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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 71
5. A number of scattered passages in Athanasius lead us to the same conclusion. For instance, if the Arian formula had the sense which is here maintained, of being an argument against our Lord's eternity, the Catholic answer would be, 'He could not be before His generation because His generation is eternal, as being from the Father.' Now this is precisely the language Athanasius uses, when it occurs to him to introduce the words in question. Thus in Orat. ii. S:57 he says, 'The creatures began to come to be (ginesthai); but the Word of God, not having beginning (archen) of being, surely did not begin to be, nor begin to come to be, but was always. And the works have a beginning (archen) in the making, and the beginning precedes things which come to be; but the Word not being of such, rather Himself becomes the Framer of those things which have a beginning. And the being of things originate is measured by their becoming (en to ginesthai), and at some beginning (origin) doth God begin to make them through the Word, that it may be known that they were not before their origination (prin genesthai); but the Word hath His being in no other origin than the Father (vid. supr. S:11, note 1), 'whom they themselves allow to be unoriginate, so that He too exists unoriginately in the Father, being His offspring not His creature.' We shall find that other Fathers say just the same. Again, we have already come to a passage where for 'His generation,' he substitutes 'making,' a word which Bull would not say that either the Nicene Council or S. Hippolytus would use; clearly shewing that the Arians were not quoting and denying a Catholic statement in the ouk en prin, &c., but laying down one of their own. 'Who is there in all mankind, Greek or Barbarian, who ventures to rank among creatures One whom he confesses the while to be God, and says that "He was not 'before He was made,' prin poiethe."' Orat. i. S:10. Arius, who is surely the best explainer of his own words, says the same; that is, he interprets 'generation' by 'making,' or confesses that he is bringing forward an argument, not opposing a dogma; 'Before His generation,' he says, 'or creation, or destination (horisthe), Rom. i. 4), or founding (vid. Prov. viii. 23), He was not; for He was not ingenerate.' Theod., Hist. i. 4. Eusebius of Nicomedia also, in a passage which has already come before us, says distinctly, '"It is plain to any one," that what has been made was not before its generation; but what came to be has an origin of being.' De Syn. S:17.
6. If there are passages in Athanasius which seem to favour the opposite interpretation, that is, to imply that the Catholics held or allowed, as Bp. Bull considers, that 'before His generation, He was,' they admit of an explanation. E.g. "How is He not in the number of the creatures, if, as they say, He was not before His generation? for it is proper to the creatures and works, not to be before their generation.' Orat. ii. S:22. This might be taken to imply that the Arians said, 'He was not,' and Catholics 'He was.' But the real meaning is this, 'How is He not a creature, if the formula be true, which they use, "He was not before His generation?" for it may indeed properly be said of creatures that "they were not before their generation."' And so again when he says, 'if the Son was not before His generation, Truth was not always in God,' supr. S:20, he does not thereby imply that the Son was before His generation, but he means, 'if it be true that, &c.,' 'if the formula holds,' 'if it can be said of the Son, "He was not, &c."' Accordingly, shortly afterwards, in a passage already cited, he says the same of the Almighty Father in the way of parallel; 'God who is, hath He so become, whereas He was not, or "is He too before His generation?"' (S:25), not implying here any generation at all, but urging that the question is idle and irrelevant, that the formula is unmeaning and does not apply to, cannot be said of, Father or Son.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/athanasius/discourses-against-arians.asp?pg=71
