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Translated by P. E. Pusey
St Cyril of Alexandria Resources Online and in Print
44 Pages
Page 42
And one may very easily see this outlined in the Mosaic books too in shadow unto them of old: for the sacrifice of the sheep rescued from death and decay them of Israel and abashed the destroyer, but it was a type of Christ, for Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us, in order that He might undo the cheerless mastery of death and might by His own Blood win all under heaven: for we were bought with a Price and arc not our own, for One died for all, He He Whose worth surpasses all, in order that they which live no longer live to themselves but to Him Who died for them and rose; Paul too will aid saying, For I through the Law died to the Law in order to live to God, I have been co-crucified with Christ: no longer live I, hut Christ liveth in me: and what I now live in the flesh I live in faith of the Son of God Who loved me and gave Himself for me. Christ's therefore are we all and through Him have we been reconciled to the Father, Christ having suffered in the flesh for us, in order that He might manifest us cleansed. For it has been written, Wherefore Jesus too, in order that He might cleanse the people through His own blood suffered outside the gate, and again, And you who once were estranged and enemies in your understanding by wicked wories, He hath now reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy and spotless before Him. Understand therefore how He says that it was His Proper Blood and His Proper Flesh which was given for us, in order that we should not say that it belonged to a son other than He, conceived of individually and honoured with a bare connection and having an adventitious glory and non-essential excellence and, as a cloak and sort of mask thrown over him, the name of sonship and of the Godhead that is over all things. For if he is by nature in such case as the opponents like to think, in no wise will it befit him to have to say, I am the truth: for how is that true which is not as it is said to be, but is something bastard and falsely-called? But verily CHRIST is truth and over all as God: for the Word hath remained what it was even though it have been made flesh, in order that He Which is over all and hath been made among all by reason of the human nature may have preserved to Him the being above every thing and beyond the measures of the creation.
B. But (he says) the being said to suffer will impress on God the Word much ill-repute and will besides perchance bring accusation upon our august mystery.
A. Yet despising the shame He chose to suffer in the flesh for our sakes according to the Scriptures: and I would account it a frailty of Jewish mind and a dread charge of Gentile infatuation, to think it right to be ashamed of the suffering on the cross. The Divine Paul writes, Seeing that both Jews ask for signs and Greeks seek for wisdom, but WE preach Christ [73] Crucified, to the Jews an offence, to the Gentiles foolishness, but to them which are called, Jews and Greeks, Christ God's Power and God's wisdom, because the folly of God, is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
B. How? for I do not at all understand.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/cyril-alexandria/christ-one.asp?pg=42