9. Gregory again discusses the generation of the Only-Begotten, and other different modes of generation, material and immaterial, and nobly demonstrates that the Son is the brightness of the Divine glory, and not a creature.

And now let us return once more to the precise statement of Eunomius. We believe also in the Son of God, the only begotten God, the first-born of all creation, very Son, not Ungenerate, verily begotten before the worlds. That he transfers, then, the sense of generation to indicate creation is plain from his expressly calling Him created, when he speaks of Him as coming into being and not uncreate. But that the inconsiderate rashness and want of training which shows itself in the doctrines may be made manifest, let us omit all expressions of indignation at his evident blasphemy, and employ in the discussion of this matter a scientific division. For it would be well, I think, to consider in a somewhat careful investigation the exact meaning of the term generation. That this expression conveys the meaning of existing as the result of some cause is plain to all, and I suppose there is no need to contend about this point: but since there are different modes of existing as the result of a cause, this difference is what I think ought to receive thorough explanation in our discussion by means of scientific division. Of things which have come into being as the results of some cause we recognize the following differences. Some are the result of material and art, as the fabrics of houses and all other works produced by means of their respective material, where some art gives direction and conducts its purpose to its proper aim. Others are the result of material and nature; for nature orders the generation of animals one from another, effecting her own work by means of the material subsistence in the bodies of the parents; others again are by material efflux. In these the original remains as it was before, and that which flows from it is contemplated by itself, as in the case of the sun and its beam, or the lamp and its radiance, or of scents and ointments, and the quality given off from them. For these, while remaining undiminished in themselves, have each accompanying them the special and peculiar effect which they naturally produce, as the sun his ray, the lamp its brightness, and perfumes the fragrance which they engender in the air.

There is also another kind of generation besides these, where the cause is immaterial and incorporeal, but the generation is sensible and takes place through the instrumentality of the body; I mean the generation of the word by the mind. For the mind being in itself incorporeal begets the word by means of sensible instruments. So many are the differences of the term generation, which we discover in a philosophic view of them, that is itself, so to speak, the result of generation. And now that we have thus distinguished the various modes of generation, it will be time to remark how the benevolent dispensation of the Holy Spirit, in delivering to us the Divine mysteries, imparts that instruction which transcends reason by such methods as we can receive. For the inspired teaching adopts, in order to set forth the unspeakable power of God, all the forms of generation that human intelligence recognizes, yet without including the corporeal senses attaching to the words. For when it speaks of the creative power, it gives to such an energy the name of generation, because its expression must stoop to our low capacity; it does not, however, convey thereby all that we include in creative generation, as time, place, the furnishing of matter, the fitness of instruments, the design in the things that come into being, but it leaves these, and asserts of God in lofty and magnificent language the creation of all existent things, when it says, He spoke the word and they were made, He commanded and they were created. Again when it interprets to us the unspeakable and transcendent existence of the Only-begotten from the Father, as the poverty of human intellect is incapable of receiving doctrines which surpass all power of speech and thought, there too it borrows our language and terms Him Son,— a name which our usage assigns to those who are born of matter and nature. But just as Scripture, when speaking of generation by creation, does not in the case of God imply that such generation took place by means of any material, affirming that the power of God’s will served for material substance, place, time and all such circumstances, even so here too, when using the term Son, it rejects both all else that human nature remarks in generation here below — I mean affections and dispositions and the co-operation of time, and the necessity of place — and, above all, matter, without all which natural generation here below does not take place. But when all such material, temporal and local existence is excluded from the sense of the term Son, community of nature alone is left, and for this reason by the title Son is declared, concerning the Only-begotten, the close affinity and genuineness of relationship which mark His manifestation from the Father.

And since such a kind of generation was not sufficient to implant in us an adequate notion of the ineffable mode of subsistence of the Only-begotten, Scripture avails itself also of the third kind of generation to indicate the doctrine of the Son’s Divinity, — that kind, namely, which is the result of material efflux, and speaks of Him as the brightness of glory Hebrews 1:3, the savour of ointment , the breath of God Wisdom 7:25; illustrations which in the scientific phraseology we have adopted we ordinarily designate as material efflux. But as in the cases alleged neither the birth of the creation nor the force of the term Son admits time, matter, place, or affection, so here too the Scripture employing only the illustration of effulgence and the others that I have mentioned, apart from all material conception, with regard to the Divine fitness of such a mode of generation, shows that we must understand by the significance of this expression, an existence at once derived from and subsisting with the Father. For neither is the figure of breath intended to convey to us the notion of dispersion into the air from the material from which it is formed, nor is the figure of fragrance designed to express the passing off of the quality of the ointment into the air, nor the figure of effulgence the efflux which takes place by means of the rays from the body of the sun: but as has been said in all cases, by such a mode of generation is indicated this alone, that the Son is of the Father and is conceived of along with Him, no interval intervening between the Father and Him Who is of the Father. For since of His exceeding loving-kindness the grace of the Holy Spirit so ordered that the divine conceptions concerning the Only-begotten should reach us from many quarters, and so be implanted in us, He added also the remaining kind of generation — that, namely, of the word from the mind. And here the sublime John uses remarkable foresight. That the reader might not through inattention and unworthy conceptions sink to the common notion of word, so as to deem the Son to be merely a voice of the Father, he therefore affirms of the Word that He essentially subsisted in the first and blessed nature Itself, thus proclaiming aloud, In the Beginning was the Word, and with God, and God, and Light, and Life , and all that the Beginning is, the Word was also.

Since, then, these kinds of generation, those, I mean, which arise as the result of some cause, and are recognized in our every-day experience, are also employed by Holy Scripture to convey its teaching concerning transcendent mysteries in such wise as each of them may reasonably be transferred to the expression of divine conceptions, we may now proceed to examine Eunomius’ statement also, to find in what sense he accepts the meaning of generation. Very Son, he says, not ungenerate, verily begotten before the worlds. One may, I think, pass quickly over the violence done to logical sequence in his distinction, as being easily recognizable by all. For who does not know that while the proper opposition is between Father and Son, between generate and ungenerate, he thus passes over the term Father and sets ungenerate in opposition to Son, whereas he ought, if he had any concern for truth, to have avoided diverting his phrase from the due sequence of relationship, and to have said, Very Son, not Father? And in this way due regard would have been paid at once to piety and to logical consistency, as the nature would not have been rent asunder in making the distinction between the persons. But he has exchanged in his statement of his faith the true and scriptural use of the term Father, committed to us by the Word Himself, and speaks of the Ungenerate instead of the Father, in order that by separating Him from that close relationship towards the Son which is naturally conceived of in the title of Father, he may place Him on a common level with all created objects, which equally stand in opposition to the ungenerate.  

Verily begotten, he says, before the worlds. Let him say of Whom He is begotten. He will answer, of course, Of the Father, unless he is prepared unblushingly to contradict the truth. But since it is impossible to detach the eternity of the Son from the eternal Father, seeing that the term Father by its very signification implies the Son, for this reason it is that he rejects the title Father and shifts his phrase to ungenerate, since the meaning of this latter name has no sort of relation or connection with the Son, and by thus misleading his readers through the substitution of one term for the other, into not contemplating the Son along with the Father, he opens up a path for his sophistry, paving the way of impiety by slipping in the term ungenerate. For they who according to the ordinance of the Lord believe in the Father, when they hear the name of the Father, receive the Son along with Him in their thought, as the mind passes from the Son to the Father, without treading on an unsubstantial vacuum interposed between them. But those who are diverted to the title ungenerate instead of Father, get a bare notion of this name, learning only the fact that He did not at any time come into being, not that He is Father. Still, even with this mode of conception, the faith of those who read with discernment remains free from confusion. For the expression not to come into being is used in an identical sense of all uncreated nature: and Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are equally uncreated. For it has ever been believed by those who follow the Divine word that all the creation, sensible and supramundane, derives its existence from the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. He who has heard that by the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth, neither understands by word mere utterance, nor by breath mere exhalation, but by what is there said frames the conception of God the Word and of the Spirit of God. Now to create and to be created are not equivalent, but all existent things being divided into that which makes and that which is made, each is different in nature from the other, so that neither is that uncreated which is made, nor is that created which effects the production of the things that are made. By those then who, according to the exposition of the faith given us by our Lord Himself, have believed in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, it is acknowledged that each of these Persons is alike unoriginate, and the meaning conveyed by ungenerate does no harm to their sound belief: but to those who are dense and indefinite this term serves as a starting-point for deflection from sound doctrine. For not understanding the true force of the term, that ungenerate signifies nothing more than not having come into being, and that not coming into being is a common property of all that transcends created nature, they drop their faith in the Father, and substitute for Father the phrase ungenerate: and since, as has been said, the Personal existence of the Only-begotten is not connoted in this name, they determine the existence of the Son to have commenced from some definite beginning in time, affirming (what Eunomius here adds to his previous statements) that He is called Son not without generation preceding His existence.

What is this vain juggling with words? Is he aware that it is God of Whom he speaks, Who was in the beginning and is in the Father, nor was there any time when He was not? He knows not what he says nor whereof he affirms, but he endeavours, as though he were constructing the pedigree of a mere man, to apply to the Lord of all creation the language which properly belongs to our nature here below. For, to take an example, Ishmael was not before the generation that brought him into being, and before his birth there was of course an interval of time. But with Him Who is the brightness of glory, before and after have no place: for before the brightness, of course neither was there any glory, for concurrently with the existence of the glory there assuredly beams forth its brightness; and it is impossible in the nature of things that one should be severed from the other, nor is it possible to see the glory by itself before its brightness. For he who says thus will make out the glory in itself to be dark and dim, if the brightness from it does not shine out at the same time. But this is the unfair method of the heresy, to endeavour, by the notions and terms employed concerning the Only-begotten God, to displace Him from His oneness with the Father. It is to this end they say, Before the generation that brought Him into being He was not Son: but the sons of rams, of whom the prophet speaks — are not they too called sons after coming into being? That quality, then, which reason notices in the sons of rams, that they are not sons of rams before the generation which brings them into being — this our reverend divine now ascribes to the Maker of the worlds and of all creation, Who has the Eternal Father in Himself, and is contemplated in the eternity of the Father, as He Himself says, I am in the Father, and the Father in Me. Those, however, who are not able to detect the sophistry that lurks in his statement, and are not trained to any sort of logical perception, follow these inconsequent statements and receive what comes next as a logical consequence of what preceded. For he says, coming into being before all creation, and as though this were not enough to prove his impiety, he has a piece of profanity in reserve in the phrase that follows, when he terms the Son not uncreate. 

In what sense then does he call Him Who is not uncreate very Son? For if it is meet to call Him Who is not uncreate very Son, then of course the heaven is very Son; for it too is not uncreate. So the sun too is very Son, and all that the creation contains, both small and great, are of course entitled to the appellation of very Son. And in what sense does He call Him Who has come into being Only-begotten? For all things that come into being are unquestionably in brotherhood with each other, so far, I mean, as their coming into being is concerned. And from whom did He come into being? For assuredly all things that have ever come into being did so from the Son. For thus did John testify, saying, All things were made by Him. If then the Son also came into being, according to Eunomius’ creed, He is certainly ranked in the class of things which have come into being. If then all things that came into being were made by Him, and the Word is one of the things that came into being, who is so dull as not to draw from these premises the absurd conclusion that our new creed-monger makes out the Lord of creation to have been His own work, in saying in so many words that the Lord and Maker of all creation is not uncreate? Let him tell us whence he has this boldness of assertion. From what inspired utterance? What evangelist, what apostle ever uttered such words as these? What prophet, what lawgiver, what patriarch, what other person of all who were divinely moved by the Holy Ghost, whose voices are preserved in writing, ever originated such a statement as this? In the tradition of the faith delivered by the Truth we are taught to believe in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. If it were right to believe that the Son was created, how was it that the Truth in delivering to us this mystery bade us believe in the Son, and not in the creature? And how is it that the inspired Apostle, himself adoring Christ, lays it down that they who worship the creature besides the Creator are guilty of idolatry? For, were the Son created, either he would not have worshipped Him, or he would have refrained from classing those who worship the creature along with idolaters, lest he himself should appear to be an idolater, in offering adoration to the created. But he knew that He Whom he adored was God over all Romans 9:5, for so he terms the Son in his Epistle to the Romans. Why then do those who divorce the Son from the essence of the Father, and call Him creature, bestow on Him in mockery the fictitious title of Deity, idly conferring on one alien from true Divinity the name of God, as they might confer it on Bel or Dagon or the Dragon? Let those, therefore, who affirm that He is created, acknowledge that He is not God at all, that they may be seen to be nothing but Jews in disguise, or, if they confess one who is created to be God, let them not deny that they are idolaters.

