Against VIII.--As I have often said, the doxology which we offer to the Lord Christ is one, and we confess the same to be at once God and man, as the method of the union has taught us; but we shall not shrink from speaking of the properties of the natures. For God the Word did not undergo change into flesh, nor yet again did the man lose what he was and undergo transmutation into the nature of God. Therefore we worship the Lord Christ, while we maintain the properties of either nature.
Against IX.--Here he has plainly had the hardihood to anathematize not only those who at the present time hold pious opinions, but also those who were in former days heralds of truth; aye even the writers of the divine gospels, the band of the holy Apostles, and, in addition to these, Gabriel the archangel. For he indeed it was who first, even before the conception, announced the birth of the Christ according to the flesh; saying in reply to Mary when she asked, "How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?" "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; therefore also that holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." [206] And to Joseph he said, "Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost." [207] And the Evangelist says, "When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph...she was found with child of the Holy Ghost." [208] And the Lord Himself when He had come into the synagogue of the Jews and had taken the prophet Isaiah, after reading the passage in which he says, "The spirit of the Lord is upon me because He hath anointed me" and so on, added, "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears." [209] And the blessed Peter in his sermon to the Jews said, "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost." [210] And Isaiah many ages before had predicted, "There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots; and the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord;" [211] and again, "Behold my servant whom I uphold, my beloved in whom my soul delighteth. I will put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles." [212] This testimony the Evangelist too has inserted in his own writings. And the Lord Himself in the Gospels says to the Jews, "If I with the spirit of God cast out devils, no doubt the kingdom of God is come upon you." [213] And John says, "He that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining on Him, the same is He which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost." [214] So this exact examiner of the divine decrees has not only anathematized prophets, apostles, and even the archangel Gabriel, but has suffered his blasphemy to reach even the Saviour of the world Himself. For we have shewn that the Lord Himself after reading the passage "The spirit of the Lord is upon me because He hath anointed me," said to the Jews, "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears." And to those who said that He was casting out devils by Beelzebub He replied that He was casting them out by the Spirit of God. But we maintain that it was not God the Word, of one substance and co-eternal with the Father, that was formed by the Holy Ghost and anointed, but the human nature which was assumed by Him at the end of days. We shall confess that the Spirit of the Son was His own if he spoke of it as of the same nature and proceeding from the Father, and shall accept the expression as consistent with true piety. But if he speaks of the Spirit as being of the Son, or as having its origin through the Son we shall reject this statement as blasphemous and impious. For we believe the Lord when He says, "The spirit which proceedeth from the Father;" [215] and likewise the very divine Paul saying, "We have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God." [216]
Against X.--The unchangeable nature was not changed into nature of flesh, but assumed human nature and set it over the common high priests, as the blessed Paul teaches in the words, "For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins: who can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way; for that he himself also is encompassed with infirmity. And by reason hereof he ought, as for the people so also for himself." [217] And a little further on interpreting this he says, "As was Aaron so also was the Christ." [218] Then pointing out the infirmity of the assumed nature he says, "Who in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplication with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from death, and was heard for His godly fear, though He was a son yet learned obedience by the things that He suffered: and having been made perfect He became unto all that obey Him the author of eternal salvation; named of God a high priest of the order of Melchisedec." [219] Who then is He who was perfected by toils of virtue and who was not perfect by nature? Who is He who learnt obedience by experience, and before his experience was ignorant of it? Who is it that lived with godly fear and offered supplication with strong crying and tears, not able to save Himself but appealing to Him that is able to save Him and asking for release from death? Not God the Word, the impassible, the immortal, the incorporeal, whose memory is joy and release from tears, "For he has wiped away tears from off all faces," [220] and again the prophet says, "I remembered God and was glad," [221] Who crowneth them that live in godly fear, "Who knoweth all things before they be," [222] "Who hath all things that the Father hath;" [223] Who is the unchangeable image of the Father, [224] "Who sheweth the Father in himself." [225] It is on the contrary that which was assumed by Him of the seed of David, mortal, passible, and afraid of death; although this itself afterwards destroyed the power of death through union with the God who had assumed it; [226] which walked through all righteousness and said to John, "Suffer it to be so now for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness." [227] This took the name of the priesthood of Melchisedec, for it put on infirmity of nature;--not the Almighty God the Word. Wherefore also, a little before, the blessed Paul said, "We have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin." [228] It was the nature taken from us for our sakes which experienced our feelings without sin, not He that on account of our salvation assumed it. And in the beginning of this part of his subject he teaches us in the words "Consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Jesus, who was faithful to Him that appointed Him as also Moses was faithful in all His house." [229] But no one holding the right faith would call the unmade the uncreate, God the Word coeternal with the Father, a creature; but on the contrary, Him of David's seed Who being free from all sin was made our high priest and victim, after Himself offering Himself on our behalf to God having in Himself the Word, God of God, united to Himself and inseparably conjoined.
