on an animate body, deprives the rational soul, in his writings, of both honor and salvation. Such is the difference in damaged dogmas. If you love the truth, then tell me, should you enter into any kind of reasoning with those who err, or should you leave them to themselves, while they are rushing into the abyss? Yeranist. It is inhumane to despise the sick! Orthodox. Therefore, it is necessary to sympathize with them and heal them according to strength. Orthodox. But if you knew how to heal bodily illnesses, then, being besieged on all sides by sick people, each of whom would present to you their own sufferings, for example, one - suppuration of the eyes, another - wounds on the ears, one - pain in the teeth, one - excessive tension of the nerves, another - weakening of them, one - excess bile, another - phlegm, tell me what would you do? Would he offer one medicine to all of them, or would he offer his own medicine to each disease? Yeranist. Obviously, each disease requires its own medicine, which drives out that particular disease and not another. Orthodox. Do you want to say that the disease you are driving away will only obey you when you prescribe cooling medicines to someone suffering from fever, use warming against cooling, relieve excessive nerve tension, strengthen weakness with tonics, dry up excess moisture, and counteract dryness with moisture? Is it so? Yeranist. This is how the main law of medical science commands to heal, for the opposite is healed by the opposite. Orthodox. Therefore, when arguing against heresies, shouldn’t we give each of them a decent medicine? Orthodox. But won’t there be a decent medicine when we fill in what is missing in their confession and cut off what is superfluous? Orthodox. So, trying to heal Photinus, Marcellus and other heretics close to them, what should we add to their confession in order to fulfill the law of medical science? Yeranist. Confession of the Divinity of Christ, which they lack. Orthodox. But will it be necessary to tell them about humanity, while they confess the Lord Christ to be a man? Orthodox. Discussing with Arius and Eunomius about the incarnation of the Only Begotten, what do we advise them to add to their confession? Yeranist. The Only Begotten taking on a soul: for they say that God the Word took on one body. Orthodox. And what does Apollinaris lack for the perfection of his teaching about the incarnation? Yeranist. He must not separate the mind from the soul, but must confess that the rational soul is also received along with the body. Orthodox. What do Marcion, Manes, Valentinus and those close to them profess and what do they reject? Yeranist. They say that they believe in the Divinity of Christ, but do not admit His humanity. Orthodox. Therefore, we will try to convince them so that they accept the teaching about humanity with love, and do not regard the Divine construction of our salvation as a ghost. Yeranist. This is how it should be done, and not otherwise. Orthodox. So, let us tell them that Jesus Christ should be called not only God, but also man. Orthodox. But how can we force others to call Christ a man when we ourselves reject this name? For they will not listen to our convictions, but will also accuse us of the fact that we are of the same mind with them. Yeranist. Can they consider us to be like-minded people when we confess that God the Word took on flesh and a rational soul? Orthodox. But why run about in the name when we confess the very thing? Yeranist. Christ must be called from that nature which is more venerable. Orthodox. Observing the rule you proposed, it will not be possible for us to call Christ either crucified or risen from the dead, or to assert anything else similar about him. Yeranist. These are the names of saving sufferings; but whoever rejects suffering destroys salvation. Orthodox. But the name: “man” is the name of nature; silence about nature is its rejection, and whoever rejects nature destroys suffering, without which salvation will remain a word without a thing. Yeranist. I consider it necessary to know that human nature is perceived; but to call the Savior of the universe a man means to diminish the glory of the Sovereign. Orthodox. So, do you consider yourself wiser than Peter and Paul, and even the Savior himself? For the Lord said to the Jews: “Why are you seeking to kill Me, the man who spoke the truth to you” from My Father (John 8:40); He also often called himself the son of man. And the all-praised Peter speaks thus to the Jewish people: “Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man known among you from God,” etc. (Acts 2:22). And Blessed Paul, offering the leaders of the Areopagus the saving gospel, among other things said: “Despising the years of ignorance, God now commands all men everywhere to repent: He has not appointed the day, in which He will judge the world in righteousness about the Man, Who has presented Him with faith, giving to all, by raising Him from the dead” (Acts 17:30-31). So, whoever rejects the name ordained and preached by the Lord and the apostles considers himself wiser than the great teachers, and even the very Source of the wisest teachers. Yeranist. Yes, they offered this teaching to the infidels; now the greatest part of the universe has accepted the faith. Orthodox. On the contrary, there are still Jews, and pagans, and countless hosts of heretics, and it is necessary to offer decent teaching to each generation of erring ones. But if everyone were of the same mind, tell me, what do you find harmful in confessing Christ as God and man? Do we not see in Him both perfect Divinity and full humanity? Yeranist. We have often said that this is our confession. Orthodox. Why now reject what we already confess? Yeranist. I consider it unnecessary to call Christ a man, especially when the faithful converse with the faithful. Orthodox. Do you consider the Divine Apostle faithful? Yeranist. Not only faithful, but also a teacher of all believers. Orthodox. Do you consider Timothy worthy of the same name? Yeranist. As a student of Pavlov and a teacher of others. Orthodox. Listen, then, to how the teacher of teachers writes to his most perfect disciple: “There is one God, and one Advocate for God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself redemption for all” (1 Tim. 2:5-6). So, stop talking idlely, prescribing to us laws about divine names, when the very name of the mediator (intercessor), used here, means Divinity and humanity. Jesus Christ could not be called a mediator if He were only God, because how could He fulfill the office of mediator between God and us if He had nothing of ours? But since He, as God, is united with the Father, being consubstantial with Him, and as a man, He is united with us, having borrowed from us the form of a servant: He is rightly called a mediator, as uniting in himself separated natures, that is, Divinity and humanity. Yeranist. Was not Moses called a mediator, although he was only a man? Orthodox. Moses was the image of truth; the image does not have everything that the truth has. For this reason, although he was not by nature God, he was nevertheless called God in order to express the image in himself. “Behold, you have given thee,” it is said, “a god to Pharaoh” (Ex. 7:1), and as to God, a prophet is assigned to him, for it is said: “And Aaron your brother will be your prophet.” And the truth is where God is God by nature, and at the same time man by nature. Yeranist. But who would call an image someone who does not have the clear features of the prototype? Orthodox. Don't you call royal images images of the king? And yet they do not have everything that the prototype has: for, firstly, they are inanimate and devoid of reason; further, they do not have internal organs, such as the womb, liver, etc. Then, although they have the appearance of external feelings, they do not have their strength: the ears do not hear, the lips do not speak, the eyes do not see, the hands do not write, the legs do not walk, and in general not a single member exhibits the actions characteristic of a person. And yet they are called royal images. So exactly Moses is a mediator, and Christ is a mediator; but the first is like a likeness and an image, and the last is like truth. But to make this subject clearer to you, remember what the Epistle to Hebrews says about Melchizedek. Orthodox. I mean the place in which the divine apostle, comparing the Levitical priesthood with the priesthood of Christ, likened Melchizedek to the Lord Christ, saying that the Lord has a priesthood according to the order of Melchizedek. Yeranist. I remember that the divine apostle speaks about this this way: “This Melchizedek is the king of Salem, the priest of the Most High God, who slaughtered Abraham, having returned from the slaughter of the kings, and bless him: to whom Abraham also separated tithes from all: first of all, the king of righteousness is said, then the king of Salem, who is the king of the world: without a father, without a mother, without a clergyman, no beginning of the day, no having an end to life: he is likened to the Son of God, and remains a priest forever” (Heb. 7:1-3). Did you understand these words? Orthodox. The same ones. And I praise you that you brought the passage intact - without truncation. Tell me, do all the traits that are attributed to him here befit Melchizedek by nature and truth? Yeranist. Who dares to separate what the divine apostle united? Orthodox. So, do you say that all this befits Melchizedek by nature? Orthodox. Do you consider Melchizedek to be a man, or do you think that he took on a different nature? Orthodox. Born or unborn? Yeranist. You are asking very ridiculous questions. Orthodox. But you yourself are to blame for this: for you are clearly fighting against the truth. So, answer. Yeranist. There is only one unborn - God and Father. Orthodox. Therefore we must call Melchizedek born? Orthodox. But from what is said about him, the opposite is seen. Remember what you just read: “without a father, without a mother, without a clergyman, without a beginning by day, without an end to life.” How can these traits befit Melchizedek when they exceed human nature? Yeranist. Indeed, they exceed the measure of human nature. Orthodox. What then? Did the apostle really tell a lie? Orthodox. How should we act in order to preserve both the truth for the apostle and the traits that exceed human nature for Melchizedek? Yeranist. This place is very dark and requires careful interpretation. Orthodox. For those who are attentive, it will not be difficult to comprehend its meaning. The Apostle, having said: “without father, without mother, without clergy, having neither beginning to day, nor end to life,” added: “he is likened to the Son of God, a priest remains.” By this he clearly teaches us that the prototype of Melchizedek in features that exceed human nature is Christ the Lord. But we will consider this subject in the following way. Tell me, did our Lord have a father according to the flesh? Yeranist. Because he was born from the Holy Virgin. Orthodox. Therefore, is He rightly called edematous? Orthodox. Further, do you assert that He had a mother by Divine nature? Orthodox. Because the world was born before from one Father? Orthodox. For the same reason, he is called without genealogy, as having an ineffable birth from the Father: for, as the prophet says: “Who can confess His generation” (Is. 53:8)? Yeranist. Your reasoning is correct. Orthodox. Therefore, it behooves Him to have neither a beginning of days nor an end of life: for He is beginningless and endless and, in short, eternal and co-eternal with the Father. Yeranist. And I also think about this. But it is necessary to find the reason why this same thing befits the wonderful Melchizedek. Orthodox. It befits him as an image and image. But the image, as we said before, does not have everything that the prototype has. What belongs to the Savior by nature and truth, ancient history ascribed to Melchizedek by silence about his genealogy. This story names the father of Abraham, the father and mother of Isaac, as well as Jacob and his sons, and in continuous order enumerates the forefathers, but, speaking of Melchizedek, it does not name either his father or mother, does not say from which of the children of Noah he descends, and all this for the purpose of prescribing in him the image of the One who in fact has neither mother nor father. The divine apostle himself teaches us to understand this in this way, when in the same place he adds the following: “But he who is not of Abraham’s generation is counted among them, and bless him who has the promise” (Heb. 7:6). Yeranist. But can it be said about Melchizedek that he is without a father and without a mother - just because the Divine Scripture did not mention his parents? Orthodox. If he really were without a father and without a mother, he would no longer be an image, but the truth. But since this belongs to him not by nature, but by the structure of Divine Scripture, he shows in himself the image of truth. Yeranist. But the image must have the features of the prototype. Orthodox. Isn't man called the image of God? Yeranist. Man is not the image of God, but is created in the image of God. Orthodox. Listen to what the apostle says: “A man should not cover the head, the image and glory of God” (1 Cor. 11:7). Orthodox. So, if we follow your judgment, man would have to retain the clear features of the prototype, that is, to be neither created, nor complex, nor describable; He would have to create from nothing, produce everything without labor, in a word, and besides, neither be sick, nor grieve, nor be angry, nor sin, but be immortal and incorruptible and have everything that has an archetype. Yeranist. Man is not in all respects the image of God. Orthodox. But no matter in what respect you agree to recognize man as the image of God, you will always find an immeasurable distance between the image and the truth. Orthodox. Consider also the following: the divine apostle called the Son the image of the Father, saying about Him: “Who is the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15). Yeranist. What then? Doesn't the Son have everything that the Father has? Orthodox. Not all. The Son is not the Father, is not completely uncaused, is not unborn: for if He had this, He would not be the Son. Therefore, I rightly said that the image does not have everything that the prototype has. Orthodox. In this sense, the divine apostle said about Melchizedek that he was “like the Son of God.” Yeranist. Let us assume that in this sense it is said about Melchizedek: “without father, without mother, without clergy of the family”; but how to understand the following words: “having neither beginning by day, nor end by day?” Orthodox. The inspired Moses, outlining the genealogy of the forefathers, tells us that Adam, being of such and such years, gave birth to Seth, and after living for so many years, he died. We read the same thing from him about Seth, about Enos and about others; but he kept silent about the birth of Melchizedek and the end of his life; therefore, Melchizedek only in history does not have “a beginning with a day and an end with life,” but in fact the only begotten Son of God is beginningless and endless. Yeranist. Everyone agrees on this. Orthodox. In these godly and truly divine features, Melchizedek is the image of the Lord Christ, and in the priesthood, which belongs more to man than to God, Jesus Christ became a Bishop “according to the order of Melchizedek” (Heb. 6:20; Psalm 109:4). For just as Melchizedek was the priest of the “tongues,” so the Lord Christ offered the all-holy and saving sacrifice for “all” people. Yeranist. We have already talked too much about this subject. Orthodox. But it would be necessary to say even more: because you yourself said that this place is difficult to understand. Yeranist. Now let's return to the above question. Orthodox. What was the subject of our research? Yeranist. When I argued that Christ should not be called a man, but only God, you cited a lot of evidence and, among other things, the apostolic saying in the letter to Timothy: “there is one God and one Advocate for God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself redemption for all” (1 Tim. 2:5-6). Orthodox. Now I remember why we went into this retreat. When I said that the very name of the mediator indicates two natures in the Savior, you objected that Moses, who was only a man, and not God and man, was also called a mediator. This forced me to extend my proof to the fact that the image does not have everything that the prototype has. Tell me, do you agree that the Savior Christ should also be called a man? Yeranist. As the Son of God, I call Him God. Orthodox. If you call Him God because He is the Son of God, then call Him man, because He Himself repeatedly calls Himself the Son of man. Yeranist. The name of man does not befit Him as much as the name of God. Orthodox. Why? Is it because it is not true, or for some other reason? Yeranist. The name: “God” is the name of nature, and the name: “man” is the name of the building of salvation. Orthodox. But is the construction of salvation true, or illusory and false? Orthodox. So, if the grace of construction is true, and we call the incarnation of God the Word construction, then the name “man” is true: for by the perception of human nature He is called man. Yeranist. He was called a man before He suffered, but after His suffering He is not called that. Orthodox. But the divine apostle wrote to Timothy after the suffering and resurrection of Christ, and yet he called the Savior Christ a man. After suffering and resurrection, he wrote to the Corinthians, where among other things we read: “For death was made by man, and the resurrection of the dead by man” (1 Cor. 15:21); and to show who he was talking about in this place, he added: “For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all live” (1 Cor. 22). After suffering and resurrection, the divine Peter, reasoning with the Jews; called Him husband (Acts 2:22). After Christ’s ascension into heaven, the first martyr Stephen, being stoned, said to the Jews: “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God” (Acts 7:56). We should not consider ourselves wiser than the great preachers of truth. Yeranist. I do not consider myself wiser than the holy teachers, but I do not find any need for this name. Orthodox. But in what way will you convince those who reject the humanity of the Lord, such as the Marcionists and Manichaeans and others suffering from the same illness, in what way will you convince them to accept the teaching of the truth? Shouldn't you offer evidence that the Lord Christ is called not only God, but also man? Yeranist. Of course, they need to offer it. Orthodox. But why don’t you want to teach the truth of dogma to the faithful? Have you forgotten the apostolic statute, which commands us to be “ever ready to answer every question that asks us concerning the hope we have” (1 Peter 3:15)? Let's use a comparison. Does a good military leader alone fight the enemies, shooting arrows at them, hitting them with a spear, breaking their ranks, or does he arm his own soldiers, build them into ranks and inspire them with courage? Yeranist. This is his real business. Orthodox. The divine Paul does the same when he says to believers: “Put on the full armor of God, for you are able to stand against the wiles of the devil” (Eph. 6:11); and again: “Gird up your loins with truth, and put on the breastplate of righteousness” (Eph. 6:14). Remember also what we talked about above, that is, that the doctor gives the patient’s body exactly what it lacks; if there is an excess of cold in the body, then instead of it it supplies heat and cold. This is what the Lord himself did. Yeranist. How do you know about this? Orthodox. From the Holy Gospels. Orthodox. Who did the Jews consider the Savior Christ to be? Orthodox. And that He and God existed, they didn’t know about it at all? Orthodox. Was it really not necessary to teach them this? Orthodox. Listen, then, to what the Lord says to them: “Many good works have been shown to you from My Father: for whose work do you lay a stone against Me” (John 10:32)? And when they said: “About a good deed we will not lay stones against You, but about blasphemy: for You, this man, have made God for yourself,” He added: “Is it not written in your law: I am God, you are God? You said blasphemy and said: I am the Son of God. Unless I do the works of My Father, do not have faith in Me: for I am in My Father, and the Father is in Me” (John 10:33–38). Yeranist. From the testimony you provided, it is clear that the Lord was proving to the Jews his Divinity, and not his humanity. Orthodox. Yes, they had no need to learn what they already knew: that Christ was a man, they already knew that, but they did not know that he was also God. The Lord did the same with the Pharisees: seeing that they were approaching Him as a simple man, He asked them: “What do you think about Christ, whose son is?” And when they said to Him: “David,” He added: “How then does David call His Lord by the Spirit, saying: The Lord says to my Lord, Sit at My right hand,” and concludes: “If David calls His Lord, what son is he?” Yeranist. With this testimony you refute yourself: for, obviously, here the Lord teaches the Pharisees to call Him not the son, but the Lord of David; therefore requires that He be called God, and not man. Orthodox. It seems that you have not thoroughly grasped the divine teaching. The Lord did not forbid calling Himself the son of David, but added that one must still believe that He is the Lord of David. This is especially evident from the following words: “if David calls His Lord, for he has a son.” He did not say: if the Lord is the Lord, then he is no longer a son, but - “What kind of son does he have?” that is, in what respect is He the Lord, and in what respect is He the son? And this obviously shows both Divinity and humanity. Yeranist. There is no need for conclusions when the Lord himself clearly teaches that He does not want to be called the son of David. Orthodox. Therefore, He had to teach the blind, the Canaanite wife, and the people not to call Him the son of David: because the blind cried out: “Son of David, have mercy” on us (Luke 18:38-39), and the Canaanite wife: “Son of David, have mercy on me, my daughter is angry with evil” (Matthew 15:22), and the people cried out: “Hosanna to the son.” David, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” (Matthew 21:9). However, the Lord not only was not offended, but also praised their faith. Yeranist. Before the resurrection, He tolerated these names, forgiving the weaknesses of people who had not achieved perfection in faith, but after the resurrection they are unnecessary. Orthodox. Where do we place Blessed Paul? among those who are perfect in faith, or among those who are imperfect? Yeranist. Obviously, among the most perfect, as teachers of the perfect. Orthodox. But when did he start his preaching? Yeranist. After