10. He explains the phrase The Lord created Me, and the argument about the origination of the Son, the deceptive character of Eunomius’ reasoning, and the passage which says, My glorywill I not give to another, examining them from different points of view.

But of course they bring forward the passage in the book of Proverbs which says, The Lord created Me as the beginning of His ways, for His works. Now it would require a lengthy discussion to explain fully the real meaning of the passage: still it would be possible even in a few words to convey to well-disposed readers the thought intended. Some of those who are accurately versed in theology do say this, that the Hebrew text does not read created, and we have ourselves read in more ancient copies possessed instead of created. Now assuredly possession in the allegorical language of the Proverbs marks that slave Who for our sakes took upon Him the form of a slave Philippians 2:7 . But if any one should allege in this passage the reading which prevails in the Churches, we do not reject even the expression created. For this also in allegorical language is intended to connote the slave, since, as the Apostle tells us, all creation is in bondage Romans 8:20-1. Thus we say that this expression, as well as the other, admits of an orthodox interpretation. For He Who for our sakes became like as we are, was in the last days truly created — He Who in the beginning being Word and God afterwards became Flesh and Man. For the nature of flesh is created: and by partaking in it in all points like as we do, yet without sin, He was created when He became man: and He was created after God Ephesians 4:24, not after man, as the Apostle says, in a new manner and not according to human wont. For we are taught that this new man was created— albeit of the Holy Ghost and of the power of the Highest — whom Paul, the hierophant of unspeakable mysteries, bids us to put on, using two phrases to express the garment that is to be put on, saying in one place, Put on the new man which after God is created Ephesians 4:24, and in another, Put on the Lord Jesus Christ Romans 13:14. For thus it is that He, Who said I am the Way , becomes to us who have put Him on the beginning of the ways of salvation, that He may make us the work of His own hands, new modelling us from the evil mould of sin once more to His own image. He is at once our foundation before the world to come, according to the words of Paul, who says, Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid 1 Corinthians 3:11, and it is true that before the springs of the waters came forth, before the mountains were settled, before He made the depths, and before all hills, He begets Me. For it is possible, according to the usage of the Book of Proverbs, for each of these phrases, taken in a tropical sense, to be applied to the Word. For the great David calls righteousness the mountains of God, His judgments deeps, and the teachers in the Churches fountains, saying Bless God the Lord from the fountains of Israel; and guilelessness he calls hills, as he shows when he speaks of their skipping like lambs. Before these therefore is born in us He Who for our sakes was created as man, that of these things also the creation may find place in us. But we may, I think, pass from the discussion of these points, inasmuch as the truth has been sufficiently pointed out in a few words to well-disposed readers; let us proceed to what Eunomius says next.

Existing in the Beginning, he says, not without beginning. In what fashion does he who plumes himself on his superior discernment understand the oracles of God? He declares Him Who was in the beginning Himself to have a beginning: and is not aware that if He Who is in the beginning has a beginning, then the Beginning itself must needs have another beginning. Whatever He says of the beginning he must necessarily confess to be true of Him Who was in the beginning: for how can that which is in the beginning be severed from the beginning? And how can any one imagine a was not as preceding the was? For however far one carries back one’s thought to apprehend the beginning, one most certainly understands as one does so that the Word which was in the beginning (inasmuch as It cannot be separated from the beginning in which It is) does not at any point of time either begin or cease its existence therein. Yet let no one be induced by these words of mine to separate into two the one beginning we acknowledge. For the beginning is most assuredly one, wherein is discerned, indivisibly, that Word Who is completely united to the Father. He who thus thinks will never leave heresy a loophole to impair his piety by the novelty of the term ungenerate. But in Eunomius’ next propositions his statements are like bread with a large admixture of sand. For by mixing his heretical opinions with sound doctrines, he makes uneatable even that which is in itself nutritious, by the gravel which he has mingled with it. For he calls the Lord living wisdom, operative truth, subsistent power, and life:— so far is the nutritious portion. But into these assertions he instils the poison of heresy. For when he speaks of the life as generate he makes a reservation by the implied opposition to the ungenerate life, and does not affirm the Son to be the very Life. Next he says:— As Son of God, quickening the dead, the true light, the light that lightens every man coming into the world , good, and the bestower of good things. All these things he offers for honey to the simple-minded, concealing his deadly drug under the sweetness of terms like these. For he immediately introduces, on the heels of these statements, his pernicious principle, in the words Not partitioning with Him that begot Him His high estate, not dividing with another the essence of the Father, but becoming by generation glorious, yea, the Lord of glory, and receiving glory from the Father, not sharing His glory with the Father, for the glory of the Almighty is incommunicable, as He has said, ‘My glory will I not give to another. Isaiah 42:8 ‘ These are his deadly poisons, which they alone can discover who have their souls’ senses trained so to do: but the mortal mischief of the words is disclosed by their conclusion:— Receiving glory from the Father, not sharing glory with the Father, for the glory of the Almighty is incommunicable, as He has said, ‘My glory will I not give to another.’ Who is that other to whom God has said that He will not give His glory? The prophet speaks of the adversary of God, and Eunomius refers the prophecy to the only begotten God Himself! For when the prophet, speaking in the person of God, had said, My glory will I not give to another, he added, neither My praise to graven images. 

For when men were beguiled to offer to the adversary of God the worship and adoration due to God alone, paying homage in the representations of graven images to the enemy of God, who appeared in many shapes among men in the forms furnished by idols, He Who heals them that are sick, in pity for men’s ruin, foretold by the prophet the loving-kindness which in the latter days He would show in the abolishing of idols, saying, When My truth shall have been manifested, My glory shall no more be given to another, nor My praise bestowed upon graven images: for men, when they come to know My glory, shall no more be in bondage to them that by nature are no gods. All therefore that the prophet says in the person of the Lord concerning the power of the adversary, this fighter against God, refers to the Lord Himself, Who spoke these words by the prophet! Who among the tyrants is recorded to have been such a persecutor of the faith as this? Who maintained such blasphemy as this, that He Who, as we believe, was manifested in the flesh for the salvation of our souls, is not very God, but the adversary of God, who puts his guile into effect against men by the instrumentality of idols and graven images? For it is what was said of that adversary by the prophet that Eunomius transfers to the only-begotten God, without so much as reflecting that it is the Only-begotten Himself Who spoke these words by the prophet, as Eunomius himself subsequently confesses when he says, this is He Who spoke by the prophets.

Why should I pursue this part of the subject in more detail? For the words preceding also are tainted with the same profanity — receiving glory from the Father, not sharing glory with the Father, for the glory of the Almighty God is incommunicable. For my own part, even had his words referred to Moses who was glorified in the ministration of the Law, — not even then should I have tolerated such a statement, even if it be conceded that Moses, having no glory from within, appeared completely glorious to the Israelites by the favour bestowed on him from God. For the very glory that was bestowed on the lawgiver was the glory of none other but of God Himself, which glory the Lord in the Gospel bids all to seek, when He blames those who value human glory highly and seek not the glory that comes from God only. For by the fact that He commanded them to seek the glory that comes from the only God, He declared the possibility of their obtaining what they sought. How then is the glory of the Almighty incommunicable, if it is even our duty to ask for the glory that comes from the only God, and if, according to our Lord’s word, every one that asks receives? But one who says concerning the Brightness of the Father’s glory, that He has the glory by having received it, says in effect that the Brightness of the glory is in Itself devoid of glory, and needs, in order to become Himself at last the Lord of some glory, to receive glory from another. How then are we to dispose of the utterances of the Truth, — one which tells us that He shall be seen in the glory of the Father Mark 8:38, and another which says, All things that the Father has are Mine? To whom ought the hearer to give ear? To him who says, He that is, as the Apostle says, the ‘heir of all things Hebrews 1:2 ‘ that are in the Father, is without part or lot in His Father’s glory; or to Him Who declares that all things that the Father has, He Himself has also? Now among the all things, glory surely is included. Yet Eunomius says that the glory of the Almighty is incommunicable. This view Joel does not attest, nor yet the mighty Peter, who adopted, in his speech to the Jews, the language of the prophet. For both the prophet and the apostle say, in the person of God —I will pour out of My Spirit upon all flesh Joel 2:28; Acts 2:17 . He then Who did not grudge the partaking in His own Spirit to all flesh — how can it be that He does not impart His own glory to the only-begotten Son, Who is in the bosom of the Father, Who has all things that the Father has? Perhaps one should say that Eunomius is here speaking the truth, though not intending it. For the term impart is strictly used in the case of one who has not his glory from within, whose possession of it is an accession from without, and not part of his own nature: but where one and the same nature is observed in both Persons, He Who is as regards nature all that the Father is believed to be stands in no need of one to impart to Him each several attribute. This it will be well to explain more clearly and precisely. He Who has the Father dwelling in Him in His entirety — what need has He of the Father’s glory, when none of the attributes contemplated in the Father is withdrawn from Him?

11. After expounding the high estate of the Almighty, the Eternity of the Son, and the phrase being made obedient, he shows the folly of Eunomius in his assertion that the Son did not acquire His sonship by obedience.

What, moreover, is the high estate of the Almighty in which Eunomius affirms that the Son has no share? Let those, then, who are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight Isaiah 5:21, utter their groundling opinions — they who, as the prophet says, speak out of the ground Isaiah 29:4 . But let us who reverence the Word and are disciples of the Truth, or rather who profess to be so, not leave even this assertion unsifted. We know that of all the names by which Deity is indicated some are expressive of the Divine majesty, employed and understood absolutely, and some are assigned with reference to the operations over us and all creation. For when the Apostle says Now to the immortal, invisible, only wise God , and the like, by these titles he suggests conceptions which represent to us the transcendent power, but when God is spoken of in the Scriptures as gracious, merciful, full of pity, true, good, Lord, Physician, Shepherd, Way, Bread, Fountain, King, Creator, Artificer, Protector, Who is over all and through all, Who is all in all, these and similar titles contain the declaration of the operations of the Divine loving-kindness in the creation. Those then who enquire precisely into the meaning of the term Almighty will find that it declares nothing else concerning the Divine power than that operation which controls created things and is indicated by the word Almighty, stands in a certain relation to something. For as He would not be called a Physician, save on account of the sick, nor merciful and gracious, and the like, save by reason of one who stood in need of grace and mercy, so neither would He be styled Almighty, did not all creation stand in need of one to regulate it and keep it in being. As, then, He presents Himself as a Physician to those who are in need of healing, so He is Almighty over one who has need of being ruled: and just as they that are whole have no need of a physician, so it follows that we may well say that He Whose nature contains in it the principle of unerring and unwavering rectitude does not, like others, need a ruler over Him. Accordingly, when we hear the name Almighty, our conception is this, that God sustains in being all intelligible things as well as all things of a material nature. For this cause He sits upon the circle of the earth, for this cause He holds the ends of the earth in His hand, for this cause He metes out leaven with the span, and measures the waters in the hollow of His hand ; for this cause He comprehends in Himself all the intelligible creation, that all things may remain in existence controlled by His encompassing power.

