Since therefore these things do not befit the nature of the Word in Christ, it is necessary that they accord with His flesh, according to which He is rightly called the elect servant, rightly strengthened, rightly filled with wisdom, rightly to have grown, rightly to have the Holy Spirit over Himself. XIII. That this may appear still more evidently, let us add a few things. Isaiah says of Him: 'Before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good: before the child shall know to call father or mother, he shall receive the strength of Damascus and the spoils of Samaria' (Isaiah 8:4). Do we dare to subject the nature of the Word to so great an ignorance, to which neither things past nor things future are hidden? And again Luke: 'But Jesus advanced in age, and wisdom, and grace with God and men' (Luke 2:52).
If the nature of the Word advanced in Him, then it was made changeable by advancement: for what advances is changed for the better. Concerning also the power and glory of the kingdom and the authority of judgment, which He received in time, on account of the merit of the passion, according to the nature of the flesh, let us say a few things briefly. Gabriel in the Gospel speaks thus of Him: 'And the Lord God shall give Him the throne of David His father, and He shall reign in the house of Jacob, and of His kingdom there shall be no end' (Luke 1:32). To David also these are the words of the Father concerning Him: 'Of the fruit of thy womb I will set upon thy throne' (Psalm 132:11). Likewise: 'And I will set His throne unto the age of the age, and His throne as the days of heaven' (Psalm 89:29-30).
'And I will make Him the firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth' (Psalm 89:28). Likewise: 'For My hand shall help Him, and My arm shall strengthen Him' (Psalm 89:22). 'And I will set His hand in the sea, and His right hand in the rivers' (Psalm 89:26). 'And He shall have dominion from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth' (Psalm 72:8). And David of Him to the Father: 'Thou hast crowned Him with glory and honour, and hast set Him over the works of Thy hands. Thou hast subjected all things under His feet' (Psalm 8:6). Likewise: 'Thou hast set on His head a crown of precious stone. He asked life, and Thou gavest Him length of days for ever and ever' (Psalm 21:4). According to that of Isaiah:
'If He shall deliver His soul unto death, He shall see a long-lived seed' (Isaiah 53:10). Likewise: 'For the sake of truth, and meekness, and justice, go forth and reign' (Psalm 45:5). And Daniel: 'To Him was given dominion, honour, and a kingdom' (Daniel 7:14). Why He received all of which is not passed over in silence. For He Himself, showing the merit of so great a dignity received, says: 'To him that overcometh and keepeth My works unto the end, I will give power over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron, as I also have received of My Father' (Revelation 2:26-28). Likewise: 'To him that shall overcome, I will give to sit with Me in My throne, even as I also overcame, and sat down with My Father in His throne' (Revelation 3:21). To which victory all the hosts of heaven bear witness, saying:
'Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive glory, and honour, and wisdom, and strength, and power' (Revelation 5:12). These things concerning the glory and power of the kingdom, which the Son of God received in time on account of the merit of the passion according to the nature of His flesh — since according to the nature of the Word He had need of nothing — let us have said briefly. Now let us speak much more briefly of the authority of judgment. Although in the throne of the kingdom nothing other than the authority of the Judge would be shown. XIV. The prophet therefore speaks thus of Him to the Father: 'O God, give Thy judgment to the king, and Thy justice to the king's son' (Psalm 72:1). And He Himself: 'When I shall take a time, I will judge justices' (Psalm 75:3). And in the Gospel:
'He hath given Him,' he says, 'power to execute judgment, because He is the Son of man' (John 5:27). Of these sacred utterances we find no better interpreter than the Lord Himself, who is able to lay bare for us the causes and merit of so great goods conferred upon Himself. Let all the cleverness of human argumentation cease, nor let unskilled skill dare to extend itself beyond the measure of the divine exposition. Let the Son of God Himself fully teach with the sacred mouth of divinity, why or in what respect He who was thus made an incarnate man was exalted by the Father with so great honours — He who became incarnate in such a way that, remaining immutably in that which He was, He lost nothing of those things which He had before. Let Him say, therefore, why He received power in time, who always had it.
'He hath given Him power,' He says, 'to execute judgment, because He is the Son of man' (Ibid.). What then, Lord Jesus Christ, wilt Thou appear to us as one and another, when we confess Thee to be one and the same Son of God and son of man? Why then didst Thou not say: 'And He hath given Him power, because He is the Son of God'? 'I am one and the same,' He says, 'and cannot be divided. But I willed to show why or whence I received what I always had. For according to the nature whereby I am God the Word, I have lacked nothing, I have received nothing, since I am the Son of God, and was born unto this: but according to the nature of the flesh, whereby I, God the Word, was made an incarnate man, I have both lacked and received, since I am the son of man, and was born unto this.' XV.