the Ascension of the Savior, the descent of the Holy Spirit and the murder of Stephen. Orthodox. At the end of his life, writing his last letter to Timothy, and passing on to him, as it were, some kind of paternal inheritance in his will, he says: “Remember the Lord Jesus Christ, who rose from the dead from the seed of David, according to my gospel” (2 Tim. 2:8). Yeranist. That the Lord, offering to those who listened precisely the teaching that was lacking in the fullness of their faith, proved His Divinity to the Pharisees and other Jews, I heard this from you; but show me where He teaches about His flesh. Orthodox. It was completely unnecessary to teach about the flesh, because everyone saw it in eating, and in drinking, and in labor, and in sleep. But, after the resurrection, the Lord revealed to the unbelieving apostles not His Divinity, but humanity. “You see,” He said, “my hands and my nose, as I myself am: touch Me and see that a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see Me has” (Luke 24:39). So, I fulfilled what I promised, showing that the Lord offered the teaching about the Divinity to those who did not know His Divinity, and the teaching about the flesh to those who did not believe in the resurrection of the flesh. Therefore, leaving aside strife, confess the two natures of the Savior. Yeranist. There were two natures before the union, and when united they became one. Orthodox. When did the connection take place? Yeranist. Immediately at conception. Orthodox. But did God the Word exist before conception? Yeranist. Not only before conception, but also before age. Orthodox. Was the flesh always part of Him? Yeranist. No, it was formed by the Holy Spirit after the angelic gospel. Orthodox. Therefore, before the union there were not two natures, but only one. For if the Divinity existed from eternity, and humanity was not co-inherent with it, as formed together with the angelic greeting, and if the union of natures is identical with incarnation, then it follows that before the union there was one nature, as existing before the ages, and after the union there were two: received and accepted. And that each of these natures, after their union, remained whole and unadulterated, Holy Scripture testifies to this. Yeranist. But after the union I recognize only one nature. Orthodox. At what time did the evangelists write their Gospels: before the union of natures, or after the union? Yeranist. Obviously, after the union: since they wrote after Christmas, miracles, suffering, resurrection, the ascension of Christ into heaven and the descent of the Holy Spirit. Orthodox. Listen to what John says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was to God, and God was the Word. This one from time immemorial was unto God, all things were by Him, and without Him nothing came into being”, etc. (John 1:1-3), and Matthew: “the book of the joy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham”, etc. (Matthew 1:1); Luke also produces Him from Abraham and David. Can you, accepting one nature in Christ, agree the gospel of the first Evangelist with the gospel of the last two? Obviously, you cannot: for to be in the beginning and to come from Abraham, to be the Creator of everything and to have a created progenitor, are mutually contradictory expressions. But let's study this subject in more detail. Tell me, do you believe that God the Word is the Creator of everything? Yeranist. This is how the Divine Scripture teaches me to believe. Orthodox. But on what day, after the creation of heaven and earth, was Adam created? Orthodox. How many generations separate Adam from Abraham? Yeranist. I think it's twenty. Orthodox. And from Abraham to our Savior Christ, how many generations does the Evangelist Matthew count? Orthodox. So, if Christ the Lord is one nature, then how is it possible that He was both the Creator of everything visible and invisible, and at the same time, after so many generations, He was conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin? How is it possible that He was both the Creator of Adam and at the same time the son of Adam’s descendants? Yeranist. I have already said before that both befit the incarnate God; for I know one incarnate nature of the Word. Orthodox. And we, my dear, do not affirm that two natures of the Word were incarnate, for we know one nature of God the Word, but together we are taught that the flesh which He took on and became incarnate is of a different nature than the Word. You will see for yourself. Tell me, was the incarnation accomplished through a change? Yeranist. I don’t know the image of the incarnation, but I believe that the Word became incarnate. Orthodox. In this answer you imitate the Pharisees, who, seeing the power of the Lord of the question and fearing reproof, said to Him: “We do not know” (Matthew 21:27). I, on the contrary, loudly preach that the Divine incarnation is free from change: for, otherwise, neither the names nor the deeds of the Divine could befit the incarnate one. Yeranist. That God the Word is irreplaceable, we have already affirmed this more than once. Orthodox. Therefore He became incarnate, taking on flesh. Orthodox. But the other is the nature of God the Word incarnate, and the other is the nature of the flesh assumed by God the Word. Thus, if the incarnation was accomplished not through change, but through the perception of flesh, and properties, both Divine and human, are attributed to Christ as God incarnate; then it follows that the natures were not mixed by incarnation, but remained whole. Understanding the Incarnation in this way, we will see perfect agreement between the Evangelists: for one of them preaches about the Divine properties of one and the same Only Begotten, that is, the Lord Christ, the other - about the human ones. The Lord himself teaches us this when in one place he calls himself the Son of God, in another – the Son of man; sometimes he honors his mother as a parent, and sometimes he forbids her as a Master (Luke 2:51; John 2:4); sometimes he approves of those who call Him the son of David, sometimes he teaches the ignorant that He is not only the son, but also the Lord of David; sometimes he calls Nazareth and Capernaum his fatherland, sometimes he cries out: “before even Abraham was not, I am” (John 8:58). Divine Scripture is filled with such passages, and they show that in Christ there is not one, but two natures. Yeranist. And I reject the fusion of natures, but I do not affirm two natures, so as not to introduce two sons. Therefore, I think that the Divinity remains intact, and humanity is absorbed into the Divinity. Orthodox. These are the fables of the pagans and the ravings of the Manichaeans, about which it is shameful to even speak: for the former wrote a lot about the perfections of the gods, and the latter - about the daughter of light; We turn away from such teaching, not only as impious, but also as senseless: for how did a simple and uncomplicated nature, all-embracing, inaccessible and indescribable, swallow up the nature that it accepted? Yeranist. Just as the sea absorbs a drop of sweet water, which immediately disappears after mixing with sea water. Orthodox. But between the sea and a drop of water, if there is a difference, it is only in quantity and quality: one is very small, the other is very large; one is sweet, the other is salty; in everything else they have great affinity with each other: for both have a moist and flowing nature, both have in common that they are created and soulless, and both are called body. Therefore, there is nothing absurd in the fact that related natures, having united, undergo confusion and are absorbed by one another; but between the Divine and human natures the difference is infinite, and mixing them is a sheer impossibility. But I can give you many objects that, when combined, do not merge with each other, but remain intact. For example, doesn’t the light of the rising sun fill all the air, spreading throughout the entire air? Orthodox. But in illuminated air, don’t we see light, and don’t we call it light? Orthodox. And yet, even in the presence of light in it, the air does not lose its qualities, for even in the light we feel dryness, and humidity, and warmth, and cold. After the removal of light, the air remains air, without suffering any change from the light. Yeranist. That's fair. Orthodox. Consider also the following example. Iron thrown into the fire becomes red-hot, and the fire passes through his entire being; How then does such a close connection not change the nature of iron? Thus, if in bodies we see a mutual union without a fusion of natures, then it is completely unreasonable to assume such a fusion in an incorruptible and unchangeable nature and the destruction of the nature perceived by it. Yeranist. I do not say that the perceived nature is destroyed, but I affirm that it has changed into a Divine being. Orthodox. Consequently, the human race no longer has the same limitations. But tell me, when did this change take place? Yeranist. I have said more than once that it is in conception. Orthodox. But upon conception He (Jesus Christ) was a fetus in the womb and, having been born, was and was called a baby, receiving worship from the shepherds, and was also a child, which was called from an angel (Luke 2:12). Since all this is characteristic of human nature, then if the union took place at the time of conception, it is obvious that humanity did not lose its nature after the union. Yeranist. I confess that I incorrectly determined the time of application. The flesh received its transformation into the Divine nature after the resurrection from the dead. Orthodox. Therefore, after the resurrection, there was nothing left in the flesh that would show its nature? Yeranist. If it had remained, then, obviously, the Divine change would not have followed. Orthodox. How did Jesus Christ, to assure the apostles, show them “his hands and nose?” Yeranist. In exactly the same way that He entered them, “by the closed door.” Orthodox. But “by the closed door” He entered exactly as He came from the womb, without breaking the seal of virginity, and as He walked on the waters. But then, in your own words, there was no transformation of nature yet. Yeranist. The Lord showed his hands to the apostles exactly as He wrestled with Jacob. Orthodox. The Lord does not allow us to think like this: for He showed the apostles the nature of the flesh for the purpose so that they would not think that they were seeing a spirit before them. “Why are you troubled,” He says to them, “and why are thoughts entering your hearts? You see My hand and nose, for I myself am. Handle Me and see that a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see Me having” (Luke 24:38-39). He did not say: “being flesh and bones,” but: “having flesh and bones,” in order to show that there is another thing that “has” by nature, and another thing that it has: for just as there is another thing that has received and another that has been accepted, in both there is one Christ, so there is a great difference between what has and what it has, without dividing, however, the Christ thus represented into two persons. But when the apostles were still perplexed, the Lord demanded food from them, and “we will eat food before them.” This eating, although it was not the satisfaction of the body’s needs, was also not a ghost. Yeranist. In my opinion, one of two things must be assumed: either the Lord ate food out of a feeling of need, or, if this need is not assumed, then He only pretended to eat food, but in fact did not eat it. Orthodox. The body, which had become immortal, of course, had no need for food, as the Lord said about those who would be resurrected: “there they neither marry nor fast, but they are like angels” (Mark 12:25). But that He actually ate food, the apostles testify to this. Blessed Luke says at the beginning of the Acts: “The Lord, who was poisonous” with the apostles, “commanded them not to leave Jerusalem” (Acts 1:4). Peter says even more clearly: “those who were with Him were poisoned and beaten, after His resurrection from the dead” (Acts 10:41). For, since it is natural for those in this life to eat food, the Lord, through eating and drinking, proved the resurrection of the flesh to those who doubted it. He did exactly this with Lazarus and the daughter of Jairus, commanding that they give her “food” (Mark 5:43; John 12:2). Yeranist. If we admit that the Lord actually ate food, then we will have to agree that all people, after the resurrection, will eat it. Orthodox. What the Savior did, according to some special construction, is not the rule and definition of nature: because He also created something else that will not be in the resurrected bodies. Orthodox. Will the bodies of the resurrected be incorruptible and immortal? Yeranist. The divine Paul teaches us this, saying: “It is sown into corruption and raised in incorruption; it is not sown in honor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness and raised in strength; a spiritual body is sown, a spiritual body is raised” (1 Cor. 15:42–44). Orthodox. But the Lord, who has the power to resurrect bodies intact and intact (without bodily defects), left in His own body traces of nails and pierced ribs, as evidenced by both the Lord Himself and the hand of Thomas, which touched Him (John 20:27). Orthodox. So, if the Lord, after the resurrection, ate food, and showed His disciples his hands and feet, and the marks of the nails and spears with which His ribs were pierced, and said to them: “Handle Me and see that a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see Me having” (Luke 24:39): then it follows that even after the resurrection the nature of the flesh was preserved, and was not transformed into something else. nature. Yeranist. Therefore, even after the resurrection it is subject to suffering and death? Orthodox. No way; on the contrary, it is imperishable, impassive and immortal. Yeranist. And if it is incorruptible, passionless and immortal, then it follows that it was transformed into another nature. Orthodox. If this consequence were correct, then for the same reason it would be possible to conclude that the bodies of all people will be transformed into another essence: for they will all be incorruptible and immortal. But haven’t you heard what the apostle says: “It is fitting for this corruptible to put on incorruption, and for this mortal to put on immortality” (1 Cor. 15:53)? Orthodox. Consequently, nature remains whole, only its perishability changes into incorruptibility and mortality into immortality. But we will consider this subject in the following way. Don't we call both a healthy and a sick body the same thing as a body? Yeranist. Because both have the same essence. Orthodox. However, we see a big difference between them: because one of them is healthy, whole and undamaged, the other, on the contrary, either has an eye gouged out, or a leg is broken, or there is some other defect. Yeranist. But both health and illness are in the same nature. Orthodox. Therefore, the body should be called a being, and illness and health - an accident. Yeranist. Fair, because illness may or may not happen to the body. Orthodox. Consequently, both damage and death are names of accidents, and not of essence. Orthodox. Consequently, the human body, having risen free from corruption, will also be freed from mortality, without losing its own nature. Orthodox. Consequently, the Master’s body, although it has risen incorruptible, passionless, immortal, shining with Divine glory, and although it is honored with worship from the heavenly Powers: nevertheless, it is all a body, and has the same limitations. Yeranist. This is true; but I do not think that you would argue that it, even after its ascension into heaven, was not transformed into the Divine nature. Orthodox. I will not allow myself to speak based on human speculation: for I am not so bold as to assert anything that is silent in the divine Scripture. But I hear the voice of St. Paul: “God has appointed a day, in which He wills to judge the world in righteousness, concerning the Man whom He has ordained, giving faith to all, having raised Him from the dead” (Acts 17:31). I also hear the voice of St. angels: “This Jesus will come again in the same way” the disciples saw “Him going into heaven” (Acts 1:11). But they saw a limited nature, not an unlimited one. I also hear what the Lord himself says: “See the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven” (Matthew 26:64). But I know that what is subject to human vision is limited: for the unlimited nature is inaccessible to vision. In addition, to sit on the throne of glory and “set the sheep at your right hand, and the goats at your left” (Matthew 25:31-33) also shows limitations. Yeranist. But from this it follows that God the Word was not unlimited even before His incarnation: for the prophet saw Him surrounded by Seraphim. Orthodox. The prophet saw not the being of God, but some image adapted to his acceptability. But after the resurrection, all people will see the most visible nature of the Judge. Yeranist. Having promised not to speak a single word without confirming it with the testimony of Scripture, you now offer me your conclusions. Orthodox. What I am affirming, I borrow from the Holy Scriptures: for the prophet Zechariah says: “They will look upon the one whose blood has broken” (Zechariah 12:10). Can this prophecy be fulfilled if the crucifiers do not recognize the nature that they crucified? Also St. the victorious Stephen cried out: “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God” (Acts 1:56). But he saw the nature that is visible, and not the invisible. Yeranist. All this is in Scripture; but I do not think that you can show me that spirit-bearing men call the body ascended into heaven a body. Orthodox. Listen to what the apostle says: “For our citizenship is in heaven, from where we also wait for our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humility, so that it may be conformed to the body of His glory” (Phil. 3:20-21). From this it is clear that the body has not changed into another nature; but it remained a body, only filled with Divine glory and emitting rays of light. The bodies of the saints will be conformed to this body. Yeranist. Will the bodies of the saints really be completely equal to the body of the Lord? Orthodox. In incorruption and immortality they will also participate, they will also have fellowship in glory, as the apostle says: “For as long as we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified with Him” (Rom 8:17); but in the degree of this glory there will be a great difference: the Lord's body will have the same superiority over the bodies of the saints as the sun has over the stars, or better, as the Lord has over the servants, the illuminator over the illuminated. However, He also gave His own names to His servants: calling Himself Light, He also called the saints Light, saying: “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14); Called the Sun of righteousness, he speaks of his servants: “then the righteous will shine like the sun” (Matthew 13:43). Therefore the bodies of the saints will be conformed to the body of the Lord in quality of glory, but not in degree. Now, it seems, everything that you demanded of me is clearly presented to you. Yeranist. You reasoned very contentedly; but I follow the saints who shone forth in the churches of old. So, show whether they spoke in their writings about the two natures in Christ, after their union. Orthodox. I will read their explanations to you, you will see their evidence. St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch and martyr, says in his letter to the Smyrnae: “I know and believe that even after the resurrection He (Jesus Christ) is in the flesh; and when He came to those who were with Peter, He said to them: Take me, touch Me, and make sure that I am not an incorporeal spirit.” St. Irenaeus, ancient Bishop of Lyons - in the third book against heresies: “Jesus Christ united man with God: for if man had not defeated the adversary to man, then this adversary would have been defeated unjustly; on the other hand, if God had not granted salvation, it would not be firm for us. And if a person were not united with God, he could not participate in incorruption. For it was necessary for the Intercessor of God and men, through his own affinity with both, to unite both in love and like-mindedness, and to bring man to God and to proclaim God to men.” He is also in the third book of the same work: “And again, when (John) says in the epistle: “Everyone who believes, because Jesus Christ is born of God” (1 John 5:1), etc., he shows that he knows one and the same Christ, to whom the gates of heaven were opened when He ascended in the flesh, and who in the same flesh, to which he suffered, will again come to reveal the glory of the Father.” St. Hippolytus, Bishop and Martyr – in a letter to a certain queen: “The Apostle calls Him (Jesus Christ) the firstfruits of the dead, as the firstborn from the dead, who, having risen from the dead and wanting to show that the same body has been resurrected, which died when the disciples doubted this, calling Thomas, said: come, touch and see, “for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see Me having” (John 20:27 )". He also interprets Psalm 23: “He (Jesus Christ) comes to the gates of heaven, He is accompanied by angels; but the gates of heaven were closed. Now for the first time the Powers of Heaven see the flesh rising, and hear from the angels preceding the Savior and Lord: “Lift up your gates, princes, and lift up the gates of eternity, and the King of glory will come in” (Psalm 23:7).” St. Eustathius, Bishop of Antioch and Confessor - in a word about the soul: “Before suffering, He (Jesus Christ) every time predicted His bodily death, saying that He would be handed over to the bishops, and pointing to the victorious sign of the cross. But after suffering, having risen from the dead on the third day, when the disciples doubted His resurrection, appearing to them in the same body, He said that He had all flesh and bones, presenting to their eyes the pierced ribs and the marks of the very nails.” St. Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria - in an essay against Arius: “When the apostle says: “In this way God has exalted Him, and given Him a name that is above every name” (Phil. 2:9), he speaks of the church of His body, and not of the Divinity: for it is not the most high God who is exalted, but the flesh of the most high, and the flesh of the most high is given the name that is above every name. It was not by grace that the Word of God received the name God, but His flesh along with Him was honored with Divine honor.” He is in the same word: “When (John) says: “The Holy Spirit is not with him, but Jesus is not glorified” (John 7:39), he says that His flesh has not yet been glorified: for it is not the Lord of glory that is glorified, but the flesh of the Lord of glory itself receives glory, ascending with Him into heaven.” St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan – in a letter to Emperor Gratian: “We should not understand the words read: “The Lord of glory will be crucified” as if He were crucified in His glory. But since He is God and man, God according to Divinity and man according to the perception of the flesh, it is said: “The God of glory will be crucified”: for He has both natures, that is, Divine and human; in human nature He endured suffering, so that the one who suffered was called inseparably both the Lord of glory and the Son of man, as it is written: “The Son of man who came down from heaven is in heaven” (John 3:13).” St. Basil, Bishop of Caesarea - in a word against Eunomius: “I affirm that to be in the image of God means the same as to be in the essence of God: for just as the words: “we have taken on the form of a servant” mean that our Lord was in the essence of humanity, so whoever says that He “was in the image of God” ascribes to Him the properties of the Divine nature.” St. Gregory of Nazianzus – in his word for the new week: “At His glorious coming He will again come to judge the living and the dead. He will come no longer flesh, but also not incorporeal, in some more God-like body, which he himself knows, in order to be visible from those who pierced Him, and at the same time to remain God, alien to the coarseness of the body.” St. Gregory of Nyssa - in the catechetical word: “If the human soul, united by the necessity of nature with the body, rushes freely everywhere: then what is the need to assert that the Divinity is constrained by the nature of the flesh?” St. Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium - in a word on the text: “My Painful Father Is”: “Distinguish between the natures - God and man: for He (Christ) did not become man by falling away from the Divine, but rather by constant self-improvement from man - God.” St. John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople - in the interpretation of the Gospel of John: “Why does the Evangelist add: “and dwell in us?” As if he were saying this: do not imagine anything incongruous in the word: “to be”: for I said this not about the change of this immutable nature, but about indwelling and dwelling. Dwelling is not identical with dwelling: then it would not be dwelling; for nothing dwells in itself. I said something else in essence: for by the union of natures, God the Word and the flesh are one - not by the fusion of natures, lower by annihilation, but by some inexplicable and ineffable union.” St. Flavian, Bishop of Antioch – in his homily on Epiphany: “But “whoever speaks of the mighty powers of the Lord will make all His praises heard” (Ps. 105:2)? Who will express in words the greatness of the blessings poured out on us? Human nature is united with the Divine, while both (natures) remain whole.” St. Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem - in the IV catechetical teaching: “Believe that the only begotten Son of God, for the sake of our sins, descended from heaven to earth, taking upon himself humanity similar to ours, and being born of the Holy Virgin and the Holy Spirit. Not in the form and ghost, but truly, His incarnation took place; He did not pass through the Virgin as through a canal, but was truly incarnate from her; really ate like us and really drank like us. For if incarnation is a ghost, then salvation will also be a dream. Christ had two natures: He was a man, since He was visible, and at the same time God is invisible; as a man He did indeed eat as we do (for He had flesh like ours); and as God, he fed five thousand people with five loaves; really died as a man; and he raised a four-day-old dead man like God; slept on the ship truly like a man, and walked on the waters like God.” Antiochus, Bishop of Ptolemais: “Do not confuse natures, and you will not be at a loss regarding the construction of salvation.” St. Hilary, Bishop and Confessor - in a word on faith: “He does not know his own life who does not recognize in Jesus Christ both true God and true man. It is equally dangerous to deny Christ Jesus, or the Spirit of God, or the flesh of our body. “Everyone who has confessed Me before men, let us also confess him before My Father who is in heaven. And whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33). This was spoken by the Word made flesh, this was taught by the man Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, for the salvation of the Church, having himself become a mediator in that very sacrament with which He mediated between God and man. He is one - in both natures connected to each other; in each of them is one and the same, but in such a way that, being in one of both, He does not lose the other, so that the born man does not cease to be God, or vice versa, being God, does not cease to be a man. Therefore, the blessedness of true faith is to preach God and man, and to confess the flesh and the Word, and that God knows that He is also man, and that the flesh is not ignorant, that it is also the Word.” Augustine, Bishop of Hippo - in the interpretation of the Gospel of John: “Why are you a heretic? Because Christ is God and man: then when He speaks as a man, you, by slandering Him, are slandering God. He shows the human nature, and you dare to humiliate the Divine nature in Him.” Severian, Bishop of Gabala - in a word for the Nativity of Christ: “Oh, a truly heavenly and earthly mystery, visible and invisible! For such is the born Christ: heavenly and earthly, contained and not contained, visible and not visible; He is heavenly by the nature of Divinity, and earthly by the nature of humanity; visible according to the flesh, invisible according to the Spirit, supported by the body, and not contained according to the Word.” Cyril, Bishop of Alexandria - in his interpretation of the Epistle to the Hebrews: “Although it is said that the only begotten Word of God was hypostatically united with the flesh, we do not affirm that this resulted in a mixture of both natures with each other; on the contrary, each nature remains what it is.” Now you have heard, my friend, the testimonies of the great lamps of the universe, you have seen the rays of their teaching, and you have learned for sure that they preached the unfused union of Divinity and humanity in Jesus Christ not only after His birth, but also after His saving suffering, and resurrection and ascension. Yeranist. I did not think that they distinguished the natures in Jesus Christ after their union, but now I find that they believe that there is an immeasurable difference in that. Orthodox. Only rage and unbridled insolence tend to raise their tongues against these valiant warriors and the most excellent warriors (αριστεων) of the faith. Dialogue III. The Impassible. Orthodoxus and Eranistes. Orth. – In our former discussions we have proven that God the Word is immutable, and became incarnate not by being changed into flesh, but by taking perfect human nature. The divine Scripture, and the teachers of the churches and luminaries of the world have clearly taught us that, after the union, He remained as He was, unmixed, impassible, unchanged, uncircumscribed; and that He preserved unimpaired the nature which He had taken. For the future then the subject before us is that of His passion, and it will be a very profitable one, for then have been brought to us the waters of salvation. Eran. – I am also of opinion that this discourse will be beneficial. I shall not however consent to our former method, but I propose myself to ask questions. Orth. – And I will answer, without making any objection to the change of method. He who has truth on his side, not only when he questions but also when he is questioned, is supported by the might of the truth. Ask then what you will. Eran. – Who, according to your view, suffered the passion? Orth. – Our Lord Jesus Christ. Eran. – Then a man gave us our salvation. Orth. – No; for have we confessed that our Lord Jesus Christ was only man? Eran. – Now define what you believe Christ to be. Orth. – Incarnate Son of the living God. Eran. – And is the Son of God God? Orth. – God, having the same substance as the God Who begat Him. Eran. – Then God experienced the passion. Orth. – If He was nailed to the cross without a body, apply the passion to the Godhead; but if he was made man by taking flesh, why then do you exempt the passible from the passion and subject the impassible to it? Eran. – But the reason why He took flesh was that the impassible might undergo the passion by means of the passible. Orth. – You say impassible and apply passion to Him. Eran. – I said that He took flesh to suffer. Orth. – If He had a nature capable of the Passion He would have suffered without flesh; so the flesh becomes superfluous. Eran. – The divine nature is immortal, and the nature of the flesh mortal, so the immortal was united with the mortal, that through it He might taste of death. Orth. – That which is by nature immortal does not undergo death, even when conjoined with the mortal; this is easy to see. Eran. – Prove it; and remove the difficulty. Orth. – Do you assert that the human soul was immortal, or mortal? Orth. – And is the body mortal or immortal? Eran. – Indubitably mortal. Orth. – And do we say that man consists of these natures? Orth. – So the immortal is conjoined with the mortal? Orth. – But when the connexion or union is at an end, the mortal submits to the law of death, while the soul remains immortal though sin has introduced death, or do you not hold death to be a penalty? Eran. – So divine Scripture teaches. For we learn that when God forbade Adam to partake of the tree of knowledge He added “on the day that ye eat thereof ye shall surely die.” 1 Orth. – Then death is the punishment of them that have sinned? Orth. – Why then, when soul and body have both sinned together, does the body alone undergo the punishment of death? Eran. – It was the body that cast its evil eye upon the tree, and stretched out its hands, and plucked the forbidden fruit. It was the mouth that bit it with the teeth, and ground it small, and then the gullet committed it to the belly, and the belly digested it, and delivered it to the liver; and the liver turned what it had received into blood and passed it on to the hollow vein 2 and the vein to the adjacent parts and they through the rest, and so the theft of the forbidden food pervaded the whole body. Very properly then the body alone underwent the punishment of sin. Orth. – You have given us a physiological disquisition on the nature of food, on all the parts that it goes through and on the modifications to which it is subject before it is assimilated with the body. But there is one point that you have refused to observe, and that is that the body goes through none of these processes which you have mentioned without the soul. When bereft of the soul which is its yoke mate the body lies breathless, voiceless, motionless; the eye sees neither wrong nor right; no sound of voices reaches the ears, the hands cannot stir; the feet cannot walk; the body is like an instrument without music. How then can you say that only the body sinned when the body without the soul cannot even take a breath? Eran. – The body does indeed receive life from the soul, and it furnishes the soul with the penal possession of sin. Orth. – How, and in what manner? Eran. – Through the eyes it makes it see amiss; through the ears it makes it hear unprofitable sounds; and through the tongue utter injurious words, and through all the other parts act ill. Orth. – Then I suppose we may say Blessed are the deaf; blessed are they that have lost their sight and have been deprived of their other faculties, for the souls of men so incapacitated have neither part nor lot in the wickedness of the body. And why, O most sagacious sir, have you mentioned those functions of the body which are culpable, and said nothing about the laudable? It is possible to look with eyes of love and of kindness; it is possible to wipe away a tear of compunction, to hear oracles of God, to bend the ear to the poor, to praise the Creator with the tongue, to give good lessons to our neighbor, to move the hand in mercy, and in a word to use the parts of the body for complete acquisition of goodness. Eran. – This is all true. Orth. – Therefore the observance and transgression of law is common to both soul and body. Orth. – It seems to me that the soul takes the leading part in both, since it uses reasoning before the body acts. Eran. – In what sense do you say this? Orth. – First of all the mind makes, as it were, a sketch of virtue or of vice, and then gives to one or the other form with appropriate material and color, using for its instruments the parts of the body. Orth. – If then the soul sins with the body; nay rather takes the lead in the sin, for to it is entrusted the bridging and direction of the animal part, why, as it shares the sin, does it not also share the punishment? Eran. – But how were it possible for the immortal soul to share death? Orth. – Yet it were just that after sharing the transgression, it should share the chastisement. Orth. – But it didn’t do so. Orth. – At least in the life to come it will be sent with the body to Gehenna. Eran. – So He said “Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” 3 Orth. – Therefore in this life it escapes death, as being immortal; in the life to come, it will be punished, not by undergoing death, but by suffering chastisement in life. Eran. – That is what the divine Scripture says. Orth. – It is then impossible for the immortal nature to undergo death. Orth. – How then do you say, God the Word tasted death? For if that which was created immortal is seen to be incapable of becoming mortal, how is it possible for him that is without creation and eternally immortal, Creator of mortal and immortal natures alike, to partake of death? Eran. – We too know that His nature is immortal, but we say that He shared death in the flesh. Orth. – But we have plainly shewn that it is in no wise possible for that which is by nature immortal to share death, for even the soul created together with, and conjoined with, the body and sharing in its sin, does not share death with it, on account of the immortality of its nature alone. But let us look at this same position from another point of view. Eran. – There is every reason why we should leave no means untried to arrive at the truth. Orth. – Let us then examine the matter thus. Do we assert that of virtue and vice versa some are teachers and some are followers? Orth. – And do we say that the teacher of virtue deserves greater recompense? Orth. – And similarly the teacher of vice deserves twofold and threefold punishment? Orth. – And what part shall we assign to the devil, that of teacher or disciple? Eran. – Teacher of teachers, for he himself is father and teacher of all iniquity. Orth. – And who of men became his first disciples? Orth. – And who received the sentence of death? Eran. – Adam and all his race. Orth. – Then the disciples were punished for the bad lessons they had learned, but the teacher, whom we have just declared to deserve two-fold and three-fold chastisement, got off the punishment? Orth. – And though this so came about we both acknowledge and declare that the Judge is just. Orth. – But, being just, why did He not exact an account from him of his evil teaching? Eran. – He prepared for him the unquenchable flame of Gehenna, for, He says, “Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” 4 And the reason why he did not here share death with his disciples is because he has an immortal nature. Orth. – Then even the greatest transgressors cannot incur death if they have an immortal nature. Orth. – If then even the very inventor and teacher of iniquity did not incur death on account of the immortality of his nature, do you not shudder at the thought of saying that the fount of immortality and righteousness shared death? Eran. – Had we said that he experienced the passion involuntarily, there would have been some just ground for the accusation which you bring against us. But if the passion which is preached by us was spontaneous and the death voluntary, it becomes you, instead of accusing us, to praise the immensity of His love to man. For He suffered because He willed to suffer, and shared death because He wished it. Orth. – You seem to me to be quite ignorant of the divine nature, for the Lord God wishes nothing inconsistent with His nature, and is able to do all that He wishes, and what He wishes is appropriate and agreeable to His own nature. Eran. – We have learned that all things are possible with God. 5 Orth. – In expressing yourself thus indefinitely you include even what belongs to the Devil, for to say absolutely all things is to name together not only good, but its opposite. Eran. – But did not the noble Job speak absolutely when he said “I know that thou canst do all things and with thee nothing is impossible”? 6 Orth. – If you read what the just man said before, you will see the meaning of the one passage from the other, for he says “Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast made me as the clay and wilt thou bring me into dust again? Hast thou not poured me out as milk and curdled me like cheese? Thou hast clothed me with skin and flesh and hast fenced me with bones and sinews, thou hast granted me life and favor.” 7 And then he adds: – “Having this in myself I know that thou canst do all things and that with thee nothing is impossible.” 8 Is it not therefore all that belongs to these things that he alleges to belong to the incorruptible nature, to the God of the universe? Eran. – Nothing is impossible to Almighty God. Orth. – Then according to your definition sin is possible to Almighty God? Eran. – Because He doesn’t wish it. Orth. – Wherefore does He not wish it? Eran. – Because sin is foreign to His nature. Orth. – Then there are many things which He cannot do, for there are many kinds of transgression. Eran. – Nothing of this kind can be wished or done by God. Orth. – Nor can those things which are contrary to the divine nature. Orth. – As, for instance, we have learned that God is intelligent and true Light. Orth. – And we could not call Him darkness or say that He wished to become, or could become, darkness. Orth. – Again, the Divine Scripture calls His nature invisible. Orth. – And we could never say that It is capable of being made visible. Orth. – Nor comprehensive. Eran. – No; for He is not so. Orth. – No; for He is incomprehensible, and altogether unapproachable. Orth. – And He that is could never become non-existent. Eran. – Away with the thought! Orth. – Nor yet could the Father become Son. Orth. – Nor yet could the unbegotten become begotten. Orth. – And the Father could never become Son? Orth. – Nor could the Holy Ghost ever become Son or Father. Eran. – All this is impossible. Orth. – And we shall find many other things of the same kind, which are similarly impossible, for the Eternal will not become of time, nor the Uncreated and made, nor the infinite finite, and the like. Eran. – None of these is possible. Orth. – So we have found many things which are impossible to Almighty God. Orth. – But not to be able in any of these respects is proof not of weakness, but of infinite power, and to be able would certainly be proof not of power but of impotence. Eran. – How do you say this? Orth. – Because each one of these proclaims the unchangeable and invariable character of God. For the impossibility of good becoming evil signifies the immensity of the goodness; and that He that is just should never become unjust, nor He that is true a liar, exhibits the stability and the strength that there is in truth and righteousness. Thus the true light could never become darkness; He that is could never become nonexistent, for the existence is perpetual and the light is naturally invariable. And so, after examining all other examples, you will find that the not being able is declaratory of the highest power. That things of this kind are impossible in the case of God, the divine Apostle also both perceived and laid down, for in his Epistle to the Hebrews 9 he says, “that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie we might have a strong consolation.” 10 He shews that this incapacity is not weakness, but very power, for he asserts Him to be so true that it is impossible for there to be even a lie in Him. So the power of truth is signed through its want of power. And writing to the blessed Timothy, the Apostle adds “It is a faithful saying, for if we be dead with Him we shall also live with Him, if we suffer we shall also reign with Him; if we deny Him He will also deny us, if we believe not yet He abideth faithful, He cannot deny Himself.” 