Let us enquire, then, Who it is that works all in all. Who is He Who made all things, and without Whom no existing thing does exist? Who is He in Whom all things were created, and in Whom all things that are have their continuance? In Whom do we live and move and have our being? Who is He Who has in Himself all that the Father has? Does what has been said leave us any longer in ignorance of Him Who is God over all Romans 9:5, Who is so entitled by S. Paul —our Lord Jesus Christ, Who, as He Himself says, holding in His hand all things that the Father has , assuredly grasps all things in the all-containing hollow of His hand and is sovereign over what He has grasped, and no man takes from the hand of Him Who in His hand holds all things? If, then, He has all things, and is sovereign over that which He has, why is He Who is thus sovereign over all things something else and not Almighty? If heresy replies that the Father is sovereign over both the Son and the Holy Spirit, let them first show that the Son and the Holy Spirit are of mutable nature, and then over this mutability let them set its ruler, that by the help implanted from above, that which is so overruled may continue incapable of turning to evil. If, on the other hand, the Divine nature is incapable of evil, unchangeable, unalterable, eternally permanent, to what end does it stand in need of a ruler, controlling as it does all creation, and itself by reason of its immutability needing no ruler to control it? For this cause it is that at the name of Christ every knee bows, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.  For assuredly every knee would not thus bow, did it not recognize in Christ Him Who rules it for its own salvation. But to say that the Son came into being by the goodness of the Father is nothing else than to put Him on a level with the meanest objects of creation. For what is there that did not arrive at its birth by the goodness of Him Who made it? To what is the formation of mankind ascribed? To the badness of its Maker, or to His goodness? To what do we ascribe the generation of animals, the production of plants and herbs? There is nothing that did not take its rise from the goodness of Him Who made it. A property, then, which reason discerns to be common to all things, Eunomius is so kind as to allow to the Eternal Son! But that He did not share His essence or His estate with the Father — these assertions and the rest of his verbiage I have refuted in anticipation, when dealing with his statements concerning the Father, and shown that he has hazarded them at random and without any intelligible meaning. For not even in the case of us who are born one of another is there any division of essence. The definition expressive of essence remains in its entirety in each, in him that begets and in him who is begotten, without admitting diminution in him who begets, or augmentation in him who is begotten. But to speak of division of estate or sovereignty in the case of Him Who has all things whatsoever that the Father has, carries with it no meaning, unless it be a demonstration of the propounder’s impiety. It would therefore be superfluous to entangle oneself in such discussions, and so to prolong our treatise to an unreasonable length. Let us pass on to what follows.

Glorified, he says, by the Father before the worlds. The word of truth has been demonstrated, confirmed by the testimony of its adversaries. For this is the sum of our faith, that the Son is from all eternity, being glorified by the Father: for before the worlds is the same in sense as from all eternity, seeing that prophecy uses this phrase to set forth to us God’s eternity, when it speaks of Him as He that is from before the worlds. If then to exist before the worlds is beyond all beginning, he who confers glory on the Son before the worlds, does thereby assert His existence from eternity before that glory: for surely it is not the non-existent, but the existent which is glorified. Then he proceeds to plant for himself the seeds of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit; not with a view to glorify the Son, but that he may wantonly outrage the Holy Ghost. For with the intention of making out the Holy Spirit to be part of the angelic host, he throws in the phrase glorified eternally by the Spirit, and by every rational and generated being, so that there is no distinction between the Holy Spirit and all that comes into being; if, that is, the Holy Spirit glorifies the Lord in the same sense as all the other existences enumerated by the prophet, angels and powers, and the heaven of heavens, and the water above the heavens, and all the things of earth, dragons, deeps, fire and hail, snow and vapour, wind of the storm, mountains and all hills, fruitful trees and all cedars, beasts and all cattle, worms and feathered fowls.  If, then, he says, that along with these the Holy Spirit also glorifies the Lord, surely his God-opposing tongue makes out the Holy Spirit Himself also to be one of them.

The disjointed incoherencies which follow next, I think it well to pass over, not because they give no handle at all to censure, but because their language is such as might be used by the devout, if detached from its malignant context. If he does here and there use some expressions favourable to devotion it is just held out as a bait to simple souls, to the end that the hook of impiety may be swallowed along with it. For after employing such language as a member of the Church might use, he subjoins, Obedient with regard to the creation and production of all things that are, obedient with regard to every ministration, not having by His obedience attained Sonship or Godhead, but, as a consequence of being Son and being generated as the Only-begotten God, showing Himself obedient in words, obedient in acts. Yet who of those who are conversant with the oracles of God does not know with regard to what point of time it was said of Him by the mighty Paul, (and that once for all), that He became obedient Philippians 2:8 ? For it was when He came in the form of a servant to accomplish the mystery of redemption by the cross, Who had emptied Himself, Who humbled Himself by assuming the likeness and fashion of a man, being found as man in man’s lowly nature — then, I say, it was that He became obedient, even He Who took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses Matthew 8:17, healing the disobedience of men by His own obedience, that by His stripes He might heal our wound, and by His own death do away with the common death of all men — then it was that for our sakes He was made obedient, even as He became sin 2 Corinthians 5:21  and a curse Galatians 3:13  by reason of the dispensation on our behalf, not being so by nature, but becoming so in His love for man. But by what sacred utterance was He ever taught His list of so many obediences? Nay, on the contrary every inspired Scripture attests His independent and sovereign power, saying, He spoke the word and they were made: He commanded and they were created :— for it is plain that the Psalmist says this concerning Him Who upholds all things by the word of His power Hebrews 1:3, 

Whose authority, by the sole impulse of His will, framed every existence and nature, and all things in the creation apprehended by reason or by sight. Whence, then, was Eunomius moved to ascribe in such manifold wise to the King of the universe the attribute of obedience, speaking of Him as obedient with regard to all the work of creation, obedient with regard to every ministration, obedient in words and in acts? Yet it is plain to every one, that he alone is obedient to another in acts and words, who has not yet perfectly achieved in himself the condition of accurate working or unexceptionable speech, but keeping his eye ever on his teacher and guide, is trained by his suggestions to exact propriety in deed and word. But to think that Wisdom needs a master and teacher to guide aright Its attempts at imitation, is the dream of Eunomius’ fancy, and of his alone. And concerning the Father he says, that He is faithful in words and faithful in works, while of the Son he does not assert faithfulness in word and deed, but only obedience and not faithfulness, so that his profanity extends impartially through all his statements. But it is perhaps right to pass in silence over the inconsiderate folly of the assertion interposed between those last mentioned, lest some unreflecting persons should laugh at its absurdity when they ought rather to weep over the perdition of their souls, than laugh at the folly of their words. For this wise and wary theologian says that He did not attain to being a Son as the result of His obedience! Mark his penetration! With what cogent force does he lay it down for us that He was not first obedient and afterwards a Son, and that we ought not to think that His obedience was prior to His generation! Now if he had not added this defining clause, who without it would have been sufficiently silly and idiotic to fancy that His generation was bestowed on Him by His Father, as a reward of the obedience of Him Who before His generation had showed due subjection and obedience? But that no one may too readily extract matter for laughter from these remarks, let each consider that even the folly of the words has in it something worthy of tears. For what he intends to establish by these observations is something of this kind, that His obedience is part of His nature, so that not even if He willed it would it be possible for Him not to be obedient.

For he says that He was so constituted that His nature was adapted to obedience alone , just as among instruments that which is fashioned with regard to a certain figure necessarily produces in that which is subjected to its operation the form which the artificer implanted in the construction of the instrument, and cannot possibly trace a straight line upon that which receives its mark, if its own working is in a curve; nor can the instrument, if fashioned to draw a straight line, produce a circle by its impress. What need is there of any words of ours to reveal how great is the profanity of such a notion, when the heretical utterance of itself proclaims aloud its monstrosity? For if He was obedient for this reason only that He was so made, then of course He is not on an equal footing even with humanity, since on this theory, while our soul is self-determining and independent, choosing as it will with sovereignty over itself that which is pleasing to it, He on the contrary exercises, or rather experiences, obedience under the constraint of a compulsory law of His nature, while His nature suffers Him not to disobey, even if He would. For it was as the result of being Son, and being begotten, that He has thus shown Himself obedient in words and obedient in acts. Alas, for the brutish stupidity of this doctrine! You make the Word obedient to words, and suppose other words prior to Him Who is truly the Word, and another Word of the Beginning is mediator between the Beginning and the Word that was in the Beginning, conveying to Him the decision. And this is not one only: there are several words, which Eunomius makes so many links of the chain between the Beginning and the Word, and which abuse His obedience as they think good. But what need is there to linger over this idle talk? Any one can see that even at that time with reference to which S. Paul says that He became obedient (and he tells us that He became obedient in this wise, namely, by becoming for our sakes flesh, and a servant, and a curse, and sin) — even then, I say, the Lord of glory, Who despised the shame and embraced suffering in the flesh, did not abandon His free will, saying as He does, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up ; and again, No man takes My life from Me; I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again ; and when those who were armed with swords and staves drew near to Him on the night before His Passion, He caused them all to go backward by saying I am He John 18:5-6, and again, when the dying thief besought Him to remember him, He showed His universal sovereignty by saying, Today shall you be with Me in Paradise Luke 23:43 . If then not even in the time of His Passion He is separated from His authority, where can heresy possibly discern the subordination to authority of the King of glory?

FURTHER READING

Did the Ante-Nicene Fathers Worship the Holy Spirit as God Almighty?

EARLY CHURCH & THE CARMEN CHRISTI

WERE EARLY CHRISTIANS TRINITARIANS?

THE EARLY CHURCH ON THE ETERNAL BEGETTING OF THE SON

Ignatius of Antioch’s Proclamation of the Essential Deity of Christ

Justin Martyr’s Witness to Christ’s essential and eternal Deity

JUSTIN MARTYR’S CHRISTOLOGY REVISITED

AN ORTHODOX’S MISREADING OF JUSTIN

Revisiting Shabir Ally’s Distortion of Justin Martyr Pt. 1, Pt. 2

IRENAEUS AND THE DEITY OF CHRIST

MORE FROM IRENAEUS ON THE DEITY OF CHRIST

DID TERTULLIAN DENY THE ETERNAL NATURE OF CHRIST?

Tertullian and the Doctrine of the Trinity

Origen’s Christology

HILARY’S TRINITARIAN BELIEFS

ST. AMRBOSE & CHRIST’S DEITY

Chapter 7.

The likeness of Christ to the Father is asserted on the authority of St. Paul, the prophets, and the Gospel, and especially in reliance upon the creation of man in God’s image.

48. The Apostle says that Christ is the image of the Father — for he calls Him the image of the invisible God, the first-begotten of all creation. First-begotten, mark you, not first-created, in order that He may be believed to be both begotten, in virtue of His nature, and first in virtue of His eternity. In another place also the Apostle has declared that God made the Son heir of all things, by Whom also He made the worlds, Who is the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His substance. Hebrews 1:2 The Apostle calls Christ the image of the Father, and Arius says that He is unlike the Father. Why, then, is He called an image, if He has no likeness? Men will not have their portraits unlike them, and Arius contends that the Father is unlike the Son, and would have it that the Father has begotten one unlike Himself, as though unable to generate His like.

49. The prophets say: In Your light we shall see light; and again: Wisdom is the brightness of everlasting light, and the spotless mirror of God’s majesty, the image of His goodness. Wisdom 7:26 See what great names are declared! Brightness, because in the Son the Father’s glory shines clearly: spotless mirror, because the Father is seen in the Son: John 12:45 image of goodness, because it is not one body seen reflected in another, but the whole power [of the Godhead] in the Son. The word image teaches us that there is no difference; expression, that He is the counterpart of the Father’s form; and brightness declares His eternity. The image in truth is not that of a bodily countenance, not one made up of colors, nor modelled in wax, but simply derived from God, coming out from the Father, drawn from the fountainhead.

50. By means of this image the Lord showed Philip the Father, saying, Philip, he that sees Me, sees the Father also. How then do you say, Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? John 14:9-10 Yes, he who looks upon the Son sees, in portrait, the Father. Mark what manner of portrait is spoken of. It is Truth, Righteousness, the Power of God: not dumb, for it is the Word; not insensible, for it is Wisdom; not vain and foolish, for it is Power; not soulless, for it is the Life; not dead, for it is the Resurrection. You see, then, that while an image is spoken of, the meaning is that it is the Father, Whose image the Son is, seeing that no one can be his own image.

51. More might I set down from the Son’s testimony; howbeit, lest He perchance appear to have asserted Himself overmuch, let us enquire of the Father. For the Father said, Let us make man in Our image and likeness. Genesis 1:26 The Father says to the Son in Our image and likeness, and you say that the Son of God is unlike the Father.

