To my most honored and beloved fellow-minister Flaccillus, Eusebius, greetings in the Lord. If what we have written briefly in reply to the garrulous and verbose treatise of Marcellus has sufficed, you should not be surprised; for indeed there was no need of many words to overturn things already condemned at once and by common consent. Therefore in the first two books I used only the citation of the man's own words, and without any refutation made the proof against them evident from the words themselves. But now, in addition to that exposure, I have also brought forward, in the three books now in hand, the refutation of the same. For he, having composed one single, endless, and far-wandering treatise, says that he did this because he acknowledges one God, lest unawares, by dividing Scripture, he should give the Son of God room for a hypostasis. But we, honoring the all-holy and thrice-blessed Trinity, have in so many books comprehended the whole subject, sparing verbosity, and setting forth the true theology in summary and briefly. If then what has been written is sufficient, you yourself, on reading it, may judge; but if anything is lacking, you may also supply it -- clearly as a brother making up a brother's deficiencies, if indeed it needs healing, curing it by correction. I pray that you fare well and remember me always to the Lord.
1. That Marcellus vainly slandered Sabellius, while holding the same opinions as he. 2. That the grace of Christ granted to the church of God a special knowledge concerning the Father and the Son. 3. That those of heterodox opinion have erred in various ways in their teaching concerning the Son. 4. That those who do not confess the Son of God to subsist call themselves Christians in vain. 5. How Marcellus denied the Son of God, imitating the heresy of Sabellius. 6. How the church of God believes. 7. How those of heterodox opinion have fallen away in various ways from the theology concerning the Son. 8. An exposition of sound and ecclesiastical orthodoxy. 9. That the Son did not come into being in the same manner as the many created things. 10. That, being alone begotten of the Father, he alone is fittingly proclaimed both God and only-begotten Son. 11. How the church acknowledges one God, though admitting that the Son is God from God. 12. That his begetting from the Father is ineffable. 13. That the Son's oversight is necessary and salvific for all. 14. That the church rightly rejected Marcellus for holding the same views as Sabellius. 15. With what words Marcellus attacked Sabellius, pretending not to hold the same views as he. 16. How he is caught out by his own words, holding the same opinions as Sabellius. 17. How he openly denied the hypostasis of the Son. 18. How he asserted that before the incarnation the Son was nothing other than word alone, similar to that among men. 19. How the divine Scriptures named the Son of God, even before the incarnation, not only 'Word' but countless other titles as well. 20. Citations and partial interpretations of the proofs from divine Scripture, in thirty chapters in all.
I for my part supposed that the citations of Marcellus' own words, which I gathered in the foregoing books, would suffice for the refutation directed against them by themselves. For they contained so manifest and unashamed a denial of the Son of God, that even without any counter-argument it was something to be shunned by the nurslings of the church of God, the teaching contained in them.
But since I considered that perhaps some might be swept away from ecclesiastical theology by the abundant citation which the man used to give credence to what he supposed would support him, I judged it necessary, for the present, to bring to light the refutation of these things also, so that everyone might learn that not a single word of the divinely inspired Scripture provided testimony in accord with him as he denied the Son of God, but all of them uttered directly the opposite voice against him, correcting, without distortion, his misinterpretations of the divine Scriptures. And at the same time, together with the exposure of these things, I shall append the theology of our Savior -- having nothing new to say, nor any clever discovery of my own devising, but putting forward the uncorrupted teaching of the church of God, which she received from those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ear-witnesses of the Word, and which she guards.
Now before examining these matters -- since in the midst of his treatise I found Sabellius being assailed by him, and was astonished at the man's folly, in that he did not refrain from speaking evil of one whom, above all others, he ought to have praised, since that man had become of one mind and opinion with him -- I did not think it right to pass over the matter in silence, but resolved to hand down a refutation of this point too in the present writing. For his having slandered the ministers of God, even though it brought reproach on himself, brought a good name to those who were thereby freed from communion with him,
nevertheless there was some plausibility in his seeming to disparage what was not congenial to him; but that he should, without realizing it, be assailing himself through his abuse of one who shares his own opinion, seems to me to be at once shameless and senseless. That this is indeed so may be shown by the man's own refutation of himself: introducing, according to Sabellius, God as Son-Father -- even if not in bare terms, yet in truth -- by abolishing the hypostasis of the Son and defining God as one; and calling this one both his own father and again, in turn, his own son. For he granted that the Word in God
having defined this to be one and the same as himself, he said that he [God] is styled its father; and that the Word is his son -- not truly being a son in the hypostasis of essence, but properly and truly being a word. He notes, at any rate, that it is not word in a loose or metaphorical sense, but properly and truly being word, and nothing else than word.
