Dialogues. The “Eranistes” or “Polymorphus” of the Blessed Theodoretus, Bishop of Cyrus.
“But you persist continually in your blasphemies attacking the Son of God, and using these words ‘as the Son and the Father are one, so also are the soul which the Son took and the Son Himself one.’ You are ignorant that the Son and the Father are one on account of their one substance and the same Godhead; but the soul and the Son are each of a different substance and different nature. For if the soul of the Son and the Son Himself are one in the same sense in which the Father and the Son are one, then the Father and the Soul will be one and the soul of the Son shall one day say ‘He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father;’ but this is not so; God forbid. For the Son and the Father are one because there is no distinction between their qualities, but the soul and the Son are distinguished alike in nature and substance, in that the soul which is naturally of one substance with us was made by Him. For if the soul and the Son are one in the same manner in which the Father and the Son are one, as Origen would have it, then the soul equally with the Son will be ‘the brightness of God’s glory and express image of His person.’ But this is impossible; impossible that the Son and the soul should be one as He and the Father are one. And what will Origen do when again he attacks himself? For he writes, never could the soul distressed and ‘exceeding sorrowful’ be the ‘firstborn of every creature.’ For God the Word, as being stronger than the soul, the Son Himself, says ‘I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it again.’ If then the Son is stronger than His own soul, as is agreed, how can His soul be equal to God and in the form of God? For we say that ‘He emptied Himself and took upon Him the form of a servant.’ In the extravagance of his impieties Origen surpasses all other heretics, as we have shewn, for if the Word exists in the form of God and is equal to God and if he supposes thus daring to write the soul of the Saviour to be in the form of God and equal with God, how can the equal be greater, when the inferior in nature testifies to the superiority of what is beyond it?”
Testimony of the Holy John Chrysostom, bishop of Constantinople.
From the Discourse held in the Great Church:—
“Thy Lord exalted man to heaven, and thou wilt not even give him a share of the agora. But why do I say ‘to heaven’? He seated man on a kingly throne. Thou expellest him from the city.”
Of the same, on the beginning of Ps. xlii. :—
“Up to this day Paul does not cease to say ‘We are ambassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us; we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God.’ Nor did He stand here, but taking the first fruits of thy nature He sat down ‘above all principality and power and might, and every name that is named not only in this world but in the world to come.’ What could be equal to this honour? The first fruits of our race which has so much offended and is so dishonoured sits so high and enjoys honour so vast.”
Of the same about the division of tongues:—
“For bethink thee what it is to see our nature riding on the Cherubim and all the power of heaven mustered round about it. Consider too Paul’s wisdom and how many terms he searches for that he may set forth the love of Christ to men, for he does not say simply the grace, nor yet simply the riches, but the ‘exceeding great riches of His grace in His kindness.’”
Of the same from his Dogmatic Oration, on the theme that the word spoken and deeds done in humility by Christ were not so spoken and done on account of infirmity, but on account of differences of dispensation:—
“And after His resurrection, when He saw His disciple disbelieving, He did not shrink from shewing him both wound and print of nails, and letting him lay his hand upon the scars, and said ‘Examine and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones.’ The reason of His not assuming the manhood of full age from the beginning, and of His deigning to be conceived, to be born, to be suckled, and to live so long upon the earth, was that by the long period of the time and all the other circumstances, He might give a warranty for this very thing.”
Of the same against those who assert that demons rule human affairs:—
“Nothing was more worthless than man and than man nothing has become more precious. He was the last part of the reasonable creation, but the feet have been made the head, and through the firstfruits have been borne up to the kingly throne. Just as some man noble and bountiful, on seeing a wretch escaped from shipwreck who has saved nothing but his bare body from the waves, welcomes him with open hands, clothes him in a radiant robe, and exalts him to the highest honour, so too hath God done towards our nature. Man had lost all that he had, his freedom, his intercourse with God, his abode in Paradise, his painless life, whence he came forth like a man all naked from a wreck, but God received him and straightway clothed him, and, taking him by the hand, led him onward step by step and brought him up to heaven.”
“But God made the gain greater than the loss, and exalted our nature to the royal throne. So Paul exclaims ‘And have raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places’ at His right hand.”
Of the same from his III rd oration against the Jews:—
“He opened the heavens; of foes he made friends; He introduced them into heaven; He seated our nature on the right hand of the throne; He gave us countless other good things.”
