67. When then received He the works to perfect, O God's enemies? for from this also He created' will be understood. If ye say, At the beginning when He brought them into being out of what was not,' it is an untruth; for they were not yet made; whereas He appears to speak as taking what was already in being. Nor is it pious to refer to the time which preceded the Word's becoming flesh, lest His coming should thereupon seem superfluous, since for the sake of these works that coming took place. Therefore it remains for us to say that when He has become man, then He took the works. For then He perfected them, by healing our wounds and vouchsafing to us the resurrection from the dead. But if, when the Word became flesh, then were given to Him the works, plainly when He became man, then also is He created for the works. Not of His essence then is He created' indicative, as has many times been said, but of His bodily generation. For then, because the works were become imperfect and mutilated from the transgression, He is said in respect to the body to be created; that by perfecting them and making them whole, He might present the Church unto the Father, as the Apostle says, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but holy and without blemish [2667] .' Mankind then is perfected in Him and restored, as it was made at the beginning, nay, with greater grace. For, on rising from the dead, we shall no longer fear death, but shall ever reign in Christ in the heavens. And this has been done, since the own Word of God Himself, who is from the Father, has put on the flesh, and become man. For if, being a creature, He had become man, man had remained just what he was, not joined to God; for how had a work been joined to the Creator by a work [2668] ? or what succour had come from like to like, when one as well as other needed it [2669] ? And how, were the Word a creature, had He power to undo God's sentence, and to remit sin, whereas it is written in the Prophets, that this is God's doing? For who is a God like unto Thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by transgression [2670] ?' For whereas God has said, Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return [2671] ,' men have become mortal; how then could things originate undo sin? but the Lord is He who has undone it, as He says Himself, Unless the Son shall make you free [2672] ;' and the Son, who made free, has shewn in truth that He is no creature, nor one of things originate, but the proper Word and Image of the Father's Essence, who at the beginning sentenced, and alone remitteth sins. For since it is said in the Word, Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return,' suitably through the Word Himself and in Him the freedom and the undoing of the condemnation has come to pass.
68. Yet,' they say, though the Saviour were a creature, God was able to speak the word only and undo the curse.' And so another will tell them in like manner, Without His coming among us at all, God was able just to speak and undo the curse;' but we must consider what was expedient for mankind, and not what simply is possible with God [2673] . He could have destroyed, before the ark of Noah, the then transgressors; but He did it after the ark. He could too, without Moses, have spoken the word only and have brought the people out of Egypt; but it profited to do it through Moses. And God was able without the judges to save His people; but it was profitable for the people that for a season judges should be raised up to them. The Saviour too might have come among us from the beginning, or on His coming might not have been delivered to Pilate; but He came at the fulness of the ages [2674] ,' and when sought for said, I am He [2675] .' For what He does, that is profitable for men, and was not fitting in any other way; and what is profitable and fitting, for that He provides [2676] . Accordingly He came, not that He might be ministered unto, but that He might minister [2677] ,' and might work our salvation. Certainly He was able to speak the Law from heaven, but He saw that it was expedient to men for Him to speak from Sinai; and that He has done, that it might be possible for Moses to go up, and for them hearing the word near them the rather to believe. Moreover, the good reason of what He did may be seen thus; if God had but spoken, because it was in His power, and so the curse had been undone, the power had been shewn of Him who gave the word, but man had become such as Adam was before the transgression, having received grace from without [2678] , and not having it united to the body; (for he was such when he was placed in Paradise) nay, perhaps had become worse, because he had learned to transgress. Such then being his condition, had he been seduced by the serpent, there had been fresh need for God to give command and undo the curse; and thus the need had become interminable [2679] , and men had remained under guilt not less than before, as being enslaved to sin; and, ever sinning, would have ever needed one to pardon them, and had never become free, being in themselves flesh, and ever worsted by the Law because of the infirmity of the flesh.
