駁歐諾米（反駁篇） 第 1 章 第 3/6 段

and thus the argument of piety remains unconfused, preserving for each of the two names its own proper signification, so that in "Only-begotten" we behold the pre-eternal, while through "firstborn of creation" we behold the manifestation, through flesh, of the pre-eternal one.

Let us again take up Eunomius' statement word for word.

"...a true Son, not unbegotten, truly begotten before the ages..."

That he transfers, then, the emphasis of "begetting" over into the meaning of "creation" is clear from the fact that he expressly styled him a creature, calling him "become" and "not uncreated."

But we, so that his heedlessness and lack of instruction in doctrine may be made most manifest, setting aside indignant protest at the evident blasphemy, shall treat the argument concerning this matter by a certain technical division.

For it seems to me good to examine closely, by a more careful inquiry, the very meaning of "begetting" in our discourse.

That this name signifies being from some cause is clear to everyone, and I think there is no need to contend about this.

But since the account of things subsisting from a cause is varied, I think it fitting that this be clarified in our discourse by means of a certain technical division.

Among things, then, that have come to be from some cause, we have discerned the following differences.

For some things are from matter and craft, as the constructions of buildings and other works which come about through suitable matter, over which a certain craft presides, bringing to completion, for its own purpose, what has been set before it; and other things are from matter and nature.

For nature builds up the generations of living creatures from one another, carrying out its own operation through the material hypostasis present in their bodies.

And other things are from material effluence, in which the preceding source remains what it is, while what flows from it is observed in itself — as in the case of the sun and its ray, or the lamp and its radiance, or spices and perfumed oils and the quality given off from them.

For these, while remaining undiminished in themselves, each immediately has accompanying it the natural property given off from it — as the sun has its ray, the lamp its radiance, and the spices the fragrance engendered in the air from them.

There is also, besides these, another kind of begetting, whose cause is immaterial and incorporeal, while the begetting itself is perceptible and comes about through the body — I mean the word begotten from the mind.

For the mind, being in itself incorporeal, begets the word through the organs of sense.

So many differences of begetting have we discerned, as it were, in a certain general survey.

Now that these modes of begetting have thus been distinguished by us, it would be timely to observe how the loving providence of the Holy Spirit, in handing down the divine mysteries, gives its teaching of things beyond reason by means of what is comprehensible to us.

For the divinely inspired teaching takes up all the kinds of begetting known to the human understanding, for the demonstration of the ineffable power, without admitting along with them the corporeal implications of the terms.

For whenever it speaks of the constructive power, it calls this operation "begetting," because the discourse must descend to the lowliness of our capacity; yet it does not thereby imply all that is, for us, considered together with constructive generation — not place, not time, not the preparation of matter, not the cooperation of instruments, not the labor involved in what comes to be — but, leaving these aside for us, it testifies to God's generation of beings in a grand and lofty manner, saying: "He spoke, and they came to be; he commanded, and they were created."

Again, when it interprets the ineffable and inexpressible existence of the Only-begotten from the Father, because human poverty is incapable of containing teachings beyond speech and understanding, there too it makes use of our own terms and calls him "Son" — which is the name our custom applies to those begotten from matter and nature.

...dispositions, and the cooperation arising from time, and the need of place, and above all matter — without all of which the begetting here below, from nature, does not come about.

But since none of this material and extended notion is included in the signification of "Son," only the nature remains; and for this reason, by the term "Son" is signified, in the case of the Only-begotten, the proper and genuine manifestation from the Father.

And since this kind of begetting alone was not sufficient to produce in us an adequate conception of the ineffable existence of the Only-begotten, Scripture also takes up, for the signification of the theology of the Son, the other kind of begetting — that from material effluence — and speaks of "the radiance of glory," "the fragrance of ointment," and "the vapor of God," which, in the technical exposition we have set forth, our usage calls "material effluence."

But just as, in what has been said before, neither the coming-to-be of creation nor the signification of "Son" admitted time, matter, place, or passion along with it, so also here, having purged the signification of "radiance" and the other terms mentioned of all material notion, Scripture, taking up only what is fitting to God in this kind of begetting, shows through the implication of this expression that the Son must be understood as being from him and, at the same time, together with him.

