St Gregory of Nyssa AGAINST EUNOMIUS, Second Part, Complete

Translated by W. Moore and H. A. Wilson

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This Part: 128 Pages

Page 5

What then saith the son of thunder? "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God [419] ." And what saith he that came after him, that other who had been within the heavenly temple, who in Paradise had been initiated into mysteries unspeakable? "Being," he says, "the Brightness of His glory, and the express Image of His person [420] ." What, after these have thus spoken, are the words of our ventriloquist [421] ? "The seal," quoth he, "of the energy of the Almighty." He makes Him third after the Father, with that non-existent energy mediating between them, or rather moulded at pleasure by non-existence. God the Word, Who was in the beginning, is "the seal of the energy":--the Only-begotten God, Who is contemplated in the eternity of the Beginning of existent things, Who is in the bosom of the Father [422] , Who sustains all things, by the word of His power [423] , the creator of the ages, from Whom and through Whom and in Whom are all things [424] , Who sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and hath meted out heaven with the span, Who measureth the water in the hollow of his hand [425] , Who holdeth in His hand all things that are, Who dwelleth on high and looketh upon the things that are lowly [426] , or rather did look upon them to make all the world to be His footstool [427] , imprinted by the footmark of the Word--the form of God [428] is "the seal" of an "energy." Is God then an energy, not a Person? Surely Paul when expounding this very truth says He is "the express image," not of His energy, but "of His Person." Is the Brightness of His glory a seal of the energy of God? Alas for his impious ignorance!

[419] S. John i. 1

[420] Heb. i. 3.

[421] Cf. the use of engastrimuthos in LXX. (e.g. Lev. xix. 31, Is. xliv. 25).

[422] S. John i. 18

[423] Cf. Heb. i. 3

[424] Cf. Rom. xi. 36

[425] Cf. Isa. xl. 12-22.

[426] Cf. Ps. cxxxviii. 6.

[427] Cf. Isa. lxvi. 1

[428] Cf. Phil. ii. 5

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