Ancoratus 1 part 4/12

He, then, who, being so many days' journey distant from the place, knew that Lazarus had died — did he, being present in the place, not know it? By no means! But he wished to show — since he did all these things because no one as yet believed in him perfectly — so that he might display the great loving-kindness of his forbearance toward us.

For it was necessary that those women should not say, "He has been four days, he already stinks," nor go and see for themselves, but rather say:

"You know all things, and if you will, he shall live."

Wherefore also he wept over the hardness of men.

He asked, then, not out of ignorance, but he reproves by testing, and shows loving-kindness.

And "who touched me?" he says — not because he did not know who touched him, but so that he himself might not proclaim the miracle that had happened, but rather so that she, having heard, might come forward and tell of the grace that had come to her, and, having confessed, might hear:

"Your faith has saved you" — so that she might also encourage others to believe, that they might be healed.

"Whom do they say that I, the Son of Man, am?" he says — just as also in the Old Testament, speaking from the person of the Father, it says, "Adam, where are you?" — yet he knew where he was.

Wherefore also he afterward convicts him, saying, "You have eaten from the tree."

And to Cain, "Where is Abel your brother?" — and he did not ask out of ignorance.

For he says, "Cursed are you upon the earth, which opened her mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand."

"For behold, his blood cries out to me."

He who said that the blood cries out, then, was not ignorant, but he asked in order that he might give him room for repentance unto self-defense.

But they turn again to the contentiousness of their ignorance, and say that these utterances in the Old Testament belong to the Son himself.

But immediately their contrivance is refuted.

For he who said to Moses, "What is this in your hand?" — the same said, "I am the One who Is."

And the Lord says to the Sadducees, discoursing concerning the resurrection, that the dead are raised: "God said —"

"I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob."

He is, therefore, God of the living, and not of the dead.

And again, it is possible to show many things that have been spoken in the Old Testament from the person of the Father.

But also, often, from the person of the Son, and again from the person of the Holy Spirit.

And, "Where is Sarah your wife?" the Son of God, who had come from above with the two angels, said to Abraham.

For if he did not know where she was, he would not have said "Sarah."

"So Sarah laughed," being inside — he wishes to indicate her modesty, as an example for those women who wish to be pious in truth, so that when they receive guests they may indeed serve from their own labors, but on account of modesty may not show their face to the men.

For that blessed woman surely prepared the food, and having prepared it, did not appear before the face of the angels, thereby setting forth an example of modesty to the generations after these.

He who was received as guest for a time called her by the woman's name, because neither the name, nor the fashioning, nor the thought of man escapes his notice.

"Whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?" he says. And he himself declares "the Son of Man," confessing it, so that they might not suppose that he was asking concerning the invisible nature.

And they say, "Elijah, and Jeremiah, and John."

"But who do you say that I am?"

"You are the Christ, the Son of the living God," he says, and is immediately pronounced blessed.

For he did not ask out of ignorance, but wishing to show that the teaching which proclaims the Son to the Church as true God is of the Father, so that Peter might be compelled to say what he had been taught by the Father.

And do not marvel if he says that "through me they come to the Father," and thereby suppose him to be altered from the essence of the Father.

For he himself again teaches, "No one comes to me unless the Father draws him."

As, then, the Father sends people to the Son, so also the Son brings them in to the Father, that he might show the divinity to be one and the same.

But as for "he advanced in stature and wisdom" — if he is the Wisdom of God, he does not lack wisdom.

But since he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, the fullness was not diminished.

But in order to show him as having been decanted from heaven into humanity, that is, into the workshop of Mary.

For "ointment emptied out is your name," it says.

It did not say "poured forth," but "emptied out" — from heaven to earth, so that from earth it might be emptied out into Mary.

And from Mary, having become flesh, he is conceived; he is born in Bethlehem; from Bethlehem he passes over to Nazareth, from Nazareth to Capernaum, from Capernaum to Jerusalem and to the sea, in his walking upon the waters, and to the regions of Tyre and Nain and Judea and Jericho and to Bethphage and Bethany, and to Jerusalem, namely the temple, and the Mount of Olives, and Gethsemane, to the house of Caiaphas, to the praetorium, and to Herod, to the place of Golgotha, to the tomb, and as far as Hades, to the earth after the resurrection, and into the heavens.