11 Again then the phrase “He cannot” is indicative of infinite power, for even though all men deny Him He says God is Himself, and cannot exist otherwise than in His own nature, for His being is indestructible. This is what is meant by the words “He cannot deny Himself.” Therefore the impossibility of change for the worse proves infinity of power. Eran. – This is quite true and in harmony with the divine words. Orth. – Granted then that with God many things are impossible, – everything, that is, which is repugnant to the divine nature, – how comes it that while you omit all the other qualities which belong to the divine nature, goodness, righteousness, truth, invisibility, incomprehensibility, infinity, and eternity, and the rest of the attributes which we assert to be proper to God, you maintain that His immortality and impassibility alone are subject to change, and in them concede the possibility of variation and give to God a capacity indicator of weakness? Eran. – We have learned this from the divine Scripture. The divine John exclaims “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,” 12 and the divine Paul, “For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more being reconciled we shall be saved by His life.” 13 Orth. – Of course all this is true, for these are divine oracles, 14 but remember what we have often confessed. Orth. – We have confessed that God the Word the Son of God did not appear without a body, but assumed perfect human nature. Eran. – Yes; this we have confessed. Orth. – And He was called Son of Man because He took a body and human soul. Orth. – Therefore the Lord Jesus Christ is verily our God; for of these two natures the one was His from everlasting and the other He assumed. Orth. – While, then, as man He experienced the passion, as God He remained incapable of suffering. Eran. – How then does the divine Scripture say that the Son of God suffered? Orth. – Because the body which suffered was His body. But let us look at the matter thus; when we hear the divine Scripture saying “And it came to pass when Isaac was old his eyes were dim so that he could not see,” 15 whither is our mind carried and on what does it rest, on Isaac's soul or on his body? Eran. – Of course on his body. Orth. – Do we then conjecture that his soul is also shared in the affection of blindness? Orth. – We assert that only his body was deprived of the sense of sight? Orth. – And again when we hear Amaziah saying to the prophet Amos, “Oh thou seer go flee away into the land of Judah,” 16 and Saul enquiring: “Tell me I pray thee where the seer's house is,” 17 we understand nothing bodily. Orth. – And yet the words used are significant of the health of the organ of sight. Orth. – Yet we know that the power of the Spirit when given to purer souls inspires prophetic grace and causes them to see even hidden things, and, in consequence of them thus seeing, they are called seers and beholders. Eran. - What you say is true. Orth. – And let us consider this too. Orth. – When we hear the story of the divine evangelists narrating how they brought to God a man sick of the palsy, laid upon a bed, do we say that this was paralysis of the parts of the soul or of the body? Eran. – Plainly of the body. Orth. – And when while reading the Epistle to the Hebrews we light upon the passage where the Apostle says “Where lift up the hands which hang down and the feeble knees and make straight paths for your feet lest that which is lame be turned out of the way, but let it rather be healed,” 18 do we say that the divine Apostle said these things about the parts of the body? Orth. – Shall we say that he was for removing the feebleness and infirmity of the soul and stimulating the disciples to manliness? Orth. – But we do not find these things distinguished in the divine Scripture, for in describing the blindness of Isaac he made no reference to the body, but spoke of Isaac as absolutely blind, nor in describing the prophets as seers and beholders did he say that their souls saw and beheld what was hidden, but mentioned the persons themselves. Orth. – And he did not point out that the body of the paralytic was palsied, but called the man a paralytic. Orth. – And even the divine Apostle made no special mention of the souls, though it was these that he intended to strengthen and to rouse. Orth. – But when we examine the meaning of the words, we understand which belongs to the soul and which to the body. Eran. – And very naturally; for God made us reasonable beings. Orth. – Then let us make use of this reasoning faculty in the case of our Maker and Saviour, and let us recognize what belongs to His Godhead and what to His manhood. Eran. – But by doing this we shall destroy the supreme union. Orth. – In the case of Isaac, of the prophets, of the man sick of the palsy, and of the rest, we did so without destroying the natural union of the soul and of the body; we did not even separate the souls from their proper bodies, but by reason alone distinguished what belonged to the soul and what to the body. Is it not then monstrous that while we take this course in the case of souls and bodies, we should refuse to do so in the case of our Saviour, and confound natures which differ not in the same proportion as soul from body, but in as vast a degree as the temporal from the eternal and the Creator from the created? Eran. – The divine Scripture says that the Son of God experienced the passion. Orth. – We deny that it was suffered by any other, but none the less, taught by the divine Scripture, we know that the nature of the Godhead is impassible. We are told of impassibility and of passion, of manhood and of Godhead, and we therefore attribute the passion to the passible body, and confess that no passion was undergone by the nature that was impassible. Eran. – Then a body won our salvation for us. Orth. – Yes; but not a mere man's body, but that of our Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God. If you regard this body as insignificant and of small account, how can you hold its type to be an object of worship and a means of salvation? and how can the archetype be contemptible and insignificant of that of which the type is adorable and honorable? Eran. – I do not look at the body as of small account, but I object to dividing it from the Godhead. Orth. – We, my good sir, do not divide the union but we regard the peculiar properties of the natures, and I am sure that in a moment you will take the same view. Eran. – You talk like a prophet. Orth. – No; not like a prophet, but as knowing the power of truth. But now answer me this. When you hear the Lord saying “I and my Father are one,” 19 and “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father,” 20 do you say that this refers to the flesh or to the Godhead? Eran. – How can the flesh and the Father possibly be of one substance? Orth. – Then these passages indicate the Godhead? Orth. – And so with the text, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was God,” 21 and the like. Orth. – Again when the divine Scripture says, “Jesus therefore being wearied with his journey sat thus on the well,” 22 of what is the weariness to be understood, of the Godhead or of the body? Eran. – I cannot bear to divide what is united. Orth. – Then it seems you attribute the weariness to the divine nature? Orth. – But then you directly contradict the exclamation of the prophet “He fainteth not neither is weary; there is no searching of His understanding. He giveth power to the faint and to them that have no might he increaseth strength." 23 And a little further on “But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary and they shall walk and not faint.” 24 Now how can He who bestows upon others the boon of freedom from weariness and want, possibly be subject to hunger and thirst? Eran. – I have said over and over again that God is impassible, and free from all want, but after the incarnation He became capable of suffering. Orth. – But did He do this by admitting the sufferings in His Godhead, or by allowing the passible nature to undergo its natural sufferings and by suffering proclaim that what was seen was no unreality, but was really assumed of human nature? But now let us look at the matter thus: we say that the divine nature was uncircumscribed. Orth. – And uncircumscribed nature is circumscribed by none. Orth. – It therefore needs no transition for it is everywhere. Orth. – And that which needs no transition needs not to travel. Orth. – And that which does not travel does not grow weary. Orth. – It follows then that the divine nature, which is uncircumscribed, and needs not to travel, was not worn. Eran. – But the divine Scripture says that Jesus was weary, and Jesus is God; “And our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things.” 25 Orth. – But the exact expression of the divine Scripture is that Jesus “was wearied” not “is wearied.” 26 We must consider how one and the other can be applied to the same person. Eran. – Well; try to point this out, for you are always for forcing on us the distinction of terms. Orth. – I think that even a barbarian could easily make this distinction. The union of unlike natures being conceded, the person of Christ on account of the union receives both; to each nature its own properties are attributed; to the uncircumscribed immunity from weariness, to that which is capable of transition and travel weariness. For traveling is the function of the feet; of the muscles to be strained by over exercise. Eran. – There is no controversy about these being bodily affections. Orth. – Well then; the prediction which I made, and you scoffed at, has come true; for look; you have shewn us what belongs to manhood, and what belongs to Godhead. Eran. – But I have not divided one son into two. Orth. – Nor do we, my friend; but giving heed to the difference of the natures, we consider what benefits godhead, and what is proper to a body. Eran. – This distinction is not the teaching of the divine Scripture; it says that the Son of God died. So the Apostle; – “For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son.” 27 And he says that the Lord was raised from the dead for “God” he says “raised the Lord from the dead.” 28 Orth. – And when the divine Scripture says “And devout men carried Stephen to his burial and made great lamentation over him” 29 would any one say that his soul was committed to the grave as well as his body? Orth. – And when you hear the Patriarch Jacob saying “Bury me with my Fathers,” 30 do you suppose this refers to the body or to the soul? Eran. – To the body; without question. Orth. - Now read what follows. Eran. – “There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife. There they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife and there I buried Leah.” 31 Orth. – Now, in the passages which you have just read, the divine Scripture makes no mention of the body, but as far as the words used go, signifies soul as well as body. We however make the proper distinction and say that the souls of the patriarchs were immortal, and that only their bodies were buried in the double cave. 32 Orth. – And when we read in the Acts how Herod slew James the brother of John with a sword, 33 we are not likely to hold that his soul died. Eran. – No; how could we? We remember the Lord's warning "Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul." 34 Orth. – But does it not seem to you impious and monstrous in the case of mere men to avoid the invariable connexion of soul and body, and in the case of scriptural references to death and burial, to distinguish in thought the soul from the body and connect them only with the body, while in trust in the teaching of the Lord you hold the soul to be immortal, and then when you hear of the passion of the Son of God to follow quite a different course? Are you justified in making no mention of the body to which the passion belongs, and in representing the divine nature which is impassible, immutable and immortal as mortal and passible? While all the while you know that if the nature of God the Word is capable of suffering, the assumption of the body was superfluous. Eran. – We have learned from the Divine Scriptures that the Son of God suffered. Orth. – But the divine apostle interprets the Passion, and shews what nature suffered. Eran. – Show me this at once and clear the matter up. Orth. – Are you not acquainted with the passage in the Epistle to the Hebrews in which the divine Paul 35 says “For which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren saying I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the Church will I sing praise unto Thee.” And again, Behold I and the children which God hath given me.'" 36 Eran. – Yes, I know this, but this does not give us what you promised. Orth. – Yes: even these suggest what I promised to shew. The word brotherhood signifies kinship, and the kinship is due to the assumption of the nature, and the assumption openly proclaims the impassibility of the Godhead. But to understand this the more plainly read what follows. Eran. – “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same that through death He might destroy him that hat the power of death...and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lives subject to bondage.” 37 Orth. – This, I think, needs no explanation; it teaches clearly the mystery of the oeconomy. Eran. – I see nothing here of what you promised to prove. Orth. – Yet the divine Apostle teaches plainly that the Creator, pitying this nature not only seized cruelly by death, but throughout all life made death's slave, effected the resurrection through a body for our bodies, and, by means of a mortal body, undid the dominion of death; for since His own nature was immortal He righteously wished to stay the sovereignty of death by taking the first fruits of them that were subject to death, and while He kept these first fruits (i.e. the body) blameless and free from sin, on the one hand He gave death license to lay hands on it and so satisfy its insatiability, while on the other, for the sake of the wrong done to this body, he put a stop to the unrighteous sovereignty usurped over all the rest of men. These firstfruits unrighteously engulfed He raised again and will make the race to follow them. Set this explanation side by side with the words of the Apostle, and you will understand the impassibility of the Godhead. Eran. – In what has been read there is no proof of the divine impassibility. Orth. – Nay: does not the statement of the divine Apostle, that the reason of His making the children partakers of the flesh and blood was that through death He might destroy him that hath the power of death, distinctly signify the impassibility of the Godhead, and the passibility of the flesh, and that because the divine nature could not suffer He assumed the nature that could and through it destroyed the power of the devil? Eran. – How did He destroy the power of the devil and the dominion of death through the flesh? Orth. – What arms did the devil use at the beginning when he enslaved the nature of men? Eran. – The means by which he took captive him who had been constituted citizen of Paradise, was sin. Orth. – And what punishment did God assign for the transgression of the commandment? Orth. – Then sin is the mother of death, and the devil its father. Orth. – War then was waged against human nature by sin. Sin seduced them that obeyed it to slavery, brought them to their vile father, and delivered them to their very bitter offspring. Orth. – So with reason the Creator, with the intention of destroying either power, assumed the nature against which war was being waged, and, by keeping it clear of all sin, both set it free from the sovereignty of the devil, and, by its means, destroyed the devil's dominion. For since death is the punishment of sinners, and death unrighteously and against the divine law seized the sinless body of the Lord, He first raised up that which was unfairly detained, and then promised release to them that were with justice imprisoned. Eran. – But how do you think it just that the resurrection of Him who was dishonestly detained should be shared by the bodies which had been righteously delivered to death? Orth. – And how do you think it just that, when it was Adam who transgressed the commandment, his race should follow their forefather? Eran. – Although the race had not participated in the famous transgression, yet it committed other sins, and for this cause death incurred. Orth. – Yet not sinners only but just men, patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and men who have shone bright in many kinds of virtue have come into death's meshes. Eran. – Yes; for how could a family sprung of mortal parents remain immortal? Adam after the transgression and the divine sentence, and after coming under the power of death, knew his wife, and was called father; having himself become mortal he was made father of mortals; reasonably then all who have received mortal nature follow their forether. Orth. – You have shewn very well the reason of our being partakers of death. The same however must be granted about the resurrection, for the remedy must be met for the disease. When the head of the race was doomed, all the race was doomed with him, and so when the Saviour destroyed the curse, human nature won freedom; and just as they that shared Adam's nature followed him in his going down into Hades, so all the nature of men will share in newness of life with the Lord Christ in His resurrection. Eran. – The decrees of the Church must be given not only declaratorily but demonstratively. Tell me then how these doctrines are taught in the divine Scripture. Orth. – Listen to the Apostle writing to the Romans, and through them teaching all mankind: “For if through the offense of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift; for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offenses unto justification. For if by one man's offense death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ" 38 and again: "Therefore as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." 39 And when introducing to the Corinthians his argument about the resurrection he shortly reveals to them the mystery of the oeconomy, and says: “But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them which slept.” For since by man came death by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” 40 So I have brought you proofs from the divine oracles. Now look at what belongs to Adam compared with what belongs to Christ, the disease with the remedy, the wound with the salve, the sin with the wealth of righteousness, the ban with the blessing, the doom with the delivery, the transgression with the observance, the death with the life, hell with the kingdom, Adam with Christ, the man with the Man. And yet the Lord Christ is not only man but eternal God, but the divine Apostle names Him from the nature which He assumed, because it is in this nature that he compares Him with Adam. The justification, the struggle, the victory, the death, the resurrection are all of this human nature; it is this nature which we share with Him; in this nature they who have exercised themselves beforehand in the citizenship of the kingdom shall reign with Him. Of this nature I spoke, not dividing the Godhead, but referring to what is proper to the manhood. Eran. – You have gone through long discussions at this point, and have strengthened your argument by scriptural testimony, but if the passion was really of the flesh, how is it that when he praises the divine love to men, the Apostle exclaims, “He that spared not His own Son but delivered Him up for us all,” 41 what son does he say was delivered up? Orth. – Watch well your words. There is one Son of God, wherefore He is called only begotten. Eran. – If then there is one Son of God, the divine Apostle called him own Son. Eran. – Then he says that He was delivered up. Orth. – Yes, but not without a body, as we have agreed again and again. Eran. – It has been agreed again and again that He took body and soul. Orth. – Therefore the Apostle spoke of what relates to the body. Eran. – The divide Apostle says distinctly “Who spared not his own Son.” Orth. – When then you hear God saying to Abraham “Because thou hast not withheld thy son thy only son,” 42 do you allege that Isaac was slain? Orth. – And yet God said “Thou hast not withheld,” and the God of all is true. Eran. – The expression “thou hast not withheld” refers to the readiness of Abraham, for he was ready to sacrifice the lad, but God prevented it. Orth. – Well; in the story of Abraham you were not content with the letter, but unfolded it and made the meaning clear. In precisely the same manner examine the meaning of the words of the Apostle. You will then see that it was by no means the divine nature which was not withheld, but the flesh nailed to the Cross. And it is easy to perceive the truth even in the type. Do you regard Abraham's sacrifice as a type of the oblation offered on behalf of the world? Eran. – Not at all, nor yet can I make words spoken rhetorically in the churches a rule of faith. Orth. – You ought by all means to follow teachers of the Church, but, since you inappropriately oppose yourself to these, hear the Saviour Himself when addressing the Jews; “Your Father Abraham rejoiced to see my day and he saw it and was glad.” 43 Note that the Lord calls His passion “a day.” Eran. – I accept the Lord's testimony and do not doubt the type. Orth. – Now compare the type with the reality and you will see the impassibility of the Godhead even in the type. Both in the former and in the latter there is a Father; both in the former and the latter a well beloved Son, each bearing the material for the sacrifice. The one bore the wood, the other the cross upon his shoulders. It is said that the top of the hill was dignified by the sacrifice of both. There is a correspondence moreover between the number of days and nights and the resurrection which followed, for after Isaac had been slain by his father's willing heart, on the third day after the bountiful God had ordered the deed to be done, he rose to new life at the voice of Him who loves mankind. 44 A lamb was seen caught in a thicket, furnishing an image of the cross, and slain instead of the lad. Now if this is a type of the reality, and in the type the only begotten Son did not undergo sacrifice, but a lamb was substituted and laid upon the altar and completed the mystery of the oblation, why then in the reality do you hesitate to assign the passion to the flesh, and to proclaim the impassibility of the Godhead? Eran. – In your observations upon this type you represent Isaac as living again at the divine command. There is nothing therefore unseemly if, fitting the reality to the type, we declare that God the Word suffered and came to life again. Orth. – I have said again and again that it is quite impossible for the type to match the archetypal reality in every respect, and this may also be easily understood in the present instance. Isaac and the lamb, as touching the difference of their natures, suit the image, but as touching the separation of their divided persons 45 they do so no longer. We preach so close an union of Godhead and of manhood as to understand one person 46 undivided, and to acknowledge the same to be both God and man, visible and invisible, circumscribed and uncircumscribed, and we apply to one of the persons all the attributes which are indicative alike of Godhead and of manhood. Now since the lamb, an unreasoning being, and not gifted with the divine image, 47 could not possibly prefigure the restoration to life, the two divide between them the type of the mystery of the oeconomy, and while one furnishes the image of death, the other supplies that of the resurrection. We find precisely the same thing in the Mosaic sacrifices, for in them too may be seen a type outlined in anticipation of the passion of salvation. Eran. – What Mosaic sacrifice foreshadows the reality? Orth. – All the Old Testament, so to say, is a type of the New. It is for this reason that the divine Apostle plainly says – “the Law having a shadow of good things to come” 48 and again “now all these things happened unto them for ensamples.” 49 The image of the archetype is very distinctly exhibited by the lamb slain in Egypt, and by the red heifer burned without the camp, and moreover referred to by the Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews, where he writes “Where Jesus also that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate.” 50 But of this no more for the present. I will however mention the sacrifice in which two goats were offered, the one being slain, and the other let go. 51 In these two goats there is an anticipative image of the two natures of the Saviour; – in the one let go, of the impassible Godhead, in the one slain, of the passible manhood. Eran. – Do you not think it irreverent to like the Lord to goats? Orth. – Which do you think is a fitter object of avoidance and hate, a serpent or a goat? Eran. – A serpent is plainly hateful, for it injures those who come within its reach, and often hurts people who do it no harm. A goat on the other hand comes, according to the Law, in the list of animals that are clean and may be eaten. Orth. – Now hear the Lord likening the passion of salvation to the brazen serpent. He says: “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.” 