And although these things may have sufficed, by the firmness of their strength, for the demonstration in Christ of both natures, yet that the clarity of the truth may shine forth more and more, it pleases us also to treat that saying of the Apostle by which he asserts that Christ was made a mediator for us (1 Timothy 2:5). Which office He could not fulfil except from the truth of the nature of the flesh which He had from us, since through it He appeared as the middle one between God and men. And since, as the Apostle says and the truth of things teaches, 'a mediator is not of one' (Galatians 3:20), but Christ according to you has one nature, show whence He is the middle one between us and that:
because if, as you impiously hold, the nature of the mediator is one, in that which is the one and singular remedy of our salvation, the sacrament will be frustrated. For whence will He be the middle one, if He has not had both? For unless thou givest such a one between God and men, who is so in the middle that from each He is both, that is, that He is both God on account of the nature of divinity, and the same is man on account of the nature of humanity, thou dost not show how things human may be reconciled to things divine.
For since by the transgression of the commandment we had become enemies of God, and were turning in the opposite direction with discordant minds, declining from things above and tending toward things below, it had been necessary, by the intervention of the divine mercy, the enmities being dissolved, that the opposing parties be recalled into one, and that things below be restored to things above: which could not otherwise be done, unless such a mediator existed, who, coming from things heavenly, might be joined to things earthly, retaining in Himself that which He was, and assuming that which He was not. Who would become one in both, and thus through the communion of both natures, in one and the same person, might both associate things human with things divine, and things divine with things human: first uniting both in Himself, without the abolition of either; then reconciling all the faithful to God the Father.
And since the sacrament of reconciliation demanded an immaculate sacrifice, such a victim had to be sought as would be so in the middle between God and men, that it should both succumb to death through that which it had of man, and conquer death through that which it held of divinity in itself. XVI. Hence the Apostle says: 'For although He was crucified through our weakness, yet He liveth by the power of God' (2 Corinthians 13:4). Therefore through this offering of His death, which was His from what was ours, using the office of mediator, He reconciled us to God, as the Apostle says: 'For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son' (Romans 5:10). And again: 'Dissolving,' he says, 'the enmities in His flesh' (Ephesians 2:14):
which flesh, that it was of our race and of our nature, the same Apostle testifies to the Hebrews, saying: 'For it became Him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, who had brought many sons unto glory, to make the prince of their salvation perfect through suffering. For both He that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying: I will declare Thy name to my brethren' (Hebrews 2:10-12). For 'He that sanctifieth,' that is Christ; and 'they who are sanctified,' that is the faithful, are all, he says, 'of one.' 'Of one,' he says, they have it that they are brethren. By what 'one,' unless by the race of our nature? For the faithful are not brethren of Christ from both natures; but from one, that is, the human:
'For which cause,' he says, 'He is not ashamed to call them brethren': but He would be ashamed to call them brethren, if He had only one and the same divine nature: but now having both, and subsisting in both kinds of natures, from one He calls them brethren, from the other servants. Whence it is established that through the human nature ineffably united to the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ was made a mediator: and thereby he who strives to take away from Him this nature, that is the human, by the profession of one nature, attempts to empty out the whole mystery of our faith and salvation. Likewise the Apostle continues, saying to the Hebrews:
'For He did not at once take hold of the angels, but of the seed of Abraham; whence it behoved Him in all things to be made like unto His brethren, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in those things which are toward God, to make a propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that wherein He Himself suffered and was tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted' (Hebrews 2:16-18). What he says is this: that Christ took, not the nature of angels, but of men from the seed of Abraham, that He might, by the truth of the nature taken, be made like in all things to His brethren; that hence He might become a merciful and faithful high priest, in that He took, not the nature of angels, but of men, conscious of infirmity and frailty;
through which and in which, having experienced the infirmities of suffering, He might mercifully and faithfully supplicate the Father for sinners: 'For in that,' he says, 'wherein He Himself suffered and was tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted.' What is that wherein He suffered and experienced infirmity, unless the human nature, of which in the Gospel, in the time of His passion, He said: 'The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak' (Matthew 26:41)? Conscious of which infirmity, He learned to succour the infirm. Which sense the Apostle, explaining yet more broadly, says: 'For we have not a high priest who cannot have compassion on our infirmities, but one tempted in all things and in all respects according to the likeness, without sin' (Hebrews 4:15). Likewise:
'And He Himself,' he says, 'was in like manner in the same sufferings' (Hebrews 2:18). And again: 'And although He was the Son of God, He learned by the things which He suffered' (Hebrews 5:8); whence also He has compassion on our infirmities. I ask, whence did He learn the things which He suffered? Whence does He have compassion? Whence was He in the same sufferings? Whence, having experienced infirmities, did He learn to succour the infirm? Whence did He offer a remedy to God for the infirm, if He had not had the nature of our infirmity? — since both to experience and to learn the unknown is wont to be proper to human, not to divine, nature. XVII. They could still, with a manifold heap of testimonies, ventilate the matter of Christ's humanity, and in no way confine within narrow limits a subject lying broadly open;
were it not that, in order to dispatch — or rather to refute — the remaining things which had been written against the Council of Chalcedon by the rashness of shameless men, our discourse hastens onward; let us see of what sort these things are. From the decree of the synod: 'Indeed, this holy and saving sacrament of divine grace would suffice for the full recognition and confirmation of piety. For it most fully teaches concerning the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and presents to those who faithfully receive it the incarnation of our Lord' (Council of Chalcedon, Act 5). On this point they reprehend them in this chapter, that after the confession of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the old men handed down some fourth Lord, I know not whom, as incarnate.
