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Translated by Bl. Jackson.
St Basil the Great Resources Online and in Print
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This Part: 128 Pages
Page 20
8. Again, as is said through Solomon the Wise in the Proverbs, "He was created;" and He is named "Beginning of ways" [1835] of good news, which lead us to the kingdom of heaven. He is not in essence and substance a creature, but is made a "way" according to the oeconomy. Being made and being created signify the same thing. As He was made a way, so was He made a door, a shepherd, an angel, a sheep, and again a High Priest and an Apostle, [1836] the names being used in other senses. What again would the heretics say about God unsubjected, and about His being made sin for us? [1837] For it is written "But when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put all things under Him." [1838] Are you not afraid, sir, of God called unsubjected? For He makes thy subjection His own; and because of thy struggling against goodness He calls himself unsubjected. In this sense too He once spoke of Himself as persecuted--"Saul, Saul," He says, "why persecutest thou me?" [1839] on the occasion when Saul was hurrying to Damascus with a desire to imprison the disciples. Again He calls Himself naked, when any one of his brethren is naked. "I was naked," He says, "and ye clothed me;" [1840] and so when another is in prison He speaks of Himself as imprisoned, for He Himself took away our sins and bare our sicknesses. [1841] Now one of our infirmities is not being subject, and He bare this. So all the things which happen to us to our hurt He makes His own, taking upon Him our sufferings in His fellowship with us.
[1835] The text of Prov. viii. 22 in the LXX. is kurios ektise me archen hodon autou eis erga autou. The rendering of A.V. is "possessed," with "formed" in the margin. The Hebrew verb occurs some eighty times in the Old Testament, and in only four other passages is translated by possess, viz., Gen. xiv. 19, 22, Ps. cxxxix. 13, Jer. xxxii. 15, and Zec. xi. 5. In the two former, though the LXX. renders the word in the Psalms ekteso, it would have borne the sense of "create." In the passage under discussion the Syriac agrees with the LXX., and among critics adopting the same view Bishop Wordsworth cites Ewald, Hitzig, and Genesius. The ordinary meaning of the Hebrew is "get" or "acquire," and hence it is easy to see how the idea of getting or possessing passed in relation to the Creator into that of creation. The Greek translators were not unanimous and Aquila wrote ektesato. The passage inevitably became the Jezreel or Low Countries of the Arian war, and many a battle was fought on it. The depreciators of the Son found in it Scriptural authority for calling Him ktisma, e.g. Arius in the Thalia, is quoted by Athanasius in Or. c. Ar. I. iii. S: 9, and such writings of his followers as the Letter of Eusebius of Nicomedia to Paulinus of Tyre cited in Theod., Ecc. Hist. I. v., and Eunomius as quoted by Greg. Nyss., c. Eunom. II. 10; but as Dr. Liddon observes in his Bampton Lect. (p. 60, ed. 1868), "They did not doubt that this created Wisdom was a real being or person." ektisewas accepted by the Catholic writers, but explained to refer to the manhood only, cf. Eustathius of Antioch, quoted in Theod., Dial. I. The view of Athanasius will be found in his dissertation on the subject in the Second Discourse against the Arians, pp. 357-385 of Schaff & Wace's edition. cf. Bull, Def. Fid. Nic. II. vi. 8.
[1836] Heb. iii. 1.
[1837] cf. 2 Cor. v. 21.
[1838] 1 Cor. xv. 28. i.e. Because the Son then shall be subjected, He is previously anupotaktos, not as being "disobedient" (1 Tim. i. 9), or "unruly" (Tit. i. 6, 10), but as being made man, and humanity, though subject unto Him, is not yet seen to be "put under Him" (Heb. ii. 8).
[1839] Acts ix. 4.
[1840] Matt. xxv. 36.
[1841] cf. Isa. liii. 4 and Matt. viii. 17.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/basil/letters.asp?pg=20
