Disputation at Bizya 1 part 4/10

For if things that exist, having come to be out of things that do not exist, possess a self-preserving power directed toward being, and not toward non-being;

and it is proper to this power by nature to have an impulse toward things that sustain being, and an aversion toward things that destroy it;

then the super-essential Word also, having been made man in essence, possessed also the self-preserving power belonging to the being of his own humanity;

the impulse and aversion of which he willingly showed forth through operation;

the impulse, by making use of natural and blameless things to such an extent that he was even considered by unbelievers not to be God;

and the aversion, at the time of the Passion, by voluntarily making a withdrawal from death.

What absurdity, then, has the Church of God committed, in confessing, together with his human and created nature, also the principles implanted in it by him in a creative manner, undiminished within him — principles without which it is impossible for that nature to exist?

If fear belongs to us naturally, and this fear is among the things that are blameworthy, then according to you, blameworthy things — that is, sin — are naturally inherent in us.

Again you deceive, by the ambiguity of the term, yourself, not the truth.

For there is fear both according to nature and contrary to nature;

and fear according to nature is a power, self-preserving through a contraction of being;

but fear contrary to nature is an irrational contraction.

The fear contrary to nature, then, the Lord did not admit at all, inasmuch as it arises from a betrayal of right reasoning;

but the fear according to nature, as being indicative of the power inherent in nature that strives to preserve being, he, willing it for our sake, as one who is good, accepted.

For in the Lord the natural movements do not take the lead over the act of willing, as they do in us;

but just as, having truly hungered and thirsted, he did not hunger and thirst in the manner proper to us, but in the manner above us;

so also, having truly feared, he feared not according to us, but above us.

And to speak generally, everything natural in Christ has joined to it, together with the principle proper to it, also the mode above nature — so that the nature might be confirmed through the principle, and the economy through the mode.

Therefore, so that we may escape this subtle terminology, difficult for many to grasp, let us confess him as the same one, perfect God and perfect man, setting aside all the rest, since perfection in itself already comprises the natural properties.

If speaking of the natures without the property belonging to each, or of Christ as perfect God and perfect man without the marks of perfection, is, according to you, a mark of consummate piety, then let the councils be anathematized, and before them, the Fathers;

for they legislated for us to confess not only the natures, but also the property of each nature;

and not only to confess the same one as perfect God and perfect man, but also the marks of perfection — that is, saying that the same and one person is visible and invisible, mortal and immortal, corruptible and incorruptible, tangible and intangible, created and uncreated;

and according to this same pious understanding, they also piously dogmatized two wills of that same and one person, not only by means of the definite number "two," but also by means of the pronoun-construction "this and that";

and by means of the qualifying description of calling the one "divine" and the other "human."

For the nature of number is not confined to one manner.

If it is not possible for these expressions to be spoken, because of the malicious abuse of the heretics, let us be content with only what has been said by the councils;

and let us say the wills to be neither one nor two.

If it is necessary to confess only what has been said by the councils, then neither should one say "the one incarnate nature of God the Word," comprehensive of the whole piety of the mystery, since it has not been proclaimed by a council.

Nevertheless, even so, you will be compelled to confess the wills together with the natures and their properties.

For if you say that the things naturally belonging to the natures of Christ are their properties, and willing is naturally inborn in each of his natures, then together with the other natural properties you will be compelled to acknowledge also that the wills belong to the natures.

Moreover, if the councils anathematized both Apollinarius and Arius on account of the expression "one will," since each of them made use of it for the establishment of his own heresy—

the one wishing thereby to show the flesh to be consubstantial with the Word;

and the other striving to introduce the Son as of a different essence from the Father—how then is it possible for us to be pious, if we do not confess the expressions contrary to the heretics?

And the fifth council—to pass over everything else—decreed word for word: "to receive all the compositions of the holy Athanasius, and Basil, and the Gregories, and certain other expressly select teachers," in which the two wills are also set down; and they have handed down two wills.

And does it not seem to you that the expression "natural will" offends the ears of the many?

Setting aside the divine [life], how many kinds of life do you say there are among existing things?

