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Translated by Cardinal Newman.
St Athanasius the Great Resources Online and in Print
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This Part: 128 Pages
Page 48
45. But since He Himself is said to be 'exalted,' and God 'gave' Him, and the heretics think this a defect [2075] or affection in the essence [2076] of the Word, it becomes necessary to explain how these words are used. He is said to be exalted from the lower parts of the earth, because death is ascribed even to Him. Both events are reckoned His, since it was His Body [2077] , and none other's, that was exalted from the dead and taken up into heaven. And again, the Body being His, and the Word not being external to it, it is natural that when the Body was exalted, He, as man, should, because of the body, be spoken of as exalted. If then He did not become man, let this not be said of Him: but if the Word became flesh, of necessity the resurrection and exaltation, as in the case of a man, must be ascribed to Him, that the death which is ascribed to Him may be a redemption of the sin of men and an abolition of death, and that the resurrection and exaltation may for His sake remain secure for us. In both respects he hath said of Him, 'God hath highly exalted Him,' and 'God hath given to Him;' that herein moreover he may show that it is not the Father that hath become flesh, but it is His Word, who has become man, and receives after the manner of men from the Father, and is exalted by Him, as has been said. And it is plain, nor would any one dispute it, that what the Father gives, He gives through. the Son. And it is marvellous and overwhelming verily; for the grace which the Son gives from the Father, that the Son Himself is said to receive; and the exaltation, which the Son bestows from the Father, with that the Son is Himself exalted. For He who is the Son of God, became Himself the Son of Man; and, as Word, He gives from the Father, for all things which the Father does and gives, He does and supplies through Him; and as the Son of Man, He Himself is said after the manner of men to receive what proceeds from Him, because His Body is none other than His, and is a natural recipient of grace, as has been said. For He received it as far as His man's nature [2078] was exalted; which exaltation was its being deified. But such an exaltation the Word Himself always had according to the Father's Godhead and perfection, which was His [2079] .
[2075] elattoma, ad Adelph. 4.
[2076] At first sight it would seem as if S. Athanasius here used ousia essence for subsistence, or person; but this is not true except with an explanation. Its direct meaning is here, as usual, essence, though indirectly it comes to imply subsistence. He is speaking of that Divine Essence which, though also the Almighty Father's, is as simply and entirely the Word's as if it were only His. Nay, even when the Essence of the Father is spoken of in a sort of contrast to that of the Son, as in the phrase ousia ex ousias, harsh as such expressions are, it is not accurate to say that ousia is used for subsistence or person, or that two ousiai are spoken of (vid. de Syn. 52, note 8), except, that is, by Arians, as Eusebius, supr. Ep. Eus. S:6 [or by Origen, Prolegg. ii. S:3 (2) a.] Just below we find phusis tou logou, S:51 init.
[2077] This was the question which came into discussion in the Nestorian controversy, when, as it was then expressed, all that took place in respect to the Eternal Word as man, belonged to His Person, and therefore might be predicated of Him; so that it was heretical not to confess the Word's body (or the body of God in the Person of the Word), the Word's death (as Athan, in the text), the Word's exaltation, and the Word's, or God's, Mother, who was in consequence called theotokos, which was the expression on which the controversy mainly turned. Cf. Orat. iii. 31, a passage as precise as if it had been written after the Nestorian and Eutychian controversies, though without the technical words then adopted.
[2078] ton anthropon.
[2079] ten patriken heautou theoteta, cf. de Syn. 45, note 1.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/athanasius/discourses-against-arians.asp?pg=48
