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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 28
Himself hath adored with us, for Ye worship (He says) what ye know not, we worship what we know: yet is He to be adored also, for to Him every knee boweth: and this again after one manner and another. For He worshippeth as having assumed the nature that payeth worship, He again the Same is worshipped as surpassing the nature that worshippeth in that He is conceived of as God. Yet must we not sever the worship unto man by himself and God by Himself, nor yet as connected with God by equality of dignity, while the Persons are dissevered, do we say that the man is worshipped with Him (for it were replete with the uttermost impiety): but we must worship One Word of God Incarnate and made man, and at the same time believe that the Body united to Him was ensouled with a reasonable soul like ours. For neither did God Almighty bid two first-borns to be worshipped as well by us as by the holy Angels (for One is He Who was brought into the world): and if we look more carefully into the mode of this bringing in, we find it to be the mystery of the Economy with flesh. But He was brought into the world then when He was made Man, albeit He be seen to be in His own Nature most far removed from the earth and be believed to be truly in the Excellence of Godhead: for Other than the elements is their Maker. Therefore above the things which Himself made is He by Nature in that He is God by Nature. Yet is One (as I said before) to be worshipped then too when He is among many brethren: for then is He for that reason called First-born.
One [41] did the blind from the birth when wondrously healed worship: for Jesus (it says) finding him in the temple said, Dost thou believe on the Son of God, and he said, Who is He, Lord, that I might believe on Him? Christ manifesting Himself embodied to him says, Thou had both seen Him and He That speaketh with thee is He. Seest thou how He used the singular number, not permitting God and man to be conceived of separately? yea rather if one were to call Emmanuel man, it signifies not bare man (far from it) but the Word of God united to our nature. As One did the Divine disciples worship Him, when beholding Him wondrously borne on the waters they worshipped saying, Truly [42] Thou art the Son of God.
When therefore Ave say that man is co-worshipped with God, we have brought in a gross severance. For the word, With, except it be said of one by composition, will always full surely persuade us to conceive of two. For like as no one will be said to live with himself nor again to eat with to pray with and to walk with himself (for the with prefixed to the word introduces a declaration of two persons): so if one say that the man is co-worshipped with God, he will without question say two sons and severed one from another: for the plan of union, if it be conceived of in regard to mere equality of dignity or authority, is convicted of being untrue. And this has been shewn by us in many words.
41. [q] See this same argument in the treatise de Recta Fide to the Emperor Theodosius p. 31, put forth anew in the little Dialogue De Incarnatione Unigeniti, p. 703: see also above, p. 76.
42. [r] S. Cyril's argument on those words in his Thesaurus, against the Arians who denied the Son's Godhead, equally holds here as to its being no mere man apart by himself who was walking on the water. S. Cyril says, "What then will they say who contend against the Truth and follow only their own likings, when they seethe whole choir of the holy Apostles together worshipping the Son as God and saying with an oath that Truly He is the Son of God? for if according to their unlearning He is one of the creatures how is He truly Son of God? for it were impossible that one who has not by nature come forth out of any, and who has not the own (τὸ ἴδιον) of the essence of him who begat him, be truly son. And how if the disciples made a mistake in saying this, was the Saviour silent, albeit He did not disregard them when they made mistakes? and verily to Peter when on one occasion he answered not aright, He says, Get behind Me satan, thou art an offence to Me because thou savourest not God's but man's. But since He was silent, when called truly the Son of God, in that He rebuked them not as mistaken, it is clear that He accepts them as saying aright. Seeing then that the holy Apostles say that He is Son and truly so, and that Christ Himself assents to it, who will endure them who bruit something else?" Thes. cap. 32, pp. 308 d e. "What did the most wise disciples, esteeming Him as Son not as creature? For when stepping on edge of wave, strewing neath His Feet with ineffable might the moist and soon-dissolving nature of the waters, He coursed the wide expanse, and gave the holy disciples an unwonted wonder, and at length of His own will vent with them and sailed in their little skiff, albeit He might most easily, had He willed to do it, have been borne on the waves themselves: they in astonishment and reflecting on that resistless authority, began to worship saying, Truly Thou art Son of God. Will they then, doing this with an oath and saying that He is truly Son of God, be reasonably accused of falsehood and be taken and convicted of aberration from the truth? For if He is not Son, sprung of the Essence of Him Who begat Him, but a creature, gilded with the glory of sonship and having the appellation in mere words, why did they worship Him? why did the initiators and heralds of the Truth call Him Son?" Dial ii. p.437 d e.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/cyril-alexandria/incarnation-only-begotten.asp?pg=28