52. John says, Beloved, we are sons of God, and it does not yet appear what we shall be: we know that if He be revealed, we shall be like Him. 1 John 3:2 O blind madness! O shameless obstinacy! We are men, and, so far as we may, we shall be in the likeness of God: dare we deny that the Son is like God?

53. Therefore the Father has said: Let us make man in Our image and likeness. At the beginning of the universe itself, as I read, the Father and the Son existed, and I see one creation. I hear Him that speaks. I acknowledge Him that does: but it is of one image, one likeness, that I read. This likeness belongs not to diversity but to unity. What, therefore, you claim for yourself, you take from the Son of God, seeing, indeed, that you can not be in the image of God, save by help of the image of God.

Chapter 8.

The likeness of the Son to the Father being proved, it is not hard to prove the Son’s eternity, though, indeed, this may be established on the authority of the Prophet Isaiah and St. John the Evangelist, by which authority the heretical leaders are shown to be refuted.

54. It is plain, therefore, that the Son is not unlike the Father, and so we may confess the more readily that He is also eternal, seeing that He Who is like the Eternal must needs be eternal. But if we say that the Father is eternal, and yet deny this of the Son, we say that the Son is unlike the Father, for the temporal differs from the eternal. The Prophet proclaims Him eternal, and the Apostle proclaims Him eternal; the Testaments, Old and New alike, are full of witness to the Son’s eternity.

55. Let us take them, then, in their order. In the Old Testament— to cite one out of a multitude of testimonies — it is written: Before Me has there been no other God, and after Me shall there be none. Isaiah 43:10 I will not comment on this place, but ask you straight: Who speaks these words — the Father or the Son? Whichever of the two you say, you will find yourself convinced, or, if a believer, instructed. Who, then, speaks these words, the Father or the Son? If it is the Son, He says, Before Me has there been no other God; if the Father, He says, After Me shall there be none. The One has none before Him, the Other none that comes after; as the Father is known in the Son, so also is the Son known in the Father, for whenever you speak of the Father, you speak also by implication of His Son, seeing that none is his own father; and when you name the Son, you do also acknowledge His Father, inasmuch as none can be his own son. And so neither can the Son exist without the Father, nor the Father without the Son. The Father, therefore, is eternal, and the Son also eternal.

56. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. Was, mark you, with God. Was— see, we have was four times over. Where did the blasphemer find it written that He was not. Again, John, in another passage — in his Epistle — speaks of That which was in the beginning. 1 John 1:1 The extension of the was is infinite. Conceive any length of time you will, yet still the Son was.

57. Now in this short passage our fisherman has barred the way of all heresy. For that which was in the beginning is not comprehended in time, is not preceded by any beginning. Let Arius, therefore, hold his peace. Moreover, that which was with God is not confounded and mingled with Him, but is distinguished by the perfection unblemished which it has as the Word abiding with God; and so let Sabellius keep silence. And the Word was God. This Word, therefore, consists not in uttered speech, but in the designation of celestial excellence, so that Photinus’ teaching is refuted. Furthermore, by the fact that in the beginning He was with God is proven the indivisible unity of eternal Godhead in Father and Son, to the shame and confusion of Eunomius. Lastly, seeing that all things are said to have been made by Him, He is plainly shown to be author of the Old and of the New Testament alike; so that the Manichæan can find no ground for his assaults. Thus has the good fisherman caught them all in one net, to make them powerless to deceive, albeit unprofitable fish to take.

Chapter 9.

St. Ambrose questions the heretics and exhibits their answer, which is, that the Son existed, indeed, before all time, yet was not co-eternal with the Father, whereat the Saint shows that they represent the Godhead as changeable, and further, that each Person must be believed to be eternal.

58. Tell me, thou heretic — for the surpassing clemency of the Emperor grants me this indulgence of addressing you for a short space, not that I desire to confer with you, or am greedy to hear your arguments, but because I am willing to exhibit them — tell me, I say, whether there was ever a time when God Almighty was not the Father, and yet was God. I say nothing about time, is your answer. Well and subtly objected! For if you bring time into the dispute, you will condemn yourself, seeing that you must acknowledge that there was a time when the Son was not, whereas the Son is the ruler and creator of time. He cannot have begun to exist after His own work. You, therefore, must needs allow Him to be the ruler and maker of His work.

59. I do not say, do you answer, that the Son existed not before time; but when I call Him Son, I declare that His Father existed before Him, for, as you say, father exists before son. But what means this? You deny that time was before the Son, and yet you will have it that something preceded the existence of the Son — some creature of time — and you show certain stages of generation intervening, whereby thou dost give us to understand that the generation from the Father was a process in time. For if He began to be a Father, then, in the first instance, He was God, and afterwards He became a Father. How, then, is God unchangeable? For if He was first God, and then the Father, surely He has undergone change by reason of the added and later act of generation.

60. But may God preserve us from this madness; for it was but to confute the impiety of the heretics that we brought in this question. The devout spirit affirms a generation that is not in time, and so declares Father and Son to be co-eternal, and does not maintain that God has ever suffered change.

61. Let Father and Son, therefore, be associated in worship, even as They are associated in Godhead; let not blasphemy put asunder those whom the close bond of generation has joined together. Let us honour the Son, that we may honour the Father also, as it is written in the Gospel. John 5:23 The Son’s eternity is the adornment of the Father’s majesty. If the Son has not been from everlasting, then the Father has suffered change; but the Son is from all eternity, therefore has the Father never changed, for He is always unchangeable. And thus we see that they who would deny the Son’s eternity would teach that the Father is mutable.

Chapter 10.

Christ’s eternity being proved from the Apostle’s teaching, St. Ambrose admonishes us that the Divine Generation is not to be thought of after the fashion of human procreation, nor to be too curiously pried into. With the difficulties thence arising he refuses to deal, saying that whatsoever terms, taken from our knowledge of body, are used in speaking of this Divine Generation, must be understood with a spiritual meaning.

62. Hear now another argument, showing clearly the eternity of the Son. The Apostle says that God’s Power and Godhead are eternal, and that Christ is the Power of God — for it is written that Christ is the Power of God and the Wisdom of God. If, then, Christ is the Power of God, it follows that, forasmuch as God’s Power is eternal, Christ also is eternal.

63. You can not, then, heretic, build up a false doctrine from the custom of human procreation, nor yet gather the wherewithal for such work from our discourse, for we cannot compass the greatness of infinite Godhead, of Whose greatness there is no end, in our straitened speech. If you should seek to give an account of a man’s birth, you must needs point to a time. But the Divine Generation is above all things; it reaches far and wide, it rises high above all thought and feeling. For it is written: No man comes to the Father, save by Me. John 14:6 Whatsoever, therefore, thou dost conceive concerning the Father — yea, be it even His eternity— you can not conceive anything concerning Him save by the Son’s aid, nor can any understanding ascend to the Father save through the Son. This is My dearly-beloved Son, the Father says. Is mark you — He Who is, what He is, forever. Hence also David is moved to say: O Lord, Your Word abides for ever in heaven, — for what abides fails neither in existence nor in eternity.

64. Do you ask me how He is a Son, if He have not a Father existing before Him? I ask of you, in turn, when, or how, do you think that the Son was begotten. For me the knowledge of the mystery of His generation is more than I can attain to, — the mind fails, the voice is dumb — ay, and not mine alone, but the angels’ also. It is above Powers, above Angels, above Cherubim, Seraphim, and all that has feeling and thought, for it is written: The peace of Christ, which passes all understanding. If the peace of Christ passes all understanding, how can so wondrous a generation but be above all understanding?

65. Do thou, then (like the angels), cover your face with your hands, for it is not given you to look into surpassing mysteries! We are suffered to know that the Son is begotten, not to dispute upon the manner of His begetting. I cannot deny the one; the other I fear to search into, for if Paul says that the words which he heard when caught up into the third heaven might not be uttered, 2 Corinthians 12:2-5 how can we explain the secret of this generation from and of the Father, which we can neither hear nor attain to with our understanding?

66. But if you will constrain me to the rule of human generation, that you may be allowed to say that the Father existed before the Son, then consider whether instances, taken from the generation of earthly creatures, are suitable to show forth the Divine Generation. If we speak according to what is customary among men, you cannot deny that, in man, the changes in the father’s existence happen before those in the son’s. The father is the first to grow, to enter old age, to grieve, to weep. If, then, the son is after him in time, he is older in experience than the son. If the child comes to be born, the parent escapes not the shame of begetting.

67. Why take such delight in that rack of questioning? You hear the name of the Son of God; abolish it, then, or acknowledge His true nature. You hear speak of the womb — acknowledge the truth of undoubted begetting. Of His heart — know that here is God’s word. Of His right hand — confess His power. Of His face — acknowledge His wisdom. These words are not to be understood, when we speak of God, as when we speak of bodies. The generation of the Son is incomprehensible, the Father begets impassibly, and yet of Himself and in ages inconceivably remote has very God begotten very God. The Father loves the Son, John 5:20 and you anxiously examine His Person; the Father is well pleased in Him, you, joining the Jews, look upon Him with an evil eye; the Father knows the Son, and you join the heathen in reviling Him. Luke 23:36-37

Chapter 11.

It cannot be proved from Scripture that the Father existed before the Son, nor yet can arguments taken from human reproduction avail to this end, since they bring in absurdities without end. To dare to affirm that Christ began to exist in the course of time is the height of blasphemy.

68. You ask me whether it is possible that He Who is the Father should not be prior in existence. I ask you to tell me when the Father existed, the Son as yet being not; prove this, gather it from argument or evidence of Scripture. If you lean upon arguments, you have doubtless been taught that God’s power is eternal. Again, you have read the Scripture that says: O Israel, if you will hearken unto Me, there shall be no new God in you, neither shall you worship a strange God. The first of these commands betokens [the Son’s] eternity, the second His possession of an identical nature, so that we can neither believe Him to have come into existence after the Father, nor suppose Him the Son of another Divinity. For if He existed not always with the Father, He is a new [God]; if He is not of one Divinity with the Father, He is a strange [God]. But He is not after the Father, for He is not a new God; nor is He a strange God, for He is begotten of the Father, and because, as it is written, He is God above all, blessed forever. Romans 9:5

69. But if the Arians believe Him to be a strange God, why do they worship Him, when it is written: You shall worship no strange God? Else, if they do not worship the Son, let them confess thereto, and the case is at an end — that they deceive no one by their professions of religion. This, then, we see, is the witness of the Scriptures. If you have any others to produce, it will be your business to do so.

70. Let us now go further, and gather the truth in conclusion from arguments. For although arguments usually give place, even to human evidence, still, heretic, argue as you will. Experience teaches us, you say, that the being which generates is prior to that which is generated. I answer: Follow our customary experience through all its departments, and if the rest agree herewith, I oppose not your claim that your point be granted; but if there be no such agreement, how can you claim assent on this one point, when in all the rest you lack support? Seeing, then, that you call for what is customary, it comes about that the Son, when He was begotten of the Father, was a little child. You have seen Him an infant, crying in the cradle. As the years passed, He has gone forward from strength to strength — for if He was weak with the weakness of things begotten, He must also have fallen under the weakness, not only of birth, but of life also.

71. But perchance you run to such a pitch of folly as not to flinch from asserting these things of the Son of God, measuring Him, as you do, by the rule of human infirmity. What, then, if, while you cannot refuse Him the name of God, you are bent to prove Him, by reason of weakness, to be a man? What if, while you examine the Person of the Son, you are calling the Father in question, and while you hastily pass sentence upon the Former, you include the Latter in the same condemnation!

72. If the Divine Generation has been subject to the limits of time — if we suppose this, borrowing from the custom of human generation, then it follows, further, that the Father bare the Son in a bodily womb, and laboured under the burden while ten months sped their courses. But how can generation, as it commonly takes place, be brought about without the help of the other sex? You see that the common order of generation was not the commencement, and you think that the courses of generation, which are ruled by certain necessities whereunto bodies are subject, have always prevailed. You require the customary course, I ask for difference of sex: you demand the supposition of time, I that of order: you enquire into the end, I into the beginning. Now surely it is the end that depends on the beginning, not the beginning on the end.