52 If a brazen serpent was a type of the crucified Saviour, of what impropriety are we guilty in comparing the passion of salvation with the sacrifice of the goats? Eran. – Because John called the Lord “a lamb,” 53 and Isaiah called Him “lamb” and “sheep.” 54 Orth. – But the blessed Paul calls Him “sin” 55 and “curse.” 56 As curse therefore He satisfies the type of the accursed serpent; as sin He explains the figure of the sacrifice of the goats, for on behalf of sin, in the Law, a goat, and not a lamb, was offered. So the Lord in the Gospels liked the just to lambs, but sinners to children; 57 and since He was ordained to undergo the passion not only on behalf of just men, but also of sinners, He appropriately foreshadows His own offering through lambs and goats. Eran. – But the type of the two goats leads us to think of two persons. Orth. – The passibility of the manhood and the impassibility of the Godhead could not possibly be prefigured both at once by one goat. The one which was slack could not have shewn the living nature. So two were taken in order to explain the two natures. The same lesson may well be learned from another sacrifice. Orth. – From that in which the lawgiver bids two pure birds be offered – one to be slain, and the other, after having been dipped in the blood of the slain, to be let go. Here also we see a type of the Godhead and of the manhood – of the manhood slain and of the godhead appropriating the passion. Eran. – You have given us many types, but I object to enigmas. Orth. – Yet the divine Apostle says that the narratives are types. 58 Hagar is called a type of the old covenant; Sarah is liked to the heavenly Jerusalem; Ishmael is a type of Israel, and Isaac of the new people. So you must accuse the loud trumpet of the Spirit for giving its enigmas for us all. Eran. – Though you urge any number of arguments, you will never induce me to divide the passion. I have heard the voice of the angel saying to Mary and her companions, “Come, see the place where the Lord lay.” 59 Orth. – This is quite in accordance with our common customs; we speak of the part by the name which belongs to all the parts. When we go into the churches where the holy apostles or prophets or martyrs are buried, we ask from time to time, “Who is it who lies in the shrine?” and those who are able to give us information say in reply, Thomas, it may be, the Apostle, 60 or John the Baptist, 61 or Stephen the protomartyr, 62 or any other of the saints, mentioning them by name, though perhaps only a few scanty relics of them lie here. But no one who hears these names which are common to both body and soul will imagine that the souls also are shut up in the chests; everyone knows that the chests contain only the bodies or even small portions of the bodies. The holy angel spoke in precisely the same manner when he described the body by the name of the person. Eran. – But how can you prove that the angel spoke to the women about the Lord's body? Orth. – In the first place, the tomb itself suffices to settle the question, for to a tomb is committed neither soul nor Godhead whose nature is uncircumscribed; tombs are made for bodies. Furthermore this is plainly taught by the divine Scripture, for so the holy Matthew narrates the event, “When the even was come there came a rich man of Arimathæa named Joseph who also himself was Jesus' disciplë he went to Pilate and begged the body of Jesus. Then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered, and when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock: and he rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre and departed.” 63 See how often he mentions the body in order to stop the mouths of them who blaspheme the Godhead. The same course is pursued by the thrice blessed Mark, whose narrative I will also quote. “And now when the even was come, because it was the preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathæa, an honorable counselor, which also waited for the kingdom of God, came, and went in boldly unto Pilate, and craved the body of Jesus. And Pilate marveled if He were already dead; and calling to him the centurion, he asked him whether He had been any while dead. And when he knew it of the centurion, he gave the body to Joseph, and he brought fine linen, and took him down, and wrapped Him in the linen, and laid Him in a sepulchre,” 64 and so on. Observe with admiration, the harmony of terms, and how consistently and continuously the word body is introduced. The illustrious Luke, too, relates just in the same way how Joseph begged the body and after he had received it treated it with due rites. 65 By the divine John we are told yet more, “Joseph of Arimathæa being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus; and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore and took the body of Jesus. And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes about a hundred pound weight. Then they took the body of Jesus and wounded it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury. Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. There they laid Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day, for the sepulchre was nigh at hand." 66 Observe how often mention is made of the body; how the Evangelist shows that it was the body which was nailed to the cross, the body begged by Joseph of Pilate, the body taken down from the tree, the body wrapped in linen clothes with the myrrh and aloes, and then the name of the person given to it; and Jesus said to have been laid in a tomb. the angel said, “Come see the place where the Lord lay,” 67 naming the part by Thus the name of the whole; and we constantly do just the same. In this place, we say, such an one was buried; not the body of such an one. Every one in his senses knows that we are speaking of the body, and such a mode of speech is customary in divine Scripture. Aaron, we read, died and they buried him on Mount Hor. 68 Samuel died and they buried him at Ramah, 69 and there are many similar instances. The same use is followed by the divine Apostle when speaking of the death of the Lord. “I delivered unto you first of all,” he writes, “that which I also received how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures,” 70 and so on. Eran. – In the passages we have just now read the Apostle does not mention a body, but Christ the Savior of us all. You have brought evidence against your own side, and wounded yourself with your own weapon. Orth. – You seem to have very quickly forgotten the long discourse in which I proved to you over and over again that the body is spoken of by the name of the person. This is what is now done by the divine Apostle, and it can easily be proven from this very passage. Now let us look at it. Why did the divine writer write thus to the Corinthians? Eran. – They had been deceived by some into believing that there is no resurrection. When the teacher of the world learned this he furnished them with his arguments about the resurrection of the bodies. Orth. – Why then does he introduce the resurrection of the Lord, when he wishes to prove the resurrection of the bodies? Eran. – As sufficient to prove the resurrection of us all. Orth. – In what is His death like the death of the rest; that by His resurrection may be proven the resurrection of all? Eran. – The reason of the incarnation, suffering, and death of the only begotten Son of God, was that He might destroy death. Thus, after rising, by His own resurrection He preaches the resurrection of all. Orth. – But who, hearing of a resurrection of God, would ever believe that the resurrection of all men would be exactly like it? The difference of the natures does not allow of our believing in the argument of the resurrection. He is God and they are men, and the difference between God and men is incalculable. They are mortal, and subject to death, like to the grass and to the flower. He is almighty. Eran. – But after His incarnation God the Word had a body, and through this He proved His likeness to men. Orth. – Yes; and for this reason the suffering and the death and the resurrection are all of the body, and in proof of this the divine Apostle in another place promises renewal of life to all, and to them that believe in the resurrection of their Saviour, yet look upon the general resurrection of all as fable, he exclaims, “Now if Christ be preached that He rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen, and if Christ he not risen...your faith is vain, you are yet in your sins.” 71 And from the past he confirms the future, and from what is disbelieved he disproves what is believed, for he says, If the one seems impossible to you, then the other will be false; if the one seems real and true, then let the other in like manner seem true, for here too a resurrection of the body is preached, and this body is called the first fruits of those. The resurrection of this body after many arguments he affirms directly, “But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept, for since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead, for as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive,” 72 and he does not only confirm the argument of the resurrection, but also reveals the mystery of the oeconomy. He calls Christ man that he may prove the remedy to be appropriate to the disease. Eran. – Then the Christ is only a man. Orth. – God forbid. On the contrary, we have again and again confessed that He is not only man but eternal God. But He suffered as man, not as God. And this the divine Apostle clearly teaches us when he says “For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.” 73 And in his letter to the Thessalonians, he strengthens his argument concerning the general resurrection by that of our Saviour in the passage “For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even them also which sleep in Jesus will bring God with him.” 74 Eran. – The Apostle proves the general resurrection by means of the Lord's resurrection, and it is clear that in this case also what died and rose was a body. For he would never have attempted to prove the general resurrection by its means unless there had been some relation between the substance of the one and the other. I shall never consent to apply the passion to the human nature alone. It seems agreeable to my view to say that God the Word died in the flesh. Orth. – We have frequently shewn that what is naturally immortal can in no way die. If then He died He was not immortal; and what perils lie in the blasphemy of the words. Eran. – He is by nature immortal, but He became man and suffered. Orth. – Therefore He did not change, for how otherwise could He be immortal submit to death? But we have agreed that the substance of the Trinity is immutable. Having therefore a nature superior to change, He by no means shared death. Eran. – The divine Peter says “Christ hat suffered for us in the flesh.” 75 Orth. – This agrees with what we have said, for we have learned the rule of dogmas from the divine Scripture. Eran. – How then can you deny that God the Word suffered in the flesh? Orth. – Because we have not found this expression in the divine Scripture. Eran. – But I have just quoted you the utterance of the great Peter. Orth. – You seem to ignore the distinction of the terms. Eran. – What terms? Do you not regard the Lord Christ as God the Word? Orth. – The term Christ in the case of our Lord and Saviour signifies the incarnate Word the Immanuel, God with us, 76 both God and man, but the term “God the Word” so said signifies the simple nature before the world, superior to time, and incorporeal. Wherefore the Holy Ghost that spake through the holy Apostles nowhere attributes passion or death to this name. Eran. – If the passion is attributed to the Christ, and God the Word after being made man was called Christ, I hold that he who states God the Word to have suffered in the flesh is in no way unreasonable. Orth. – Hazardous and rash in the extreme is such an attempt. But let us look at the question in this way. Does the divine Scripture state God the Word to be of God and of the Father? Orth. – And it describes the Holy Ghost as being in like manner of God? Orth. – But it calls God the Word only begotten Son. Orth. – It nowhere so names the Holy Ghost. Orth. – Yet the Holy Ghost also has Its subsistence of the Father and God. Orth. – We grant then that both the Son and the Holy Ghost are both of God the Father; but would you dare to call the Holy Ghost Son? Eran. – Because I do not find this term in the divine Scripture. Eran. – Because I no more learn this in the divine Scripture. Orth. – But what name can properly be given to that which is neither begotten nor created? Eran. – We style it uncreated and unbegotten. Orth. – And we say that the Holy Ghost is neither created nor begotten. Orth. – Would you then dare to call the Holy Ghost unbegotten? Orth. – But why refuse to call that which is naturally uncreate, but not begotten, unbegotten? Eran. – Because I have not learned so from the divine Scripture, and I am greatly afraid of saying, or using language which Scripture does not use. Orth. – Then, my good sir, I maintain the same caution in the case of the passion of salvation; do you too avoid all the divine names which Scripture has avoided in the case of the passion, and do not attribute the passion to them. Orth. – The passion is never connected with the name “God.” Eran. – But even I do not affirm that God the Word suffered apart from a body, but say that He suffered in flesh. Orth. – You affirm then a mode of passion, not impassibility. No one would ever say this even in the case of a human body. For who not altogether out of his feelings would say that the soul of Paul died in flesh? This could never be said even in the case of a great villain; for the souls even of the wicked are immortal. We say that such or such a murderer has been slain, but no one would ever say that his soul had been killed in the flesh. But if we describe the souls of murderers and violators of sepulchres as free from death, far more right is it to acknowledge as immortal the soul of our Saviour, in that it never tasted sin. If the souls of them who have most greatly erred have escaped death on account of their nature, how could that soul, whose nature was immortal and who never received the least taint of sin, have taken death's hook? Eran. – It is quite useless for you to give me all these long arguments. We are agreed that the soul of the Saviour is immortal. Orth. – But of what punishment are you not deserving, you who say that the soul, which is by nature created, is immortal, and are for making the divine substance mortal for the Word; you who deny that the soul of the Saviour tasted death in the flesh, and dare to maintain that God the Word, Creator of all things, passed the passion? Eran. – We say that He did not experience the passion impassibly. Orth. – And what man in his senses would ever put up with such ridiculous riddles? Who ever heard of an impassible passion, or of an immortal mortality? The impassible has never undergone passion, and what has undergone passion could not possibly be impassible. But we hear the exclamation of the divine Paul: “Who only hath immortality dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto unto.” 77 Eran. – Why then do we say that the invisible powers too and the souls of men, aye and the very devils, are immortal? Orth. – We do say so; that God is absolutely immortal. He is immortal not by partaking of substance, but in substance; He does not possess an immortality which He has received of another. It is He Himself who has bestowed their immortality on the angels and on them that thou hast just now mentioned. How, moreover, when the divine Paul styles Him immortal and says that He only hath immortality, can you attribute to Him the passion of death? Eran. – We say that He tasted death after the incarnation. Orth. – But over and over again we have confessed Him immutable. If being previously immortal He subsequently suffered death through the flesh, a change having preceded His undergoing death; if His life left Him for three days and three nights, how do such statements fall short of the most extreme impiety? For I think that not even they that are struggling against impiety can venture to let such words fall from their lips without peril. Eran. – Cease from charging us with impiety. Even we say that not the divine nature suffered but the human; but we do say that the divine shared with the body in suffering. Orth. – What can you mean by sharing in suffering? Do you mean that when the nails were driven into the body the divine nature felt the sense of pain? Orth. – Both now and in our former investigations we have shewn that the soul does not share all the faculties of the body but that the body while it receives vital force has the sense of suffering through the soul. And even supposing us to grant that the soul shares in pain with the body we shall none the less find the divine nature to be impassible, for it was not united to the body instead of a soul. Or do you not acknowledge that He assumed a soul? Eran. – I have often acknowledged it. Orth. – And that He assumed a reasonable Soul? Orth. – If then together with the body He assumed the soul, and we grant that the soul shared in suffering with the body, then the soul, not the Godhead, shared the passion with the body; it shared the passion, receiving pangs by means of the body. But somebody possibly might agree to the soul sharing suffering with the body, but might deny its sharing death, because of its having an immortal nature. On this account the Lord said “Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul.” 78 If then we deny that the soul of the Saviour shared death with the body, how could any one accept the blasphemy you and your friends presumptuously promulgate when you dare to say that the divine nature shared in death? This is the more inexcusable when the Lord points out at one time that the body 79 was being offered, at another that the soul was being troubled. 80 Eran. – And where doth the Lord shew that the body was being offered? Or are you going to bring me once more that well worn passage “Destroy this church and in three days I will raise it up”? 81 Or with your conceited self-sufficiency are you going to quote me the words of the Evangelist? “But He spake of the church of his body. When therefore He was risen from the dead His disciples remembered that He had said this unto them and they believed the Scripture and the words which He had said.” 82 Orth. – If you have such a detestation of the divine words which preach the mystery of the incarnation, why, like Marcion and Valentinus and Manes, do you not destroy texts of this kind? For this is what they have done. But if this seems to you rash and impious, do not turn the Lord's words into ridicule, but rather follow the Apostles in their belief after the resurrection that the Godhead raised again the church which the Jews had destroyed. Eran. – If you have any good evidence to adduce, give over gibing and fulfill your promise. Orth. – Remember especially those words of the gospels in which the Lord made a comparison between manna and the true bread. Orth. – In that passage after speaking at some length about the bread of life, he added, “The bread that I will give is my flesh which I will give for the life of the world.” 83 In these words may be understood alike the bounty of the Godhead and the boon of the flesh. Eran. – One quotation is not enough to resolve the question. Orth. – The Ethiopian eunuch had not read much of the Bible, but when he had found one witness from the prophets he was guided by it to salvation. But not all Apostles and prophets and all the preachers of the truth who have lived since then are enough to convince you. Nevertheless I will bring you some further testimony about the Lord's body. You cannot but know that passage in the Gospel history where, after eating the passover with His disciples, our Lord pointed to the death of the typical lamb and taught what body corresponded with that shadow. 84 Orth. – Remember then what it was which our Lord took and broke, and what He called it when He had taken it. Eran. – I will answer in mystic language for the sake of the uninitiated. After taking and breaking it and giving it to His disciples He said, “This is my body which was given for you” 85 or according to the apostle “broken” 86 and again, “This is my blood of the New Testament which is shed for many.” 87 Orth. – Then when exhibiting the type of the passion He did not mention the Godhead? Orth. – But He did mention the body and blood. Orth. – And the body was nailed to the Cross? Orth. – Come, then; look at this. When after the resurrection the doors were shut and the Lord came to the holy disciples and beheld them affrighted, what means did He use to destroy their fear and instead of fear to infuse faith? Eran. – He said to them “Behold my hands and my feet that it is I myself; handle me and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have.” 88 Orth. – So when they disbelieved He shewed them the body? Orth. – Therefore the body rose? Orth. – And I suppose what rose was what had died? Orth. – And what had died was what was nailed to the cross? Orth. – Then according to your own argument the body suffered? Eran. – Your series of arguments forces us to this conclusion. Orth. – Consider this too. Now I will be questioner, and do you answer as becomes a lover of the truth. Orth. – When the Holy Ghost came down upon the Apostles, and that wonderful sight and sound collected thousands to the house, what did the chief of the apostles in the speech he then made say concerning the Lord's resurrection? Eran. – He quoted the divine David, and said that he had received promises from God that the Lord Christ should be born of the fruit of his loins and that in trust in these promises he prophetically foresaw His resurrection, and plainly said that His soul was not left in Hades and that His flesh did not see corruption. 