7. But we should like your piety to ask them this. When Israel was ordered to go up to Jerusalem to worship at the temple of the Lord, where was the ark, and above it the Cherubim of glory overshadowing the Mercy-seat [4767] ,' did they do well or the opposite? If they did ill, how came it that they who despised this law were liable to punishment? for it is written that if a man make light of it and go not up, he shall perish from among the people [4768] . But if they did well, and in this proved well-pleasing to God, are not the Arians, abominable and most shameful of any heresy, many times worthy of destruction, in that while they approve the former People for the honour paid by them to the Temple, they will not worship the Lord Who is in the flesh as in a temple? And yet the former temple was constructed of stones and gold, as a shadow. But when the reality came, the type ceased from thenceforth, and there did not remain, according to the Lord's utterance, one stone upon another that was not broken down [4769] . And they did not, when they saw the temple of stones, suppose that the Lord who spoke in the temple was a creature; nor did they set the Temple at nought and retire far off to worship. But they came to it according to the Law, and worshipped the God who uttered His oracles from the Temple. Since then this was so, how can it be other than right to worship the Body of the Lord, all-holy and all-reverend as it is, announced as it was by the archangel Gabriel, formed by the Holy Spirit, and made the Vesture of the Word? It was at any rate a bodily hand that the Word stretched out to raise her that was sick of a fever [4770] : a human voice that He uttered to raise Lazarus from the dead [4771] ; and, once again, stretching out His hands upon the Cross, He overthrew the prince of the power of the air, that now works [4772] in the sons of disobedience, and made the way clear for us into the heavens.
8. Therefore he that dishonours the Temple dishonours the Lord in the Temple; and he that separates the Word from the Body sets at nought the grace given to us in Him. And let not the most impious Arian madmen suppose that, since the Body is created, the Word also is a creature, nor let them, because the Word is not a creature, disparage His Body. For their error is matter for wonder, in that they at once confuse and disturb everything, and devise pretexts only in order to number the Creator among the creatures.
But let them listen. If the Word were a creature, He would not assume the created body to quicken it. For what help can creatures derive from a creature that itself needs salvation? But since the Word being Creator has Himself made the creatures, therefore also at the consummation of the ages [4773] He put on the creature, that He as creator might once more consecrate it, and be able to recover it. But a creature could never be saved by a creature, any more than the creatures were created by a creature, if the Word was not creator. Accordingly let them not lie against the divine Scriptures nor give offence to simple brethren; but if they are willing let them change their mind in their turn, and no longer worship the creature instead of God, Who made all things. But if they wish to abide by their impieties, let them alone take their fill of them, and let them gnash their teeth like their father the devil, because the Faith of the Catholic Church knows that the Word of God is creator and maker of all things; and we know that while in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God [4774] ,' now that He has become also man for our salvation we worship Him, not as though He had come in the body equalising Himself with it, but as Master, assuming the form of the servant, and Maker and Creator coming in a creature in order that, in it delivering all things, He might bring the world nigh to the Father, and make all things to be at peace, things in heaven and things on the earth. For thus also we recognise His Godhead, even the Father's, and worship His Incarnate Presence, even if the Arian madmen burst themselves in sunder.
Greet all that love the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that you may be well, and remember us to the Lord, beloved and truly most longed-for. If need be this is to be read to Hieracas [4775] the presbyter.
[4738] Adelphius is named in the Tome' (above, p. 486), as bishop of Onuphis. Previously he had been exiled by the Arians to the Thebaid (above, pp. 297, &c.). Hence in the title of this letter he is styled Confessor.' The letter (Migne xxvi, 1072) is directed against the Arian Christology. Although Ath. treats it (§1) as a new blasphemy,' it had been held by the Arians from the first; Epiph. Anc. 33, traces it back to Lucian; but doubtless it had by this time been brought more to the front in their teaching. We know that it occupied a prominent place in the Eunomian system. (References in Dorner III. i. 3.) After briefly refuting the doctrinal error, Athanasius turns to the Arian charge of creature-worship brought against the Nicene doctrine. Not forgetting to remind them that their own doctrine was really open to this charge, Ath. points out at greater length that the object of Catholic worship is not the human nature of Christ as such, but the Word Incarnate; and that the human Saviour is worshipped because He is the Word Himself. The date proposed by Montfaucon is adopted, though there is nothing to fix it absolutely. Its style closely resembles that of the writings of the third Exile.' (See also Bright, Later Tr., p. 61.)
[4739] 2 Cor. ii. 11.
[4740] Rom. i. 30.
[4741] 2 Tim. iii. 8.
[4742] Ps. lxxxii. 5.
[4743] John i. 14.
[4744] Tit. iii. 10, 11.
[4745] Isa. xxxii. 6, LXX.
[4746] 1 Pet. v. 8.
[4747] As some modern devotions at least tend to do.
[4748] John x. 33.
[4749] Matt. viii. 2.
[4750] Matt. ix. 20.
[4751] Ib. viii. 26.
[4752] John ix. 6.
[4753] Rom. i. 28.
[4754] Phil. ii. 10, 11.
[4755] Ib. vv. 6, 7.
[4756] planetheisan gennesin.
[4757] 2 Pet. i. 4.
[4758] Rom. viii. 3.
[4759] Heb. x. 20.
[4760] Acts vii. 55.
[4761] Ib. i. 11.
[4762] John xvii. 24.
[4763] Ps. xliii. 3.
[4764] Matt. i. 23, and Isa. vii. 14.
[4765] Tit. ii. 13, 14.
[4766] Heb. ii. 14.
[4767] Heb. ix. 5.
[4768] Cf. Lev. xvii. 9; Num. ix. 13.
[4769] Matt. xxiv. 2.
[4770] Mark i. 31.
[4771] Joh. xi. 43.
[4772] Eph. ii. 2. Athan. here omits the tou pneumatos, thus increasing the difficulty of the gen. particp.
[4773] Heb. ix. 26.
[4774] John i. 1.
[4775] Perhaps the Hierax' of pp. 257, 297, 560, above.