ℹ️ This corpus has no verse-level morphological tagging. Lemmas come mainly from word-level tagging of other books in the same language (not from this verse), falling back to dictionary form-matching for the rest. Rare homographs can still be misread; verify against the original and a specialist lexicon where precision matters.
ℹ️ The Chinese and English alongside are this site's own translation, made directly from the original text on this page (not the CUV or the WEB, which follow the Masoretic Text and a different textual tradition).
{B} Do we then say that all things were made through a man, and that the one who, in the last times of the age, had his birth from a woman, is the maker of heaven and earth and, in sum, of all things in them? {A} Then you yourself tell me, for I will ask:
did not the Word become flesh? Was he not called the Son of man? Did he not take the form of a servant? Did he not empty himself, being made in the likeness of men and found in fashion as a man? If, then, they deny the economy, the inspired disciples will rise up against them, saying:
Then what sense would it make to understand, in the case of a man, that he came in the flesh? Rather it would befit one who is outside flesh and not of a nature like ours, both to come to be in flesh and, together with it, to come into this world while remaining what he was.
Therefore, even if he became man, there is nothing to prevent us from thinking that all things were brought into being through him, insofar as he is conceived as God and coeternal with the Father.
For being God, the Word has not been altered, even though he came into the assumption of flesh endowed with a rational soul—and not by joining a man to himself, as those who innovate upon the faith assert, but by himself becoming flesh, as I said, that is, becoming man.
For thus he saved his own people, not as a man joined to God, but as God who came to be in the likeness of those who were in peril, so that in him, and as the first, the human race might be refashioned unto its original state.
{B} Then it will be repudiated by us, this notion that one ought to think or say that a man was joined to God the Word, and became a sharer in his dignity, and holds adoption in the rank of grace.
For the force of the sacred Scriptures knows nothing of this; rather it is the invention of a novelty-loving and feeble mind, slack and unable to see the depth of the mystery.
For where has any such thing been said by the holy Scripture? For the inspired Paul, making very clear the mystery of the incarnation of the Only-begotten, says:
For since the children, he says, are partakers of blood and flesh, he also himself in like manner partook of the same, that through death he might bring to nought him that had the power of death, that is, the devil.
For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and concerning sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.
And we say that he partook of blood and flesh, according to a sense agreeing with the inspired words—not the one who in his own nature is in flesh and blood and cannot be otherwise, but the one who was never this and is of a nature other than ours.
And we say that he who for our sake became as we are, while also being above us insofar as he is conceived as God, came to be both from a woman and in the likeness of sinful flesh.
For the Word became flesh—yet not flesh of sin, but in the likeness of sinful flesh; he dwelt among those upon the earth as a man and came to be in a likeness to us, yet not with us under sin, but beyond knowing how to err.
But these men, somehow stripping away from the Only-begotten so august and admired an economy, join a man to him by mere relation, adorned with extraneous honors and made resplendent with an alien glory—not God in truth, but a partner and sharer of God, a Son falsely so named, a saved Saviour and a ransomed Redeemer—even though the blessed Paul wrote thus:
For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly and righteously in this present age, looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.
For they transfer, as I said, the power of the mystery of Christ into its very opposite; and to say that he was 'deemed worthy' would be nothing else than to declare him a common man and to wall him off, ill-advisedly, into utter otherness—so that one must conceive of a worshipped dyad of sons, of whom one is by nature and in truth, while the other is adoptive and spurious, having nothing that is his own, so that to him too may be said, along with us:
For how was he not Yea and Nay, if he is said to be God and is not God, if 'Son' and 'Lord' are falsely predicated of him? But if it stands as they themselves say, then it would be fitting, I suppose, even to say:
For what does not belong by nature, but is from outside, introduced and given by another, would belong not so much to the receiver as to the one who apportioned and bestowed it.
{A} But where is the emptying? And of whom would it any longer be conceived to take place? For it is not possible to see anyone rather emptied, but, on the contrary, being filled—and that though he did not have the fullness in his own nature.
For he would not have needed what comes from another, and to receive would have been superfluous to him, since he has from himself what is self-complete and sufficient for every purpose whatsoever; but 'of his fulness have all we received,' and the proclamation of those who speak of God could not prove false.
For Christ is full, and absolutely nothing is given to him insofar as he is conceived and is God, even though receiving came to be his on account of the measure of humanity and inasmuch as he appeared as we are—to whom one might quite rightly say: For what hast thou that thou didst not receive? {B} Yes, he says.
{A} But, O good sirs, one might say to them, he who has another conjoined to him could not be conceived as one—how could he? Rather he is one with one, or at any rate one with another, and these are two utterly and in every way.
But he would be conceived as being in truth one Son, if we say that the same one is the God the Word begotten of God in a divine manner, and yet paradoxically man according to the flesh from a woman.
Or, taken in yet another way: for he says, the Jesus who is yesterday and today will be the same also for ever—evidently being something recent, both yesterday and today—and yet the God the Word coexists with his own Father.
{A} Most of all they do wrong, diverting the truth toward what seems to them, in their lack of understanding, to be so, and corrupting the precision of the sacred Scriptures.
But if anyone should call Christ Jesus also pre-eternal, he would not stray from the truth, since there is one Son and Lord, the pre-eternal Word, who in the last times of the age endured birth according to the flesh from a woman.
For the Word who is unto the ages, how could he take upon himself the 'yesterday and today,' if indeed Christ is one and is not divided, according to the voice of the inspired Paul? For that he wills to be thus made known by us, you will learn from this as well.
If I have told you earthly things and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if I tell you heavenly things? And: No man hath ascended into heaven, but he that came down from heaven, the Son of man.
For as one who is ever-existing and the pre-eternal Word, descended from the heavens, and then having appeared the same as a man like us, as one Christ and Lord even when he became flesh, he says such things.
After me cometh a man who is preferred before me, for he was before me; and I knew him not, but that he should be made manifest to Israel, therefore am I come baptizing with water.
Understand, then, how, calling him a man and naming him a lamb, he says that the one who takes away the sin of the world is no other, and attributes to him this great and truly extraordinary and God-befitting dignity.
On this account too the most excellent Peter, beholding the Word not bare nor fleshless, but appearing in flesh and blood, clearly and unerringly made his rendering of faith in him, saying:
But if the mystery were not profound, and if God were not in the flesh, while according to them a man held adoption by grace, why would he have needed so great an initiator—so that none of those on earth revealed it to the disciple, but he obtained the Father himself as his teacher for this? And indeed the inspired disciples too, when they once saw him walking upon the back of the sea, were astonished at the divine sign and confessed their faith, saying:
But if he is spurious and falsely named, and holds his being a Son as something adoptive, let them charge those disciples with false testimony—and that though they had sworn it.
{A} And how does the Son of man have his own angels, and shine forth also in the glory of his Father †....†? The Son of man is about to come in the glory of his Father with his angels. And again:
For to behold in a man the surpassing greatness of the ineffable glory—not as alien, nor as supplied in the measure of grace, but as his own—how will it not persuade us that God was in a form like ours, and truly the Son of the God who is over all? {B} He himself, they say, asserted that the angels were his own, and he became the worker of these signs, the Word dwelling in him and having apportioned to him the proper glory and the energy.
For it is written that Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power; who went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil.
{A} Then, since the Word being God is holy and by nature and essentially has all-prevailing might, he would in no way need either power from another or, as it were, an introduced sanctification—who, pray, is the one anointed with power and the Holy Spirit? {B} They would perhaps say, the man taken up by conjunction.
But to us there is one God the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him.
How then, tell me, are all things through a man? And on what grounds is he ranked immediately, as Son, with the Father, with no intermediary? Then where shall we put the Only-begotten, when we elevate the man into his place—and that, as he says, while he is being energized by him and honored on his account? Has not their argument departed from probability, is it not carried off the mark, and, as having altogether missed the truth, would it not be justly laughed at? {B} The Word of God, they say, has been named 'man' in some such way as this:
for just as the man taken up by him was born in Bethlehem of Judaea, but is called a Nazarene because of dwelling in Nazareth, so too God the Word is named 'man' because of his dwelling in a man.
Let someone cry out to the adversaries: Why do you do violence to the truth, and, perverting the power of the divine doctrines, carry yourselves outside the royal road? For the Word, it seems, no longer became flesh according to the Scriptures, but rather an inhabitant-of-a-man; and it would follow that he should be called rather 'man-related' than 'man,' just as indeed he who dwelt in Nazareth was named 'Nazarene,' and not 'Nazareth.'
And nothing at all, I think, would prevent—if indeed they think well of what they have senselessly invented—the Father and, moreover, the Holy Spirit from being named 'man' along with the Son.
These men deride the mystery of the incarnation, perverting into something discordant the doctrines of the Church, which are so right and worthy to be heard.
Let them tell me, then—for I will ask—would the grace of prophecy be a thing of renown for any man whatever, or to be deemed worthy of apostolic rewards, or to be appointed a sacred minister? {B} I say it would.
{A} But these things they would say are small and not worth taking, for Christ insofar as he is conceived as God—even if through these very things he is seen to be emptied, and to have received them along with the humanity.
And just as, being God by nature and Lord in truth, he took the form of a servant, as having come to be in it and in the assumption of what is ours, so too, giving the Spirit of prophecy, appointing apostles, and establishing sacred ministers, he was likened in all things to his brethren;
For they had a grace measured out according to what seemed good to God, and accruing to them in time; but he was full of the Godhead, and from the very birth itself;
{A} Then in the quantity of grace and in the length of time Christ surpassed the holy prophets who were before him, and this is what is exceptional in him.
But it is open to inquiry whether he is a prophet at all; and it is not so much the 'more' or the 'less,' or even the being superior, as the very being a prophet and not beyond our measure, that constitutes the meanness in him—even if he should be conceived as having been this from the beginning, just as indeed the inspired Baptist, of whom the blessed angel says:
Nevertheless we will not follow their follies, nor will we make them definers and innovators of our own faith, abandoning the sacred Scripture and dishonoring the tradition from the holy apostles and evangelists.
Nor, because a feeble and most unlearned mind has settled in them, and they are unable to discern the depth of the mystery, shall we too on that account go astray, growing ignorant along with them and refusing to go straight toward the truth.
But we know that the most holy Paul wrote that we ought to cast down reasonings and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and to bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.
Nevertheless, then, can you tell me the things at which they take offense, and over which they stumble against the stone of stumbling in Jewish fashion? {B} I could—how not? And very many such things.
For it is written that, And John bare witness, saying, I have beheld the Spirit descending out of heaven, and it abode upon him; and I knew him not, but he that sent me to baptize with water, he said unto me:
{A} Then how does the one who was baptized and received the visible descent of the Spirit baptize with the Holy Spirit, and fulfill the things befitting and proper to the divine nature alone? For he is the supplier of sanctification, and showing this, the incarnate Word, as his own good, breathed bodily upon the holy apostles, saying:
And how does the inspired Baptist, most clearly pointing out the sanctified one, bear witness that This is the Son of God, singularly and with the definite article? For, being a hierophant under the sun, had he known him to be another alongside the truly Son, he ought to have marked the truth, saying plainly:
But if it is true that, having lowered himself into emptying, he became as we are, why do they remove from him the things through which he would be conceived as emptied, most ill-advisedly undoing the consummate skill of the economy with flesh? {B} If, then, he is said both to have received glory and to have become Lord, and to have been exalted by the Father, and to have been established as king, will you attach these too to God the Word, and not in every way wrong his glory? {A} That the nature of God the Word is filled with glory, kingship, and true lordship—how could anyone doubt? And it is certain that he is conceived also in the most God-befitting heights.
...making them his own; and there was in Christ something unwonted and strange, the paradox: in a servile form, lordship; in human meanness, God-befitting glory; the one under the yoke crowned with the boasts of kingship, as far as concerns the measure of humanity; and in the most supreme excellencies, lowliness.
For the Only-begotten became man, not that he might remain within the measures of the emptying, but that, taking together with it the things that belong to it, being God by nature, he might be known as such, and might dignify the nature of the man in himself, declaring it a partaker of sacred and divine dignities.
Who in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and having been heard for his godly fear, though he was a Son, yet learned obedience by the things which he suffered; and being made perfect, he became unto all them that obey him the author of indestructible salvation.
And I will add to what I said that other saying: My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? For they say such things are unbefitting God the Word, and fall far short of the surpassing excellence inherent in him [I might say].
{A} I myself also know that these things would not fit the Word who was begotten of God the Father, if the mode of the economy be thrust aside, and if the saying 'He became flesh according to the Scriptures' be not received by us.
But since we have been firmly fixed upon this, and since to be in doubt at all bears the charge of impiety, come, let us examine, as far as is possible, the depth of the economy.
The Word from God the Father, then, appeared to us in a form like ours, to benefit human affairs in ever so many ways, and to point out very clearly the path that leads to every one of the things to be admired.
It was therefore necessary to learn, when temptation runs down even upon those who are in peril for the sake of love toward God, what sort of persons they ought to be who have chosen to accomplish the renowned and exceptional citizenship and life—whether slackening and falling back into sloth, and luxuriating out of season and giving themselves over to ease, or rather straining toward prayers, and being seen by the Saviour weeping, and thirsting for the help and the manly courage from him, if indeed he should choose that we even suffer.
And besides this it was necessary to know usefully where at last the term of obedience comes to an end, and through what rewards it proceeds, and how great and of what sort is the recompense of endurance.
For what glory is it if, when ye sin and are buffeted, ye endure it? But if, when ye do well and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is grace with God, because Christ also died for you, leaving you an example, that ye should follow his steps.
...to make use of the measures of humanity, and to lift up a prayer, and to let fall a tear, and to seem already somehow even to need the Saviour, and to learn obedience, although he was a Son.
For the Spirit-bearer was as it were astonished at the mystery, that being by nature and in truth a Son, and conspicuous in the boasts of the Godhead, he lowered himself unto humiliation, so as to undergo the meanness of human poverty.
And to think one ought to follow after him—what else would this be than that one must play the man in temptations, while asking the help from above not carelessly and slackly, but rather employing the most earnest prayers, and letting fall the tear that comes from godly fear? {B} Well said.
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?—how then could they understand it? {B} They would suppose, as I think, that such utterances belong to the assumed man.
{A} As of one in despondency, then, finding the onset of the temptation least of all bearable, but hard to endure—or how? {B} As of one in distress, as is likely, out of human faint-heartedness.