For ointment, emptied out from vessel to vessel, perfumes all the vessels, and the coming of Christ from heaven has sanctified the whole earth, namely those who receive him in truth.

And again, the stone, taking up magnitude and becoming once more a great mountain — and it is plain that the mountain is not in one place, but fills the whole inhabited world — this one, being Wisdom and having become man, extending his power to the world, that he might fill the inhabited world with grace, "advanced in stature and wisdom."

So that he might not obscure the truth of the sequence.

But again they hunt after other vain suppositions, weaving them in among the divine words, and they think contrary [to the truth], and they say:

"How then is it written, 'Receive the high priest of our confession, who is faithful to him that made him,' and, 'Let it be known to you, all the house of Israel, that this Jesus, whom you crucified — him God has made Lord and Christ'?"

And great wonder comes over me, how those who lay hold of the sequences [of the text] remain ignorant of the meaning expressed within them.

"A high priest, being faithful to him that made him" — this is not said concerning [his] divinity.

For God came, and the divine scriptures make all things clear to us.

For there is nothing crooked or twisted in them, but all things are straightforward to those who understand, and right to those who find knowledge.

"For," it says, "receive instruction, and not silver."

For if anyone does not receive instruction from God — that is, the faith of the truth — then all things are for him crooked and perverted; but for those who understand rightly and find knowledge, all things are right and beyond reproach.

But in order to refute them, the apostle says:

"For every high priest taken from among men is appointed on behalf of men in the things pertaining to God, in order to offer gifts and sacrifices."

For this reason the Only-begotten himself also, since he came to become a high priest on behalf of men, took from us [our] flesh, so that he, having on our behalf become, from us, an offering to his own Father, God, might call the disciples brothers.

Where then is "having become" fulfilled? Not from any other source, but with respect to the high priesthood.

"Receive," it says, "the high priest, who is faithful to him that made him."

But in order that I may also employ a further illustration:

Suppose someone were to ask a king about his own son, and, having made bold, should say to him:

"Who is this?" And having heard from the father the rightful confession:

"He is my son" — he should again ask:

"Your son by nature?" And when the king has said "Yes," the questioner will press further still:

"What then have you made him?" He will certainly answer.

Has he, then, by stating the office/rank, thereby denied the [son's] legitimacy of birth? If he states the second thing, has he thereby annulled the first? By no means.

So then, in this same way, God the Father also begat the Son without beginning, and it is in the flesh that the saying "he made him high priest" is fulfilled.

"But," they say, "it is written: 'The Lord created me, a beginning of his ways, for his works.'"

And first of all, these vainglorious men are ignorant of the very title of the book.

For the book is called "The Proverbs of Solomon."

And everything that is spoken in proverb is not identical with the plain force of the [literal] word.

For behold, our Lord Jesus Christ spoke in parables, and we see that the parables do not correspond in that same manner to our [literal] subject.

"For," he says, "the kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed."

And if we should wish to understand this piecemeal according to our own [literal] mind, it would be clear that the kingdom of heaven is a place of vast expanse.

If indeed one must speak of it as a place — a kingdom in which God the Father is King, and God the Word and Son of God, and the Holy Spirit of God, and angels and archangels, spiritual hosts, Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the righteous — then where will so many things find room in a grain of mustard seed? But the figurative sense of the saying is spoken enigmatically.

So then, what is spoken in proverb is not identical [with its literal sense].

So too with the woman who had ten drachmas and lost one, and lit a lamp and found it; so too with the net that was cast into the sea; so too with the seed that was sown upon the earth.

All these things are spoken enigmatically, and are not identical with their [literal] force.

And we do not really know whether Solomon the proverb-maker spoke this saying concerning the Son of God.