What sort of calumny — or rather ignorance — they have here marked, no wise man fails to see. For if they had stated it as it seems to these word-hunters, so as to say: 'For it most fully teaches concerning the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and His incarnation,' it would have been uncertain whose incarnation, out of the Trinity, it was; or certainly it might be thought to be the incarnation of the Holy Spirit, whose person's name the commemoration of the mystery of the incarnation followed: and therefore, for the distinction of the person of the Son, that they might show the mystery of the incarnation to pertain to Him, they preferred to repeat His designation again under the appellation of 'Lord.' Which the Apostle also is found to have done at the beginning of the Epistle to the Romans;
where, lest the resurrection should be thought to be predicated of the Holy Spirit, he was compelled, so close at hand, to repeat the name of the Lord Christ; for he says thus: 'Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the Gospel of God, which He had promised before by His prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning His Son, who was made to Him of the seed of David according to the flesh; who was predestinated the Son of God in power, according to the spirit of sanctification, by the resurrection from the dead, of Jesus Christ our Lord' (Romans 1:1-4). What more closely, and almost in one breath, named the Son of God? He could have said 'by His resurrection,' and not repeated 'of Jesus Christ our Lord';
whom, as I said, he had just named as the predestinated Son of God: but because he had interposed the name of the Holy Spirit, lest he should seem to have referred the resurrection to Him, if he were to say 'by His resurrection'; he chose, by naming Christ a second time, to incur tautology, provided that he might more pressingly demonstrate that the mystery of the resurrection pertained to Christ. Therefore if the repetition of the name of Christ indicates two Christs, let them accuse the Apostle himself, who gave this rule of speech. But also when he says: 'Concerning His Son who was made to Him of the seed of David,' they can bring against him no small calumny, in that he left another to be understood, who was not made of the seed of David, but begotten from the womb of the Father;
for the distinction of whom, namely of the one spiritually born of the Father, he wished to show another born according to the flesh of the seed of David, saying: 'Concerning His Son, who was made to Him of the seed of David.' This also they will mark with equal calumny, that he says: 'Who was predestinated the Son of God'; so that, because to be predestinated is wont to be proper to him who never was, not to him who always was, they would judge one Son of God to be temporal by the law of predestination, and another eternal. For how are the most blessed Fathers to be thought to have introduced some fourth one, who in what follows say thus?
'Let us follow the opinions of our Fathers, that, confessing one and the same Lord Jesus Christ, we may fittingly teach the same to be perfect in divinity, and the same to be a perfect carnal man as God' (Council of Chalcedon, Act 5). What could be said more openly, more lucidly, or more religiously concerning the one and the same Lord Christ? Or what could be demonstrated more strongly for repelling and utterly crushing the calumnies of those who rashly reprehend? XVIII. Wherefore let us pass on to other chapters from the decree of the synod. 'On account of those who sought to subvert the secret of the substance, saying that man was created without divinity from the venerable Virgin Mary, shamelessly'
'and commonly, [we receive] the letters of the venerable Cyril, formerly bishop of the Church of Alexandria, fitting for the whole East against the madness of Nestorius, in which a clear exposition of the certain and saving creed is declared to those who desire it. Also the letter of Leo, archbishop of the first see, which was seen to have been destined and directed to the venerable Flavian of holy memory, to intercept the malignity of Eutyches' (Council of Chalcedon, Act 5). The calumniators of this venerable council, that they might open for themselves some avenue of reprehension, altered the opening words of the present chapter: and what is there set down against those who suppose man to have been begotten without divinity, these said 'mere man.'