89 Orth. – His resurrection therefore is of these. Eran. – How can any one in his senses say that there is a resurrection of the soul which never died? Orth. – How comes it that you who attribute the passion, the death and the resurrection to the immutable and uncircumscribed Godhead have suddenly appeared before us in your right mind and now object to connecting the word resurrection with the soul? Eran. – Because the word resurrection is applicable to what has fallen. Orth. – But the body does not obtain resurrection apart from a soul, but being renewed by the divine will, and conjoined with its yokefellow, it receives life. Was it not thus that the Lord raised Lazarus? Eran. – It is plain that not the body alone rises. Orth. – This is more distinctly taught by the divine Ezekiel, 90 for he points out how the Lord commanded the bones to come together, and how all of them were duly fitted together, and how He made sinews and veins and arteries grow with all the flesh pertaining to them and the skin that clothes them all, and then ordered the souls to come back to their own bodies. Orth. – But the Lord's body did not undergo this corruption, but remained unimpaired, and on the third day recovered its own soul. Orth. – Then the death was of what had suffered? Eran. - Without question. Orth. – And when the great Peter mentioned the resurrection, and the divine David too, they said that His soul was not left in Hell, but that His body did not undergo corruption? Orth. – Then it was not the Godhead which suffered death, but the body by severance from the soul? Eran. – I cannot brook these absurdities. Orth. – But you are fighting against your own arguments; it is your own words which you are calling absurd. Eran. – You slander me; not one of these words is mine. Orth. – Suppose any one to ask what is the animal which is at once reasonable and mortal, and suppose some one else to answer – man; which of the two would you call interpreter of the saying? The questioner or the answerer? Orth. – Then I was quite right in calling the arguments yours? For you, I ween, in your answers, by rejecting some points and accepting others, confirmed them. Eran. – Then I will not answer any longer; do you answer. Eran. – What do you say to those words of the Apostle “Had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory”? 91 in this passage he mentions neither body nor soul. Orth. – Therefore you must not put the words “in the flesh” in it, – for this is your ingenious invention for decrying the Godhead of the Word – but must attribute the passion to the bare Godhead of the Word. Eran. – No; no. He suffered in the flesh, but His incorporeal nature was not capable of suffering by itself. Orth. - Ah! but nothing must be added to the Apostles words. Eran. – When we know the Apostles meaning there is nothing absurd in adding what is left out. Orth. – But to add anything to the divine words is wild and rash. To explain what is written and reveal the hidden meaning is holy and pious. Orth. – We two then shall do nothing unreasonable and unholy in examining the mind of the Scriptures. Orth. – Let us then look together into what seems to be hidden. Orth. – Did the great Paul call the divine James the Lord's brother? 92 Orth. – But in what sense are we to regard him as brother? By relationship of His godhead or of His manhood? Eran. – I will not consent to divide the united natures. Orth. – But you have often divided them in our previous investigations, and you shall do the same thing now. Tell me; do you say that God the Word was only begotten Son? Orth. – And only begotten means only Son. Orth. – And the only one cannot have a brother? Eran. – Of course not, for if He had had a brother He would not be called the only begotten. Orth. – Then they were wrong in calling James the brother of the Lord. For the Lord was only begotten, and the only begotten cannot have a brother. Eran. – No, but the Lord is not incorporeal and the proclaimers of the truth are referring only to what touches the godhead. Orth. – How then would you prove the word of the apostle true? Eran. – By saying that James was of kin with the Lord according to the flesh. Orth. – See how you have brought in again that division which you object to. Eran. – It was not possible to explain the kinship in any other way. Orth. – Then do not find fault with those who cannot explain similar difficulties in any other way. Eran. – Now you are getting the argument off the track because you want to shirk the question. Orth. – Not at all, my friend. That will be settled too by the points we have investigated. Now look; when you were reminded of James the brother of the Lord, you said that the relationship referred not to the Godhead but to the flesh. Orth. – Well, now that you are told of the passion of the cross, refer this too to the flesh. Eran. – The Apostle called the crucified “Lord of Glory,” 93 and the same Apostle called the Lord “brother of James.” Orth. – And it is the same Lord in both cases. If then you are right in referring the relationship to the flesh you must also refer the passion to the flesh, for it is perfectly ridiculous to regard the relationship without distinction and to refer the passion to Christ without distinction. Eran. – I follow the Apostle who calls the crucified “Lord of glory.” Orth. – I follow too, and believe that He was “Lord of glory.” For the body which was nailed to the wood was not that of any common man but of the Lord of glory. But we must acknowledge that the union makes the names common. Once more do you say that the flesh of the Lord came down from heaven? Orth. – But was formed in the Virgin's womb? Orth. – How, then, does the Lord say “If ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where He was before,” 94 and again “No man hath ascended up to heaven but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven?” 95 Eran. – He is speaking not of the flesh, but of the Godhead. Orth. – Yes; but the Godhead is of the God and Father. How then does He call him Son of man? Eran. – The peculiar properties of the natures are shared by the person, for on account of the union the same being is both Son of man and Son of God, everlasting and of time, Son of David and Lord of David, and so on with the rest. Orth. – Very right. But it is also important to recognize the fact that no confusion of natures results from both having one name. Wherefore we are endeavoring to distinguish how the same being is Son of God and also Son of man, and how He is “the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever,” 96 and by the reverent distinction of terms we find that the contradictions are in agreement. Orth. – You say that the divine nature came down from heaven and that in consequence of the union it was called the Son of man. it behoves us to say that the flesh was nailed to the tree, but to hold that the divine nature even on the cross and in the tomb was inseparable from this flesh, though from it it derived no sense of suffering, since the divine nature is naturally incapable of undergoing both suffering and death and its substance is immortal and impassible. It is in this sense that the crucified is styled Lord of Glory, by attribution of the title of the impassible nature to the passible, since, as we know, a body is described as belonging to this latter. Now let us examine the matter thus. The words of the divine Apostle are "Had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory." 97 They crucified the nature which they knew, not that of which they were wholly ignorant: had they known that of which they were ignorant they would not have crucified that which they knew: they crucified the human because they were ignorant of the divine. Have you forgotten their own words. “For a good work we stone thee not but for blasphemy, and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.” 98 These words are a plain proof that they recognized the nature they saw, while of the invisible they were wholly ignorant: had they known that nature they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. Eran. – That is very probable, but the exposition of the faith laid down by the Fathers in council at Nicæa says that the only begotten Himself, very God, of one substance with the Father, suffered and was crucified. Orth. – You seem to forget what we have agreed on again and again. Eran. -What do you mean? Orth. – I mean that after the union the holy Scripture applies to one person terms both of exaltation and of humiliation. But you possibly are also ignorant that the illustrious Fathers first mentioned His taking flesh and being made man, and then subsequently added that He suffered and was crucified, and thus spoke of the passion after they had set forth the nature capable of passion. Eran. – The Fathers said that the Son of God, Light of Light, of the substance of the Father, suffered and was crucified. Orth. – I have observed more than once that both the Divine and the human are ascribed to the one Person. It is in accordance with this position that the thrice blessed Fathers, after teaching how we should believe in the Father, and then passing on to the person of the Son, did not immediately add “and in the Son of God,” although it would have very naturally followed that after defining what touches God the Father they should straightway have introduced the name of Son. But their object was to give us at one and the same time instruction on the theology and on the oeconomy, 99 lest there should be supposed to be any distinction between the Person of the Godhead and the Person of the Manhood. On this account they added to their statement concerning the Father that we must believe also in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Now after the incarnation God the Word is called Christ, for this name includes alike all that is proper to the Godhead and to the manhood. We recognize nevertheless that some properties belong to the one nature and some to the others, and this may at once be understood from the actual terms of the Creed. For tell me to what do you apply the phrase “of the substance of the Father”? to the Godhead, or to the nature that was fashioned of the seed of David? Eran. – To the Godhead, as is plain. Orth. – And the clause “Very God of very God”; to which do you hold this belongs, to the Godhead or to the manhood? Orth. – Therefore neither the flesh nor the soul is of one substance with the Father, for they are created, but the Godhead which formed all things. Orth. – Very well, then. And when we are told of passion and of the cross we must recognize the nature which submitted to the passion; we must avoid attributing it to the impassible, and must attribute it to that nature which was assumed for the distinct purpose of suffering. The acknowledgment on the part of the most excellent Fathers that the divine nature was impassible; and their attribution of the passion to the flesh is proven by the conclusion of the creed, which runs “But they who state there was a time when He was not, and before He was begotten He was not, and He was made out of the non-existent, or who allege that the Son of God was of another essence or substance mutable or variable, these the holy Catholic and apostolic Church anathematizes.” See then what penalties are denounced against them that attribute the passion to the divine nature. 100 Eran. – They are speaking in this place of mutation and variation. Orth. – But what is the passion but mutation and variation? For if, being impassible before His incarnation, He suffered after His incarnation, He assuredly suffered by undergoing mutation; and if being immortal before He became man, He tasted death, as you say, after being made man, He underwent a complete alteration by being made mortal after being immortal. But expressions of this kind, and their authors with them, have all been expelled by the illustrious Fathers from the bounds of the Church, and cut off like rotten limbs from the sound body. We therefore exhort you to fear the punishment and abhor the blasphemy. Now I will show you that in their own writings the holy Fathers have held the opinions we have expressed. Of the witnesses I shall bring forward some took part in that great Council; some flourished in the Church after their time; some illuminated the world long before. But their harmony is broken neither by difference of periods nor by diversity of language; like the harp their strings are several and separate but like the harp they make one harmonious music. Eran. – I was anxious for and shall be delighted at such citations. Instruction of this kind cannot be gainsaid, and is most useful. Orth. – Now; open your ears and receive the streams that flow from the spiritual springs. Testimony of the holy Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, and martyr. From his Epistle to the Smyrnæans: – “They do not admit Eucharists and oblations, because they do not confess the Eucharist to be flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ which suffered for our sins and which of His goodness the Father raised.” 101 Testimony of Irenæus, bishop of Lyons. From his third book against heresies (Chap. xx.): – “It is clear then that Paul knew no other Christ save Him that suffered and was buried and rose and was born, whom he calls man, for after saying, If Christ be preached that He rose from the dead,' 102 he adds, giving the reason of His incarnation, For since by man came death by man came also the resurrection of the dead,' 103 and on all occasions in reference to the passion, the manhood and the dissolution of the Lord, he uses the name of Christ as in the text, Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ died,' 104 and again, But now in Christ ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh in the blood of Christ,' 105 and again, Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.'" 106 Of the same from the same work. (Chapter xxi.): – “For as He was Man that He might be tempted, so was He Word that He might be glorified. In His temptation, His crucifixion and His dying, the Word was inoperative; but in His victory, His patience, His goodness, His resurrection and His assumption it was co-operative with the manhood.” Of the same from the fifth book of the same work: – “When with His own blood the Lord had ransomed us, and given His soul on behalf of our souls, and His flesh instead of our flesh.” The testimony of the holy Hippolytus, bishop and martyr. From his letter to a certain Queen: – “So he calls Him The firstfruits of them that slept,' 107 and The first born of the dead.' 108 When He had risen and was wishful to show that what had risen was the same body which died, when the Apostles doubted, He called to Him Thomas and said Handle me and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have.'" 109 Of the same from the same letter: – "By calling Him firstfruits He bore witness to what we have said, that the Saviour, after taking the flesh of the same material, raised it, making it firstfruits of the flesh of the just, in order that all we that believe might have expectation of our resurrection through trust in Him that is risen." Of the same from his discourse on the two thieves: – “The body of the Lord gave both to the world, – the holy blood and the sacred water.” Of the same from the same discourse – “And the body being, humanly speaking, a corpse, has in itself great power of life, for there flowed from it what does not flow from dead bodies – blood and water, – that we might know what vital force lies in the indwelling power in the body, so that it is a corpse evidently unlike others, and is able to pour forth for us causes of life.” 110 Of the same from the same discourse – “Not a bone of the holy Lamb is broken. The type shews that the passion cannot touch the power, for the bones are the power of the body." Testimony of the holy Eustathius, bishop of Antioch, and confessor. From his book on the soul: – “Their impious calumny can be refuted in a few words; they may be right, unless He voluntarily gave up His own body to the destruction of death for the sake of the salvation of men. First of all they attribute to Him extraordinary infirmity in not being able to repel His enemies assault.” Of the same from the same book: – “Why do they, in the concoction of their earth-born deceits, make much of proving that the Christ assumed a body without a soul? In order that if they could seduce any to lay down that this is the case, then, by attributing to the divine Spirit variations of affection, they might easily persuade them that the mutable is not begotten of the immutable nature." Of the same from his discourse on “the Lord created me in the beginning of His ways”: 111 – “The man Who died rose on the third day, and, when Mary was eager to lay hold of His holy limbs, He objected and cried Touch me not. 112 For I am not yet ascended to my Father; but go to my brethren and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father and to my God and your God.' 113 Now the words I am not yet ascended to my Father,' were not spoken by the Word and God, who came down from heaven, and was in the bosom of the Father, nor by the Wisdom which contains all created things, but were uttered by the man who was compacted of various limbs, who had risen from the dead, who had not yet after His death gone back to the Father, and was reserving for Himself the first fruits of His progress." Of the same from the same work: – “As he writes he expressly describes the man who was crucified as Lord of Glory, declaring Him to be Lord and Christ, just as the Apostles with one voice when speaking to Israel in the flesh say Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus, Whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” 114 He so made Jesus Christ who suffered. He did not so make the Wisdom nor yet the Word who has the might of dominion from the beginning, but Him who was lifted up on high and stretched out His hands upon the Cross.” Of the same from the same work: – “For if He is incorporeal and not subject to manual contact, nor apprehended by eyes of flesh, He undergoes no wound, He is not nailed by nails, He has no part in death, He is not hidden in the ground, He is not shut in a grave, He does not rise from a tomb.” Of the same from the same book: – 'No man taketh it from me....I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it again.' 115 If as God He had the double power, He yet yielded to them who were striving of evil counsel to destroy the church, but by His resurrection He restored it in greater splendour. It is proven by incontrovertible evidence that He of Himself rose and renewed His own house, and the great work of the Son is to be ascribed to the divine Father; for the Son does not work without the Father, as is declared in the unimpeachable utterances of the holy Scriptures. Wherefore at one time the divine Parent is described as having raised the Christ from the dead, at another time the Son promises to raise His own church. If then from what has previously been laid down the divine spirit of the Christ is proven to be impassible, in vain do the accursed assail the apostolic definitions. If Paul says that the Lord of Glory was crucified, clearly referring to the manhood, we must not on this account refer suffering to the divine. Why then do they put these two things together, saying that the Christ was crucified from infirmity?” Of the same from the same work: – “But had it been becoming to attribute to Him any kind of infirmity, any one might have said that it was natural to attach these qualities to the manhood, though not to the fulness of the Godhead, or to the dignity of the highest wisdom, or to Him who according to Paul is described as God over all.” 116 Of the same from the same book: – “This then is the manner of the infirmity according to which He is described by Paul as coming to death, for the man lives by God's power when plainly associated with God's spirit, since from the preceding statements He who is believed to be in Him is proven to be also the power of the Most High.” Of the same from the same – “As by entering the Virgin's womb He did not lessen His power, so neither by the fastening of His body to the wood of the cross is His spirit defiled. For when the body was crucified on high the divine Spirit of wisdom dwelt even within the body, trod in heavenly places, filled all the earth, reigned over the depths, visited and judged the soul of every man, and continued to do all that God continually does, for the wisdom that is on high is not prisoned and contained within bodily matter, just as moist and dry material are contained within their vessels and are contained by but do not contain them. But this wisdom, being a divine and ineffable power, embraces and confirms alike all that is within and all that is without the church, and then proceeding beyond comprehends and sways at once all matter.” Of the same from the same work: – “But if the sun being a visible body, apprehended by the senses, endures everywhere such adverse influences without changing its order, or feeling any blow, be it small or great; can we suppose the incorporeal Wisdom to be defiled and to change its nature because its church is nailed to the cross or destroyed or wounded or corrupted? The church suffers, but the substance abides without spot, and preserves its entire dignity without defilement.” Of the same from his work on the titles of the Psalms of Degrees: – “The Father who is perfect, infinite, incomprehensible, and is incapable alike of adornment or disfigurement, receives no acquired glory; nor yet does His Word, who is God begotten of Him, through whom are angels and heaven and earth's boundless bulk and all the form and matter of created things; but the man Christ raised from the dead is exalted and glorified to the open discomfiture of His foes." Of the same from the same work: – “They however who have lifted up hatred against Him, though they be fenced round with the forces of His foes, are scattered abroad, while the God and Word gloriously raised His own church.” Of the same from his interpretation of the 92nd Psalm: – “Moreover the prophet Isaiah following the tracks of His sufferings, among other utterances exclaims with a mighty voice And we saw Him and He had no form nor beauty. His form was dishonoured and rejected among the sons of men,' 117 thus clearly showing that the marks of indignity and the sufferings must be applied to the human but not to the divine. And immediately afterwards he adds Being a man under stroke, and able to bear infirmity.' 118 “He it is who after suffering outrage was seen to have no form or comeliness, then again was changed and clothed with beauty, for the God dwelling in Him was not led like a lamb to death and slaughtered like a sheep, for His nature is invisible.” Testimony of the Holy Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, and confessor. From his letter to Epictetus: – “Whoever reached such a pitch of impiety as to think and say that the Godhead itself of one substance with the Father was circumcised, and from perfect became imperfect; and to deny that what was crucified on the tree was the body, asserting it on the contrary to be the very creative substance of wisdom?” Of the same from the same treatise – “The Word associated with Himself and brought upon Himself what the humanity of the Word suffered, that we might be able to share in the Godhead of the Word. And marvelous it was that the sufferer and He who did not suffer were the same; sufferer in that His own body suffered and He was in it while suffering, but not suffering because the Word, being by nature God, was impassible. And He Himself the incorporeal was in the passible body, and the body contained in itself the impassible Word, destroying the infirmities of His body.” Of the same from the same letter: – “For being God and Lord of Glory, He was in the body ingloriously crucified; but the body suffered when smitten on the tree, and water and blood flowed from its side; but being church of the Word, it was full of the Godhead. Wherefore when the sun saw its Creator suffering in His outraged body, it drew in its rays, and darkened the earth. And that very body with a mortal nature rose superior to its own nature, on account of the Word within it, and is no longer touched by its natural corruption, but clothed with the superhuman Word, became incorruptible.” Of the same from his greater discourse on the Faith: – “Was what rose from the dead, man or God? Peter, the Apostle, who knows better than we, interprets and say, and when they had fulfilled all that was written of Him they took Him down from the tree and laid Him in a sepulchre, but God raised Him from the dead.' 119 Now the dead body of Jesus which was taken down from the tree, which had been laid in a sepulchre, and entombed by Joseph of Arimathæa, is the very body which the Word raised, saying, Destroy this church, and in three days I will raise it up.' 120 It is He who quickens all the dead, and quickened the man Christ Jesus, born of Mary, whom He assumed. For if while on the cross 121 He raised corpses of the saints that had previously undergone dissolution, much more can God the everliving Word raise the body, which He wore, as says Paul, For the word of God is quick and powerful.'" 