The apostle, then, knows how to say, "the world did not know God through the wisdom of God," and "God has made foolish the wisdom of the world," and again he says, "not in fleshly wisdom, but in the power of God"; and Solomon knows how to call her Wisdom, saying, "I was enamored of her beauty, and I took her to myself as a bride"; and Job knows wisdom, and says, "But whence was wisdom found? and what place is there of understanding?"; and "the wisdom of the poor man is despised"; and "he himself is the corrector of wisdom"; and "the Only-begotten is the Wisdom of the Father."

For did he not proceed from him as Mind, being Word and God and being Wisdom? Is the Father, then, left wanting wisdom in himself?

How then, to God alone wise and invisible [does this apply], while to men all these things are incomprehensible and boundless? God gave wisdom to Solomon, and filled Bezalel with wisdom, and "wise men conceal shame."

And concerning wisdom there is much that could be said.

But that Wisdom of the Father is of one, unique kind, having no other thing set beside it for comparison.

Nevertheless, even if this saying were indeed being uttered concerning her, I neither assent to it nor renounce it, but I leave the knowing of it to God.

But I see that the things said [by them] are set in contrastive opposition by force.

"For," it says, "he created me, a beginning of his ways, for his works; before the age he founded me";

and "before all the hills he begets me."

How then is that which is begotten [also] founded? And how is that which is created [also] begotten? For if it is created, it is not truly begotten.

For we do not create the things we beget, nor do we beget the things we create.

For we ourselves are created, and the things begotten by us are likewise created.

But in God, who is uncreated, the offspring is not created.

For if he begat, he did not create;

but if after creating he then again begat, how then is that which was first created afterward begotten? If, then, the things said pertain to him, they are fulfilled with respect to the incarnate dispensation.

And for this reason it states the nearer things first, and relates the more ancient things afterward.

For, wishing to persuade men of the things nearest at hand, it begins from the flesh; for the beginning of the ways of the righteousness of the gospel is that the Word became flesh for us in Mary, the soul too having been founded in her flesh, so that it might afterward show forth the things above.

But we say that he came from the Father's bosom, from the heavens, upon the earth — since it was afterward that he came to us, having accomplished the whole dispensation.

Therefore the Word is not created — far be it! — and the divine scripture has engendered nothing crooked for us in any respect whatsoever.

Moreover, both in nature itself and among the [other] translators, the wording has not been rendered in this way.

For Aquila says, "The Lord acquired me," inasmuch as in the Hebrew it says "adonai qanani";

which is interpreted as what we have said.

And we ourselves, too, according to custom, say of those who are begotten, "he acquired children."

But not even in this way has he fixed the full force of the interpretation.

For "adonai qanani" can also be interpreted thus: "The Lord nested me."

And for this reason Peter clearly proclaims, saying, "This Jesus, whom you crucified" —

he did not say "the God the Word from above," but "this Jesus" — that is, the flesh that was conceived together with the Word from above in the womb of Mary; and it is called "this" on account of the Lord's man [that came] from Mary.

For it is in this [man] that the [word] "†being created" [text corrupt] is likewise fulfilled, as Peter says: "being put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit"; and again, "Christ, then, having suffered for us in the flesh"; and again, "of whom is the Christ, according to the flesh," as Paul says.

And the Savior himself was saying in the gospel, "But now you seek to kill me, a man who has spoken to you the truth which I heard from the Father" — so as to show that the suffering belongs to his humanity and to the lower things, but that he himself is, by nature, the Son of the Father, from the things above.

And with this saying Paul the holy apostle also concurs, declaring: "One God, and one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus," who "did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant."

You see how he has declared him to be man, yet not a mere man.

For "mediator of God and men," since he mediates for both parties, means: with respect to his Father, he is God by nature, genuinely begotten; but with respect to men, he is man by nature, genuinely born of Mary without the seed of a man.

For thus he is mediator of God and men — being God, and having become man — not having been changed in nature, but mediating, according to each [nature], with respect to both [parties].

But again, in their ignorance, they say:

"You see, he did not consider it robbery to be equal with God."

And these contentious men do not even know the true sense [of the phrase].

It does not mean, "he did not wish to become equal to God by robbery," but rather, "he did not consider it robbery to be equal with God" — that is, to be God by nature, because he indeed was [God].