73. Everything, say you, that is begotten has a beginning, and therefore because the Son is the Son, He has a beginning, and came first into existence within limits of time. Let this be taken as the word of their own mouth; as for myself, I confess that the Son is begotten, but the rest of their declaration makes me shudder. Man, do you confess God, and diminish His honour by such slander? From this madness may God deliver us. (Exposition of the Christian Faith, Book I)

FURTHER READING

Ignatius of Antioch’s Proclamation of the Essential Deity of Christ

Justin Martyr’s Witness to Christ’s essential and eternal Deity

JUSTIN MARTYR’S CHRISTOLOGY REVISITED

AN ORTHODOX’S MISREADING OF JUSTIN

Revisiting Shabir Ally’s Distortion of Justin Martyr Pt. 1, Pt. 2

IRENAEUS AND THE DEITY OF CHRIST

MORE FROM IRENAEUS ON THE DEITY OF CHRIST

DID TERTULLIAN DENY THE ETERNAL NATURE OF CHRIST?

Tertullian and the Doctrine of the Trinity

Origen’s Christology

HILARY’S TRINITARIAN BELIEFS

GREGORY & CHRIST’S BEGETTING

WERE EARLY CHRISTIANS TRINITARIANS?

THE EARLY CHURCH ON THE ETERNAL BEGETTING OF THE SON

Did the Ante-Nicene Fathers Worship the Holy Spirit as God Almighty?

EARLY CHURCH & THE CARMEN CHRISTI

            Questions have come to me about alleged difficulties still left unanswered after my article on St. Justin Martyr proving a difference between “another God” (heteros theos) – meaning a personal difference in the same essence – and “other god” (allos theos) – meaning another essence numerically distinct and separate from God’s.

            Question 1: Isn’t’ Philo, and by extension Justin Martyr, just “Middle Platonists” and therefore what is produced by “God” the Father is somehow inferior to him?

Answer: Yes, If Philo and Justin were relying on merely Middle Platonism (and Stoic) sources, we would need to suspect subordinationism. However, as the specialist Dr. Winston points out:[1]

• The Logos is identified with God’s Word Genesis 1:1-3 (dibbur; p. 16).
• The Word is a personal entity (p. 17)
• The Logos is a principiate from a principle (water from its source)
• Philo considers the Word to be analogous to God’s “son” (p. 20)
• Philo uses also Pythagoras and Stoicism, but with a Jewish twist so that the Word is a “power” of God in a special sense, viz., he is YHWH (Jehovah; pp 18-19).
• The mind (Father) and thinker (logos) are simultaneous (p. 18)

These initial theological principles mean that neither Philo (as a main source for Justin Martyr) nor Justin should be reduced to mere Middle Platonism, but rather their syncretism of Angelomorphic theology in the Old Testament with Pythagorean, Platonist, and Stoic elements must be weighed and evaluated with excruciating detail, particularly given Philo’s commitment to there being strictly one God, as far as his essence and existence are concerned. Thus, for Philo there is “another God” (heteros theos) but not an “other God” (allos theos) as I demonstrate in my article above in the hyperlink. Here, another divine identity (hypostasized wisdom) versus some other essence is a fair way to take the distinction. The conclusion of Dr. Winston is that Philo tries to check Platonist degradation of emanating beings by reliance on Scripture for understanding the identity of God’s word.[2] His success in weaving both together into a Jewish monotheism is limited by a lack of scholarly consensus about his success. Still, for Philo, philosophy is a handmaiden to theology, not vice versa. This provides a safe interpretative key to understand Philo as an intellectual Jew not a Hellenistic intellectual with a merely Jewish educational background.

            Question 2: Can’t we assert that Justin’s use of Philo unimportant and merely incidental and therefore is not a good starting point to understand Justin’s use of “another God”?

Answer: Wrong! the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae or TLG provides scholars with a standard ability to isolate authors and works by a search engine that excludes ancients unaware of technical terminology and includes authors who uniquely use rare or even standard terms. In this case, “another God” (heteros theos) is used in Jewish literature from the 3^rd century BC – 1^st century AD in Greek by LXX Exodus 34:14: “For ye shall not worship another god,[3] for the Lord God, a jealous name, is a jealous God.”[4] It is then used next by Philo of Alexandria. Among Christians writing in Greek it is used afterwards by Justin and Origen and Pseudo-Clement in the midst of their quoting Jewish Scripture. In these Christian cases its use is not tied to LXX Exodus 34:14 but rather to discussions exactly like that of Philo, namely, on God, his word, and the word as the logical power of the Father. In this, even the latest critical edition of Justin agrees by noting that there is connection between Philo’s and Justin’s heteros theos or another God:[5]

Drs. Minns and Parvis support my first article on the following points: “allos theos” is heretical in Philo/Justin but “heteros theos” is not; (2.) The notion of someone divine “under” the vault of heaven accounts for the “hypo/under” that is traditionally read as subordinationist (“subject to”) but not thus in the CUA (below) translation of Trypho in English. (3.) Philo is at the root of this theology.

            What would be new for Drs. Minns and Parvis is my philological work of tracing the usage of allos theos and heteros theos in Jewish and Christian literature. Undoubtedly this finding would require them to consider updating any claims that scholars today make about subordinationism in two ways: (i.) showing that even if subordination can still be argued, then it must newly be argued with different premises since there is a clear distinction between the two; (ii.) They might possibly be more hesitant to carry on the pre-critical or pre-scientific commentary tradition of Justin-interpretation as subordinationist, since the Greek sources for these terms and their meaning (especially Philo) are much better understood today than in the 20^th century (with the exception of its last decade since the publishing of critical editions in Greek).

            Question 3: Don’t Dr. Falls’ and Dr. Winston’s footnotes and the introduction to Justin’s work by Drs Minns and Parvis show that scholars agree that Justin is a subordinationist?

Answer: Quite the opposite, there are statements made by modern scholars showing how confusing Justin is to them. For example, Dr. Walls quoted vociferously by unitarians writes: “St. Justin elsewhere refers to Christ as the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, it would seem that in this passage he applies it to God the Father.”[6] So, Jesus is the God of Abraham and so is the Father! In the same translation the translator is confused that Justin “seems” to imply Jesus is an “another angel” (allos angelos),[7] unaware of Angel-Christ theology or angelomorphic themes that can solve this problem.[8] That Christ is an Angel (sent) as others are angels (sent-ones) but that Jesus is Scripturally head of the angelic armies in the Old Testament, as Justin clearly attests, is lost on Dr. Falls. Finally, Dr. Falls says about Justin referring to God the Father who begot Jesus as one whom “We know no ruler more kingly or just than he except God who begot him.” To this the translator writes “This seems to imply the error of subordinationism which teach that the Father is greater than the Son; cf. also ch. 2 Apol. 13; Dial. 56 (Cf. Rauschen […] and Altaner, Patrologia).[9]

            Point #1: Dr. Falls originally translated in 1948 (prior to Danielou’s groundbreaking work on Angelomorphic Christology and cataloguing ancient and recent work on the Angel-Christ). Thus, it’s not surprising that the opinions are dated.

            Point #2: Dr. Falls confusion about the Angel-Christ as a creature and in the same breath his confusion about the God of Abraham as both Christ and God the Father are due to the lack of systematic study available on the Angel-Christ theology at this time (it was known in Scholastic manuals but only treated in passing).

            Point #3: The capital point is that Dr. Falls is wise enough to keep writing: “it seems” that is not “it is the case” or not “clearly Justin believes…” because Dr. Falls is confused. The Patrologia that he cites is from 1956! Danielou’s pioneering work (1952) on the basics of Angel-Christ talk became available in English in 1957. Angelmorphic Christology is now standard scholarship but was only gradually absorbed in other disciplines such that even liberal and agnostic scholars, like Bart Ehrmann, admit in recent publications that his old exegesis was wrong since St. Paul believed in the preexistence of the Angel-Christ.

            Conclusion:  Scholars rightly and wisely tend not to overcommit themselves to positions on topics that are for them unclear and obscure. Dr. Falls is not to be faulted for using “seems” since this allows him to understate his case based upon the state of scholarship in the 1950s and in more recent times. Drs Minns and Parvis admit many controversial and conjectural readings on issues like question of the world being made “by the Logos” or merely instrumental “through” the Logos. Scholars are wisely cautious, unlike debaters and partisans of a viewpoint. My own position is that the lack of an index of subjects like “subordinationism” in the new addition of their Apology in English or even other works shows the gradual lack of interest and evidence to robustly press this topic. The fact is that very detailed work remains to be done on how combining Old Testament oneness of the godhead with Hellenistic philosophy creates new horizons for metaphysics (the study of the status and rank of non-material being in the Logos). One of the horizons is approaching the contribution by Christians of personhood to replace timeless mental-products or forms of the Platonic past. The dignity of persons and hypostatization of Wisdom and of the Spirit naturally lead to different metaphysics than Middle and Neo-Platonism. It is up to the specialists to tease out what this means. My own contribution on Justin Martyr above in the hyperlink (invited to be published by a peer-reviewed journal since my informal publication) importantly notes that one must understand how “another God” and “other god” are used in Justin before one can speculate on his subordinationism. The failure to do so, for example, led to Dr. Falls confusing and almost self-contradictory footnotes, were it not for the salvific use of “seems!”

[1] David Wintston, Logos Mystical Theology in Philo of Alexandria (Hoboken NJ, 1985).

[2] Wintston, Logos,18-25.

[3] Brenton’s LXX seems to have a variant that reads plural “strange gods.” The scientific

[4] J. Wevers (Ed.), Exodus (Göttingen, 1991), 2, Ch. 31, v. 14: “οὐ γὰρ μὴ προσκυνήσητε θεῷ ἑτέρῳ· ὁ γὰρ κύριος ὁ θεὸς ζηλωτὸν ὄνομα, θεὸς ζηλωτής ἐστιν.”

[5]  Denis Minns and Paul Parvis, Justin, Philosoperh and Martyr: Apologies (Oxford, 2014), 62.

[6] Thomas Falls (ed.), Saint Justin Martyr…, The Fathers of the Church 6 (Washington DC, 1948, 1965, 1977, 2008 ), 201.

[7] Here, a ready solution might be that “heteros angelos” (another angel) would be an angel of the same set or species, while “allos angelos” (= Christ) refers to something like “allos theos” or another kind of essence different from the one of comparison. So, Christ as “allos angelos” is essentially different from the other ranks of angels.

[8] Thomas Falls (ed.), Saint Justin Martyr…, 39, note 2.

[9] Thomas Falls (ed.), Saint Justin Martyr…, 44, note 3.

One of the most interesting, in fact remarkable, variants of Hebrews 2:9 is found in the Syriac translation known as the Peshitta.

According to this version, Jesus is said to be the God who chose to die for everyone out of his grace for mankind:

“But we see that he is Yeshua, who became a little lower than the Angels for the suffering of his death, and glory and honor are placed upon his head, for God himself, by his grace, tasted death (hu ger bətaybuteh alaha… ṭəᶜem mawta) in the place of every person.” Hebrews 2:9 Peshitta Holy Bible Translated (HPBT https://biblehub.com/hpbt/hebrews/2.htm)

“But him who was humbled to be less than the angels, we see to be JESHU himself, for the sake of the passion of his death; and glory and honour set upon his head; for He Aloha, [Hu ger Aloho.] in his grace, for every man hath tasted death!” Etheridge‘s Peschito Syriac NT

“But we see him, who was depressed somewhat lower than the angels, to be this Jesus, because of the passion of his death; and glory and honor are placed on his head; for God himself, in his grace, tasted death for all men.” Murdock‘s Syriac Peshitta NT

However, there is another reading which is reflected in the following rendering of the Peshitta:

“We see that he is Jesus who humbled himself to be a little lower than the angels, through his suffering and his death, but now he is crowned with glory and honor; for he tasted death for the sake of every one but God.” George Lamsa Bible (LAMSA https://biblehub.com/lamsa/hebrews/2.htm)

The world-renowned scholar on Syriac Christianity Sebastian P. Brock is worth quoting at length since he explains how these different readings may have been the result of the two main variants of Heb. 2:9 in the Greek copies, which the Syriac speaking Christians would have been aware of:

Although numerous points in this excerpt call for comment, here we must confine ourselves to a single passage, that concerning Heb. 2:9b. As is well known, the vast majority of Greek manuscripts provides the following text in the second half of Heb. 2:9. All emphasis is mine:

… hopos chariti theou hyper pantos geusetai thanatou,

while the variant choris theou, in place of chariti theou, is found only in 0121b, 424c, 1739*”, in the margin of one Vulgate manuscript and in some Peshitta manuscripts (the other Peshitta manuscripts imply a Greek text reading chariti theos). The reading  choris theou is definitely older than the Nestorian controversy, seeing that it is already known to several third and fourth-century writers;⁴ a number of modern scholars have argued that it actually represents the original text of the Letter.⁵ Whatever the original reading may have been (and this is not of concern here), it is clear that the poor attestation of choris theou in the extant manuscript tradition is the result of its adoption by writers of the strict Antiochene christological tradition and consequent rejection by all who preferred the Alexandrine christology of Cyril–and in the sixth century this would have meant the vast majority of the Greek speaking church. We can even see something of the process by which attitudes became polarized: whereas Diodore is still happy to accept either reading,⁶ Theodore regards chariti theou as a deliberate alteration which he ridicules.⁷ By Philoxenus’ time, nearly a century later, the reading choris theou has come to be seen as a characteristic feature of theologians in the Antiochene christological tradition, having been dropped by all others: since the reading is by then only found among ‘Nestorians’, it is an easy step to go on to accuse them of inventing it. Nor is Philoxenus the only person to make this accusation, for the later Greek Chalcedonian writers Oikumenios⁸ and Theophylact⁹ do exactly the same.

Syriac writers from the mid fifth-century onwards were sharply divided in the positions they took on Christology, and it will come as no surprise that writers belonging to the Church of the East regularly quote Heb. 2:9 with the reading “apart from God”,¹⁰ while Syrian Orthodox authors equally regularly provide either “in his grace, God” (the other reading found in Peshitta manuscripts) or “by the grace of God”, an exact translation of the Greek which would be known to them from the Philoxenian and Harklean versions and from Syriac translations of Greek writers.¹¹ It is accordingly a matter of some interest to see what is the situation at Heb. 2:9b in actual manuscripts of the Peshitta. That the witness of Peshitta manuscripts at this point is divided has not escaped the notice of scholars, among whom Wescott has so far probably provided the most detailed information;² Wescott, however, only made use of a small proportion of the readily accessible early manuscripts of the Peshitta, and so a more extensive enquiry may not be out of place here. (Brock, “Hebrews 2:9b in Syriac Tradition,” in Novum Testamentum, Volume XXVII (27), 3 (Oxford, 1983), pp. 237-239)

To highlight Brock’s points, the reading choris theou (“apart from/without God”) was already known among 3^rd-4^th century AD Christian writers, and was later adapted by the Antiochene or the so-called Nestorian Christians who disagreed with the Christology of Cyril of Alexandria.

The former group were careful to distinguish the human nature of Christ from his divine nature to the extent that they were accused of dividing the Son into two Persons, namely, a divine and a human Person. They did this for the express purpose of defending the Son’s divine nature against any charge of it having morphed into a human nature and/or its having adapted human qualities such as mutability, passions etc.

As such, these Christians would not say that God was born of Mary, or that God died, since the divine nature knows of no beginning or end. I.e., God qua God can never be born, grow, hunger, become weary, or die. Rather, it was the Man who was born, hungered, grew, died and was raised to life. They even refused to call the holy Mother Theotokos (“God-bearer,” “Mother of God”), and chose to instead address her as Christotokos (“Christ-bearer,” “Mother of Christ”).

This explains why the Antiochene school of Christology adopted the reading choris theou into their Syriac copies of Hebrews 2:9, since this affirmed to them that Christ died not as God, but as a mere human being.    

The Alexandrian school, on the other hand, insisted on emphasizing the inseparable union of the two natures of the one Son so as to avoid the charge of positing two different Persons, namely a divine Son and a Man who then became united together at the conception of that Man in the consecrated womb of the holy Virgin. They, therefore, chose to speak of God being born, God dying on the cross, God rising from the dead, etc.

It, therefore, only makes sense that those Syriac speaking Christians that agreed with the Christology of Cyril of Alexandria would have adopted a reading of Hebrews 2:9 that emphasized the fact that it was God himself who, in his grace, died for all mankind.  

Brock goes on to list the variant Syriac readings among the extant Peshitta MSS:

For the present purpose 31 Peshitta New Testament manuscripts dating between the fifth and thirteenth centuries (inclusive) have been sampled; this represents a high proportion of the extant Peshitta manuscripts in western libraries belonging to this time scale that preserve the passage.’³ With the manuscripts belonging to the later part of this period it is possible to tell their ecclesiastical allegiance on grounds of script, but for the earlier centuries this is not normally possible.

Besides the two basic Peshitta readings, “in his grace, God” (= a, below), and “apart from God” (= d), there also occur two small variants of the former reading, “God in his grace” ( = b), and “in grace, God” (= c). Thus in Peshitta manuscripts we have the following four possible readings:

hu ger b-taybuteh alaha hlap t‘em kulnas’ mawta = a

‘for he in his grace God for the sake of everyone tasted death’

hu ger alaha b-taybuteh … = b

‘for he, God, in his grace …’

‘ hu ger b-taybuta alaha … = c

‘for he in grace God …’

ha ger star men alahi … = d

‘for he apart from God …’

All these of course conflict with the more exact translation of the Greek that is found in the Philoxenian (as quoted by Philoxenus in the passage translated above), in the Harklean and in quotations of the passage found in Syriac translations of Greek writers, all of which have “by the grace of God”. (Brock, pp. 239-240)

Note that three of the four variants basically say the same thing, namely, it was God himself who tasted death for all men.

Brock then concludes by presenting some compelling arguments for why he thinks that the original Peshitta actually read that it was God who tasted death for everyone:

It will be convenient first of all to set out the evidence of the Peshitta manuscripts consulted in tabular form. The witnesses are given in chronological order, by century,¹⁴ and where the ecclesiastical allegiance of the manuscript is evident the symbol W (Western, i.e. Syrian Orthodox or Maronite) or E (Eastern, i.e. Church of the East) is prefixed to the manuscript number. In the first column the reading can be assumed to be a unless otherwise stated. An asterisk denotes the reading of the first hand, before correction. Unless otherwise specified all Add. ( = Additional) and Or. (= Oriental) manuscripts cited belong to the British Library. From this table it will be apparent that from at least the eleventh century onwards it can be safely predicted that East Syrian manuscripts will contain the reading d (‘apart from God’), while West Syrian ones will have readings a, b or c. It is no surprise to find this state of affairs reflected in the printed editions: those in East Syrian script, based on East Syrian manuscripts have d,¹⁵ while those in serto script, based on West Syrian manuscripts, have a, or b.¹⁶ (Brock, pp. 240-241; emphasis mine)

What was the original Peshitta reading? At first sight the fact that we have at least four manuscripts altered from d to a, and only one doubtful one from a to d, might lead one to suggest that d is the original and that the reading a, already in several fifth to seventh century manuscripts, is due to anti-Nestorian bias, once d had become established (already by Theodore of Mopsuestia’s time) as a key text for the Antiochene christological tradition.

This is certainly a possible hypothesis, but I am inclined to think that the situation was more complex and that the evidence would be better interpreted somewhat differently.

Up to its closure in 489 the Persian School at Edessa served as the channel by which Antiochene theology (especially that of Theodore) reached the Syriac world. If, as must have been the case, the teachers at the School were aware of Theodore’s views on the correct reading at Heb. 2:9, they would hardly have tolerated a Peshitta reading which explicitly went against his opinion;’ and at this date no objection would have been felt to ‘correcting’ the Peshitta (supposing it originally had reading a) to concur with the Greek text advocated by the ‘Exegete’ par excellence, seeing that the Peshitta (at least as far as the Gospels were concerned) was already the outcome of a revision which aimed at a closer correspondence to the Greek.

On this second hypothesis, then, that the original reading of the Peshitta was b-taybuteh alaha, and not star men alaha, we would have two series of changes: (1) The first stage would take place at the Persian School of Edessa, from the 430’s onwards, propagating Theodore’s reading (i.e. our d) in Peshitta manuscripts. Since the School was extremely influential (even on West Syrian writers like Philoxenus and Jacob of Serugh in matters of exegesis), it would not be surprising if manuscripts copied there, with reading d, reached circles which disliked the School’s Christological teaching. We thus have the background set for the second set of changes: (2) From the late fifth century onwards manuscripts which were descended from Peshitta texts ‘corrected’ to Theodore’s reading at the Persian School were now ‘corrected’ back to reading a. This is the stage which we actually witness in Add. 14480 and 14479 (the latter indeed written in Edessa in 533/4).

The choice between these two hypotheses could be settled once for all if we had a quotation of Heb. 2:9 in a Syriac author writing before the 430’s. Unfortunately, however, neither Aphrahat nor the Liber Graduum obliges, but we do have Ephrem’s Commentary on the Pauline Epistles, preserved only in Armenian. Molitor’s retroversion into Greek of Ephrem’s quotations of Paul suggests that Ephrem tantalizingly omitted the key words of interest to us when he commented on the passage;¹⁹ reference to the Armenian,²⁰ however, suggests that this is in fact not quite the case:

Ayl p‘arawk‘ ew patuov zor asac‘ Dawit‘ etei psakeac‘vasn zi astuac vasn amenayn mardkan zmah casekeac‘.

But (he) whom David said that ‘He crowned with glory and honour’: (this is) because ‘God, for the sake of all mankind, tasted death’.²¹

Both the Latin translation of the Commentary and Molitor failed to observe that ‘God’ was part of the quotation; this was presumably because they had the Greek reading ‘by the grace of God’ in mind, rather than the Peshitta ‘in his grace, God’. But even if ‘God’ is not strictly part of the quotation, Ephrem could not possibly have written this sentence if his Syriac New Testament text had star men alaha (reading d); on the other hand his words reflect very closely reading a, with God as subject of the verb ‘tasted’: all he has done is to abbreviate the text slightly by omitting ‘in his grace’.

We may accordingly safely conclude that the second hypothesis is to be preferred, and that the original Peshitta version of Heb. 2:9b read hu ger b-taybuteh alaha hlap kulnas’ t‘em mawta, ‘for he in his grace, God, tasted death on behalf of everyone’. (Brock, pp. 243-244)

We, thus, have a very ancient witness from the Syriac stream for the widespread belief in the divinity of Christ. These early versions and Christological disputes all point in one direction, namely, the Christians worldwide held to the fact of Jesus Christ being God in an absolute, essential sense who then became Man for the salvation of the world.

FURTHER READING

MORE ANCIENT WITNESSES TO CHRIST’S DEITY

Ante-Nicene Witness to Jesus’ Deity

IRENAEUS AND THE DEITY OF CHRIST

MORE FROM IRENAEUS ON THE DEITY OF CHRIST

Justin Martyr’s Witness to Christ’s essential and eternal Deity

Ignatius of Antioch’s Proclamation of the Essential Deity of Christ

Tertullian and the Doctrine of the Trinity

Historical references:

“They are deceived, too, by those highly mendacious documents which profess to give the history of many thousand years, though, reckoning by the sacred writings, we find that not 6000 years have yet passed.”

St. Augustine, City of God, Book XII, chapter 10, “Of the Falseness of the History Which Allots Many Thousand Years to the World’s Past”, 426 A.D. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/120112.htm

“All the years from the creation of the world amount to a total of 5698 years, and the odd months and days.”

Theophilus of Antioch, To Autolycus, Book III, Chapter XXVIII, Leading Chronological Epochs, ~180 A.D. http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/theophilus-book3.html

“After these statements, Celsus, from a secret desire to cast discredit upon the Mosaic account of the creation, which teaches that the world is not yet ten thousand years old, but very much under that…But let this assailant of the Christian faith tell us by what arguments he was compelled to accept [this].”

Origen, Contra Celsum, Book I, Chapter XIX, 248 A.D. http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/origen161.html

“The period, then, to the advent of the Lord from Adam and the creation is 5531 years…”

Julius Africanus, Chronography, Fragment 18:4, 221 A.D. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0614.htm

From the birth of Christ, then, we must reckon the 500 years that remain to make up the 6000, and thus the end shall be.”

Hippolytus of Rome, Fragments, On Daniel II:4-6, ~ 205 A.D. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0502.htm

“Now twenty-four hours fill up the space of one day — we mean of a day and of a night; and if, at the time of the solstices, they have not both an equal length, the time marked by Scripture does not the less circumscribe their duration.”

Basil, Hexaemeron, Homily II:8 , ~370 A.D. (commentary on Gen. 1:5) https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/32012.htm

“For me grass is grass; plant, fish, wild beast, domestic animal, I take all in the literal sense…Let us hear Scripture as it has been written.”

St. Basil, Hexaemeron, Homily IX:1 https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/32019.htm

“His own Word is both suitable and sufficient for the formation of all things, even as John, the disciple of the Lord, declares regarding Him: “All things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made.” Now, among the “all things” our world must be embraced. It too, therefore, was made by His Word, as Scripture tells us in the book of Genesis that He made all things connected with our world by His Word. David also expresses the same truth: “For He spake, and they were made; He commanded, and they were created.”

Whom, therefore, shall we believe as to the creation of the world – these heretics who have been mentioned that prate so foolishly and inconsistently on the subject, or the disciples of the Lord, and Moses, who was both a faithful servant of God and a prophet? He at first narrated the formation of the world in these words: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” and all other things in succession: but neither gods nor angels.

Now, that this God is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Paul the apostle also has declared, “There is one God, the Father, who is above all, and through all things, and in us all.” I have indeed proved already that there is only one God; but I shall further demonstrate this from the apostles themselves, and from the discourses of the Lord. For what sort of conduct would it be, were we to forsake the utterances of the prophets, of the Lord, and of the apostles, that we might give heed to these persons, who speak not a word of sense?”

Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book II, Chapter XXVIII, Perfect Knowledge Cannot Be Attained in the Present Life: Many Questions Must Be Submissively Left in the Hands of God, Part 2,~180 A.D. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103228.htm

“If, however, we cannot discover explanations of all those things in Scripture which are made the subject of investigations, yet let us not on that account seek after any other God besides Him who really exists. For this is the very greatest impiety. We should leave things of that nature to God who created us, being most properly assured that the Scriptures are indeed perfect, since they were spoken by the Word of God and His Spirit: but we, inasmuch as we are inferior to, and later in existence than, the Word of God and His Spirit, are on that very account destitute of the knowledge of His mysteries. And there is no cause for wonder if this is the case with us as respects things spiritual and heavenly, and such as require to be made known to us by revelation, since many even of those things which lie at our very feet (I mean such as belong to this world, which we handle, and see, and are in close contact with) transcend our knowledge, so that even those we must leave to God.

For it is fitting that He should excel all. For how stands the case, for instance, if we endeavour to explain the cause of the rising of the Nile? We may say a great deal, plausible or otherwise, on the subject; but what is true, sure, and incontrovertible regarding it, belongs only to God. Then, again, the dwelling-place of birds – of those, I mean, which come to us in spring, but fly away again on the approach of autumn – though it is a matter connected with this world, escapes our knowledge. What explanation, again, can we give of the flow and ebb of the ocean, although every one admits there must be a certain cause? Or what can we say as to the nature of those things which lie beyond it? What, moreover, can we say as to the formation of rain, lightning, thunder, gatherings of clouds, vapours, the bursting forth of winds, and such like things; of tell as to the storehouses of snow, hail, and other like things? [What do we know respecting] the conditions requisite for the preparation of clouds, or what is the real nature of the vapours in the sky? What as to the reason why the moon waxes and wanes, or what as to the cause of the difference of nature among various waters, metals, stones, and such like things? On all those points we may indeed say a great deal while we search into their causes, but God alone who made them can declare the truth regarding them.”

Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book II, Chapter II, The World Was Not Formed by Angels, or by Any Other Being, Contrary to the Will of the Most High God, But Was Made by the Father Through the Word, Part 5, ~180 A.D. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103202.htm

“For in as many days as this world was made, in so many thousand years shall it be concluded. And for this reason the Scripture says: “Thus the heaven and the earth were finished, and all their adornment. And God brought to a conclusion upon the sixth day the works that He had made; and God rested upon the seventh day from all His works.” This is an account of the things formerly created, as also it is a prophecy of what is to come. For the day of the Lord is as a thousand years; and in six days created things were completed: it is evident, therefore, that they will come to an end at the sixth thousand year.”

Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book 5, Chapter XXVIII:3 ~ 180 A.D. www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/irenaeus-book5.html

Athenogoras, A Plea for Christians, Chapter XV, The Christians Distinguish God from Matter, 177 A.D. https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf02.v.ii.xv.html

Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, First Part, Question 91, Article 2, Whether the human body was immediately produced by God, ~1270 A.D. https://www.ccel.org/ccel/aquinas/summa.FP_Q91_A2.html

Lactantius, The Divine Institutues, Book II, Chapter XII, That Animals Were Not Produced Spontaneously, But by a Divine Arrangement, of Which God Would Have Given Us the Knowledge, If It Were Advantageous for Us to Know It, ~310 A.D. https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf07.iii.ii.ii.xii.html

The following citations can be found here: https://www.catholic.com/tract/creation-and-genesis.

Clement of Alexandria

“And how could creation take place in time, seeing time was born along with things which exist? . . . That, then, we may be taught that the world was originated and not suppose that God made it in time, prophecy adds: ‘This is the book of the generation, also of the things in them, when they were created in the day that God made heaven and earth’ [Gen. 2:4]. For the expression ‘when they were created’ intimates an indefinite and dateless production” (Miscellanies 6:16 [A.D. 208]).

Justin Martyr

“For as Adam was told that in the day he ate of the tree he would die, we know that he did not complete a thousand years [Gen. 5:5]. We have perceived, moreover, that the expression ‘The day of the Lord is a thousand years’ [Ps. 90:4] is connected with this subject” (Dialogue with Trypho the Jew 81 [A.D. 155]).

Irenaeus

“And there are some, again, who relegate the death of Adam to the thousandth year; for since ‘a day of the Lord is a thousand years,’ he did not overstep the thousand years, but died within them, thus bearing out the sentence of his sin” (Against Heresies 5:23:2 [A.D. 189]).

Origen

“For who that has understanding will suppose that the first and second and third day existed without a sun and moon and stars and that the first day was, as it were, also without a sky? . . . I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance and not literally” (The Fundamental Doctrines 4:1:16 [A.D. 225]).

“The text said that ‘there was evening and there was morning’; it did not say ‘the first day,’ but said ‘one day.’ It is because there was not yet time before the world existed. But time begins to exist with the following days” (Homilies on Genesis [A.D. 234]).

“And with regard to the creation of the light upon the first day . . . and of the [great] lights and stars upon the fourth . . . we have treated to the best of our ability in our notes upon Genesis, as well as in the foregoing pages, when we found fault with those who, taking the words in their apparent signification, said that the time of six days was occupied in the creation of the world” (Against Celsus 6:60 [A.D. 248]).

Cyprian

“The first seven days in the divine arrangement contain seven thousand years” (Treatises 11:11 [A.D. 250]).

“…six thousand years are now nearly completed since the devil first attacked man.” Treatises 11, Preface 2.

Victorinus

“God produced the entire mass for the adornment of his majesty in six days. On the seventh day, he consecrated it with a blessing” (On the Creation of the World [A.D. 280]).

Lactantius

“Therefore let the philosophers, who enumerate thousands of ages from the beginning of the world, know that the six-thousandth year is not yet complete. . . . Therefore, since all the works of God were completed in six days, the world must continue in its present state through six ages, that is, six thousand years. For the great day of God is limited by a circle of a thousand years, as the prophet shows, who says, ‘In thy sight, O Lord, a thousand years are as one day [Ps. 90:4]’” (Divine Institutes 7:14 [A.D. 307]).

Basil The Great

“‘And there was evening and morning, one day.’ Why did he say ‘one’ and not ‘first’? . . . He said ‘one’ because he was defining the measure of day and night . . . since twenty-four hours fill up the interval of one day” (The Six Days Work 1:1–2 [A.D. 370]).

Ambrose of Milan

“Scripture established a law that twenty-four hours, including both day and night, should be given the name of day only, as if one were to say the length of one day is twenty-four hours in extent. . . . The nights in this reckoning are considered to be component parts of the days that are counted. Therefore, just as there is a single revolution of time, so there is but one day. There are many who call even a week one day, because it returns to itself, just as one day does, and one might say seven times revolves back on itself” (Hexaemeron [A.D. 393]).

Augustine

“It not infrequently happens that something about the earth, about the sky, about other elements of this world, about the motion and rotation or even the magnitude and distances of the stars, about definite eclipses of the sun and moon, about the passage of years and seasons, about the nature of animals, of fruits, of stones, and of other such things, may be known with the greatest certainty by reasoning or by experience, even by one who is not a Christian. It is too disgraceful and ruinous, though, and greatly to be avoided, that he [the non-Christian] should hear a Christian speaking so idiotically on these matters, and as if in accord with Christian writings, that he might say that he could scarcely keep from laughing when he saw how totally in error they are. In view of this and in keeping it in mind constantly while dealing with the book of Genesis, I have, insofar as I was able, explained in detail and set forth for consideration the meanings of obscure passages, taking care not to affirm rashly some one meaning to the prejudice of another and perhaps better explanation” (The Literal Interpretation of Genesis 1:19–20 [A.D. 408]).

“With the scriptures it is a matter of treating about the faith. For that reason, as I have noted repeatedly, if anyone, not understanding the mode of divine eloquence, should find something about these matters [about the physical universe] in our books, or hear of the same from those books, of such a kind that it seems to be at variance with the perceptions of his own rational faculties, let him believe that these other things are in no way necessary to the admonitions or accounts or predictions of the scriptures. In short, it must be said that our authors knew the truth about the nature of the skies, but it was not the intention of the Spirit of God, who spoke through them, to teach men anything that would not be of use to them for their salvation” (ibid., 2:9).

“Seven days by our reckoning, after the model of the days of creation, make up a week. By the passage of such weeks time rolls on, and in these weeks one day is constituted by the course of the sun from its rising to its setting; but we must bear in mind that these days indeed recall the days of creation, but without in any way being really similar to them” (ibid., 4:27).

“[A]t least we know that it [the Genesis creation day] is different from the ordinary day with which we are familiar” (ibid., 5:2).

“For in these days [of creation] the morning and evening are counted until, on the sixth day, all things which God then made were finished, and on the seventh the rest of God was mysteriously and sublimely signalized. What kind of days these were is extremely difficult or perhaps impossible for us to conceive, and how much more to say!” (The City of God 11:6 [A.D. 419]).

“We see that our ordinary days have no evening but by the setting [of the sun] and no morning but by the rising of the sun, but the first three days of all were passed without sun, since it is reported to have been made on the fourth day. And first of all, indeed, light was made by the word of God, and God, we read, separated it from the darkness and called the light ‘day’ and the darkness ‘night’; but what kind of light that was, and by what periodic movement it made evening and morning, is beyond the reach of our senses; neither can we understand how it was and yet must unhesitatingly believe it” (ibid., 11:7).

“They [pagans] are deceived, too, by those highly mendacious documents which profess to give the history of [man as] many thousands of years, though reckoning by the sacred writings we find that not 6,000 years have yet passed” (ibid., 12:10).

“Now, eighteen months after the first light, three months after the true day, but a very few days after the pure Sun of that most wonderful study began to shine, nothing restrains me; it is my pleasure to taunt mortal men with the candid acknowledgment that I am stealing the golden vessels of the Egyptians to build a tabernacle to my God from them, far, far away from the boundaries of Egypt. If you forgive me, I shall rejoice; if you are enraged with me, I shall bear it. See, I cast the die, and I write the book. Whether it is to be read by the people of the present or of the future makes no difference: let it await its reader for a hundred years, if God Himself has stood ready for six thousand years for one to study Him.”

Johannes Kepler, Book V, The Harmony of the World, 1619 A.D.