122 Of the same from the same work: – "Life then does not die, but quickens the dead; for as the light is not injured in a dark place, so life cannot suffer when it has visited a mortal nature, for the Godhead of the Word is immutable and invariable as the Lord says in the prophecy about Himself I am the Lord I change not.'" 123 Of the same from the same work: – "Living He cannot die but on the contrary quickens the dead. He is therefore, by the Godhead derived from the Father, a fount of light; but He that died, or rather rose from the dead, our intercessor, who was born of the Virgin Mary, whom the Godhead of the Word assumed for our sake, is man.” Of the same from the same work: – “It came to pass that Lazarus fell sick and died; but the divine Man did not fall sick nor against His own will do He die, but of His own accord came to the dispensation of death, being strengthened by God the Word who dwelt within Him, and who said No man taketh it from me but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it again.' 124 The Godhead then which lays down and takes the life of man which He wore is of the Son, for in its completeness He assumed the manhood, in order that in its completeness He might quicken it, and, with it, the dead.” Of the same from his discourse against the Arians: – “When therefore the blessed Paul says the Father raised' the Son from the dead' 125 John tells us that Jesus said Destroy this church and in three days I will raise it up...but He spaké of His own body.' 126 So it is clear to them that take heed that at the raising of the body the Son is said by Paul to have been raised from the dead, for he refers to what concerns the body to the Son's person, and just so when he says the Father gave life to the Son' 127 it must be understood that the life was given to the Flesh. For if He Himself is life, how can the life receive life?” Of the same from his work on the Incarnation: – “For when the Word was conscious that in no other way could the ruin of men be undone save by death to the uttermost, and it was impossible that the Word who is immortal and Son of the Father should die, to effect His end He assumes a body capable of death, that this body, being united to the Word, who is over all, might, in the stead of all, become subject to death, and because of the indwelling Word might remain incorruptible, and so by the grace of the resurrection corruption for the future might lose its power over men. offering to death, as a sacrifice and victim free from every spot, the body which He had assumed, by His corresponding offering He thus straightway destroyed death's power over all His kind; for being the Word of God above and beyond all men, He rightly offered and paid His own church and bodily instrument, as a ransom for all souls due to death. And thus by means of the like (body) being associated with all men, the incorruptible Son of God rightly clothed all men with incorruption by the promise of the resurrection, for the corruption inherent in death no longer has any place with men, for the sake of the Word who dwelt in them by the means of the one body.” Of the same from the same work: – “Wherefore, after His divine manifestations in His works, now also on behalf of all He offered sacrifice, yielding to death His own church instead of all, that He might make all men irresponsible and free from the ancient transgression, and, exhibiting His own body as incorruptible firstfruits of the resurrection of mankind, might shew Himself stronger than death. For the body, as having a common substance – for it was a human body, although by a new miracle its constitution was of the Virgin alone – being mortal, died after the example of its like; but by the descent of the Word into it no longer suffered corruption, according to its own nature, but, on account of God the Word who dwelt within it, was delivered from corruption.” Of the same from the same work: – “Whence, as I have said, since it was not possible for the Word being immortal to die, He took upon Himself a body capable of death, in order that He might offer this same body for all, and He Himself in His suffering on behalf of all through His descent into this body might destroy Him that hath the power of death.”” 128 Of the same from the same work: 129 – “For the body in its passion, as is the nature of bodies, died, but it had the promise of incorruption through the Word that dwelt within it. For when the body died the Word was not injured; but He was Himself impassible, incorruptible, and immortal, as being God's Word, and being associated with the body He kept from it the natural corruption of bodies, as says the Spirit to Him thou wilt not suffer thy Holy One to see corruption.'" 130 The testimony of the holy Damasus, bishop of Romë 131 – "If any one say that, in the passion of the Cross, God the Son of God suffered pain, and not the flesh with the soul, which the form of the servant put on and assumed, as the Scripture saith, Let him be anathema." Testimony of the holy Ambrosius, bishop of Milan. From his book on the Catholic faith: – “There are some men who have reached such a pitch of impiety as to think that the Godhead of the Lord was circumcised, and from perfect was made imperfect; and that the divine substance, Creator of all things, and not the flesh, was on the tree." Of the same from the same work: – “The flesh suffered; but the Godhead is free from death. He yielded His body to suffer according to the law of human nature. For how can God die, when the soul cannot die? Fear not,' He says, them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul.' 132 If then the soul cannot be slain, how can the Godhead be made subject to death?” Testimony of the holy Basilius, bishop of Cæsareä – “It is perfectly well known to every one who has the least acquaintance with the meaning of the words of the Apostle that he is not delivering to us a mode of theology but is explaining the reasons of the oeconomy, 133 for he says God hath made that same Jesus whom ye have crucified both Lord and Christ.” 134 Thus he is plainly directing his argument to His human and visible nature.” Testimony of the holy Gregorius, bishop of Nazianzus. From his letter to the blessed Nectarius, bishop of Constantinoplë – “The saddest thing in what has befallen the churches is the boldness of the utterances of Apollinarius and his party. I cannot understand how your Holiness has allowed them to arrogate to themselves the power of assembling on the same terms with us.” And a little further on: – “I will no longer call this serious; it is indeed saddest of all that the only begotten God Himself, Judge of all who exist, the Prince of Life, the Destroyer of Death, is made by him mortal and allegedly to receive suffering in His own Godhead. He represents the Godhead to have shared with the body in the dissolution of that three days death of the body, and so after the death to have been raised again by the Father.” Of the same from his former exposition to Cledonius: – “It is the contention of the Arians that the manhood was without a soul, that they may refer the passion to the Godhead and represent the same power as both moving the body and suffering.” Of the same from his discourse about the Son: – “It remained for us to treat of what was commanded Him and of His keeping the commandments and doing all things pleasing to Him; and further of His perfection, exaltation, and learning obedience by all that He suffered, 135 His priesthood, His offering, His betrayal, His entreaty to Him that hath power to save Him from death, His agony, His bloody sweat, His prayer and similar manifestations, were it not clear to all that all these expressions in connexion with His Passion in no way to signify the nature which was immutable and above suffering.” Of the same from his Easter Discourse (Or. ii.): – 'Who is this that cometh from Edom?' 136 and from the earth, and how can the garments of the bloodless and bodyless be red as of one that treadeth in the wine-fat? Urge in reply the beauty of the garment of the body which suffered and was made beautiful in suffering, and was made splendid by the Godhead, than which nothing is lovelier nor more fair.” Testimony of Gregory, bishop of Nyssa. From his catechetical oration: – “And this is the mystery of the dispensation of God concerning the manhood and of the resurrection from the dead, not to prevent the soul from being separated from the body by death according to the necessary law of human nature, and to bring them together again through the resurrection.” Of the same from the same work: – “The flesh which received the Godhead, and which through the resurrection was exalted with the Godhead, is not formed of another material, but of ours; so, just as in the case of our own body, the operation of one of the senses moves to general sensation the whole man united to that part, in like manner just as though all nature were one single animal, the resurrection of the part pervades the whole, being conveyed from the part to the whole by what is continuous and united in nature. What then do we find extraordinary in the mystery that the upright stoops to the fallen to raise up him that lies low?” Of the same from the same work: – “It would be natural also in this part not to heed the one and neglect the other; but in the immortal to behold the human, and to be curiously exact about the diviner quality in the manhood.” Of the same from his work against Eunomius: – “'Tis not the human nature which raises Lazarus to life. 'Tis not the impassible power which sheds tears over the dead. The tear belongs to the man; the life comes from the very life. The thousands are not fed by human poverty; omnipotence does not hasten to the fig tree. Who was weary in the way, and who by His word sustains all the world without being weary? What is the brightness of His glory, what was pierced by the nails? What form is smitten in the passion, what is glorified for everlasting? The answer is plain and needs no interpretation.” Of the same from the same treatisë – “He blames them that refers to the passion to the human nature. He wishes himself wholly to subject the Godhead itself to the passion, for the proposition being twofold and doubtful, whether the divinity or the humanity was concerned in the passion, the denial of the one becomes the positive condemnation of the other. While therefore they blame them who see the passion in the humanity, they will bestow unqualified praise on them that maintain the Divinity of the Son of God to be passible. But the point established by these means becomes a confirmation of their own absurdity of doctrine; for if, as they allege, the Godhead of the Son suffers while that of the Father in accordance with its substance is conserved in complete impassibility, it follows that the impassible nature is at variance with the nature which sustains suffering.” The testimony of the holy Amphilochius, bishop of Iconium. From his discourse on the text “Verily, verily I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent me hath everlasting life”: 137 – “Whose then are the sufferings? Of the flesh. Therefore if you give to the flesh the suffering, give it also the lowly words; and ascribe the exalted words to Him to Whom you assign the miracles. For the God when He is in the act of working wonders naturally speaks in high and lofty language worthy of His works and the man when He is suffering fitly utters lowly words corresponding with His sufferings.” Of the same from his discourse on “My Father is greater than I”: 138 – “But when you give the sufferings to the flesh and the miracles to God, you must of necessity, though unwillingly, give the lowly words to the man born of Mary, and the high and lofty words becoming God, to the Word who existed in the beginning. The reason why I utter sometimes lofty words and sometimes lowly is that by the lofty I may show the nobility of the indwelling Word, and by the lowly make known the infirmity of the lowly flesh. So at one time I call myself equal to the Father and at another I call the Father greater; and in this I am not inconsistent with myself, but I shew that I am God and man; God by the lofty and man by the lowly. And if you wish to know in what sense my Father is greater than I, I spoke in the flesh and not in the person of the Godhead.” Of the same from his discourse on “If it be possible let this cup pass from me”: 139 – “Ascribe not then the sufferings of the flesh to the impassible God, for I, O heretic, am God, and man; God, as the miracles prove; man as is shewn by the sufferings. Since then I am God and man, tell me, who was it who suffered? If God suffered, you have spoken blasphemy; but if the flesh suffered, why do you not attribute the passion to Him to whom you describe the dread? For while one is suffering another feels on dread; while man is being crucified God is not troubled.” Of the same from his discourse against the Arians: – “And not to prolong what I am saying, I will shortly ask you, O heretic, did He who was begotten of God before the ages suffer, or Jesus who was born of David in the last days? If the Godhead suffered, thou hast spoken blasphemy; if, as the truth is, the manhood suffered, for what reason do you hesitate to attribute the passion to man?” Of the same from his discourse concerning the Son: – “Peter said, God hath made this Jesus both Lord and Christ' 140 and said too, this Jesus whom ye crucified God hath raised up.” 141 Now it was the manhood, not the Godhead, which became a corpse, and He who raised it was the Word, the power of God, who said in the Gospel, Destroy this church and in three days I will raise it up.' 142 So when it is said that God hath made Him who became a corpse and rose from the dead both Lord and Christ, what is meant is the flesh, and not the Godhead of the Son.” Of the same from his discourse on “The Son can do nothing of Himself”: 143 – “For He had not such a nature as that His life could be held by corruption, since His Godhead was not forcibly reduced to suffering. For how could it? But the manhood was renewed in incorruption. So he says For this mortal must put on immortality and this corruptible must put on incorruption.' 144 You observe the accuracy; he points distinctly to this mortal' that you may not entertain the idea of ​​the resurrection of any other flesh." Testimony of the holy Flavianus, bishop of Antioch. On Easter Day: – “Where also the cross is boldly preached by us, and the Lord's death confessed among us, though in nothing did the Godhead suffer, for the divine is impassible, but the dispensation was fulfilled by the body.” Of the same on Judas the traitor: – “When therefore you hear of the Lord being betrayed, do not degrade the divine dignity to insignificance, nor attribute to divine power the sufferings of the body. For the divine is impassible and invariable. For if through His love to mankind He took on Him the form of a servant, He underwent no change in nature. But being what He ever was, he yielded the divine 145 body to experience death." Testimony of Theophilus, bishop of Alexandria. From his Heortastic Volumë – “Of unreasoning beings the souls are not taken and replaced: they share in the corruption of the bodies, and are dissolved into dust. But after the Saviour at the time of the cross had taken the soul from His own body, He restored it to the body again when He rose from the dead. To assure us of this He uttered the words of the psalmist, the predictive exclamation, Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hell nor suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.'" 146 Testimony of the blessed Gelasius, bishop of Cæsarea in Palestine – "He was bound, He was wounded, He was crucified, He was handled, He was marked with scars, He received a lancés wound, and all these indignities were undergone by the body born of Mary, while that which was begotten from the Father before the ages none was able to harm, for the Word had no such nature. For how can any one constrain Godhead? How wound it? How to make red with blood the incorporeal nature? How surround it with grave bands? Grant now what you cannot contravene and, constrained by invincible reason, honor Godhead.” Testimony of the holy John, bishop of Constantinople. From his discourse on the words “My Father worketh hitherto and I work”: 147 – “What sign shewest Thou unto us seeing that Thou doest these things?” 148 What then does He reply Himself? Destroy this church,' He says, and in three days I will raise it up,' 149 speaking of His own body, but they did not understand Him." And a little further on: – “Why does not the evangelist pass this by? Why did he add the correction, But He spake of the church of his body'? 150 for He did not say destroy this body,' but templé that He might shew the indwelling God. Destroy this church which is far more excellent than that of the Jews. The Jewish church contained the Law; this church contains the Lawgiver; the former the letter that killeth; the latter the spirit that gives life." 151 Of the same from the discourse “That what was spoken and done in humility was not so done and spoken on account of infirmity of power but different dispensations”: – “How then does He say If it be possiblé? 152 He is pointing out to us the infirmity of the human nature, which did not choose to be torn away from this present life, but stepped back and shrank on account of the love implanted in it by God in the beginning for the present life. If then when the Lord Himself so often spoke in such terms, some have dared to say that He did not take flesh, what would they have said if none of these words had been spoken by Him?” Of the same from the same work: – “Observe how they spoke of His former age. Ask the heretic question Does God dread? Does He draw back? Does He shrink? Does He Sorrow? and if he says yes, stand off from him for the future, rank him down below with the devil, aye lower even than the devil, for even the devil will not dare to say this. But, should he say that each of these things is unworthy of God, reply – neither does God pray; for apart from these it will be yet another absurdity should the words be the words of God, for the words indicate not only an agony, but also two wills; one of the Son and another of the Father, opposed to one another. For the words Not as I will, but as Thou wilt,' are the words of one indicating this." Of the same from the same work: – “For if this be spoken of the Godhead there arises a certain contradiction, and many absurdities are thereby produced. If on the contrary it is spoken of the flesh, the expressions are reasonable, and no fault can be found with them. For the unwillingness of the flesh to die incurs no condemnation; such is the nature of the flesh and He exhibits all the properties of the flesh except sin, and indeed in full abundance, so as to stop the mouths of the heretics. When therefore He says If it be possible let this cup pass from mé and not as I will but as Thou wilt,' He only shews that He is really clothed with the flesh which fears death, for it is the nature of the flesh to fear death, to draw back and to suffer agony. Now He leaves it abandoned and stripped of its own activity, that by shewing its weakness He may convince us also of its nature. Sometimes however He conceals it, because He was not more man.” Testimony of Severianus, bishop of Gabala. From his discourse on the seals: – “The Jews withstand the apparent, ignorant of the non-apparent; they crucify the flesh; they do not destroy the Godhead. For if my words are not destroyed together with the letter which is the clothing of speech, how could God the Word, the fount of life, die together with the flesh? The passion belongs to the body, but impassibility to the dignity.” See then how they whose husbandry is in the East and in the West, as well as in the South and in the North, have all been shewn by us to condemn your vain heresy, and all openly to proclaim the impassibility of the divine Nature. See how both tongues, I mean both Greek and Latin, make one harmonious confession about the things of God. Eran. – I am myself astonished at their harmony, but I observe a significant difference in the terms they use. Orth. - Don't be angry. The very force of their fight against their adversaries is the cause of their seeming immoderate. The same thing is to be observed in the case of planters; when they see a plant bent one way or another, they are not satisfied with bringing it to a straight line, but bend it still further in the opposite direction, that by its being bent still further from the straight it may achieve its upright stature. But that you may know that the very promoters and supporters of this manifold heresy strive to surpass even the heretics of old by the greatness of their blasphemies, listen once more to the writings of Apollinarius which proclaim the impassibility of the divine nature, and confess the passion to be of the body. Testimony of Apollinarius. From his summary: – “John spoke of the church which was destroyed, namely the body of Him that raised it, and the body is entirely united to Him and He is not another among them. And if the body of the Lord was one with the Lord, the properties of the body were constituted His properties on account of the body." And again: – “And the truth is that His conjunction with the body does not take place by circumscription of the Word, so that He has nothing beyond His incorporation. Wherefore even in death immortality abides with Him; for if He transcends this composition, so does He also the dissolution. Now death is dissolution. But He was not comprehended in the composition; had He been so, the universe would have been made void; nor in the dissolution did He, like the soul, suffer the deprivation which succeeds dissolution.” And again: – “As the Saviour says that the dead bodies go away from their tombs, though their souls do not go away then, just so He says that He Himself will rise from the dead, although it is only His body that rises.” In another similar work he writes: – “Of man is the rising from the dead; of God is the raising. Now Christ both rose and raised, for He was God and man. Had the Christ been only man He would not have quickened the dead, and if He had been only God, He would not on His own account apart from the Father have quickened any of the dead. But Christ did both; the same being is both God and man. If the Christ had been only man He would not have saved the world; if He had been only God He would not have saved it through suffering, but Christ did both, so He is God and man. If the Christ had been only man or if only God He could not have been a Mediator between men and God.” And a little further on: – “Now flesh is an instrument of life fitted to the capacity for suffering in accordance with the divine will. Words are not proper to the Flesh, nor are they deeds. Being made subject to the capacity for suffering, as is natural to the flesh, it prevails over the suffering because it is the flesh of God.” And again a little further on: – “The Son took flesh of the Virgin and traveled to the world. This flesh He filled with the Holy Ghost to the sanctification of us all. So He delivered death to death and destroyed death through the resurrection to the raising of us all." From his tract concerning the faith: – “Since the passions are concerned with the flesh His power possessed its own impassibility, so to refer the passion to the power is an impious error.” And in his tract about the incarnation he further writes: – “Here then He shews that it was the same man who rose from the dead and God who reigns over all creation.” You see now that one of the professors of vain heresy plainly preaches the impassibility of the Godhead, calls the body a church, and persists in maintaining that this body was raised by God the Word. Eran. – I have heard and I am astonished; and I am really ashamed that our doctrines should appear less tenable than the innovation of Apollinarius. Orth. – But I will bring you a witness from yet another heretical herd clearly preaching the impassibility of the Godhead of the only begotten. Eran. – Whom do you mean? Orth. – You have probably heard of Eusebius the Phoenician, who was bishop of Emesa by Lebanon. 