For if he were not so, how did he take the form of a slave? Indeed, by taking it he signified its recency, and from this, marveling, he showed forth the surpassing greatness — that though he was equal to God he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, not that he might enslave the free, but that in the very form he took he might set free those slaves who obey.

As the Jews also bear witness, that he was not ashamed to call himself equal to God, nor did he hesitate, but showed this the more boldly by saying, 'If I do not say it, I shall be a liar like you.'

And on account of this they say to him, 'It is not for a good work that we kill you, but because, though you are a man, you make yourself equal to God.'

We ought to confess the figurative things concerning him.

And Scripture has spoken many figurative things concerning him, and one must not deny the things spoken enigmatically about him — that he has been called 'door,' and said to be 'stone,' and 'pillar,' and 'cloud,' and 'lion,' and 'sheep,' and 'lamp,' and 'torch,' and 'sun,' and 'angel,' and 'worm,' and 'rock,' and 'cornerstone,' and 'way,' and 'bull,' and 'calf,' and such things.

Clearly we too do not deny the things fulfilled in him enigmatically.

But we know for what reason these things have been written:

'Way,' because through him we journey toward the kingdom, toward him and the Father;

'Door,' because through him we enter in;

'Pillar,' because he himself is the foundation of our faith;

'Rock,' on account of his immovability;

'Stone,' on account of his being firmly founded;

'Sun of righteousness,' because, having illumined our darkened minds...

Then they say that if it is written concerning him that he is a creature, one must confess the 'creature' [title] as well.

Behold, I too have set forth a part of those testimonies fulfilled for us through his enigmatic sayings.

But let them tell us: in calling him a 'creature,' what use does it serve? 'Door' has fittingly been said figuratively, that there might be an entrance and benefit for us; and 'way,' that walking through him we might not go astray;

but 'creature' — for what does it become to us? What benefit does it give us? 'Yes,' says the vainglorious, contentious one—

'for unless you say he is a creature, you attach passion to the Father;'

'for everyone who begets is enveloped by passion;'

'for he either contracts, or expands, or is dilated, or flows away, or swells, or undergoes something of this sort.'

Alas indeed for such a notion, which is wicked and not at all true!

Who will think such things concerning God? And what manner of suspicion will dare such things? Clearly not even one of the demons will think anything of the sort.

And if anyone confesses the Father, he believes that he has begotten the Son in truth.

For the divine is not carried about in masses, nor is it a pregnant body, so as to undergo the aforesaid things.

For God is spirit, and spirit does not undergo flowing, nor cutting, nor contraction, nor diminution, nor expansion, nor anything of the sort.

Inasmuch, then, as the Father is spirit, he has begotten the Son, God the Word, spiritually, timelessly, incomprehensibly, and without beginning.

But that we may persuade those who hold such notions — not asserting things similar to theirs, but by means of similar things turning aside their evil defense — let us say:

A creature is that which falls short of its own master infinitely and ten-thousandfold.

And there were once many who, being in need of fire in the desert, filled a glass vessel with water and brought material that catches flame easily, made of flax or of tow.

As the refracted gleam from the glass shone down upon the material beneath, fire was immediately taken from the fire of the sun, and it kindled the flame.

Is the sun, then, cut by this sharing of its essence? Has it failed? Has it been diminished? 'No,' they say.

If, then, being a creature, it was not diminished, how much more did God — who is infinite, incomprehensible, and undefiled, being spirit — beget from himself, in incorruption, God the Word, who is ineffable, incomprehensible, and incorruptible, not through passion, not through cutting, not through deficiency, but perfect begetting perfect in perfection!

And the nature of fire kindles many lamps from one, and the first, though it remained, was not diminished;

and again, the same essence can come from many partial sources — I mean, from lamps or torches.

But the divine is not so — far be it!

For the Word did not, in turn, enter in and produce a fusion with the Father, but the Father is Father, and the Son is Son, and the Holy Spirit is Holy Spirit.

For foolish is that which is said among the Manichaeans — that in †the mind of Mani†, the souls, having come forth from the pillar of light, are one body, and, being released from their bodies, are again refashioned into the one substance, as though gathered into the one pillar, according to their mythical fabrication.

