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Translated by Cardinal Newman.
St Athanasius the Great Resources Online and in Print
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This Part: 130 Pages
Page 20
74. For He says not, 'Before the world He founded me as Word or Son,' but simply, 'He founded me,' to shew again, as I have said, that not for His own sake [2723] but for those who are built upon Him does He here also speak, after the way of proverbs. For this knowing, the Apostle also writes, 'Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ; but let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon [2724] .' And it must be that the foundation should be such as the things built on it, that they may admit of being well compacted together. Being then the Word, He has not, as Word [2725] , any such as Himself, who may be compacted with Him; for He is Only-begotten; but having become man, He has the like of Him, those namely the likeness of whose flesh He has put on. Therefore according to His manhood He is founded, that we, as precious stones, may admit of building upon Him, and may become a temple of the Holy Ghost who dwelleth in us. And as He is a foundation, and we stones built upon Him, so again He is a Vine and we knit to Him as branches,--not according to the Essence of the Godhead; for this surely is impossible; but according to His manhood, for the branches must be like the vine, since we are like Him according to the flesh. Moreover, since the heretics have such human notions, we may suitably confute them with human resemblances contained in the very matter they urge. Thus He saith not, 'He made me a foundation,' lest He might seem to be made and to have a beginning of being, and they might thence find a shameless occasion of irreligion; but, 'He founded me.' Now what is founded is founded for the sake of the stones which are raised upon it; it is not a random process, but a stone is first transported from the mountain and set down in the depth of the earth. And while a stone is in the mountain, it is not yet founded; but when need demands, and it is transported, and laid in the depth of the earth, then forthwith if the stone could speak, it would say, 'He now founded me, who brought me hither from the mountain.' Therefore the Lord also did not when founded take a beginning of existence; for He was the Word before that; but when He put on our body, which He severed and took from Mary, then He says 'He hath founded me;' as much as to say, 'Me, being the Word, He hath enveloped in a body of earth.' For so He is founded for our sakes, taking on Him what is ours [2726] , that we, as incorporated and compacted and bound together in Him through the likeness of the flesh, may attain unto a perfect man, and abide [2727] immortal and incorruptible.
[2723] S:60, n. 2.
[2724] 1 Cor. iii. 10, 11; Didym. Trin. iii. 3. p. 341.
[2725] S:8, note 3^a.
[2726] Letter 59. 6. Leon. Ep. 28. 3.
[2727] diameinomen, 69, n. 3.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/athanasius/discourses-against-arians-2.asp?pg=20