But if nothing else, it is clear that he was not properly and truly a son either, but was named so only as far as the mere sound and name, in a loose sense. And saying that the Word, having become flesh and been born of the Virgin, is one and the same with God, he declared him to be God -- the very thing which the church of God long ago, indeed from of old, rejected when Sabellius uttered it, numbering him among the godless heretics.
For as to confessing one God, in contradistinction to the polytheistic error of the Greeks, the children of the Jews were the first to receive this. But to know the same God also as Father of an only-begotten Son is a special privilege which saving grace has bestowed upon the church. And she knows Jesus Christ alone as Son, and no other -- not according to the generation of the flesh which he assumed (for this she has been taught to call the form of a servant and son of man), but according to that generation from God the Father himself before all ages, unknown to all; according to which the fullness of the Father's Godhead gave subsistence also to him as Son and God -- not a Godhead peculiarly his own and separated from the Father, nor some beginningless and unbegotten Godhead, nor one drawn in as foreign from elsewhere and alien to the Father, but one filled from the very participation in the Father's being, as if poured upon him from a fountain. For the great apostle taught that in him alone dwells the whole fullness of the Father's Godhead. Wherefore one God is proclaimed to the church of God, and there is no other besides him; but one also is the only-begotten Son of God, the image of the Father's Godhead, and for this reason God.
This theology, since the many could not grasp it in their understanding, they devised various byways of error: (a) some, granting that the Son was God, denied the man whom he had assumed; (b) others, supposing him to be a mere man, were ignorant of the God in him; (c) others, from fear of seeming to introduce a second God, defined the same one to be both Father and Son. From these the church of God, having turned aside, glories in the evangelical proclamation of the truth, boasting that she has one God over all, and inscribing one only-begotten Son, God from God, Jesus Christ, confessing him to be both Savior and one who became son of man -- being Son of God before he also became man, and having become this which he was not, through the unspeakable excess of the Father's love for mankind.
Now the word of truth proclaims these things in the voice of the church. But those who deny the Son of God, asserting that there is one God and nothing else, why do they trouble the church in vain, when it were fitting for them rather to consort with the synagogues of the Jews? And why do they impale themselves upon blasphemous words, slandering the one God with a double name, if indeed they suppose the same one to be both Father and Son? For of whom is he father, if no son subsists? And of whom will he be son, if the one who begot him did not pre-exist? Being one, he will surely, in every respect, be the very one who was made flesh and suffered and passed through mortal life among men.
But Sabellius, for saying these things, daring things godless and impious, the church of God drove far away; but Marcellus attempts to renew these same things, using as a screen an implausible argument. For while rightly defining God as one, he says that this one has in himself the Word, united and joined together with him; and then, of the one God, he calls one part 'Father' and the other 'Son' -- as though there were in him a certain double and composite essence.
And how much better, in a choice between evils, is he who does not divide the unoriginate, unbegotten, and divine power, but simply confesses in bare terms that it is the same -- how much better than either of these is the Jew, who does not divide the one God into Father and Son as Marcellus does, nor introduce, as Sabellius does, the same one as Son-Father, but rather reveres God, while acknowledging and awaiting his Christ, proclaimed through the prophets as one who will come -- whom, when he came, since they did not receive him, they have paid, and shall pay, the penalty of their unbelief in him.
But those who consider it their prayer to believe in him who has come will acknowledge these three things: the one from the seed of David and of the same holy virgin; and the Son of God who dwelt in him, pre-existing and subsisting in essence; and the Father of this one, who is God, by whom he himself continually confesses that he was sent. For us, then, there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things, according to the apostle, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things -- the only-begotten Son who pre-existed with God -- and, third, the son of man according to the flesh, whom the Son of God assumed for our sake.
But neither was the body which he assumed the same as the Son of God who assumed it, nor could the Son of God himself be thought one and the same as the one who begot him. These three, then, being posited, those who grant two of them but put the third out of the way would be cast out from the church.
