Chapter XVIII.
How we are to understand the Apostle's words: "He appeared in the flesh, was justified in the Spirit," etc.
For to begin with this assertion of yours that the Spirit filled with righteousness (justitia) what was created, and your attempts to prove this by the evidence of the Apostle, where he says that "He appeared in the flesh, was justified in the Spirit," you make each statement in an unsound sense and wild spirit. For you make this assertion; viz., that you will have it that He was filled with righteousness by the Spirit, in order to show how He was void of righteousness, as you assert that the being filled with it was given to Him. And as for your use of the evidence of the Apostle on this matter, you garble the arrangement and meaning of the sacred passage. For the Apostle's statement is not as you have quoted it, mutilated and spoilt. For what says the Apostle? "And evidently great is the mystery of Godliness, which was manifested in the flesh, was justified in the Spirit." [2638] You see then that the Apostle declared that the mystery or sacrament of Godliness was justified. For he was not so forgetful of his own words and teaching as to say that He was void of righteousness, whom he had always proclaimed as righteousness, saying: "Who was made unto us righteousness and sanctification and redemption." [2639] Elsewhere also he says: "But ye were washed, but ye were justified, but ye were sanctified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." [2640] How far then from Him was it to need being filled with righteousness, as He Himself filled all things with righteousness, and for His glory to be without righteousness, whose very name justifies all things. You see then how foolish and wild are your blasphemies, since you are trying to take away from our Lord what is ever shed forth by Him upon all believers in such a way that still in its continuous supply it is never diminished.
[2638] 1 Tim. iii. 16.
[2639] 1 Cor. i. 30.
[2640] 1 Cor. vi. 11.
Chapter XIX.
That it was not only the Spirit, but Christ Himself also who made Him to be feared.
You say too that the Spirit made Him to be feared by the devils. To reject and refute which, even though the horrible character of the utterance is enough, we will still add some instances. Tell me, I pray, you who say that the fact that the devils feared Him was not His own doing but another's, and who will have it that this was not His own power but a gift, how was it that even His name had that power, of which He Himself was, according to you, void? How was it that in His name devils were cast out, sick persons were cured, dead men were raised? For the Apostle Peter says to that lame man who was sitting at the beautiful gate of the Temple: "In the name of Jesus Christ arise and walk." [2641] And again in the city of Joppa to the man who had been lying on his bed paralysed for eight years he says, "Æneas, may the Lord Jesus Christ heal thee: arise and make thy bed for thyself." [2642] Paul too says to the pythonical spirit: "I charge thee in the name of Jesus Christ come out of her," and the devil came out of her. [2643] But understand from this how utterly alien this weakness was from our Lord: for I do not call even those weak, whom He by His name made strong, since we never heard of any devil or infirmity able to resist any of the apostles since the Lord's resurrection. How then did the Spirit make Him to be feared, who made others to be feared? Or was He in Himself weak, whose faith even through the instrumentality of others reigned over all things? Finally those men who received power from God, never used that power as if it were their own: but referred the power to Him from whom they received it: for the power itself could never have any force except through the name of Him who gave it. And so both the apostles and all the servants of God never did any thing in their own name, but in the name and invocation of Christ: for the power itself derived its force from the same source as its origin, and could not be given through the instrumentality of the ministers, unless it had come from the Author. You then--who say that the Lord was the same as one of His servants (for as the apostles had nothing but what they received from their Lord, so you make out that the Lord Himself had nothing but what He received from the Spirit; and thus you make out that everything that He had, He had not as Lord, but had received it as a servant), do you tell me then, how it was that He used this power as His own and not as something which He had received? For what do we read of Him? He says to the paralytic: "Arise, take up thy bed, and go to thine house." [2644] And again to a father who pleads on behalf of his child, He says: "Go thy way: thy son liveth." [2645] And where an only son of his mother was being carried forth for burial, "Young man," He says, "I say unto thee Arise." [2646] Did He then like those who received power from God, ask that power might be given to Him for performing these things by the invocation of the Divine Name? Why did He not Himself work by the name of the Spirit, just as the apostles wrought by His Name? Finally, what does the gospel itself state about Him? It says: "He was teaching them as one that had authority, and not like the Scribes and Pharisees." [2647] Or do you make out that He was so proud and haughty as to put to the credit of His own might the power which (according to you) He had received from God? But what do we make of the fact that the power never submitted to His servants, except through the name of its author, and could have no efficacy if the actor claimed any of it as his own?
[2641] Acts iii. 6.
[2642] Acts ix. 34.
[2643] Acts xvi. 18.
[2644] S. Matt. ix. 6.
[2645] S. John iv. 50.
[2646] S. Luke vii. 14.
[2647] S. Matt. vii. 29.