69. Again, if the Son were a creature, man had remained mortal as before, not being joined to God; for a creature had not joined creatures to God, as seeking itself one to join it [2680] ; nor would a portion of the creation have been the creation's salvation, as needing salvation itself. To provide against this also, He sends His own Son, and He becomes Son of Man, by taking created flesh; that, since all were under sentence of death, He, being other than them all, might Himself for all offer to death His own body; and that henceforth, as if all had died through Him, the word of that sentence might be accomplished (for all died [2681] ' in Christ), and all through Him might thereupon become free from sin and from the curse which came upon it, and might truly abide [2682] for ever, risen from the dead and clothed in immortality and incorruption. For the Word being clothed in the flesh, as has many times been explained, every bite of the serpent began to be utterly staunched from out it; and whatever evil sprung from the motions of the flesh, to be cut away, and with these death also was abolished, the companion of sin, as the Lord Himself says [2683] , The prince of this world cometh, and findeth nothing in Me;' and For this end was He manifested,' as John has written, that He might destroy the works of the devil [2684] .' And these being destroyed from the flesh, we all were thus liberated by the kinship of the flesh, and for the future were joined, even we, to the Word. And being joined to God, no longer do we abide upon earth; but, as He Himself has said, where He is, there shall we be also; and henceforward we shall fear no longer the serpent, for he was brought to nought when he was assailed by the Saviour in the flesh, and heard Him say, Get thee behind Me, Satan [2685] ,' and thus he is cast out of paradise into the eternal fire. Nor shall we have to watch against woman beguiling us, for in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the Angels [2686] ;' and in Christ Jesus it shall be a new creation,' and neither male nor female, but all and in all Christ [2687] ;' and where Christ is, what fear, what danger can still happen?
70. But this would not have come to pass, had the Word been a creature; for with a creature, the devil, himself a creature, would have ever continued the battle, and man, being between the two, had been ever in peril of death, having none in whom and through whom he might be joined to God and delivered from all fear. Whence the truth shews us that the Word is not of things originate, but rather Himself their Framer. For therefore did He assume the body originate and human, that having renewed it as its Framer, He might deify it [2688] in Himself, and thus might introduce us all into the kingdom of heaven after His likeness. For man had not been deified if joined to a creature, or unless the Son were very God; nor had man been brought into the Father's presence, unless He had been His natural and true Word who had put on the body. And as we had not been delivered from sin and the curse, unless it had been by nature human flesh, which the Word put on (for we should have had nothing common with what was foreign), so also the man had not been deified, unless the Word who became flesh had been by nature from the Father and true and proper to Him. For therefore the union was of this kind, that He might unite what is man by nature to Him who is in the nature of the Godhead, and his salvation and deification might be sure. Therefore let those who deny that the Son is from the Father by nature and proper to His Essence, deny also that He took true human flesh [2689] of Mary Ever-Virgin [2690] ; for in neither case had it been of profit to us men, whether the Word were not true and naturally Son of God, or the flesh not true which He assumed. But surely He took true flesh, though Valentinus rave; yea the Word was by nature Very God, though Ario-maniacs rave [2691] ; and in that flesh has come to pass the beginning [2692] of our new creation, He being created man for our sake, and having made for us that new way, as has been said.
71. The Word then is neither creature nor work; for creature, thing made, work, are all one; and were He creature and thing made, He would also be work. Accordingly He has not said, He created Me a work,' nor He made Me with the works,' lest He should appear to be in nature and essence [2693] a creature; nor, He created Me to make works,' lest, on the other hand, according to the perverseness of the irreligious, He should seem as an instrument [2694] made for our sake. Nor again has He declared, He created Me before the works,' lest, as He really is before all, as an Offspring, so, if created also before the works, He should give Offspring' and He created' the same meaning. But He has said with exact discrimination [2695] , for the works;' as much as to say, The Father has made Me, into flesh, that I might be man,' which again shews that He is not a work but an offspring. For as he who comes into a house, is not part of the house, but is other than the house, so He who is created for the works, must be by nature other than the works. But if otherwise, as you hold, O Arians, the Word of God be a work, by what [2696] Hand and Wisdom did He Himself come into being? for all things that came to be, came by the Hand and Wisdom of God, who Himself says, My hand hath made all these things [2697] ;' and David says in the Psalm, And Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Thy hands [2698] ;' and again, in the hundred and forty-second Psalm, I do remember the time past, I muse upon all Thy works, yea I exercise myself in the works of Thy hands [2699] .' Therefore if by the Hand of God the works are wrought, and it is written that all things were made through the Word,' and without Him was not made one thing [2700] ,' and again, One Lord Jesus, through whom are all things [2701] ,' and in Him all things consist [2702] ,' it is very plain that the Son cannot be a work, but He is the Hand [2703] of God and the Wisdom. This knowing, the martyrs in Babylon, Ananias, Azarias, and Misael, arraign the Arian irreligion. For when they say, O all ye works of the Lord, bless ye the Lord,' they recount things in heaven, things on earth, and the whole creation, as works; but the Son they name not. For they say not, Bless, O Word, and praise, O Wisdom;' to shew that all other things are both praising and are works; but the Word is not a work nor of those that praise, but is praised with the Father and worshipped and confessed as God [2704] , being His Word and Wisdom, and of the works the Framer. This too the Spirit has declared in the Psalms with a most apposite distinction, the Word of the Lord is true, and all His works are faithful [2705] ;' as in another Psalm too He says, O Lord, how manifold are Thy works! in Wisdom hast Thou made them all [2706] .'