Some godless persons among those of heterodox opinion, rejecting the flesh of the Savior and asserting that he appeared on earth by some semblance of illusion, were the first to miss the mark of truth. Others, who accepted the incarnate economy but denied the pre-existing Son of God, devised, as I have said, various pathless byways for themselves: some, asserting that he was a mere man of the common nature of all, in no way superior except in pre-eminence of virtue; others, teaching that the God of all himself dwelt in the body, and claiming that he was styled 'his own Son' on account of the economy which he underwent as man. These, granting two -- God and man -- deprived themselves of the third, denying the Savior himself, the only-begotten Son of God.
Of these, Sabellius long ago, and now Marcellus, being led astray in like opinion, have strenuously maintained that they know well the God over all, just as the unbelieving Jews do; and the second point, the flesh from the holy virgin, they have likewise confessed. But the third -- the very sum of the salvation of us all -- the Son of God, who is light and truth, they have thrust aside, and together with the denial of the Son have also fallen away from the light of truth.
Hence you will hear them confessing one God and honoring the flesh of the Savior, but accepting with mouth and lips the Son of God who dwelt in the flesh, while in deed rejecting him. For one ought to seek the Son of God as truly living and subsisting, neither the same as the body which he assumed, nor the same as God the Father. For no one who calls the God who is beyond all things a Son could be pious (for whose son would he be, who is clothed with unoriginate and unbegotten Godhead?); nor will anyone who says that the only-begotten Son of God is himself the Father escape the judgment reserved for blasphemers.
Wherefore the church of God, rightly cutting the straight and royal road, has rejected the other deviations; but to her own nurslings she delivers the knowledge of the divine grace, teaching them, in accordance with the very mystery of regeneration, to confess belief in one God, Father Almighty -- providing them to know this theology as perfect, exact, and complete: a theology which delivers one God, distinguishing itself from the Greek and polytheistic error; and knows him as Father, separating itself from the Jewish teaching; and confesses him Almighty, turning away from the impiety of the godless heterodox.
None, at any rate, of those of heterodox opinion would say that the Father of Christ is himself God Almighty. Just as none of the Jews would confess God to be Father without knowing the only-begotten Son, nor would any Greek say that he knows only one God. Wherefore the church, purging the error of all these, proclaims the one God, teaching that he is both Father and Almighty -- Father of the one Christ alone, but God and Creator and Lord of all the rest. So too she delivers Jesus Christ as only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages -- not being the same as the Father, but existing and living in his own right, and truly co-existing as Son, God from God, and Light from Light, and Life from Life, begotten of the Father by unutterable, ineffable, and altogether-to-us-unknown and incomprehensible words, for the salvation of the universe; and not having come into being in the same way as the rest of the begotten, nor living a life resembling that of those begotten through him, but alone brought forth from the Father himself and being Life-itself.
For it was fitting for the God over all, before every created thing and before all ages, to put forth this only-begotten offspring, as a kind of unbreakable foundation and base for the things that were to come into being through him. Wherefore, before all the things that were to be, he begot the Son, as it were a ray of light, and a fountain of life, and a treasury of good things, in whom, according to the divine apostle, are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
Of so many good things did the only good Father cause the Son to subsist, being Life-itself, the life-giver of all things, and Light-itself, the true light, illuminating every intellectual and rational essence, and Word-itself and Wisdom-itself, wisely and rationally establishing and governing all things -- for the sake of which he alone, and no other, has been proclaimed and is the only-begotten Son of God.
Whence one might justly find fault with those who have dared to call him a creature, having come into being out of nothing, like the rest of created things. For how, then, would he still be Son? And how would he be the only-begotten of God, if he bears the same nature as the rest of created things? For by this reckoning he would rather become a brother to them, not the Son of God, and would be one of the many begotten things, sharing equally with them in the fellowship of creation out of nothing.
But the divine oracles do not teach thus concerning him. Rather, when they instruct us concerning the existence of created things, they testify without qualification that all things came into being through him: for all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made; and in him were all things created that are in the heavens and on the earth, whether visible or invisible; and all things have been created through him and unto him; and he is before all things, and in him all things hold together -- according to the apostolic teachings.