Of the same from his discourse on the Ascension:—
“To this distance and height did He exalt our nature. Look where low it lay, and where it mounted up. Lower it was impossible to descend than where man descended; higher it was impossible to rise than where He exalted him.”
Of the same from his interpretation of the Epistle to the Ephesians:—
“According to His good pleasure, which He had proposed in himself, that is which He earnestly desired, He was as it were in labour to tell us the mystery. And what is this mystery? That He wishes to seat man on high; as in truth came to pass.”
Of the same from the same interpretation:—
“God of our Lord Jesus Christ speaks of this and not of God the Word.”
Of the same from the same interpretation:—
“‘And when we were dead in sins He quickened us together in Christ;’ again Christ stands in the midst, and the work is wonderful. If the first fruits live we live also. He quickened both Him and us. Seest thou that all these things are spoken according to the flesh?”
Of the same from the gospel according to St. John:—
“Why does he add ‘and dwelt among us’? It is as though he said: Imagine nothing absurd from the phrase ‘was made.’ For I have not mentioned any change in that unchangeable nature, but of tabernacling and of inhabiting. Now that which tabernacles is not identical with the tabernacle, but one thing tabernacles in another; otherwise there would be no tabernacling. Nothing inhabits itself. I spoke of a distinction of substance. For by the union and the conjunction God the Word and the flesh are one without confusion or destruction of the substances, but by ineffable and indescribable union.”
Of the same from the gospel according to St. Matthew:—
“Just as one standing in the space between two that are separated from one another, stretches out both his hands and joins them, so too did He, joining the old and the new, the divine nature and the human, His own with ours.”
Of the same from the Ascension of Christ:—
“For so when two champions stand ready for the fight, some other intervening between them, at once stops the struggle, and puts an end to their ill will, so too did Christ. As God He was wroth, but we made light of His wrath, and turned away our faces from our loving Lord. Then Christ flung Himself in the midst, and restored both natures to mutual love, and Himself took on Him the weight of the punishment laid by the Father on us.”
“Lo He brought the first fruits of our nature to the Father and the Father Himself approved the gift, alike on account of the high dignity of Him that bought it and of the faultlessness of the offering. He received it in His own hands, He made a chair of His own throne; nay more He seated it on His own right hand, let us then recognise who it was to whom it was said ‘Sit thou on my right hand’ and what was that nature to which God said ‘Dust thou art and to dust thou shalt return.’”
Of the same a little further on:—
“What arguments to use, what words to utter I cannot tell; the nature which was rotten, worthless, declared lowest of all, vanquished everything and overcame the world. To-day it hath been thought worthy to be made higher than all, to-day it hath received what from old time angels have desired; to-day it is possible for archangels to be made spectators of what has been for ages longed for, and they contemplate our nature, shining on the throne of the King in the glory of His immortality.”
Testimony of St. Flavianus, bishop of Antioch.
From the Gospel according to St. Luke:—
“In all of us the Lord writes the express image of His holiness, and in various ways shows our nature the way of salvation. Many and clear proofs does He give us both of His bodily advent and of His Godhead working by a body’s means. For He wished to give us assurance of both His natures.”
Of the same on the Theophany:—
“‘Who can express the noble acts of the Lord, or shew forth all His praise?’ who could express in words the greatness of His goodness toward us? Human nature is joined to Godhead, while both natures remain independent.”
Testimony of Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem.
From his fourth catechetical oration concerning the ten dogmas.
Of the birth from a virgin:—
“Believe thou that this only begotten Son of God, on account of our sins, came down from heaven to earth, having taken on Him this manhood of like passions with us, and being born of holy Virgin and of Holy Ghost. This incarnation was effected, not in seeming and unreality, but in reality. He did not only pass through the Virgin, as through a channel, but was verily made flesh of her. Like us He really ate, and of the Virgin was really suckled. For if the incarnation was an unreality, then our salvation is a delusion. The Christ was twofold—the visible man, the invisible God. He ate as man, verily like ourselves, for the flesh that He wore was of like passions with us; He fed the five thousand with five loaves as God. As man He really died. As God He raised the dead on the fourth day. As man He slept in the boat. As God He walked upon the waters.”
Testimony of Antiochus, bishop of Ptolemais: —
“Do not confound the natures and you will have a lively apprehension of the incarnation.”
Testimony of the holy Hilarius, bishop and confessor, in his ninth book, “de Fide”: