St Athanasius the Great FOUR DISCOURSES AGAINST THE ARIANS, Part II, Complete

Translated by Cardinal Newman.

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Page 11

65. And thus since the truth declares that the Word is not by nature a creature, it is fitting now to say, in what sense He is 'beginning of ways.' For when the first way, which was through Adam, was lost, and in place of paradise we deviated unto death, and heard the words, 'Dust thou art, and unto dust [2651] shalt thou return,' therefore the Word of God, who loves man, puts on Him created flesh at the Father's will [2652] , that whereas the first man had made it dead through the transgression, He Himself might quicken it in the blood of His own body [2653] , and might open 'for us a way new and living,' as the Apostle says, 'through the veil, that is to say, His flesh [2654] ;' which he signifies elsewhere thus, 'Wherefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation; old things are passed away, behold all things are become new [2655] .' But if a new creation has come to pass, some one must be first of this creation; now a man, made of earth only, such as we are become from the transgression, he could not be. For in the first creation, men had become unfaithful, and through them that first creation had been lost; and there was need of some one else to renew the first creation, and preserve the new which had come to be. Therefore from love to man none other than the Lord, the 'beginning' of the new creation, is created as 'the Way,' and consistently says, 'The Lord created me a beginning of ways for His works;' that man might walk no longer according to that first creation, but there being as it were a beginning of a new creation, and with the Christ 'a beginning of its ways,' we might follow Him henceforth, who says to us, 'I am the Way:'--as the blessed Apostle teaches in Colossians, saying, 'He is the Head of the body, the Church, who is the Beginning, the First-born from the dead, that in all things He might have the preeminence.'

[2651] Gen. iii. 19.

[2652] S:31, n. 8.

[2653] Vid. Or. i. S:48, 7, i. 51, 5, supr. 56, 5. Irenaeus, Haer. iii. 19, n. 1. Cyril. in Joan. lib. ix. cir. fin. This is the doctrine of S. Athanasius and S. Cyril, one may say, passim.

[2654] Heb. x. 20.

[2655] 2 Cor. v. 17.

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