For neither does "vapor" represent the diffusion into air from an underlying matter, nor does "fragrance" represent the transposition into air arising from the quality of ointment, nor does "radiance" represent the effluence of the solar body through its rays; but this alone, out of all these, as has been said, is shown through this manner of begetting: that the Son is from the Father and is understood together with him, with no interval mediating between the Father and him who is from him.

And since, out of abundant love for humankind, the grace of the Holy Spirit has arranged that our divine conceptions concerning the Only-begotten should arise in us from many sources, it has added also the remaining kind of begetting observed among us — that from mind and word.

But in this the sublime John employs even greater foresight, lest the hearer, through weakness and pettiness of mind, should fall into the common notion of "word," so as to suppose the Son to be a mere utterance of the Father.

For this reason he testifies further of the Word that he exists, according to essence, in that very first and blessed nature, proclaiming aloud this message: that in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and was God, and was light and life, and whatsoever the Beginning is, that also was he.

Now that these modes of begetting — that is, of things subsisting from a cause, known to us in our own usage — have been taken up also by holy Scripture for the teaching of things beyond us, in such a way as is fitting for each of them to be piously transferred to the representation of divine conceptions, it would be timely to examine also the argument of Eunomius, to see with what meaning he receives the implication of "begetting."

"A true Son," he says, "not unbegotten, and truly begotten before the ages."

As for the sequence maliciously distorted in this distinction, I think it fitting to pass over it, since it is evident to everyone.

For who does not know that, whereas the counter-distinction of "Son" is with "Father," and of "begotten" is with "unbegotten," this man, passing over "Father," sets "unbegotten" in counter-distinction to "Son" — when, if he had had any concern for truth, he ought not to have distorted the logical sequence of correlative terms, but should have said "a true Son, not a Father"? In that way piety would have been preserved together with the sequence of the argument, since the distinction of persons would not thereby have brought about a corresponding division of the nature.

But instead, having substituted for the true and scriptural usage of "Father" — the usage handed down by the Word himself — in the confession of faith, he named "unbegotten" in place of "Father," so that, having separated him from the kinship with the Son naturally contemplated in the appellation "Father," he might make him common to all things that appear in creation, to which likewise the counter-distinction is with "the unbegotten."

"Truly," he says, "begotten before the ages."

He will surely say "of the Father," if he is not shameless with respect to the truth.

But because it is not possible to separate the eternity of the Son from that of the eternal Father, since the very signification of "Father" surely implies also the Son together with it, for this reason, having rejected the appellation "Father," he transfers the argument to "unbegotten," since the meaning of this name is unrelated to and has nothing in common with the Son; and thus, having led his hearers astray so as not to consider the Son together with the Father, by this substitution of the term he opened a way for his malice, paving the road for impiety through the insertion of "unbegotten."

For those who, according to the command of the Master, have their faith directed toward the Father, as soon as they hear "Father," receive also the Son together with him in their understanding, since the mind passes from the Son to the Father with no interval in between over which to step in vain.

But those who have been diverted, in place of "Father," to the appellation "unbegotten," take up only the bare notion of this name, being taught merely that he did not come to be, but not also that he is Father.

From this, for those who understand intelligently, the faith remains unconfused even by way of this understanding.

For "not having come to be" is likewise said of the uncreated nature; and the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are equally uncreated, because it is believed, by those who follow the divine utterances, that every creation, both sensible and supra-mundane, has its hypostasis from the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

For he who hears that "By the word of the Lord the heavens were established, and all their host by the breath of his mouth" does not understand "word" as a mere utterance, nor "breath" as respiration, but through what has been said he forms the image of God the Word and the Spirit of God.

The same thing cannot both create and be created; but since beings are divided into two — that which makes and that which comes to be — each of the two is, in nature, something other than the other, so that neither is that which comes to be uncreated, nor is that which brings about the nature of things that come to be, created.

Now for those who believe according to the Master's exposition of the faith, into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, it is equally confessed that none of these came to be; and the meaning of "unbegotten" does no harm at all to sound faith.

But for the thick-skinned and inarticulate, this name becomes the beginning of a deviation from sound reasoning; for, not understanding the true implication of the term — that the word "unbegotten" signifies only "not having been begotten," and that "not having come to be" is common to everything transcending creation — they have abandoned faith in the Father and set up the name "unbegotten" in the Father's place.

And since, as has been said, this name does not include within its signification the hypostasis of the Only-begotten, they define the being of the Son from some fixed beginning, saying what this man has now added to what has been said — that the Son is not named "Son" apart from a begetting that precedes his being.

What new monstrosity is this again? Does he understand that he is making his argument about the God who was in the beginning, who is in the Father, and of whom it is not the case that there was a time when he was not? He does not know what he says, nor about whom he insists, but, as though genealogizing some human being, he attempts to apply to the Lord of all creation what is properly said of the nature below.

For Ishmael, for instance, did not exist before his begetting into being, yet there was surely something before his begetting — I mean the interval of time.

But in the case of the radiance of glory, "before" and "after" have no place.

For before the radiance, surely, glory itself did not exist either.

For together with the existence of glory, the radiance surely shines forth as well; and for the one to be separated from the other is not in its nature, nor is it possible to see glory by itself, prior to the radiance.

For whoever says this will make glory to be, in itself, unshining and blind, if the radiance from it does not shine forth together with it.

...of what is said, they might separate the Only-begotten God from unity with the Father.

"Before the begetting into being, he was not Son."

And the sons of rams, whom the prophet mentions — are not they too called "sons" only after they came to be? What, then, the argument observes in the sons of rams — that before their begetting into being they were not sons of rams — this our solemn theologian now attributes to the Maker of the ages and of all creation, to him who has the eternal Father within himself and is beheld within the Father's eternity, even as he himself says, "I am in the Father, and the Father in me."

But those who are unable to detect the malice in this argument, nor have been trained in any understanding of logical sequence, follow along with these incoherent statements, accepting as consistent what is added to them; for he says that he "came to be before all creation."

And, as though this expression alone were not sufficient to demonstrate his impiety, he lies in wait with the blasphemy in the words that follow, saying that he is "not uncreated."

How then does he call "true Son" one who is not uncreated? For if it is fitting to call "true Son" one who is not uncreated, then heaven too is surely a true son.

For it too is not uncreated.

Thus the sun too is a true son, and all things, small and great, that creation contains, are surely worthy of the appellation "true son."

And how does he call "only-begotten" one who came to be? For all things that have come to be are surely brothers of one another, according, I mean, to the very account of coming-to-be.

And by whom did he come to be? For whatever has come to be has surely come to be through the Son.

For thus John testifies, saying, "All things came to be through him."

If, then, according to Eunomius' argument the Son too came to be, then he too surely belongs to the nature of things that have come to be.

If, then, all things that came to be, came to be through him, and the Word too is one of the things that came to be, who is so senseless as not to perceive, from what has been laid down, the absurdity — that this novel dogmatist declares the Lord of creation to have become his own work, by expressly saying that the Lord and Maker of all creation is not uncreated? Let him say whence he derives such boldness.

From what divinely inspired Scripture? What evangelist, what apostle uttered such a word? What prophet, or lawgiver, or patriarch, or any other of those borne along by the Holy Spirit, whose utterances stand recorded, took the lead in such an expression? We have learned "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" from the truth, in the tradition of the faith.

If it were necessary to believe him to be created, how is it that truth, in handing down the mystery to us, ordained faith into the Son, and not into a creature? And how is it that the divine apostle, worshiping Christ, defines those who serve the creature rather than the Creator as practicing idolatry? For either he would not have worshiped, if Christ were created, or he would not have classed with idolaters those who serve the creation — lest he himself also seem to practice idolatry, by offering worship to a created thing.

But he knows that the one whom he worships is God over all.

For thus, in his discourse to the Romans, he names the Son.

But they surely bring forward the proverbial saying, which states, "The Lord created me the beginning of his ways, for his works."

Now this could be set forth more clearly at greater length.

Yet it should be possible, even in few words, to convey the sense to those of good understanding.

In older manuscripts we have read "He possessed me" written in place of "He created me."

And "possession" surely signifies, through the riddling language of Proverbs, the servant — him who, for our sake, took on the form of a servant.

But if anyone should put forward, in this instance, the reading prevailing in the churches, we do not reject the word "created" either.

For this too looks, through the riddle, toward the signification of "servant," since all creation is in servitude, as the Apostle says

For this reason we say that this utterance too is held piously

For truly he who became for our sake, according to our likeness, was created in the last of the days — he who in the beginning was Word and God, but afterward became flesh and man

But the nature of the flesh is created;

partaking of which in all things, according to likeness, apart from sin, he was created, becoming man; and he was created according to God, not according to man, as the Apostle says, in a certain new manner and not according to human custom

For we have learned that it was from the Holy Spirit and the power of the Most High; nevertheless this new man was created, whom Paul, the expounder of the ineffable mysteries, bids us put on, naming the garment in two ways: at one place saying, "Put on the new man, who was created according to God," and again, "Put on the Lord Jesus Christ"

For he who said, "I am the way," becomes for us who have put him on the beginning of the ways of salvation, so that he might make us works of his own hands, refashioning us again from the wicked molding of sin into his own image

And the same one becomes for us also the foundation, before the age to come, according to the word of Paul, who says, "No one can lay a foundation other than the one already laid," and, "Before the springs of the waters came forth, and before the mountains were settled, and before he made the depths, and before all the hills, he begets me"

For it is possible for each of these, transferred according to proverbial custom into a figurative sense, to be fitted to the Word

and by "hills" is signified the innocence which he showed forth through the leaping of the lambs

Before these things, then, the man who was created for our sake is begotten in us, so that the creation of such things also may find room in us

But I think it necessary to pass over the discussion of these matters, since the truth has been sufficiently shown, in a few words, to those of good judgment;

and let us pass on to what follows next in Eunomius' words

"Existing in the beginning," he says, "not without beginning"

Oh, how does he who prides himself on understanding beyond all others comprehend the divine sayings! He interprets "the one who is in the beginning" as "having a beginning," and does not know that, if the one who is in the beginning has a beginning, then the beginning itself surely has another beginning

For whatever he says concerning the beginning, this he will of necessity altogether confess also concerning the one who is in the beginning

For how shall that which is in the beginning be separated from the beginning? And how shall anyone conceive beforehand a "was not" prior to the "was"? For however far one may raise and extend one's mind toward the comprehension of the beginning, one altogether comprehends together with it that the Word who is in it cannot be separated from the beginning in which he is, never beginning to be in it nor ceasing to be in it

But let no one, on account of these things, split the doctrine into two beginnings

For the beginning is truly one, in which is inseparably beheld the Word who through all things is united to the Father

He who thinks thus will give heresy no passage, through the innovation of the name "unbegotten," to do violence to piety

But in what he sets forth next, his discourse resembles bread that has a great admixture of sand

For by mixing heretical notions in with things soundly said, he makes even the nourishing part inedible through the stone mixed into it

For he calls the Lord living Wisdom, and operative Truth, and subsisting Power, and Life;

but he inserts into these statements the venom of heresy

He supposes the Son to be the true Life

Then he says that, as Son of God, he gives life to the living and gives life to the dead — true light, light that enlightens every man coming into the world, good, and provider of good things

Offering all these things like a kind of honey to the more guileless, he conceals the poison beneath the sweetness of these words

For he immediately adds to what has been said his corrupting notion, saying that the Son does not share the dignity with the one who begot him, nor the paternal essence with anyone else, but that he became, from his begetting, glorious and lord of glory, and that he received glory from the Father, not partaking of that Father's glory;

for the glory of the Almighty is incommunicable, as he said, "My glory I will not give to another"

These are the deadly drugs, which only those whose spiritual senses have been trained can discern

But the death-bearing malice of these things is uncovered more plainly in the last of what has been said

"Having received," he says, "glory from the Father, not having partaken of that Father's glory;"

for the glory of the Almighty is incommunicable, as he said, "My glory I will not give to another"

Who is that "other" to whom God said he would not give the glory? The prophet speaks concerning the adversary, but Eunomius refers the prophecy to the only-begotten God himself

For the prophet, having said in the person of God, "My glory I will not give to another," added, "nor my praises to graven images"

For since men, through deception, were offering to the adversary the worship and veneration owed to God, revering, in the images of carved idols, the enemy of God who took manifold forms among men through the idols, he who heals those who are ill, taking pity on the ruin of mankind, foretold through the prophet the loving-kindness that would come from him in later times, in the abolition of the idols, saying that, once the truth had been made manifest, his glory would no longer be given to another, nor would his praises be dedicated to graven images

For men, once they recognize my glory, will no longer be enslaved to those who by nature are not gods

Whatever, then, the prophet says in the person of the Lord concerning the opposing operation, these things the God-fighter refers to the very Lord who spoke them through the prophet

What such persecutor of the faith is remembered to have arisen even among tyrants? Who has contrived this — that he who was manifested in the flesh for the salvation of our souls, as we have believed, is not the true God, but the one who opposes God, who works through carved images and idols the deception against mankind? For the things said concerning that adversary through the prophet, these Eunomius transfers to the only-begotten God, not even understanding this very point: that it is the Only-Begotten himself who spoke these things in the prophet, just as this same man himself says in what follows, that this is the one who spoke in the prophets

What need is there for me to go through more concerning these things? For what was said before these also partakes of the same blasphemy

"Having received," he says, "glory from the Father, not having partaken of that Father's glory;"

for the glory of the Almighty God is incommunicable

For, even if the statement had been about Moses, who was glorified in the ministry of the Law, not even so would I have tolerated such a statement — even though he, having no glory of his own, appeared suddenly glorious to the Israelites through the gift that came to him from God

For that very glory which came upon the lawgiver was not that of anyone else, but of God himself — the glory which the Lord in the Gospel bids all to seek, in the words by which he accuses those who set great store by human glory, but do not seek the glory that comes from the only God

For by the very words in which he commanded them to seek the glory that comes from the only God, he also promised that it was possible to obtain what was sought

In saying, concerning the "radiance of glory," that he has received the glory, he says nothing other than that the radiance of glory is, in itself, without glory, and needs to receive glory from another, so that thus at some point he too might become lord of glory

Where, then, shall we place the words of Truth — both the one saying that he will be seen in the glory of the Father, and again, that "All that the Father has is mine"? To whom must the hearer give heed: to him who says that he who, as the Apostle says, is heir of all things in the Father is without share in the Father's glory, or to him who confesses that all that the Father has, he himself also has? And among "all things," surely, glory too is included

But he says that the glory of the Almighty is incommunicable

This neither Joel nor the great Peter attests — he who appropriated the prophetic word in his public address to the Jews

For both the prophet and the apostle say, in the person of God, "I will pour out from my Spirit upon all flesh"

He, then, who did not begrudge all flesh a share in his own Spirit — how would he not impart his own glory to the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, who has all that the Father has? Or perhaps one might say that Eunomius, even unwillingly, speaks the truth in this

For, properly speaking, "impartation" is said in the case of one who does not have glory of his own, to whom the having of it comes from elsewhere, not from nature;

but where one and the same nature is apprehended, he who is, by nature, that very thing which the Father is believed to be does not need one who imparts it piece by piece

but rather it is well to state it more clearly and plainly

What need has he of the Father's glory, who has the whole Father in himself, with nothing of what is beheld in the Father withheld? And what, indeed, is the dignity of the Almighty, of which Eunomius declares the Son to have no share? Let those, then, who are wise in their own eyes and knowledgeable in their own sight, speak their earthly doctrines — those who, as the prophet says, speak out of the earth

But as many of us as worship the Word and are disciples of the Truth — or rather, pray to be — let us not pass over even this utterance unexamined

For we know that, of all the names by which the divine is signified, some are indicative of the divine majesty, being spoken and conceived of in and by themselves, while others are named after the operations that are above us and above all creation

For when the divine Apostle says, "To the incorruptible, invisible, only wise God," and such things, he indicates through these names the concepts representative of that transcendent power;

but when he is called by the Scriptures compassionate and merciful, abounding in mercy, true, good, lord, physician, shepherd, way, bread, fountain, king, creator, maker, defender, he who is over all and through all, he who is all in all — these and such names contain the sense of the things wrought within creation by divine loving-kindness

The name "Almighty," then, is found by those who examine it carefully to signify, with respect to the divine power, nothing other than a certain relation — the sustaining operation over the things beheld in creation, which the sense of "Almighty" indicates

For just as he would not be called physician, were it not for the sake of the sick, nor would he be named merciful and compassionate and such things, were it not on account of one who needs compassion and mercy, so also he would not be Almighty, were it not that all creation needed the one who holds it fast and preserves it in being