But when Scripture introduces the theology concerning him, it sets him apart from all the rest, and knows him as Lord and Master and Craftsman and God and Savior of all; it declares him alone, and no other, to be the only-begotten Son of God; it calls him alone Wisdom and Word and Life and Light; and image of the invisible God, and radiance of eternal light; and teaches us to think many other things akin to these concerning him -- thereby showing, in this way, the peculiar relation of the Father's Godhead toward him alone, as toward an only-begotten son.
Wherefore also, at the streams of the Jordan, the Father's voice proclaimed him alone as beloved Son, testifying with a great cry: 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.' And it repeats this testimony a second time at the transfiguration on the mountain, confirming the same saying.
Since, then, the God of all himself has furnished this testimony concerning him, and the evangelist expressly teaches that he is the only-begotten Son, saying: 'No one has ever seen God; the only-begotten Son (or only-begotten God), who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known' -- and moreover, since the Savior himself, in his own teachings concerning himself, confirms these things, saying: 'For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that everyone who believes in him should have eternal life' --
-- whoever, after these declarations, defines the Son as a thing generated out of nothing, and a creature brought forward out of non-being, does so without realizing that he grants him the name alone, while denying that he is truly Son. For he who came into being out of nothing could not truly become the Son of God, just as no other of the things begotten could either.
But he who is truly the Son of God, having been born of him, that is, from the Father, would fittingly be called both only-begotten and beloved of the Father; and thus he would also be God. For what could the offspring of God be, but that which is made like unto the one who begot it? A king builds a city, but does not beget a city; and one is said to beget a son, but not to build him. And the craftsman would be maker, but not father, of what he fashions; whereas he would not be called maker of the son who is born from him. And so, the God of all would fittingly be called Father of the Son, and Creator and Maker of the world.
But if someone should find it once said somewhere in Scripture, 'The Lord created me the beginning of his ways, for his works,' one must examine the sense of the saying, which I shall set forth a little later, and not, in the manner of Marcellus, shake the church's most authoritative doctrine on the basis of a single expression. For he too, once he heard that the Son is called Word, fell back upon the notion of man, and thereby set aside his real existence.
How, then, is it holy to compare with the rest of created things the one who is testified, both by himself and by the Father, to be Son? And how could he be only-begotten while being numbered among the multitude of created things? Indeed, from the very appellation, 'Son' establishes his natural relation to the Father, just as, again, the name 'only-begotten' touches upon both the kinship and the very generation, and the fact of being alone, with no one else sharing in his sonship. But these men seem to have suffered the same affliction as Marcellus.
For he, out of fear of saying that there are two gods, put forward the denial of the Son, abolishing his hypostasis. But those others, granting two hypostases -- the one unbegotten, the other created out of nothing -- establish one God; but for them the Son will no longer be either only-begotten, or Lord, or God, having no share whatever in the Father's Godhead, but being compared instead to the rest of created things, inasmuch as he came into subsistence out of nothing. But the church is not so.
But she proclaims the Son of God to be God and Lord, and teaches that he is truly both Son and God -- not in the manner of the many who are called sons and gods by way of title, concerning whom it is said, 'I said, you are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High' -- but insofar as he alone, begotten of the Father, existed in the form of God, and was the image of the invisible God and the firstborn of all creation. Wherefore she has learned to honor and revere and worship him alone, as her own Lord and Savior and God.
But if it is fear that afflicts them, lest they should seem to proclaim two gods, let them know that even though the Son is confessed by us to be God, there would still be one God alone -- that one alone who is without beginning and unbegotten, who possesses Godhead as his own, and who has become the cause of the Son's being, and of his being such as he is; on account of whom the Son himself confesses that he lives, saying directly, 'As the living Father sent me, I also live because of the Father,' and, 'For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself.'
Wherefore he also teaches that the Father is God both of us and of himself, when he says, 'I ascend to my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God.' And the great apostle teaches that God is the head of the Son, and the Son the head of the church -- saying in one place, 'The head of Christ is God,' and in another, concerning the Son, 'And he gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body.'