Sources:

1. “The Funeral of a Great Myth”, C.S. Lewis, https://fpb.livejournal.com/297710.html

(This essay and “Modern Theology and Biblical Criticism” are in the Walter Hooper edited collection “Christian Reflections.”

2. “Dr. Craig on Collins vs Dawkins on Design of the Universe”, Reasonable Faith Podcast transcript, https://www.reasonablefaith.org/media/reasonable-faith-podcast/dr.-craig-on-collins-vs-dawkins-on-design-of-universe/

3. “Hermeneutical vs Scientific Young Earth Creationism”, Reasonable Faith Question of the Week #605, https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/hermeneutical-vs-scientific-young-earth-creationism/

4. Craig, William Lane. Defenders 3: Excursus on Creation of Life and Biological Diversity. https://www.reasonablefaith.org/podcasts/defenders-podcast-series-3/excursus-on-creation-of-life-and-biological-diversity/

5. “Mining for God | There is Truth Beyond Science”, drcraigvideos youtube channel, https://youtu.be/Fpq1bPoopaA

FURTHER READING

THE EARLY CHURCH ON CHRIST’S THOUSAND YEAR REIGN

The following is an excerpt from Dr. Thomas Holland’s Crowned With Glory, ©2000, used with permission.

2 Peter 1:1 – “of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ”

“Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:”

The Authorized Version has been accused of inconsistency in its translation of 2 Peter 1:1 when compared with its translation of 2 Peter 1:11. In the later passage we read, “For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”In making such an accusation, some have provided the following comparison between 2 Peter 1:1 and 2 Peter 1:11.

1:1:       tou theou emon kai soteros Iesou Christou     

1:11:     tou kuriou emon kai soteros Iesou Christou   

It is then noted that the only difference between the two verses is the substitution of kuriou (Lord) in verse eleven instead of theou (God) as found in verse one. Therefore, according to the Greek, verse one must be translated as “our God and Savior” in order to be consistent. [1] Since the KJV does not do this, it is looked upon as mistranslating this passage.

The point is well taken, and would be correct if the Greek text that underlies the KJV read as presented. However, it does not. The Greek text used by the King James translators was Beza’s text of 1589 and 1598. There we find an additional emon (our) at 2 Peter 1:1 that is not provided by those who call this a mistranslation. The two are compared below with Beza’s text presented first.

Tou theou emon kai soteros emon Iesou Christou

Tou theou emon kai soteros Iesou Christou

The translation of Beza’s text is correct and consistent in the Authorized Version, and is consistent since the additional emon appears in 2 Peter 1:1 and not 2 Peter 1:11.

The question exists why Beza provided the additional emon at 2 Peter 1:1 that is not found in other Greek texts. Dr. Bruce Metzger may supply the answer. Although not discussing this passage, Dr. Metzger does note the following concerning Beza:

Accompanied by annotations and his own Latin version, as well as Jerome’s Latin Vulgate, these editions (of Beza’s text from 1565, 1582, 1589, and 1598) contained a certain amount of textual information drawn from several Greek manuscripts which Beza had collated himself, as well as the Greek manuscripts collated by Henry Stephanus, son of Robert Stephanus. [2]

Since the Greek text of Robert Stephanus did not contain the addition, and the Greek text of Beza does, it is logical to assume that Beza added the emon at 2 Peter 1:1 based on the various manuscripts that he possessed (or the ones possessed by Henry Stephanus). We would be mistaken to presume that all existing manuscripts used in the sixteenth century are still in existence today. Some have undoubtedly passed away over the process of time. Regardless, the inclusion of the extra emon in this passage provides evidence of its preservation. It is certainly not a mistranslation on the part of the KJV.

[1] White, 268.

[2] Metzger, The Text Of The New Testament, 105.

FURTHER READING

TITUS 2:13 & KJV

The following is an excerpt from Dr. Thomas Holland’s Crowned With Glory, ©2000, used with permission.

1 John 5:7 (Johannine Comma) – “These Three Are One”

“For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” —1Jo 5:7

The passage is called the Johannine Comma and is not found in the majority of Greek manuscripts. [1] However, the verse is a wonderful testimony to the Heavenly Trinity and should be maintained in our English versions, not only because of its doctrinal significance but because of the external and internal evidence that testify to its authenticity.

The External Support: Although not found in most Greek manuscripts, the Johannine Comma is found in several. It is contained in 629 (fourteenth century), 61 (sixteenth century), 918 (sixteenth century), 2473 (seventeenth century), and 2318 (eighteenth century). It is also in the margins of 221 (tenth century), 635 (eleventh century), 88 (twelveth century), 429 (fourteenth century), and 636 (fifteenth century). There are about five hundred existing manuscripts of 1 John chapter five that do not contain the Comma. [2] It is clear that the reading found in the Textus Receptus is the minority reading with later textual support from the Greek witnesses. Nevertheless, being a minority reading does not eliminate it as genuine. The Critical Text considers the reading Iesou (of Jesus) to be the genuine reading instead of Iesou Christou (of Jesus Christ) in 1 John 1:7. Yet Iesou is the minority reading with only twenty-four manuscripts supporting it, while four hundred seventy-seven manuscripts support the reading Iesou Christou found in the Textus Receptus. Likewise, in 1 John  2:20 the minority reading pantes (all) has only twelve manuscripts supporting it, while the majority reading is panta (all things) has four hundred ninety-one manuscripts. Still, the Critical Text favors the minority reading over the majority in that passage. This is common place throughout the First Epistle of John, and the New Testament as a whole. Therefore, simply because a reading is in the minority does not eliminate it as being considered original. 

While the Greek textual evidence is weak, the Latin textual evidence for the Comma is extremely strong. It is in the vast majority of the Old Latin manuscripts, which outnumber the Greek manuscripts. Although some doubt if the Comma was a part of Jerome’s original Vulgate, the evidence suggests that it was. Jerome states:

In that place particularly where we read about the unity of the Trinity which is placed in the First Epistle of John, in which also the names of three, i.e. of water, of blood, and of spirit, do they place in their edition and omitting the testimony of the Father; and the Word, and the Spirit in which the catholic faith is especially confirmed and the single substance of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit is confirmed. [3]

Other church fathers are also known to have quoted the Comma. Although some have questioned if Cyprian (258 AD) knew of the Comma, his citation certainly suggests that he did. He writes: “The Lord says, ‘I and the Father are one’ and likewise it is written of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, ‘And these three are one’.” [4] Also, there is no doubt that Priscillian (385 AD) cites the Comma:

As John says “and there are three which give testimony on earth, the water, the flesh, the blood, and these three are in one, and there are three which give testimony in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit, and these three are one in Christ Jesus.” [5]

Likewise, the anti-Arian work compiled by an unknown writer, the Varimadum (380 AD) states: “And John the Evangelist says, . . . ‘And there are three who give testimony in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit, and these three are one’.” [6] Additionally, Cassian (435 AD), Cassiodorus (580 AD), and a host of other African and Western bishops in subsequent centuries have cited the Comma. [7] Therefore, we see that the reading has massive and ancient textual support apart from the Greek witnesses.

Internal Evidence: The structure of the Comma is certainly Johannine in style. John is noted for referring to Christ as “the Word.” If 1 John 5:7 were an interpretation of verse eight, as some have suggested, than we would expect the verse to use “Son” instead of “Word.” However, the verse uses the Greek word logos, which is uniquely in the style of John and provides evidence of its genuineness. Also, we find John drawing parallels between the Trinity and what they testify (1 John 4:13-14). Therefore, it comes as no surprise to find a parallel of witnesses containing groups of three, one heavenly and one earthly.

The strongest evidence, however, is found in the Greek text itself. Looking at 1 John 5:8, there are three nouns which, in Greek, stand in the neuter (Spirit, water, and blood). However, they are followed by a participle that is masculine. The Greek phrase here is oi marturountes (who bare witness). Those who know the Greek language understand this to be poor grammar if left to stand on its own. Even more noticeably, verse six has the same participle but stands in the neuter (Gk.: to marturoun). Why are three neuter nouns supported with a masculine participle? The answer is found if we include verse seven. There we have two masculine nouns (Father and Son) followed by a neuter noun (Spirit). The verse also has the Greek masculine participle oi marturountes. With this clause introducing verse eight, it is very proper for the participle in verse eight to be masculine, because of the masculine nouns in verse seven. But if verse seven were not there it would become improper Greek grammar.

Even though Gregory of Nazianzus (390 AD) does not testify to the authenticity of the Comma, he makes mention of the flawed grammar resulting from its absence. In his Theological Orientations he writes referring to John:

. . . (he has not been consistent) in the way he has happened upon his terms; for after using Three in the masculine gender he adds three words which are neuter, contrary to the definitions and laws which you and your grammarians have laid down. For what is the difference between putting a masculine Three first, and then adding One and One and One in the neuter, or after a masculine One and One and One to use the Three not in the masculine but in the neuter, which you yourselves disclaim in the case of Deity? [8]

It is clear that Gregory recognized the inconsistency with Greek grammar if all we have are verses six and eight without verse seven. Other scholars have recognized the same thing. This was the argument of Robert Dabney of Union Theological Seminary in his book, The Doctrinal Various Readings of the New Testament Greek (1891). Bishop Middleton in his book, Doctrine of the Greek Article, argues that verse seven must be a part of the text according to the Greek structure of the passage. Even in the famous commentary by Matthew Henry, there is a note stating that we must have verse seven if we are to have proper Greek in verse eight. [9]

While the external evidence makes the originality of the Comma possible, the internal evidence makes it very probable. When we consider the providential hand of God and His use of the Traditional Text in the Reformation it is clear that the Comma is authentic.

[1] The first and second editions of Erasmus’ Greek text did not contain the Comma. It is generally reported that Erasmus promised to include the Comma in his third edition if a single manuscript containing the Comma could be produced. A Franciscan friar named Froy (or Roy) forged a Greek text containing it by translating the Comma from the Latin into Greek. Erasmus was then presented with this falsified manuscript and, being faithful to his word, reluctantly included the Comma in the 1522 edition. However, as has now been admitted by Dr. Bruce Metzger, this story is apocryphal (The Text Of The New Testament, 291). Metzger notes that H. J. de Jonge, a respected specialist on Erasmus, has established that there is no evidence of such events occurring. Therefore, opponents of the Comma in light of the historical facts should no longer affirm this report.

[2] Kurt Aland, in connection with Annette Benduhn-Mertz and Gerd Mink, Text und Textwert der griechischen Handschriften des Neuen Testaments: I. Die Katholischen Briefe Band 1: Das Material (Berlin: Walter De Gruyter, 1987), 163-166.

[3] Prologue To The Canonical Epistles. The Latin text reads, “si ab interpretibus fideliter in latinum eloquium verterentur nec ambiguitatem legentibus facerent nec trinitatis unitate in prima joannis epistola positum legimus, in qua etiam, trium tantummodo vocabula hoc est aquae, sanguinis et spiritus in ipsa sua editione ponentes et patris verbique ac aspiritus testimoninum omittentes, in quo maxime et fides catholica roboratur, et patris et filii et spirtus sancti una divinitatis substantia comprobatur.”

[4] Treatises 1 5:423.

[5] Liber Apologeticus.

[6] Varimadum 90:20-21.

[7] Some other sources include the Speculum (or m of 450 AD), Victor of Vita (489 AD), Victor Vitensis (485 AD), Codex Freisingensis (of 500 AD), Fulgentius (533 AD), Isidore of Seville (636 AD), Codex Pal Legionensis (650 AD), and Jaqub of Edessa (700 AD). Interestingly, it is also found in the edition of the Apostle’s Creed used by the Waldenses and Albigensians of the twelfth century.

[8] Fifth Orientation the Holy Spirit.

[9] Actually the 1 John commentary is the work of “Mr. John Reynolds of Shrewsbury,” one of the ministers who completed Matthew Henry’s commentary, which was left incomplete [only up to the end of Acts] at Henry’s death in 1714.

FURTHER READING

LATIN WITNESSES TO 1 JN 5:7

WALLACE & 1 JOHN 5:7

Edward F. Hills on 1 John 5:7

Turning the Tables Pt. 6a: The Three Witnesses of 1 John 5:7

Turning the Tables Pt. 6b: The Three Witnesses of 1 John 5:7