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Excerpts from the First Book, Translated by P. E. Pusey
St Cyril of Alexandria Resources Online and in Print
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11 Pages
Page 3
But haply you will say, 'Hath not then in Him dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead bodily?' This too is true and one will not deny what has been written; yet we say that not in another's body do we conceive that the Godhead of the Son hath dwelt, but rather as in His own Temple : just as the soul of man too, being other than [2] the flesh yet together with the flesh makes up the person of a single man, as Peter or Paul.
Yet Christ is conceived of as above this too : for we say that not the Word of God became to the body in place of a soul, as some most absurdly imagine [3]; but we affirm rather that His holy and spotless Body has been ensouled with reasonable soul.
All-Perfect confessedly and without increase is the Word of God (for He has been begotten out of the Perfect Father, Wisdom out of Wisdom and Might out of Might), but since Unchangeableness by Nature is His, in nothing wronged by being in a Temple, He hath remained the Same, i. e., All-Perfect and Wisdom and Might. And the flesh ripening advanced by degrees according to the law of its nature, the Word united to it made a declaration by little and little of His own Wisdom, keeping pace so to say with the increase and advance of His Body and one not inharmonious with the size of His stature. Thus He was regarded by them who saw Him, as being gradually advanced to the successive attainment of the above-named things.
Hence He hath partaken like us in blood and flesh, in order that in His own flesh combating with death and bringing it to nought, He might achieve incorruption for our mortal bodies and stay the law that rages in our members from its tyranny over us. For it was not possible in any other way to mingle life with death, except He had used a mortal Body; neither could the sting of natural pleasures have been blunted in us too, except that which was taken from our lump had been made the own body of the Word.
Not soulless, excellent sir, do we say that the flesh forth of the seed of David, united to God the Word is, nor yet will any imagine, if he have a mind not corrupted, that He was to the holy Temple instead of mind and soul [4]; yet we are not accustomed to call man, that which is forth of the seed of David, son apart and separate [5].
Yet, wise sir, would I say, soul and body combine unto a man's birth and the one does not precede the other : but God the Word, albeit He was before all worlds as God, was pleased in the latter times to be united to flesh having a reasonable soul, and to be born man, yet keep even so the glory that was His own: for He spurned not the preeminence over all which is inherent in Him, but is worshipped even thus as One and Only Son by us and by the holy angels.
2. [b] κατὰ seems an error for παρὰ.
3. [c] The Apollinarians: see in Tillemont, above p. 44 note col. 1. The extracts from S. Athanasius, speak of the Apollinarian unwillingness to own that our Lord made His own ought of created matter; see the theory that the body was consubstantial with the Godhead, their refusal to worship ought created, to allow that Christ was man. Diodore and Theodore having all this to battle with speak as if, while holding that the manhood is perfect and complete, they disjoined it altogether from God the Son, making it a distinct man and calling it His in some vague way without uniting Godhead and manhood in one. Calling it His in some vague way hindered their seeing that they were really dividing Christ into Two beings, God and man, separate from each other. Theodoret notwithstanding the powerful influence of these two minds, and his dread of Apollinarianism, enunciates clearly the Union, though with language occasionally vague. Andrew's statements (of Samosata in the same province) are still more clear. S. Athanasius says, " But ye say again, 'WE do not worship a creature.' O void of understanding! why do ye not consider that, made the Lord's Body, it bears away no created worship? for it has been made the Body of the Uncreated Word: Him Whose Body it has been made, to Him do ye offer the worship also." against Apollinarius, lib. i. 6. t. i. 926 c. " For ye essay to say that the flesh is consubstantial with the Godhead." ib. i. 9 t. i. 929 b. " But ye say again, ,If 'Christ be man, He will be a part of the world, and a part of the world cannot save the world.' O thought of deceit and madness of blasphemy, let them say of what Scripture is this rule or sophism of the devil: albeit the Prophet saith......And a Man was born in her and the Highest Himself founded her. How then does Christ not save the world, made man? seeing that it is manifest that in the nature wherein sin was committed, therein hath had place the abundance of grace. What is abundance of grace? That the Word hath been made man, abiding God; in order that made man too, He may be believed to be God, so that Christ being man is God, because being God He has been made man, and in human form saves the believers." lib. ii. 7 t. i. 945 b c d. "How then do ye say that the Word, Creator of the rational natures, commingling with Himself flesh, was made a rational man? and how without change and turn hath He been made man, if He did not compact the bondman's form so as to be rational? in order that the Word may be without turn, abiding what He was, and being God may be seen on earth, man endowed with reason : for the Lord is a heavenly man [ἐπουράνιος ἄνθρωπος, comp. 1 Cor. xv. 48 cited just below, and as the Heavenly One (ὁ ἐπουράνιος) such too the heavenly ones], not as exhibiting flesh from out of Heaven but as compacting Heavenly flesh from out of earth: wherefore also as the Heavenly One, such too the heavenly ones by the participation of His holiness. Wherefore He also makes His own the things of His body. But ye say again, 'How did they crucify the Lord of glory?' But they did not crucify the Word as ye say, not so, but they set at nought the Word, affixing to the Cross the Body of the Word. For it was God Who was set at nought," as above p. 303 note g. "Wherefore the Lord said to the Jews, Undo this Temple and in three days I will rear it. As the Prophet saith, Because was delivered unto death His Soul, not the Word Himself: and John says, He laid down His Soul (ψυχὴν) for us. How then did the Jews avail to undo the Temple of God and to part from Him the indissoluble commixture that had taken place of the flesh with the Word (τὴν ἄλυτον σύγκρασιν τῆς σαρκὸς πρὸς τὸν λόγον γενομένην), if the death of the flesh is as you take it of such sort. For neither would the body have died except it were parted from somewhat. For except there had being undoing of it, there were no death; if death have not befallen, neither hath resurrection. Allow therefore that an undoing and a parting from the body took place, as it is written in the Gospels, He gave up the ghost, and, He bowed His Head and yielded up the ghost; in order that we may see what ghost ye understood was parted from the body, and [so] the dying had place. For ye said, that the Word having commingled with Himself an impersonal flesh (σάρκα τὴν ἀνυπόστατον) exhibited man truly rational and perfect. If therefore the Word withdrew from the body and thus the dying took place, the Jews prevailed against God, dissolving the indissoluble commixture. Neither therefore hath our death had place there, if the death of the body had place, from God being parted from it. And how did the body parted from the Incorruptible God remain in incorruption? the wounding will be that of the Body, the suffering that of the Word. Wherefore ye speak of a suffering God also, uttering things consonant with yourselves, yea rather agreeing with the Arians: for they teach thus. And the Word, according to you, will by the Resurrection be raised : for it is necessary that one take the beginning of the Resurrection from Hades, in order that the Resurrection may be perfect, both the undoing of death and the release of the spirits that are there." ib. 16 t. i. 952 d e 953 a b c d.
4. [d] this being the Apollinarian error with which Diodore had to contend.
5. [e] The first fragment has been preserved to us in a syriac collection rather later than Severus, the remainder so far (except a few words here and there) belong to John of Caesarea's collection, see above p. 321 note a. Those which follow have been chiefly preserved by Severus either in his controversy with the same Bishop John, or in that with his own fellow-heretic Julian of Halicarnassus. The lines which introduce S. Cyril's fragments are Severus', except in one or two cases which have notes as they occur.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/cyril-alexandria/diodore-tarsus.asp?pg=3