By which opinion they calumniously charge that the Fathers condemned, not Nestorius, who, they say, is so far established to have held nothing of the sort, that these are his words against Paul of Samosata: 'So perish Paul of Samosata, who raved to us a bare dominical humanity.' And therefore, they say, it is manifest that the Fathers followed Nestorius, whose dogma they were unwilling to condemn by an open sentence. But the Fathers, in order to convict Nestorius of error, most evidently set it down, saying: 'On account of those who sought to subvert the secret of the substance, saying that He who was born of holy Mary is mere man.'
So that, because Nestorius asserted Christ to have been, not always 'mere,' but only in the womb of the Virgin void of divinity, these men might show those to be noted who supposed the Lord Jesus Christ to have been always 'mere': and thereby they might not contend that Nestorius was struck down by the Fathers' sentence. Whence it seems to me that there is no necessity to refute in this place the deceits of these men, who are established to have manifestly lied. For I think it suffices for the refutation of such great frauds, this very apprehension of them. Now let us pass on to other things. XIX. They also say craftily that the Fathers made commemoration of the letters of Cyril and Leo, in order that by this subtle cunning they might falsely pretend that those same letters agree with them, which it is certain are contrary to them:
And in order that they may seem to prove this, they insert two chapters of Cyril's opinions; and comparing the sayings of Leo with these, they strive to show that they are far opposed to one another. For first they put forward these words of Leo: 'For each nature in communion with the other performs what is proper to it; the Word, namely, working that which belongs to the Word, and the flesh carrying out that which belongs to the flesh: the one of these flashes forth in miracles, the other sinks beneath injuries' (Epistle 10, no. 4). But then, as though contrary to these, they append the following from Cyril: 'If anyone divides the utterances spoken of Christ in the Gospel and apostolic writings between two persons or substances,'
'and assigns some indeed as belonging to a man, considered apart from God the Father, that is, apart from the Word specially regarded; and others as worthy of God, to Him alone who is from the Father, God the Word — let him be anathema' (Cyril, chapter 4). Likewise: 'If anyone does not confess the flesh of the Lord to be life-giving and to be the proper flesh of Him who is from God the Father, the Word; but rather of some other one joined to Him in dignity, possessing merely a divine indwelling; and does not rather confess it to be life-giving, as I have said, because it became the proper flesh of the Word who gives life to all things — let him be anathema' (Cyril, chapter 11). In the former chapter Cyril most cautiously and in catholic fashion prescribed that this be avoided: that no one dare to divide Christ into two persons separately subsisting;
so as to wish to set forth one as a man, to be properly and specially known apart from God the Word; and another as God, to be understood as from the Father; dividing to each, as though they were mutually separated from one another, both their affections and their utterances. And whoever shall impiously have undertaken this, he decrees that he is liable to damnation. But in the following chapter he asserts that we should believe the flesh of the Lord to be properly the flesh of the Word, who was born of God, and not of some other one as though joined to Him according to dignity, in whom, as it were, the divinity dwelt from without, as in each of the saints; and on this account he asserts that we ought to confess the flesh of the Lord to be life-giving, because it became the proper flesh of the life-giving Word.
To Cyril's first chapter, then, these adduced words of Leo respond and agree, by which it is shown that Christ is not divided into two persons — so that he might set forth, as it were, the one subsisting in His own person apart from God the Word, and the other, God, likewise remaining in the person of His own property, to whom, as to individuals, he might divide their fitting utterances. But rather Leo taught that Christ is one and the same, substantially remaining in one person; and confessing the same to be man and the same to be God, in order to demonstrate in Himself the truth of both natures, he spoke not dividedly, but more significantly. He says therefore: 'The same eternal Only-begotten of the eternal Begetter was born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary' (Leo, Epistle 10). Likewise:
'And to discharge,' he says, 'the debt of our condition, an inviolable nature was united to a passible nature; so that, as befitted our remedies, one and the same Mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, might both be able to die from the one, and not be able to die from the other. In the whole and perfect nature, therefore, of a true man, the true God was born, complete in what is His own, complete in what is ours' (no. 2). Likewise: 'The impassible God did not disdain to be a passible man, and the immortal to be subject to the laws of death' (no. 3). Likewise: 'For He is one and the same, truly the Son of God and truly the son of man' (no. 4). Likewise: 'So that there might be recognized in Him,' he says, 'the property of the divine and human nature remaining undivided, that we may confess one Son of God.'