But the Gospel did not show it thus; rather, he broke five loaves and fed five thousand, and did not leave their leftovers, but, 'Gather up,' he said, 'and let nothing of the fragments be left,' and they gathered twelve baskets.

And they gathered them together into the receptacles, but he did not make the fragments again into a joining of loaves as they had been.

They gathered the multitude of fragments, but into many fragments; yet he showed them gathered into one collection of baskets.

And it is not on the basis of some speculative hypothesis that we have allegorized this, and the aforementioned example of the sun.

For we do not call the loaves 'souls,' nor the fragments — far be it! — nor do we equate God with the sun which was created by him, nor the Only-Begotten with the radiance sent by the sun into the tow.

In like manner, the souls that have been begotten are not joined into one fusion — far be it! — but into the dwelling-places of God that are written of, that 'many are the dwelling-places with the Father;'

not becoming gathered into one heap, but each being numbered individually.

Nor, in saying that God has begotten his Only-Begotten Son, do we attach passion to him, according to their evil blasphemy.

'For everyone who begets suffers with passion,' they say, and, by their reasoning, one ought to say neither 'creature' nor 'offspring,' lest we grant that God labors or suffers.

Whence, then, do we discover the Son, or why does he bear the name 'Son'? But these are syllogisms of men, set in motion from earthly notions.

For it is unlawful to reckon our human passions unto God, since God clearly says, 'My thought is not as your thoughts,' and again, 'Not as man, so also God.'

Therefore let them cease from blasphemy, and let them learn from the Father who says, 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased';

and again, speaking as of things to come, he says, 'For you are my beloved Son, whom I have chosen,' and then, in the Songs, 'singled out from among ten thousand.'

Whence, then, does this election come? Let them say.

For the babblers suppose that, in saying 'I have chosen,' he is called Son according to grace and not according to nature.

Let them show who is like him, that having tested all, he might choose that one.

For if he is the only-begotten Son, there is no one equal to him, nor comparable to him, being like the Son among the sons of God.

For these other sons he knows according to grace, but to that one no one is able to be equated, since he is Son by nature.

'Singled out' — and whence does the election come?

Because there were many myriads upon the earth, and Mary alone found grace, and in her he chose the holy flesh.

'He chose for us his inheritance, the beauty of Jacob, which he loved' — that is, the very essence of his beauty, the beauty of the whole of Jacob: the flesh from Mary, chosen through the Holy Spirit.

That which came to pass in the economy of the flesh, the Father showed from above to John the Baptist.

For the Father was well pleased in the enfleshed coming of Christ, while the Godhead possesses its nature without limit.

The apostle also calls him 'Son of love,' 'who delivered us,' he says, 'from the dominion of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of his love.'

And the babblers here, not understanding the expression, say that the Son exists according to a progression of God's love.

And the unlearned do not know the parallelism of the expression:

for in another place the apostle says that 'God loved us in Christ.'

For truly the Only-Begotten is the beloved Son, since the Father is love, and the Son is love, since he is love from love.

He is therefore the Son of love both for our sake and for his own, because in him he loved us, and he delivered up his only-begotten Son on our behalf.

Therefore he neither labors in working, nor suffers in begetting.

And let them not vainly heap up blasphemies for themselves.

For if the Son is created, then, by their own reasoning, he is not to be worshipped.

For it is foolish to worship a creature, and to set aside the first commandment, which says, 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord your God, the Lord is one.'

The holy Word, then, is not created, because he is worshipped.

The disciples worshipped him; the angels worship him in heaven;

for it is said, "Let all the angels of God worship him," and, "I will worship you, O Lord, my strength."

There is one matter, plain, concise, and incontrovertible, which no one can gainsay:

if those who are hostile to the Son of God have any testimony to produce, where the Father said, in the Old or the New Testament, "I created a son for myself," or where the Son said, "The Father created me."

There are four Gospels, of one thousand one hundred and sixty-two chapters, and from beginning to end the Son spoke, and the Father spoke to him, and nowhere did he say:

"My Father created me"; nor did the Father say:

"I created a son for myself," or "I created my son."