The vegetative, the sensitive, and the intellective.

Since each is distinguished from the others by some principle of its formation, what is the distinguishing and proper principle of each kind?

Proper to the vegetative is the nutritive, augmentative, and generative motion;

and to the sensitive, motion according to impulse;

and to the intellective, the self-determining [motion].

You have set forth quite clearly and without confusion the property of each kind of life.

If the property of each [kind] has been shown to be clear and unconfused, I ask again: does the nutritive, augmentative, and generative motion belong to the vegetative according to nature?

And does motion according to impulse [belong] to the sensitive [according to nature]?

Then does not the self-determining motion likewise belong, consistently, to the intellective [nature]?

This too, anyone who teaches doctrine consistently with his own principles will surely grant.

If then the self-determining motion belongs to intellective beings according to nature, then every intellective being is also by nature capable of willing.

And if every intellective being is by nature capable of willing, and God the Word truly became flesh ensouled with a rational and intellective soul, then also insofar as he is man, that same [Christ] was essentially capable of willing.

If this is so, then the expression "natural will" does not offend the ears of the pious, but rather those of the heretically-minded.

I have already, in what has preceded, been persuaded that the wills in Christ are natural;

and concerning this I seek no further proof.

For no less than the things divinely spoken, reason has shown the very nature of existing things bearing witness, that the same [Christ] was willing in accordance with his own natures, being well-pleased as God, obeying as man, and that the natural wills correspond altogether to the natures.

Beginningless [will belongs] to the beginningless [nature], and begun [will] to the begun [nature];

and it is not possible for them ever to coincide with one another into a single will, even though they belong to one and the same [subject], just as also the natures do not coincide: the beginningless and the begun, the uncreated and the created, that which made and that which was made, the infinite and the finite, that which deified and that which was deified.

But those in Byzantium, still opposing the natural wills, say that the Fathers spoke of the Lord as having the human will by way of appropriation.

Since you yourself have expounded such a wondrous and brilliant instruction of theirs—

according to what kind of appropriation do they say this?

Is it the essential [appropriation], according to which each one, possessing the things naturally belonging [to him], appropriates them on account of nature;

or the relational [appropriation], according to which we lovingly appropriate and cherish one another's [affairs], ourselves neither suffering nor performing any of these things?

Therefore, before showing the absurdity of this, it would be more just to examine more precisely whether man is by nature capable of willing, or not.

For once this is shown, the blasphemy of such a heresy will become clearer.

If it seems good, let us examine this.

That natural things are untaught, not only have those who have examined nature by reason and who excel the many affirmed, but also the custom of the more common people [attests].

If then natural things are untaught, and we possess willing untaught—

for no one is ever taught to will;

then man is by nature capable of willing.

And again, if man is by nature rational;

and that which is rational by nature is also self-determining by nature;

for the self-determining, according to the Fathers, is [the same as] willing;

then man is by nature capable of willing.

And again, if in irrational beings nature leads;

but in man nature is led, since he is moved with authority according to willing;

then man is by nature capable of willing.

And again, if man has come into being according to the image of the blessed and supra-essential Godhead;

and the divine nature is by nature self-determining;

then man too, as truly its image, is by nature self-determining;

and if self-determining by nature, then man is by nature capable of willing;

for it has already been said that the Fathers defined the self-determining as willing.

Furthermore, does not willing exist in all men?

And is it not [the case] that it exists in some but does not exist in others?

And that which is commonly observed in all characterizes the nature in the individuals under it;

then man is by nature capable of willing.

This, then, having been clearly demonstrated, let us examine, as we proposed above, also the absurdity of their proposition.

If man is by nature capable of willing, as has been shown, but according to them Christ had the human will by way of appropriation in a mere relation, then it is necessary for them, if indeed they are consistent with their own principles, [to say the same] also of our other natural properties together with it—

I mean, of course, the will according to nature—

to say [it is] by mere appropriation;

and thus for them the contemplation and initiation into the whole economy will be found to be taken merely in appearance.

Furthermore, if the decree of Sergius anathematized not those who said "in what manner" [there are two wills], but simply those who said "two wills";

and these [in Byzantium] themselves say "two," even if mistakenly, on account of the appropriation;

then those who uphold this [position] lend support to the anathema pronounced against themselves.

And again, if, according to the proposition maintained by them, persons are introduced together with the wills;

then, saying two wills—even if mistakenly, on account of the appropriation, as has been said—they will also, according to such a proposition, be saying [that there are] persons introduced together with them.

And who will bear the division of the One into two persons?

They did not say that the will which Christ formed in himself is ours.

Then they did not signify by "the human" that which belongs to him by nature, but that which he received by appropriation.

Since they also said that he likewise assumed our nature, then according to them he will be found to have this very nature too by mere appropriation.

For if that is true, so is this;

and if this is false, so is that.

By saying that he formed "our own" within himself, they [in fact] signified that which belongs to him by nature.

Since the same one was wholly God together with humanity, and the same one was wholly [man] together with divinity;

He himself, as man, in himself and through himself subjected the human [will] to God the Father, giving himself to us as the best pattern and model for imitation, so that we too, looking to him as the founder of our salvation, might willingly yield what is ours to God, by no longer willing anything other than what he himself wills.

That I did not say out of evil intent or any craftiness (==), but wishing to show forth the utmost union.

If this is granted to the followers of Severus, then, as far as concerns the premise granted, they too will not unreasonably say:

that it is not out of evil (≡Γ_≡>) intent, or any craftiness, that we speak of one nature, but, wishing, just as you also do, through the one will, to show by it the utmost union.

Behold, in saying one [for indeed one] will, they coincide with those same notions and expressions as those men.

But this one will — what do they wish to call it?

For it is right that they should give a designation for it.

So then, is it gnomic and derivative;

and if derivative, will the gnome, as the archetype, be an essence?

If it is not an essence, it is a quality;

and it will be found to be quality arising from quality;

The gnome is nothing other than what the blessed Cyril defined it to be, namely, a mode of life.

The mode of life according to virtue, let us say, or vice — does it belong to us as a matter of choice, or not?

Do we then choose while willing and deliberating, or unwillingly and without deliberation?

Admittedly, while willing and deliberating.

Therefore the gnome is nothing other than a certain qualified willing, holding fast, in relation to something, either to a good that exists or to one that is supposed [to exist].

You have made a correct exposition of the patristic definition.

If the exposition of the patristic definition has been rightly made, then, in the first place, it is not possible to call [the will of Christ] gnomic.

For how is it possible for a will to proceed from a will?

Moreover, in speaking of a gnome in Christ, as the inquiry concerning it has shown, they teach as dogma that he was a mere man, disposed deliberatively just as (≡Γ_≡>) we are, both ignorant and doubting, and holding opposing [inclinations];

since indeed one deliberates concerning things that are doubtful, and not concerning what is beyond doubt.

For we, simply, have by nature a natural desire for the good;

but [we gain] experience of how a thing is good through inquiry and deliberation.

And for this reason, in our case, gnome is fittingly spoken of, being a mode of use, not a principle of nature;

since indeed nature has changed countless times.

But in the case of the humanity of the Lord, which did not subsist merely as ours does, but divinely;

for he who appeared in flesh for our sake, from us, was God (==); [therefore his will] cannot be called gnome.

For his very being [i.e., for him himself] — that is, his subsisting divinely — itself by nature possessed both the affinity toward the good and the estrangement from evil, just as Basil, the great eye of the Church, teaches in his exposition of the forty-fourth Psalm, saying:

And in accordance with this you will also understand what was said by Isaiah concerning him: 'Before the child knows, or chooses evil things, he will choose the good.'

For the phrase 'before' shows that it was not by inquiring and deliberating as we do, but by subsisting divinely, that the good belonged to him by nature, as his very being. [Pyr.]

And if they are natural, why do they not exist equally in all who share the same nature?

They exist equally in all who share the same nature.] [Pyr.]

Then whence comes such great inequality among us?

From not exercising the things of nature equally.

Since if all of us equally exercised the natural [faculties] for that purpose for which we came to be, then one and the same virtue would be shown in all, just as nature [is one in all], admitting no more or less.

