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By Archibald Robertson.
St Athanasius the Great Resources Online and in Print
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76 Pages (Part II)
Page 24
Now Athanasius does not totally ignore any one of these conceptions, unless it be that of a transaction with the devil, which he scarcely touches even in Orat. ii. 52 (see note there). Of the forensic view he is indeed almost clear. His reference to the 'debt' (to opheilomenon, Incar. 20, Orat. ii. 66) which had to be paid is connected not so much with the Anselmic idea of a satisfaction due, as with the fact that death was by the divine word (Gen. iii.), attached to sin as its penalty.
The aspect of the death of Christ as a vicarious sacrifice (anti panton, de Incar. 9; prosphora and thusia, 10) is not passed over. But on the whole another aspect predominates. The categories under which Athanasius again and again states the soteriological problem are those of zoe and thanatos, and aphtharsia. So far as he works the problem out in detail it is under physical categories, without doing full justice to the ideas of guilt and reconciliation, of the reunion of will between man and God. The numberless passages which bear this out cannot be quoted in full, but the point is of sufficient importance to demand the production of a few details.
(a) The original state of man was not one of 'nature,' for man's nature is phthora; (ten en thanato kata phusin phthoran, Incar. 3, cf. 8, 10, 44) the Word was imparted to them in that they were made kata ten tou theou eikona (ib). Hence what later theology marks off as an exclusively supernatural gift is according to Athanasius inalienable from human nature, i.e. it can be impaired but not absolutely lost (Incar. 14, and apparently Orat. iii. 10 fin.; the question of the teaching of Athan. upon the natural endowments of man belongs specially to the Introd. to de Incarnatione, where it will be briefly discussed). Accordingly their infraction of the divine command (by turning their minds, c. Gent. 3, to lower things instead of to the theoria ton theion), logically involved them in non-existence (de Incar. 4), but actually, inasmuch as the likeness of God was only gradually lost, in phthora, regarded as a process toward non-existence. This again involved men in increasing ignorance of God, by the gradual obliteration of the eikon, the indwelling Logos, by virtue of which alone men could read the open book (c. Gent. 34 fin.) of God's manifestation of Himself in the Universe. It is evident that the pathological point of view here prevails over the purely ethical: the perversion of man's will merges in the general idea of phthora, the first need of man is a change in his nature; or rather the renewed infusion of that higher and divine nature which he has gradually lost. (Cf. de Incar. 44, chrezonton tes autou theotetos dia tou homoiou).
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/athanasius/athanasius-life-arianism-2.asp?pg=24
