I. Matt. 3, 17. 1 Disc. who ventures to rank among creatures One who he confesses the while to be God, and says, that He was not till He was made? or who is there, who to the God in whom he has put faith, refuses to give credit, when He says, This is My Beloved Son, on the pretence that He is not a Son, but a creature? rather, such madness would rouse an universal indignation. Nor does Scripture afford them any pretext; for it has been often shewn, and it shall be shewn now, that their doctrine is alien to the divine oracles. Therefore, since all that remains is to say that from the devil came their 'p. 5, mania, (for of such opinions he alone is sower1,) proceed we to resist him;-for with him is our real conflict, and they are but instruments ;-that, the Lord aiding us, and the enemy, as he is wont, being overcome with arguments, they may be put to shame, when they see him without resource who sowed this heresy in them, and may learn though late, that, as being 2 p. 79, Arians, they are not Christians. note k. ref. 4. CHAP. IV. THAT THE SON IS ETERNAL AND INCREATE. These attributes, being the points in dispute, are first proved by direct texts of Scripture. Concerning the "eternal power" of God in Rom. i. 20. which is shewn to mean the Son. Remarks on the Arian formula, "Once the Son was not," its supporters not daring to speak of " a time when the Son was not." IV. 1. Ar his suggestion then ye have maintained and ye think, CHAP. that "there was once when the Son was not ;" this is the first cloke of your views of doctrine which has to be stripped off. Say §. 11. 66 then what was once when the Son was not, O slanderous and irreligious men"? If ye say the Father, your blasphemy is but greater; for it is impious to say that He was once," or to signify Him by the word "once." For He is ever, and is now, and as the Son is, so is He, and is Himself He that is, and Father of the Son. But if ye say that the Son was once, when He Himself was not, the answer is foolish and unmeaning. For how could He both be and not be? In this difficulty, you can but answer, that there was a time, when the Word was not; for your very adverb "once" naturally signifies this. And your other, "The Son was not before His generation," is equivalent to saying, "There was once when He was not," for both the one and the other signify that there is a time before the Word. 2. Whence then this your discovery? Why do ye, as the Ps. 2, 1. heathen, rage, and imagine vain words against the Lord and or a Athan. observes that this formula of the Arians is a mere evasion to escape using the word "time." vid. also Cyril. Thesaur. iv. pp. 19, 20. Else let them explain,-"There was," what "when the Son was not?" what was before the Son? since He Himself was before all times and ages, which He created (supr. p. 30, note n.) Thus, if "when" be a word of time, He it is who was "when" He was not, which is absurd. Did they mean, how ever, that it was the Father who "was" DISC. against His Christ? for no holy Scripture has used such 1. 4. 5. 20. rob "who is" and "who was" of eternity?" This too in confutation of the Jews hath Paul written in his Epistle to Rom. 9, the Romans, Of whom as concerning the flesh Christ, who is over all, God blessed for ever; while silencing the Greeks, Rom. 1, he has said, The invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal Power and Godhead; and what the Power of God is, he teaches us elsewhere himself, Christ the Power of God and the Wisdom of God. Surely in these words he does not designate the Father, as ye often whisper one to another, affirming that the Father is His eternal power. This is not so; for he says not, "God Himself is the power," but "His is the power." Very plain is it to all that "His" is not "He;" yet not something alien but rather proper to Him. 1 Cor. 1, 24. 2 Cor. 3,16.17. 3. Study too the context and turn to the Lord; now the Lord is that Spirit ; and ye will see that it is the Son who b ráds λiyu. Our translation of the New Testament renders such phrases similarly, "he." did aiyu" wherefore he saith," but in the margin "it." Eph. v. 14. senus gì rñs ißdóμns ourw. "he spake." Heb. iv. 4. And we may take in explanation "As the Holy Ghost saith, To-day," &c. Heb. iii. 7. Or understand with Athan.daaśyğu λśywvóπæõλos.infr. §. 57. as sirev i 'Iwávvns. Orat. iii. §. 30. vid. also iv. §. 31. On the other hand, "as the Scripture hath said," John vii. 42. "what saith the Scripture ?" Rom. iv. 3. "that the Scripture saith is vain," James iv. 5. And so Athan. ode ǹ Osía ygapù aśyoura. infr. §. 56. os r Osin reapn.. Onoí. Orat. iv. §. 27. Aiyu yeap. de decr. §. 22. Onoìv å vgaon. de Syn. §. 52. Athan. has so interpreted this text, supr. p. 149. vid. Justinian's Comment for its various interpretations. It was either a received interpretation, or had been adduced at Nicæa, for Asterius had some years before these Discourses re plied to it, vid. supr. p. 101, and Orat. ii. §. 37. d S. Athanasius observes, Serap. i. 4-7. that the Holy Ghost is never in Scripture called simply "Spirit" without the addition "of God" or "of the Father" or "from Me" or of the article, or of "Holy," or "Comforter," or "of truth," or unless He has been spoken of just before. Accordingly this text is understood of the third Person in the Holy Trinity by Origen, contr. Cels.vi. 70. Basil de Sp. S. n. 52. PseudoAthan. de comm. ess. 6. On the other hand, the word oua, "Spirit," is used more or less distinctly for our Lord's Divine Nature, whether in itself or as incarnate, in Rom. i. 4. 