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Translated by P.E. Pusey
St Cyril of Alexandria Resources Online and in Print
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31 Pages
Page 21
The Word out of God the Father was begotten in some ineffable way (for beyond all understanding is His Generation, and as befits the Unembodied Nature): yet is That which is begotten conceived of as the Own Offspring of the Generator and Consubstantial with Him, for therefore is It called also Son: the Name indicating to us the Verity of the (so to say) Birth and Parturition. And since the Father ever liveth and hath being, it must needs be that He on account of Whom He is Father co-live and have co-Being Eternally with Him. The Word therefore was in the beginning and was God and, was with God (as saith the most wise Evangelist), but in the last times of the world for us men and for our salvation was made flesh and was made Man: and not at all letting go what He was, but having His own Nature unchanged and existing ever in the excellences of Godhead, yet undergoing for us economically the emptiness and not despising the poverty that belongs to the human measures. For being Rich He became poor (as it is written), that we by His poverty might become rich. He was made therefore Man and is said to have endured Generation after the flesh of a woman, because of His taking of the holy Virgin the Body that was united to Him of a truth: whence we say that the holy Virgin is Mother of God, as having borne Him in fleshly or human wise, albeit that He hath His Generation before the ages out of the Father [31].
And this, that some suppose that the Word was then called to a beginning of being when He became Man, is utterly impious and exceeding discordant. For the Saviour Himself shews them to be most unwise, saying in regard to Himself, Verily I say unto you, Before Abraham was I am: for how was He before Abraham Who was born after the flesh many ages after him? The Divine-uttering John too will I deem suffice to convict them saying, This was He of Whom I said, After me cometh a Man Who was made before me, for He was before me.
Leaving therefore as exceeding foolish to contend about what is superfluous, come let us rather go on to what is beyond, I mean unto what is profitable. Let not any be troubled, hearing the holy Virgin called Mother of God, nor let them fill their souls with Jewish unbelief, yea rather with Gentile impiety. For the Jews attacked Christ saying, For a good work we stone Thee not but for blasphemy because Thou, being a Man, makest Thyself God: and the children of the Greeks, hearing the doctrines of the Church that God hath been born of a woman, laugh.
But they shall eat the fruit of their own impiety, and shall hear of us, The fool will utter folly and his heart imagine vain things. But the plan of our Mystery, albeit to the Jews it be an offence, to the Gentiles folly, yet to us who know it, verily admirable is it and saving and far removed from being to be disbelieved by any. For if there were any whatever who should dare to say that this flesh made of earth had become mother of the bare Godhead, and that she bare out of her own self the Nature which is over the whole creation, the thing would be madness and nothing else: for not of earth has the Divine Nature been made, nor will that which is subject to decay become the root of immortality nor that which is subject to death bear the Life of all things, nor yet the Unembodied be the fruit of the palpable body, that which is subject to birth [bear] that which is superior to birth, that which hath its beginning in time, that which is without beginning.
But since we affirm that the Word became as we and took a body like to our bodies and united this of a truth unto Himself, in a way namely beyond understanding and speech, and that He was thus too made Man and born after the flesh, what is there incredible therein or worthy of disbelief? albeit the human soul (as we have already full often said) being of other nature than the body, is yet born with it, just as we say that it too has been united therewith. Yet will no one (I deem) suppose that the soul has the nature of the body as the beginning of its own existence, but God inplaces it ineffably in the body and it is born along with it; yet do we define as one the animal that is made up out of both, i. e., man. Therefore the Word was God but was made Man too, and since He has been born after the flesh by reason of the human nature, she who bare Him is necessarily Mother of God. For if she have not borne God, let not Him Who is born of her be called God; but if the God-inspired Scriptures call Him God, as God Incarnate and made Flesh, and it be not possible in any other way to be Incarnate, save through birth of a woman, how is she not Mother of God, who bare Him?
But that He is truly God Who was born, we shall know from the God-inspired Scripture too.
31. [f] See S. Cyril's first Chapter and defence of it against Andrew, above p. 24 note q.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/cyril-alexandria/incarnation-only-begotten.asp?pg=21