If the natural [endowments] come to us not from ascetic exercise but from [our] creation, and virtue is natural, how then do we acquire the virtues, though they are natural, by labor and ascetic exercise?

Ascetic exercise, and the labors that follow it, were devised by those who love virtue solely for the purpose of separating out the deception that has been mixed into the soul through sense-perception;

not for the purpose of introducing the virtues from outside as something newly added;

for they are laid up in us from [our] creation, as has been said;

whence, as soon as the deception is completely separated out, the soul at once also manifests the brightness of the virtue that is according to nature.

For he who is not foolish is prudent;

and he who is neither cowardly nor rash is courageous;

And reason, according to nature, is prudence;

and the faculty of judgment is justice, and the spirited [faculty] is courage;

and desire is temperance.

Therefore it is customary that, by the removal of what is contrary to nature, only what is according to nature shines forth;

just as, by the removal of rust, the natural gleam and brightness of iron [shines forth].

From this a very great blasphemy has been shown to belong to those who speak of a gnome in Christ.

Nor ought this to be passed over without remark: that the word 'gnome' is used in many ways and with many meanings both in Holy Scripture and among the holy Fathers, as is evident to those who read carefully.

For sometimes they use it in the sense of exhortation and counsel;

as when the Apostle says:

'Now concerning virgins I have no commandment of the Lord;'

'Against your people they have craftily devised a plan;'

which another translator, clarifying it, rendered: 'Against your people,' he said, 'they have craftily devised a counsel;'

'The shameless decree went forth from the presence of the king;'

and sometimes it is used with reference to opinion, or faith, or mind-set, as when Gregory, surnamed the Theologian, expounds in his first Oration On the Son:

'Since to rebuke is no great thing — for it is very easy, (≡Γ_≡>) and [within the power] of anyone who wishes;'

'but to bring forward one's own view in its place belongs to a man who is pious and possesses understanding.' And, simply put, so that I may not, by going through everything point by point, heap up a mass of material for this discourse, having carefully observed [the usage], I have found the word 'gnome' [to be used] according to twenty-eight distinct meanings in Holy Scripture and among the holy Fathers;

for it does not exhibit any common or particular character [of its own], but the intention of the one speaking is determined either from what is said before it or from what follows.

For how is it possible for that which is said in many ways to be the exclusive designation of some one thing?

So then, that the shame of such a heresy may become more evident, let us also examine this proposition in another way.

If it pleases you, let us examine it.

When they speak of one will — whether elective, or gnomic, or authoritative, even if they should wish to call it by some other name still;

for we do not disagree about this;

they will be compelled to call this either divine, or angelic, or human.

And first of all, whichever of these they say it is, they will [in effect] be calling it natural;

(==) since each of these terms is indeed indicative of a nature;

and what they seemed to escape by the method of division, this they are shown, by the method of analysis, to be establishing.

Consequently, if they call it divine, they have thereby acknowledged Christ to be, by nature, God alone;

But if it is angelic, he is neither God nor man, but some angelic nature;

but if it is human, they have thereby shown him to be a mere man, subject to another's authority.

Whenever they fall into these absurdities, they say that the will is neither natural nor gnomic;

but they say it is present in us by a certain aptitude.

Is this aptitude present in us according to nature, or not according to nature?

Then again, by this very analysis, they will end up saying that the will is natural;

and they gain nothing from this circuitous course;

and since aptitude, through learning, produces the habit and the readiness [to act];

then, according to them, Christ obtained the habit of will and its readiness from learning and advancement;

and he was progressing, being ignorant, before the learning, of the very things learned.

For what reason, then, do they turn away from Nestorius, while zealously clinging to his words and notions?

That in saying "one will" they are championing his cause is attested even by the Ekthesis they themselves espouse, which declared that Nestorius professed one will, even in the case of the two persons falsely attributed to him.

Moreover, in rejecting that the will is natural, they will have to say it is either hypostatic, or contrary to nature.

But if they say it is hypostatic, then in this way the Son will have a will different from the Father's;

for that which is hypostatic is characteristic of the hypostasis alone.