But the contentious and vainglorious man says:

"What then do you say about the body? Clearly it was taken up from Mary."

"And Mary, what of her?" he says, "uncreated or created? Created, clearly—we too say so—born of a man and a woman."

"The one from Mary, then, what do you say of him? Do you worship the Savior in the body, or do you not worship him?" "How then should I not worship him? For if I do not worship him, I have no life."

"See then, you worship a created thing, the body."

Great is the derangement of mind of those who say such things.

For indeed a king clothed in purple is worshipped by all. Is it then the purple that is worshipped, or the king? Clearly it is the king.

But the purple that is worn is worshipped together with him;

yet once the king has taken it off and laid it aside, the purple robe is no longer worshipped.

Again, a king often sits in his palace, upon his own throne, and those who worship him worship the king in his own palace and upon the throne; but once the king has risen up, no one worships either the palace or the throne.

No one, while the king is present in his palace, says to the king:

"Come out of your palace, that I may worship you."

So likewise let no one say to the Only-begotten:

"Leave aside the body, that I may worship you"; but rather one worships the Only-begotten together with the body—the Uncreated One together with the holy temple which he took when he came.

And no one says to the king:

"Rise from your throne, that I may worship you apart from the throne"; but rather one worships the king together with the throne.

So too Christ is worshipped together with the body that was buried and has been raised.

"But," they say, "what then do you say? Did the Father beget the Son willingly, or unwillingly? Since you say, 'The Word always was,' and, 'There is no time before the Word'?" And yet even the Arians themselves, in order to deceive certain persons, assert that the Son of God was begotten timelessly, while unwilling to call him eternal, but saying instead, "There was a time when he was not";

and they suppose that "once" does not signify time.

But when the expression is examined, you refute these ignorant men.

For "once," taken in its lexical sense, is indicative of time.

And by saying that it does not signify time, they fall, in their bad faith, into the absurdity of their own thinking.

For they employ their words with irony, being terribly arrayed in mind for war against the Son of God, shamelessly professing him to be utterly alien to the Godhead of the Father.

Did he then beget willingly, or unwillingly? If we say "unwillingly," we envelop the Godhead in necessity; and if we say "willingly," we grant that the will existed before the Word;

and even if it should be but an indivisible instant, the twinkling of an eye, or the smallest fraction of an hour, that fraction is indicative of time before the Word, and again we fall in with their argument.

And if we say that he begot unwillingly, then the Godhead is led by the necessity of nature, and not by the freedom of will.

But none of this applies to God, as you suppose, O vainglorious one.

For with God these things do not exist.

He begot, then, neither willingly nor unwillingly, but by the transcendence of his nature.

For the divine nature transcends deliberation, and it does not fall under time, nor is it led by necessity.

For in us nothing is ready-made, because there was a time when we did not exist, and first we deliberate about something, then we do what we do; or, if we have not deliberated, that which has not yet been done by us does not exist;

but with God all things are perfect and complete, and all things are fulfilled in him, and neither willingly nor unwillingly did he beget the one who eternally is—the holy Word and God begotten from him—but rather in his transcendent and ineffable nature.

But a very great wonder comes over me, O sons of the faith and of the Church, how the contentious have twisted the true things into allegory, while mistakenly taking the things spoken figuratively as the true things.

For the fact of his having been begotten, which belongs to him according to nature, they deny, saying that it is not like any one of the things that are begotten;

but the being created, which is alien to his Godhead—even though it was at times spoken of only allegorically—that they declare to be true, while they make the true thing disappear.

This is supposedly from the saying of the Gospel, where the Savior said in his teaching that no one has ever seen God.

If then the Only-begotten said that no one has seen him, but the prophets say that they have seen him, then necessarily either the Only-begotten or the prophets are lying.

And according to the reasoning of those who speak thus, together with that of the Manichaeans, the words in the prophets will turn out to be false.

But if the prophets do not lie, but speak the truth—according to the word of the Savior, "I, who spoke in the prophets, behold, I am present"—then the matter requires understanding, and there is need of allegory.

For in this way it is often fulfilled thus: