|
HOME | GREEK LANGUAGE |
LIBRARIES |
BLOG | HELP | SEARCH | BOOKSTORE | FREEWARE |
|
|
Translated by P. E. Pusey
St Cyril of Alexandria Resources Online and in Print
|
This Part: 115 Pages
Page 80
"The [18] good glory of the Only-Begotten one while is ascribed to the Father, for it is, He says, My Father which glorifieth Me, other while to the Spirit, for the Spirit of Truth, He says, shall glorify Me, other while to the power of Christ, for they, it says, went forth and preached the word everywhere, the Lord co-working and confirming the word through the signs that followed."
ยง7. If he says that the Only-Begotten Word of God, as though lacking glory in that He is and is conceived of as Word and not yet Incarnate, is glorified by the Father and the Holy Ghost:----that he both blunders and has missed the truth, I will leave saying for the present (for occasion leads us to something else); but he seems to me to have forgotten what he had just now thought out and said, for he said, "Not one and another is Christ, not other and other son, for we have not two Christs and two sons." But, O most understanding, would I say, if thou affirm that the good glory of the Only-Begotten is ascribed to the power of Christ, how will He be not one and another, or how not wholly and surely two? for if not the same be giver and receiver, or he ascribe to another than himself the things which accrue to him by nature, Christ hath wrought being possessed, as being other than the Only-Begotten: for if the good glory of the Only-Begotten have been (as you say) ascribed to him; and the Divine-uttering disciples using the power that came from him, preached and wrought miracles, how is that not true that I said? for he hath wrought using other's power, that he which wrought and not himself rather may be glorified by those in the world. What then (tell me) appears there more in Him than in the holy Apostles? for they have wrought wonders not by their own power, and this themselves clearly confessed, for they were worthy of admiration in knowing this too and glorifying Him Who worketh in them. Then how ought not Christ Who according to thee was possessed by another and had from without the good glory of the Only-Begotten, to have proclaimed to those who approach Him as God, and supplicate succour from Him, In the name of the Only-Begotten, or in His Might, be to thee this good thing: for so used to do the all-wise disciples, every where naming Jesus of Nazareth. But to no one whatever hath He declared this, but rather to His own power used He to attribute what was accomplished, one time saying to the blind man, Believe ye that I am able to do this? and requiring[ ]their assent, at another ordering with authority saying, I will, be clean. Why dost thou not, letting go the fables fit for old women which have been invented by thyself alone, occupy thyself with wise mind about the depth of the mystery? [19] []
But one may see that he little recks of things needful unto profit, but is afraid lest he let drop ought true and be caught thinking anything praiseworthy: and thinks every thing that is most discordant and makes a condemnation utterly inconsiderate of the doctrines of the church, albeit he should have remembered God saying by the mouth of Ezekiel to those who are over the spiritual flocks, Ye ate the good pasture and drank the pure water and troubled the residue with your feet, and My flock fed on the treadings down of your feet and drank the water troubled by your feet. For when WE apply our minds to the God-inspired Scriptures, we eat the good pasture, as it is written, and we drink the untroubled water, i. e. the unmixed with falsehood, translucent and most pure word of the Spirit: but if we thicken it and immingle therewith like mud the cheerlessness of our own devices, we plot against the flocks of the Saviour.
18. [c] S. Cyril had looked on these words of Nestorius as replete with gravest untruth, for S. Cyril's seventh chapter is, "If any says that Jesus has been in-wrought-in as man by God the Word and that the good glory of the Only-Begotten has been put around Him as though He were other than He, be he anathema." They may belong to one of Nestorius' earlier sermons. Mercator (p. 110 ed. Bal.) cites them as being out of the second volume, first quire (i. e. of one of the volumes of published sermons, see above p. 48 note n). Mercator tells us that this volume began, "I have yet much to say to you." (Mercator has apparently only three extracts out of the first volume, i.e. two on the Creed, and the one given above p. 51.) In the extracts made for the Council of Ephesus, part of the passage is also cited and there too as taken out of the first quire: see Merc. p. 207, top of page, and the corresponding place in the different editions of the Council of Ephesus.
19. [f] S. Cyril in his sixth Dialogue to Hermias explains that "Hence He is glorified by the Father not as though He needed glory while conceived of as apart from flesh, and believed God forth of God : but since He was man, which does not possess as fruit of his proper nature, the power of working God-befitting acts, He receives the power by the Union and Concurrence (...) Unspeakable such as is conceived to be that of the Word with His human nature." De Trin. ad Herm. dial. 6. p. 601 a b.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/cyril-alexandria/against-nestorius.asp?pg=80