1 Cor. xv. 45. 1 Tim. iii. 16. Hebr. ix. 14. 1 Pet. iii. 18. John vi. 63, &c. Indeed the early Fathers speak as if the "Holy Spirit" which came down upon S. Mary might be considered the Word. E. g. Tertullian against the Valentinians, "If the Spirit of God The Son is the Father's Eternal Power and Godhead. 197 IV. 17. contr. is signified. For after making mention of the creation, he CHAP. naturally speaks of the Framer's Power as seen in it, which Power, I say, is the Word of God, by whom all things §. 12. were made. If indeed the creation is sufficient of itself alone, without the Son, to make God known, see that you fall not into the further opinion that without the Son it came to be. But if through the Son it came to be, and in Him all things consist, it must follow that he who con- Col. 1, templates the creation rightly, is contemplating also the Word who framed it, and through Him begins to apprehend the Father1. And if, as the Saviour also says, No one1 vid. knoweth the Father, save the Son, and he to whom the Son Gent. shall reveal Him, and if on Philip's asking, Shew us the 45-47. Mat.11, Father, He said not, "Behold the creation," but, He that 27. hath seen Me, hath seen the Father, reasonably doth Paul, John14, while accusing the Greeks of contemplating the harmony and order of the creation without reflecting on the Framing Word within it; (for the creatures witness to their own Framer;) and wishing that through the creation they might apprehend the true God, and abandon their worship of it, reasonably hath He said, His eternal Power and Godhead, thereby Rom. 1, signifying the Son. 9. 20. 4. And whereas the sacred writers say, "Who exists before the ages," and By whom He made the ages, they thereby Heb. 1, as clearly preach the eternal and everlasting being of the Son, 2. even while they are designating God Himself. Thus, if Esaias says, The Everlasting God, the Creator of the of the earth; and Susanna said, O Everlasting God; did not descend into the womb to partake in flesh from the womb, why did He descend at all ?" de carn. Chr. 19. vid. also ibid. 5 and 14. contr. Prax. 26. Just. Apol. i. 33. Iren. Hær. v. 1. Cypr. Idol. Van. 6. (p. 19. Oxf. Tr.) Lactant. Instit. iv. 12. vid. also Hilar. Trin. ii. 27. Athan. λoyos iv rúμar ixλarrs rò owμa. Serap. i. 31 fin. ir λόγῳ ἦν τὸ πνεῦμα. ibid. iii. 6. And more distinctly even as late as S. Maximus, aurdy ävri oxogãs ovλλaßoûra Tov λóyor, xsxúnxs. t. 2. p. 309. The earliest ecclesiastical authorities are S. Ignatius ad Smyrn. init. and S. Hermas (even though his date were A.D. 150.) who also says plainly, Filius autem ends Is. 40, and Spiritus Sanctus est. Past. iii. 5. n. 5. 28. I. Bar. 4, 20. 22. Hebr. 1, 3. DISC. Baruch wrote, I will cry unto the Everlasting in my days, and shortly after, My hope is in the Everlasting, that He will save you, and joy is come unto me from the Holy One; yet forasmuch as the Apostle, writing to the Hebrews, says, Who being the radiance of His glory and the Expression of Ps. 90, His Person; and David too in the eighty-ninth Psalm, And 17. the brightness of the Lord be upon us, and, In Thy Light Ps. 36, 9. shall we see Light, who has so little sense as to doubt of the supr. eternity of the Son1? for when did man see light without the pp. 20, brightness of its radiance, that he may say of the Son, "There was once, when He was not," or "Before His generation He was not." 1 48. 13. 5. And the words addressed to the Son in the hundred Ps. 145, and forty-fourth Psalm, Thy kingdom is a kingdom of all ages, forbid any one to imagine any interval at all in which the Word did not exist. For if every interval is measured 2 aláva by ages, and of all the ages the Word is King and Maker, therefore, whereas no interval at all exists prior to Him", it 2 3 alávios were madness to say, "There was once when the Everlasting3 was not," and "From nothing is the Son." John 14, 6. John 10, 14. John 8, 12. John 13, 13. §. 13. 66 6. And whereas the Lord Himself says, I am the Truth, not I became the Truth;" but always, I am,—I am the Shepherd, I am the Light, and again, Call ye Me not, Lord and Master? and ye call Me well, for so I am, who, hearing such language from God, and Wisdom, and Word of the Father, speaking of Himself, will any longer hesitate about its truth, and not forthwith believe that in the phrase I am, is signified that the Son is eternal and unoriginate? 7. It is plain then from the above that the Scriptures declare the Son's eternity; it is equally plain from what follows that the Arian phrases "He was not," and "before" and "when," are in the same Scriptures predicated of creatures. Moses, for instance, in his account of the generation of our system, Gen. 2, says, And every plant of the field, before it was in the earth, 5. e Vid. p. 30, note n. The subject is treated at length in Greg. Nyss. contr. Eunom. i. t. 2. Append. p. 93-101. vid, also Ambros. de Fid. i. 8-11. As time measures the material creation, so "ages" were considered to measure the immaterial, as the duration of Angels. This had been a philosophical distinction, Timæus says, sixwv iori χρόνος τῷ ἀγεννάτω χρόνω, ὃν αἰῶνα ποταyogsúoμss. vid. also Philon. Quod Deus Immut. 6. Euseb. Laud. Č. p. 501. Naz. Or. 38, 8. |