But if contrary to nature, they thereby teach the corruption of his essences, since things contrary to nature are destructive of things according to nature.

I would gladly ask them this as well: does the God and Father of all will insofar as He is Father, or insofar as He is God?

But if insofar as He is Father, then His will shall be other than the Son's;

yet the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit too is God;

therefore they will have to grant that the will belongs to nature, that is, is natural.

Furthermore, if, according to the Fathers, those whose will is one also have one essence;

and according to them the will of Christ's divinity and of his humanity is one;

then they are saying that these have one and the same essence.

And how, being thus impious, do they claim to be following the Fathers?

And again, if according to those same Fathers the difference of nature is not made manifest in the one will, then they must necessarily either, saying one will, not say there is a natural difference in Christ, or, saying a natural difference, not say one will — if indeed they truly direct themselves by the patristic canons.

And again, if according to those same teachers the will is not common to both, namely to the two essences, then they must necessarily either not say that the two natures of the same [Christ] hold one will in common;

or, in saying this, plainly fight against the patristic laws and decrees.

The argument has shown, very clearly and concisely, the impiety interwoven with every device of our opponents.

But what shall we say to the fact that they also attempt to demonstrate this from the Fathers?

If they wish to call "Fathers" those who divide, and those who confuse, the transcendent economy [of the Incarnation], we grant them this.

For all of them held one will as their doctrine, though they stood diametrically opposed to one another in their impiety.

But if they mean the Fathers of the Church, we shall by no means grant them this.

Let them show even a single one from among the manifest and universally known Fathers, so that we too, on the day of the scrutiny of our deeds, when accused by Christ our God — "For what reason did you accept a statement that utterly dissolves the whole mystery of my incarnation?" —

may have this defense: that in all things we revered the authority of that Father.

What, then, is the meaning of that saying of Gregory the Theologian?

For "his willing, being wholly deified, is in no way opposed to God" is not contrary to the two wills.

On the contrary, it declares the two wills, and indeed all else besides, all the more expressly.

Just as inflaming brings with itself both the thing inflamed and the thing that inflamed it, and cooling both the thing cooled and the thing that cooled it, and walking both the walker and the thing walked upon, and seeing both the one seeing and the thing seen, and thinking both the one thinking and the thing thought;

for it is not possible to conceive or speak of a relation apart from the related terms —

so, consequently, likewise with the thing deified and the thing that deified it.

Moreover, if, according to them, the deification of the will is contrary to the two wills, then the deification of the nature will also be contrary to the two natures;

for the Father applied the same principle of deification to both.

The Father's usage has been shown to be entirely consonant with the two wills;

but it is also necessary to show Gregory, who illumined the Church of the Nyssenes, to be in accord with this.

For they present him as holding to one will, on the ground that the Father said concerning the Lord:

"The soul wills, the body touches;

through both, suffering is escaped."

For they say that the Father meant that the soul of the Lord wills by the divine will of the divinity united to it according to hypostasis.

Then, by the same line of reasoning, he also meant that the body touches by the divine touch — and thus, according to them, the divinity will turn out to be tangible as well.

For the very things they themselves say concerning the soul of the Lord, if another transfers them, by the same manner of expression, to the body, leads them into the utmost error.

Very concisely you have exposed the blasphemy inherent in such an interpretation.

But what shall we say also concerning the citations they adduce from the great Athanasius?

"The mind of the Lord is not yet the Lord, but rather a willing, or a wishing, or an operation directed toward something." — MAXIMUS [answered]:

They bring forward even this citation against themselves.

For may the truth never become so destitute as to need to beg for its adversaries' own weapons against them.

For if, according to the Father, "the mind of the Lord is not yet the Lord," then his mind will certainly be something other than the Lord;

that is, the mind of the Lord is not by nature "Lord," that is, God;

for it is believed to have become his according to hypostasis;

and this is clear from his adding that it is either a willing, or a wishing, or an operation directed toward something;

using as his standard for this Clement, the true philosopher among philosophers, who in the sixth book of the Stromateis defined willing (θέλησις) as "appetitive intellect";

and wishing (βούλησις) as "reasonable desire," or as "the willing concerning some particular thing."

And this divine teacher [calls it] an "operation directed toward something" because, for all things done by him in a manner befitting God, he made use of the intellectual and rational soul united to him according to hypostasis.

In truth, by the very means through which they suppose themselves to be warring against piety, they have, without realizing it, brought their own refutation upon themselves.

It is also necessary to work through the other citation which they adduce from the Father, so as to leave them no pretext whatever against the truth.

In which that admirable man says:

"He was born of a woman, having raised up for himself the form of man from the first formation, in the manifestation of flesh, but apart from fleshly wills and human reasonings, in the image of our common nature.

For the willing belongs to the divinity alone." — MAXIMUS [continued]:

Being self-interpreting, it has no need whatever of assistance from [our own] reasonings.

And how, then, does it turn out to be ambiguous to them?

Since to whom is it not evident — unless the sight of his soul is altogether blinded — that the Father discoursed on these things not concerning the natural principle, but concerning the mode of his existence according to the flesh, wishing to show that the incarnation is the work of the divine will alone — the Father being well-pleased, the Son himself performing the work, and the Holy Spirit cooperating — but not of fleshly motion and human reasonings, nor indeed of the ordinary sequence of marriage?

For God of all did not innovate upon the principle of nature by becoming man;

since he would no longer even be man, were he not to possess the principle of nature entire and unaltered in every respect — though not possessing the mode, that is, conception through seed and birth through corruption.

Therefore the God-minded teachers of the Church in no way denied the natural principles of the natures united;

in agreement with the apostles and the prophets, they declared our Lord and God Jesus Christ to be, according to both his natures, willing and operative for our salvation.

And it is possible to demonstrate this from the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments.

For indeed the Fathers, moved not of their own accord, but having learned from these Scriptures, taught this too out of love for mankind.

For it was not they themselves who were speaking, but the grace of the Spirit which had wholly interpenetrated them.

Since, purposing to be of benefit through the imitation of divine goodness, you have devoted yourself to these labors of inquiry, teach this also without hesitation.

In the holy Gospels it is said concerning the Lord, that 'On the following day Jesus wished to go into Galilee';

and it is evident that, insofar as he was not there, he willed to enter it;

for according to his divinity he is absent from nothing.

Therefore, then, it was insofar as he was man, and not insofar as he was God, that he willed to enter;

and he was possessed of will insofar as he was man.

"I will that where I am, they also may be."

If, insofar as he is God, Christ is beyond 'where';

for insofar as he is God, he is not in place;

and it is impossible for created nature to exist beyond 'where';

therefore, insofar as he is man, he wills that where he is, they also may be;

and the same one was possessed of will insofar as he was man.

"And having come to a place, he said:"

"And they gave him wine mixed with gall;"

"and having tasted it, he was not willing to drink."

According to which part of him is he said to have thirsted?

If according to his divinity, then his divinity will be subject to passion, craving drink contrary to nature.

But if according to his humanity, then it was insofar as he thirsted that, in that same respect, he was also unwilling to drink what was unsuited to nature;

and the same one was possessed of will also insofar as he was man.

"And Jesus walked in Galilee;"

"for he was not willing to walk in Judea, because the Jews were seeking to kill him."

If walking belongs by nature to the flesh, but not to the divinity united to it according to hypostasis, then it was insofar as he was man that this same one, walking in Galilee, was unwilling to walk in Judea;

and the same one was possessed of will also insofar as he was man.

"And departing from there, they passed through Galilee;"

"and he did not wish anyone to know."

It is agreed by all that this journeying belonged by nature, as has been said, to the humanity of the Lord, but not to his divinity;

and if the journeying belonged to him by nature insofar as he was man, but not insofar as he was God;

then it was also insofar as he was man, passing along with the disciples, that he did not wish anyone to know;

and the same one was possessed of will also insofar as he was man.

"And rising up from there, he departed into the region of Tyre and Sidon."

"And having entered a house, he wished no one to know;"

If, insofar as he is God, Christ was self-subsistent power;

but insofar as he was man, weakness;