Against XI.--In my opinion he appears to give heed to the truth, in order that, by concealing his unsound views by it, he may not be detected in asserting the same dogmas as the heretics. But nothing is stronger than truth, which by its own rays uncovers the darkness of falsehood. By the aid of its illumination we shall make his heterodox belief plain. In the first place he has nowhere made mention of intelligent flesh, nor confessed that the assumed man was perfect, but everywhere in accordance with the teaching of Apollinarius he speaks of flesh. Secondly, after introducing the conception of the mixture under other terms, he brings it into his arguments; for there he clearly states the flesh of the Lord to be soulless. For, he says, if any one states that the flesh of the Lord is not proper flesh of the very Word who is of God the Father, but that it is of another beside Him, let him be anathema. Hence it is plain that he does not confess God the Word to have assumed a soul, but only flesh, and that He Himself stands to the flesh in place of soul. We on the contrary assert that the flesh of the Lord having in it life [230] was life-giving and reasonable, on account of the life-giving Godhead united to it. And he himself unwillingly confesses the difference between the two natures, speaking of flesh, and "God the Word" and calling it "His own flesh." Therefore God the Word was not changed into nature of flesh, but has His own flesh, the assumed nature, and has made it life-giving by the union.
Against XII.--Passion is proper to the passible; the impassible is above passions. It was then the form of the servant that suffered, the form of God of course dwelling with it, and permitting it to suffer on account of the salvation brought forth of the sufferings, and making the sufferings its own on account of the union. Therefore it was not the Christ [231] who suffered, but the man assumed of us by God. Wherefore also the blessed Isaiah exclaims in his prophecy, "A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." [232] And the Lord Christ Himself said to the Jews, "Why seek ye to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth?" [233] But what is threatened with death is not the very life, but he that hath a mortal nature. And giving this lesson in another place the Lord said to the Jews, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." [234] Therefore what was destroyed was the (temple descended) from David, and, after its destruction, it was raised up by the only begotten Word of God impassibly begotten of the Father before the ages.
[174] Ps. ci. 28
[175] Heb. i. 12
[176] Mal. iii. 6
[177] Phil. ii. 5, 6, 7
[178] Matt. i. 23
[179] Coloss. i. 19, and ii. 9
[180] cf. n. p. 72.
[181] John ii. 19
[182] Phil. ii. 7
[183] 2 Cor. iv. 16
[184] Rom. vii. 22
[185] Ephes. iii. 17. Greek as in A.V. "in your hearts."
[186] Matt. xxvii. 48
[187] Matt. xxvi. 39
[188] John xii. 27
[189] Matt. xxiv. 36 and Mk. xiii. 22. There is no manuscript authority for the variation Son "of Man."
[190] John xvi. 15
[191] Matt. xxiv. 36
[192] Matt. xxvi. 39
[193] Matt. xx. 18, 19
[194] John viii. 26
[195] For the view that the cup deprecated by the Saviour was death there is no direct Scriptural authority and to adopt the exegesis of Theodoret and of many others would be to place the divine humanity of the Messiah on a lower level than that not merely of many a martyr and patriot but of many men unconscious of martyr's or patriot's high calling, who have nevertheless faced death and pain with calm and cheerful fortitude. The bitterness of the cup which the Saviour prayed might if possible pass from Him seems rather to have lain in the culmination of the sin of the race and nation with which His love for men had identified Him; the greed, the treachery, the meanness, the cruelty, the disloyalty, shewn by the Sons of Israel to the Son of David, by the sons of men to the Son of Man.
[196] koinonia, in the sense of participation.
[197] Coloss. ii. 8, 9
[198] Phil. ii. 7
[199] Gal. iv. 7
[200] John xv. 15
[201] Isaiah vii. 14 and ix. 6, lxx. Alex.
[202] Isaiah xlix. 3
[203] Isaiah xlix. 5
[204] Isaiah xlix. 6 "covenant of the people" being imported from lxii. 6
[205] Ephes. i. 19, 20
[206] Luke i. 34, 35
[207] Matt. i. 20
[208] Matt. i. 18
[209] Luke iv. 17, 21
[210] Acts x. 38