the Word and the flesh (no. 5). Behold, he called the property of both natures undivided: behold, he confessed the one Son of God to be the Word and the flesh. And with Cyril's second chapter, which more advisedly and in catholic fashion defines this — that the flesh of the Lord be believed to be of no other, but of the Word, which became proper to Him — these words of blessed Leo harmonize: 'For we could not,' he says, 'overcome the author of sin and death, unless He took up our nature and made it His own, He whom neither sin could contaminate nor death detain' (no. 2). Likewise, in the person of Eutyches:
'For if,' he says, 'he does not think the cross of the Lord to be false, and does not doubt that the punishment undertaken for the salvation of the world was true, let him acknowledge the flesh of Him whose death he believes' (no. 5). And very many things similar to these, which I judge it both laborious and unnecessary to gather into one heap: for sayings frequent and repeated do not suffice, but only the sayings themselves. XXI. Likewise these men, arguing against the venerable Council concerning the person of Leo, say thus: 'Spurning the apostolic testimonies, you bore witness to Leo as one rightly minded, who against the divine Gospels and at the same time the apostolic Scriptures, says: that it was one who wept over Lazarus, another who raised Lazarus by His voice;'
that it was one who was crucified, another who changed the elements in the night, one who was fastened with nails, and another who opened the gates of paradise to the faith of the thief; one who said, I and the Father are one; another who said, The Father is greater than I. Although it is familiar and proper to all heretics in common, out of zeal for falsehood and malice, to alter the opinions of catholic men; yet they are wont to do this more subtly and with a certain long circuit of words, so that what is overshadowed under the appearance of truth may seem plausible. But these men, without any mist of disguised speech, have used so open a lie that they have left us no labor of convicting them, since they have overcome themselves by their own lie.
For these are the words of Leo which they have attempted to violate by the wicked incest of their mind (no. 4): 'Just as,' he says, 'to pass over many things, it does not belong to the same nature to weep with the affection of pity over a dead friend, and to raise the same man back to life at the command of His voice, when the mound of a four-days' burial had been removed; or to hang upon the wood, and, with the light turned into night, to make all the elements tremble; or to be fastened with nails, and to open the gates of paradise to the faith of the thief: so it does not belong to the same nature to say, I and the Father are one (John x, 30), and to say, The Father is greater than I (John xiv, 28): for from us His humanity is less than the Father; from the Father His divinity is equal with the Father.' By these words he wished to demonstrate both natures in Christ;
so that the one thing which He did or said more sublimely, is from the nature of His divinity; the other, which He did more lowly or spoke more humbly, is from the nature of His flesh. So that this diversity of the actions of one Christ may not be unknown to descend from the difference of the natures; concerning which Cyril also (in the scholia on the Incarnation of the Only-begotten, chapter 15) speaks thus, saying: 'There is therefore one, before the incarnation true God, who in His humanity remained that which He was, and is, and shall be. The one Lord Jesus Christ is not therefore to be divided into a man separately and separately into God: but we say that He is one and the same Jesus Christ; not ignorant of the differences of the natures, but preserving them unconfused between themselves.' XXII.
And since these men slanderously claim that the profession of both natures is something new, let us bring forward into the midst all the teachers of the Church, from whose manifold sayings, excerpting a few brief passages, we append them to this work, sending all who are eager to the broader and fuller treatises of these men on this confession — which the most blessed Leo with provident diligence collected into one heap of testimonies; and that a twofold benefit may arise for us in producing such great and such men as witnesses, let us fit their opinions to the meanings of Leo. Leo said what these men especially think is to be reprehended: 'Each nature in communion with the other performs what is proper to it' (Leo, Epistle 10, no. 4).
Hilary the confessor also says this in one book against the Arians (Book ix on the Trinity, near the beginning): 'The Only-begotten God, therefore, was born of the Virgin, a man according to the fullness of the times, intending to advance man into God in Himself; and He held to this manner of evangelical speech throughout, so that He taught Himself to be believed the Son of God, and admonished Himself to be proclaimed the son of man; speaking and doing as a man all the things that are God's; then speaking and doing as God all the things that are man's; yet in such a way that in that very speech of both kinds He never spoke except with the signification both of man and of God.' Behold, openly teaching the communion of both natures, he said both that the Word speaks and does the things that are of the flesh, and the flesh the things that are of the Word.