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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 50
22. The Word then has the real and true identity of nature with the Father; but to us it is given to imitate it, as has been said; for He immediately adds, 'I in them and Thou in Me; that they may be made perfect in one.' Here at length the Lord asks something greater and more perfect for us; for it is plain that the Word has come to be in us [2953] , for He has put on our body. 'And Thou Father in Me;' 'for I am Thy Word, and since Thou art in Me, because I am Thy Word, and I in them because of the body, and because of Thee the salvation of men is perfected in Me, therefore I ask that they also may become one, according to the body that is in Me and according to its perfection; that they too may become perfect, having oneness with It, and having become one in It; that, as if all were carried by Me, all may be one body and one spirit, and may grow up unto a perfect man [2954] .' For we all, partaking of the Same, become one body, having the one Lord in ourselves. The passage then having this meaning, still more plainly is refuted the heterodoxy of Christ's enemies. I repeat it; if He had said simply and absolutely [2955] 'that they may be one in Thee,' or 'that they and I may be one in Thee,' God's enemies had had some plea, though a shameless one; but in fact He has not spoken simply, but, 'As Thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee, that they may be all one.' Moreover, using the word 'as,' He signifies those who become distantly as He is in the Father; distantly not in place but in nature; for in place nothing is far from God [2956] , but in nature only all things are far from Him. And, as I said before, whoso uses the particle 'as' implies, not identity, nor equality, but a pattern of the matter in question, viewed in a certain respect [2957] .
[2953] Cf. de Decr. 31. fin.
[2954] Vid. Eph. iv. 13
[2955] Cf. ii. 62, n. 13.
[2956] Vid. de Decr. 11, n. 5, which is explained by the present passage. When Ath. there says, 'without all in nature,' he must mean as here, 'far from all things in nature.' S. Clement loc. cit. gives the same explanation, as there noticed. It is observable that the contr. Sab. Greg. 10 (which the Benedictines consider not Athan.'s) speaks as de Decr. supr. Eusebius says the same thing, de Incorpor. i. init. ap. Sirm. Op. p. 68. vid. S. Ambros. Quomodo creatura in Deo esse potest, &c. de Fid. i. 106. and supr. S:1, n. 10.
[2957] Vid. Glass. Phil. Sacr. iii. 5. can. 27. and Dettmars, de Theol. Orig. ap. Lumper. Hist. Patr. t. 10, p. 212. Vid. also supr. ii. 55, n. 8.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/athanasius/discourses-against-arians-2.asp?pg=50