He himself, then, would be the source and head of the church, while the Father is his head. Thus there is one God, the Father of the only-begotten Son, and one head even of Christ himself. But since there is one source and one head, how could there be two gods, and not rather that one alone, who ascribes to himself no one higher, nor any other cause of himself, but possesses as his own the beginningless and unbegotten Godhead of monarchic authority, and who has imparted to the Son a share of his own Godhead and life -- he who through him has given subsistence to the universe; who sends him; who commands him; who lays charge upon him; who teaches him; who delivers all things to him; who glorifies him; who exalts him above; who has proclaimed him king of the universe; who delivers all judgment to him; who wills that we too should obey him; who bids him hold the throne at the right hand of his majesty, addressing him and saying --
'Sit at my right hand' -- he who, on account of all these things, is the God of the Son himself as well; whom his only-begotten child obeyed, emptying himself, humbling himself, taking the form of a servant, becoming obedient unto death; to whom he also prays, whose commands he obeys, to whom he gives thanks; whom he teaches us to consider the only true God, confessing him to be greater than himself; and whom, in addition to all these things, he wills that all of us should know to be his God as well.
And him who thus glorifies his own Father, the Father in turn, glorifying him mutually, has proclaimed Lord and Savior and God of all, and enthroned together with his own kingdom. Instructed in these things, the church of God deems it right to know him as her own God, Lord, and Savior, and as the only-begotten Son of the God over all, and to proclaim God no other of the created things; but she knows this one alone as God, whom alone the Father begot from himself.
just as he himself declared through Solomon, saying, 'Before the mountains were settled, and before all the hills, he begets me' -- thereby hinting, in this way, at the divine and supra-mundane powers by 'mountains' and 'hills.'
But if someone should busy himself inquiring how God might beget, and how he who is beyond all things could be Father, let the boldness of the question be silenced by him who said, 'Seek not what is too deep for you, and search not what is too high for you; consider what has been commanded you, for you have no need of hidden things.' And Paul too, having said, 'O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!' -- let this persuade the one who dares to press further not to attempt things unattainable. Or else let him first tell us -- regarding that which he says came into being out of nothing -- how, and in what manner, it came to subsist, having not existed at all before.
For it is not that, like the craftsmen among us, he took pre-existing matter in his hands and fashioned the universe. But just as that which is by nature impossible, as far as men are concerned (I mean bringing what does not exist at all out of non-being into being), became possible for him, and he became the Maker of all things, not in the manner of man, but by reasons ineffable and inexpressible to us -- so much more would the begetting of his only-begotten Son be unsearchable and untraceable, not only to us, as one might say, but even to all powers superior to us.
For things whose nature falls so far short, standing below and at the greatest distance from the ineffable and divine essence, how could they attain to a comprehension of what lies beyond and above them? And how could those things which did not exist before, but were brought by him out of non-being into being, possess knowledge of their own first generation, when he who brought them forth became the very cause of their existence? Or shall we, creatures of yesterday, clothed in skin and flesh, strung together with bones and sinews, who do not even know the things pertaining to ourselves, make it a safe undertaking to inquire into ineffable things, busying ourselves with how the Father begot the Son? That countless things even at our very feet elude our knowledge will be clear from what follows.
For who could say how the soul is confined within the body, how it departs, how it was in the beginning admitted into it, what its form is, what its shape, what its figure, what its essence? Let no one, then, busy himself with inquiries about demons, nor about the essence of angels, nor about principalities and thrones and dominions, nor about powers and world-rulers.
But if we are at a loss in these matters, which are so near at hand, what need is there to search out the knowledge of the beginningless and unbegotten Godhead? Why ask the unattainable -- how God came to subsist as Father of an only-begotten Son -- as though the Father's own voice did not suffice for us as testimony to the beloved, whom he proclaimed, saying, 'This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear him'?
If, then, it is commanded that we hear him, let us, obeying the royal law, hear the beloved Son. What he wishes us to know about himself he will make plain, saying, 'For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that everyone who believes in him should have eternal life.' He must indeed be believed, that we may obtain eternal life; for, he says, 'he who believes in him has eternal life.'
Not the one who knows how he was begotten of the Father -- for no one would then have a share in eternal life, if indeed it has been said that no one knew the Father except the Son, nor did anyone know the Son except the Father alone who begot him. Faith, then, suffices for us unto salvation -- the faith which grants us to know God as Father Almighty, and to inscribe his only-begotten Son as Savior. And he, among other things, also delivered this teaching, saying: 'That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit'; and, 'God is Spirit.'