153 Eran. – I have met with some of his writings, and found him to be a supporter of the doctrines of Arius. Orth. – Yes; he did belong to that sect, but in his endeavor to prove that the Father was greater than the only begotten he declares the Godhead of the depreciated Son to be impassible and for this opinion he contended with long and extraordinary perseverance. Eran. – I should be very much obliged if you would quote his words too. Orth. – To comply with your wish I will add somewhat longer evidence. Now listen to what he says, and fancy that the man himself is addressing us. Testimony of Eusebius of Emesä – “Where does he fear death? Lest he suffer anything from death? For what was death to Him? Was it not the severance of the power from the flesh? Did the power receive a nail that it should fear? If our soul suffers not the body's infirmities when united with it, but the eye grows blind and yet the mind retains its force; and a foot is cut off and yet the reasoning power does not halt – and this nature evidence, and the Lord sets His seal on, in the words Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul' (and if they cannot kill the soul, it is not because they do not wish, but because they are not able, though they would like to make the soul share the suffering of the body yoked with it) – shall He who created the soul and formed the body suffer as the body suffers, although He does take upon Himself the body's sufferings? But Christ suffered for us, and we lie not. And the bread that I will give is my flesh.' 154 This He gave for us. “That which can be mastered was mastered; that which can be crucified was crucified, but He that had power alike to dwell in it and to leave it said Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit,' 155 not into the hands of them who were trying to hasten His death. I am not fond of controversy; I rather avoid it; with all gentleness I wish to enquire into the points at issue between us as between brothers. Do not I say truly that the power could not be subject to the sufferings of the flesh? I say nothing; let him who will say what the power suffered. Did it fail? See the danger. Was it extinct? See the blasphemy. Did it no longer exist? This is the death of power. Tell me what can so master it that it suffered and I withdraw. But, if you cannot tell me, why do you object to my not telling you? What you cannot tell me, that it did not receive. Drive a nail into a soul and I will admit that it can be driven into power. But it was in sympathy. Tell me what you mean by in sympathy.' As a nail went into the flesh, so pain into the power. Let us understand was in sympathy' in this sense. Then pain was felt by the power which was not smitten. For pain always follows on suffering. But if a body often despises pain while the mind is sound, on account of the vigour of its thought, then in this case let some one explain impartially what suffered and what suffered with or was in sympathy. What then? Didn't Christ die for us? How did He die? Father, into your hands I commend my Spirit.' 156 The Spirit departed; the body remained; the body remained without breath. Did He not die then? He died for us. The Shepherd offered the sheep, the Priest offered the sacrifice, He gave Himself for us. He that spared not His own Son but delivered Him up for us all.' 157 I do not reject the words, but I want the meaning of the words. The Lord says that the bread of God came down from Heaven, 158 and though I cannot express it more clearly on account of the mysteries, He says in explanation It is my flesh.' Did the flesh of the Son come down from heaven? No. How then does He say, and that in explanation, the bread of God lives and came down from Heaven? He refers to the properties of the power to the flesh, because the power which assumed the flesh came down from heaven. Change the terms then; He refers to the power that the flesh suffers. How did Christ suffer for us? He was spat upon, He was smitten on the cheek, they put a crown about His brow, His hands and feet were pierced. All these sufferings were of the body, but they are referred to Him that dwelt therein. Throw a stone at the Emperor's statue. What is the cry? You have insulted the Emperor.' Tear the Emperor's robe. What is the cry? You have rebelled against the Emperor.' Crucify Christ's body. What is the cry? Christ died for us.' But what need of me and thee? Let us go to the Evangelists. How have you received from the Lord how the Lord died? They read Father into your hands I commend my Spirit.' 159 The Spirit on high, the body on the Cross for us. So far as His body is attributed to Himself He offered the sheep.” Of the same from the same book: – “He came to save our nature; not to destroy His own. If I consent to say that a camel flies, you directly count it strange, because it does not fit in with its nature; and you are quite right. And if I say that men live in the sea you will not accept it; you are quite right. It is contrary to nature. As then if I say strange things about these natures you count it strange; if I say that the Power which was before the ages, by nature incorporeal, in dignity impassible, which exists with the Father and by the Father's side, on His right hand and in glory, if I say that this incorporeal nature suffers, will you not stop your ears? If you will not stop your ears when you hear this, I shall stop my heart. Can we do anything to an angel? Smite him with a sword? Or cut him in pieces? Why do I say to an angel? Can we to a soul? Does a soul receive a nail? A soul is neither cut nor burnt. Do you ask why? Because it was so created. Are His works impassible and He Himself passible? I do not reject the oeconomy; on the contrary, I welcome the ill-treatment. Christ died for us and was crucified. So it is written; so the nature admitted. I do not blot out the words nor do I blaspheme the nature. But this is not true. Very well, then let something truer be said. The teacher is a benefactor, never harsh, never an enemy, unless the pupil be headstrong. Have you anything good to say? My ears are gratefully open. Does any one want to quarrel? Let him quarrel at his leisure. Could the Jews crucify the Son of God and make the power itself a dead body? Can the living die? The death of this power is its failure. Even when we die, our body is left. But if we make that power a dead body we reduce it to non-existence. I am afraid you cannot hear. If the body die, the soul is separated from it and remains; but if the soul die, since it has no body, it ceases to exist altogether. A soul by altogether dying ceases to be. For the death of the immortals is a contradiction of their existence. Consider the alternative; for I do not dare even to mention it. We say these things as we understand them, but if any one is contentions, we lay down no law. But I know one thing, that every man must reap the fruit of his opinions. Each man comes to God and brings before Him what he has said and thought about Him. Do not suppose that God reads books, or is troubled by having to recollect what you said or who heard yoü all is made manifest. The judge is on the throne. Paulus 160 is brought before Him. Thou saidst I was a man; thou hast no life with Me. Thou knewest not Me; I don't know.' Up comes another. Thou saidst I was one of the things that are created. 161 Thou knewest not My dignity; I don't know.' Up comes another. Thou saidst that I did not assume a body. Thou madest light of My grace. Thou shalt not share My immortality.' Up comes another. Thou saidst that I was not born of a Virgin to save the body of the Virgin; thou shalt not be saved.' Each one reaps the fruit of his opinions about the faith." You see the other sect of your teachers, in which you supposed that you had learned the suffering of the Godhead of the only Begotten, abhors this blasphemy, preaches the impassibility of the Godhead, and quits the ranks of them who dare to attribute the passion to it. Eran. – Yes; I am astonished at the conflict, and I admire the man's sense and opinions. Orth. – Then, my good Sir, imitate the bees. As you flit in mental flight about the meads of the divine Scripture, among the fair flowers of these illustrious Fathers, build us in your heart the honey-comb of the faith. If haply you find anywhere herbage bitter and not fit to eat, like these fellows Apollinarius and Eusebius, but still not quite without something that may be met for making honey, it is reasonable that you should sip the sweet and leave the poisonous behind, like bees who lighting often on baneful bushes leave all the deadly bane behind and gather all the good. We give you this advice, dear friend, in brotherly kindness. Receive it and you will do well. And if you hearken not we will say to you in the word of the apostle “We are pure.” 162 We have spoken, as the prophet says, what we have been commanded. Demonstrations by Syllogisms. That God the Word is Immutable. 1. We have confessed one substance of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, and have agreed that it is immutable. If then there is one substance of the Trinity, and it is immutable, then the only begotten Son, who is one person of the Trinity, is immutable. And, if He is immutable, He was not made flesh by mutation, but is said to have been made flesh after taking flesh. 2. If God the Word was made flesh by undergoing mutation into flesh, then He is not immutable. For no one in his senses would call that which undergoes alteration immutable. And if He is mutable He is not of one substance with Him that begat Him. How indeed is it possible for one part of an uncompounded substance to be mutable and the other immutable? If we grant this we shall fall headlong into the blasphemy of Arius and Eunomius, who assert that the Son is of another substance. 3. If the Lord is consubstantial with the Father, and the Son was made flesh by undergoing change into flesh, then the substance is at once mutable and immutable, which blasphemy if any one has the hardihood to maintain, he will no doubt make it worse by his blasphemy against the Father, for inasmuch as the Father shares the same substance, he will assuredly call Him mutable. 4. It is written in the divine Scriptures that God the Word took flesh, and also a soul. And the most divine Evangelist says the Word was made flesh. 163 We must therefore perforce do one of two things: either we must admit the mutation of the Word into flesh, and reject all divine Scripture, both Old and New, as teaching lies, or in obedience to the divine Scripture, we must confess the assumption of the flesh, banishing mutation from our thoughts, and piously regarding the word of the Evangelist. This latter we must do inasmuch as we confess the nature of God the Word to be immutable, and have countless testimonies to the assumption of the flesh. 5. That which inhabits a tabernacle is distinct from the tabernacle which is inhabited. 164 The Evangelist calls the flesh a tabernacle, and says that God the Word tabernacled therein. "The Word," he says, "was made flesh and dwelt among us." 165 Now if He was made flesh by mutation, He did not dwell in flesh. But we have been taught that He dwelt in flesh; for the same Evangelist in another place calls His body a church. 166 We must therefore believe the Evangelist's explanation and interpretation of what to some seemed ambiguous. 6. If when the Evangelist wrote “the Word was made flesh” he had added nothing which could remove the ambiguity, perhaps the controversy about the passage might have had some reasonable excuse, from the obscurity of the terms used. But since he immediately went on to say “and dwelt in us,” the combatants contend to no purpose. The former clause is explained by the latter. 7. The immutability of God the Word is plainly proclaimed by the wisest Evangelist, for after saying “the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us,” he immediately adds, “And we were held His glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” 167 But if, according to the foolish, He had undergone mutation into flesh, He would not have remained what He was, but if even when enveloped in the flesh He emitted the rays of His Father's nobility, it follows that the nature which He has is immutable, and it shines even in the body and sends abroad the brightness of the nature which is unseen. For that light nothing can dim. “For the light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not,” 168 as saith the very divine John. 8. The illustrious Evangelist was desirous of explaining the glory of the only-begotten, but was unable to carry out his purpose. He therefore shews it by His fellowship with the Father. For he says He is of that nature; just as though any one to persons beholding Joseph sunk in a slavery inconsistent with his rank, and unaware of the splendour of his descent, were to point out that Jacob was his father, and his forefather Abraham. So in this sense the Evangelist said that when He dwelt among us He did not dim the glory of His nature, “For we were held His glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father.” So if even when He was made flesh it was plain who He was, then He remained who he was, and did not undergo the mutation into flesh. 9 . We have confessed that God the Word took not a body only but also a soul. Why then did the divine Evangelist omit in this place mention of the soul and mention the flesh alone? Is it not plain that he exhibited the visible nature and by its means signified the nature united to it? For the mention of the soul is understood of course in that of the flesh. For when we hear the prophet saying “Let all flesh bless His holy name,” 169 we do not understand the prophet to be exhorting bodies of flesh without souls, but believe the whole to be summoned to give praise in the summoning of a part. 10. The words “the Word was made flesh” are plainly indicative not of mutation, but of His unspeakable loving-kindness. For after the illustrious Evangelist had said “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God,” and had declared Him to be Creator of the visible and invisible, and had called Him life and true light, adding other similar expressions, and had spoken concerning the Godhead in such terms as human reason can take in and the language at its command can express, he went on “And the Word was made flesh,” as though smitten with amazement and astounded at the boundless loving-kindness. His existence is eternal; He is God; He made all things; He is source of eternal life and of true light; and on account of the salvation of men He put about Him the tabernacle of flesh. And He was supposed to be only that which He appeared. So for this reason he did not even mention a soul but only the perishable and mortal flesh. Of the soul as being immortal he said nothing in order to exhibit the boundlessness of the kindness. 11. The divine Apostle calls 170 the Lord Christ seed of Abraham. But if this is true, as true it is, then God the Word was not changed into flesh, but took on Him the seed of Abraham, according to the teaching of the Apostle himself. 12. God swore to David that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, He would raise up the Christ, as the prophet 171 said and as the great Peter interpreted. 172 But if God the Word was called Christ after mutation into flesh, we shall nowhere find the truth in the oaths. Yet we have been taught that God cannot lie; nay rather is Himself the truth. Therefore God the Word did not undergo change into flesh, but in accordance with the promise, took firstfruits of David's seed. Ἐρανιστής - actually a beggar, a person living on alms. In this name the blessed one. Theodoret calls heretics whose soul-harming dogmas are nothing more than pieces or scraps that they begged from wicked people. The vena cava, by which the blood returns to the heart. The physiology of Eranistes would be held in the main “orthodox” even now, and shews that Theodoret was well abreast of the science accepted before the discovery of the circulation of the blood. Matt. xix. 26; Mark x. 27 Cf. note on Page 37. From the middle of the IIIrd century onward we find acceptance of the Pauline authorship. Among writers who quote the Ep. as St. Paul's are Cyril of Jerusalem, the two Gregories, Basil, and Chrysostom, as well as Theodoret. Isaiah xl. 28, 29. cf. Sept. The text of John iv. 6 is kekopiakos ekathezeto, i.e., after being weary sate down. kopion ekathezeto would “while being weary sate down.” The force of the passage seems to be that Scripture states our Lord to have been wearied once, – not to be wearied now; though of course in classical Greek legei (historicè) auton kopian might mean “said that he was in a state of weariness.” “The Machpelah,” always in Hebrew with the article htkphlh “the double (cave).” It is interesting to contrast the heathen idea, that the shadow goes to Hades while the self is identified with the body, with the Christian belief, that the self lives while the body is buried e.g. Homer (Il. i. 4) says that while the famous “wrath” sent many heroes' souls to Hades, it made “them” a prey to dogs and birds. cf. xxiii. 72. “psuchai eidola kamonton.” Video note on Pages 37 and 220. The sacrifice of Isaac so far as his father's part in it is concerned is regarded as having actually taken place at the moment of his felt willingness to obey. In the interval of the journey to Mount Moriah Isaac is dead to his father. It is to be noted that Theodoret thus apparently regards the divine image as consisting in the intelligence or logos. And in the implication that Isaac had the divine image, he expresses the Scriptural view that this was marred, not lost, by the fall. St. Thomas was buried at Edessa. Soc. iv. 18, Chrys. Hom. in Heb. 26. St. Stephen's remains were said to have been found at Jerusalem, and widely dispersed. cf. Dict. Christ. Ant. II. 1929. Matt. xvii. 26. Mark xiv. 22. Luke xxii. 19. 1Cor. xi. 24 Matt. xxvi. 28 and Mark xiv. 24 Acts ii. 29 et seqq. and Ps. xvi. 10 See the Creed as published by the Council. p. 50. The quotation is not quite exact, “'Eucharistias kai prosphoras ouk apodechontai” being substituted for eucharistias kai proseuches apechontai. Bp. Lightfoot (Ap. Fath. II. ii. 307) notes, “the argument is much the same as Tertullian's against the Docetism of Marcion (adv. Marc. iv. 40), Acceptum panem et distributum discipulis corpus suum illum fecit. Hoc est corpus meum dicendo, id est figura mei corporis. Figura autem non fuisset, nisi veritatis esset corpus, ceterum vacua res quod est phantasma, figuram capere non posset.' The Eucharist implies the reality of Christ's flesh. To those who deny this reality it has no meaning at all; to them Christ's words of institution are false; it is in no sense the flesh of Christ.” Cf. Iren. iv. 18, 5. Ephes. ii. 13. Observe slight differences. Gal. iii. 13 and Deut. xxi. 23 cf. Luke xxiv. 39. And for the application of these words to St. Thomas cf. page 210. The effusion of water and blood is now well known to have been a natural consequence of the “broken heart.” On the rupture of the heart the blood fills the pericardium, and then coagulates. The wound of the lance gave passage to the collected blood and serum. cf. Dr. Stroud's "Physical Cause of the Death of Christ," first published in 1847. i.e. literally, try not to lay hold of me. The quotation seems to be a confusion between Acts ii. 24, and Acts xiii. 29. Sic in Athan. Ed. Migne. II. 1030. But “after his resurrection” appears to qualify the statement “arose” as well as “appeared” in Matt. xxviii. 53 This passage is not found in the discourse on the Incarnation, but a similar passage occurs in the third oration against the Arians. Ed. Ben. p. 606. Acts ii. 24. The citation is loose. 1Cor. xv. 53. Observe the inaccuracy of the quotation. The Latin translator, as though observing the apparent impropriety of the epithet, here renders theion “sanctissimum.” Eusebius, bishop of Emesa (now Hems, where Heliogabalus received the purple, and Aurelian defeated Zenobia) c. 341–359 is called by Jerome “Signifer Arianæ factionis.” Chron. sub ann. x Constantii. Theodoret also mentions writings of his against Apelles (Hær. fab. i. 25.) ton ton in the original; lit: of the things that are, which might have an orthodox interpretation, thó strictly speaking there is no such thing as “to on;” there is only “ho on,” i.e. God. But Schulze is no doubt right in explaining ton onton here to refer to created things. John i. 14. The argument rather requires the rendering “dwelt in us,” which is that of the Rheims Version. "In nobis qui caro sumus." Bengel. But see Alford in loc. You might be interested in: