On the Trinity 3.21

Wishing, I suppose, to attach to God the Word, and not to the economy, the things said in terms of human feeling, they say that he became soulless flesh; and as though the unchangeable and pure great God had repented in agony, or had come to this [incarnation] by necessity, and not willingly and gladly, or even as though he could not, had he wished, have averted from the start what concerned the cross, so, despising the Godhead that cannot be despised, they reproach him with what is reported in Matthew: “Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass”; and, “Save me from this hour”; and what was said on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”; and, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death”; and his weeping over Lazarus; and his resting as though wearied from the journey; and his praying; and his desire for food, and his thirst; and his sleep in the boat (alas for their bad faith!); and, “An angel of the Lord appeared, strengthening him”; and the like. Against these again stands and rises up the testimony that according to the Godhead he is equal to God; and that he emptied himself; and this, that he said with confidence, “Father”; and that he himself ensouls all things that have souls; and that he never said, as a subordinate, “In the name of God, or of my Father, let it be done,” for any of the wonders he performed, as his disciples said to the [lame man …], “In the name of Jesus Christ, rise up,” and in this almighty and glorious name did what all creation together could not do; but by his own authority he worked mighty works, forgave sins, saying royally, “Your sins are forgiven you,” snatched from Hades, [drove out] demons, [saying to one,] “Be silent, be muzzled”; rebuked the winds, and they ceased; giving Peter the keys of heaven, he said, “Whatever you loose on earth will be [loosed in heaven, and whatever you bind on] earth will be bound in heaven”; to another he commanded, “Young man, arise”; to the leper he said, “I will; be clean”; to another, “Take heart, child; your sins are forgiven you”; to another, “Rise, take up your bed and walk”; to the demon, “You mute and deaf spirit,” he says, “I command you, come out.” And not only do these things stand against them, but the scoffers’ sense of “Why have you forsaken me?” was refuted beforehand: on the one hand by the Lord himself in the same John, “[The hour is coming,] and now has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own, and will leave me alone; yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me”; on the other by Paul, writing to the Hebrews that the Holy Spirit too was inseparable from him: “For if,” he says, “the blood of bulls and goats, and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on the defiled, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Jesus, who through the Holy Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify your hearts from an evil conscience?” And he offered himself to God through the Holy Spirit when he went up to the cross willingly. So one must not understand it barely, as the wording seems to show; but that here too, having condescended in all things, become poor in the form of the servant, having unchangeably reshaped himself in his speech to what is common, and keeping the whole consistency of the incarnation, and obscuring nothing of the stamp of the truth, he uttered, humbly, as the true Wisdom, what befits men, so that we too, being made like him and becoming fully conformed to him, according to the Apostle, might do what is fitting and pleasing to him, and might go from earthly things to heavenly.

What has been said about this among those outside, there is nothing like hearing from them themselves. For in this way we shall not only love still more the grand utterance of the saints among us, but also admire more and more the one Wisdom that supplies all. It runs thus: “Often they utter what mortals have strength to hear; but there are thoughts within greater than words, which one ought to look at keenly with pure eyes, traveling on another, more divine path than words.” For how could we have been fully assured that he carried our infirmities, as it is written, up to the precious cross, so as through it to provide a better state for men, unless he had first, in the way he knows, taken them upon himself and shown them? And how would it have become clear that he truly became ensouled flesh, and not in appearance — since the Manichaeans supposed that he had a body only in seeming, and the Arians that he became soulless — unless he had said, “My soul is very sorrowful,” and shown fear? For such things suit neither the Godhead nor soulless flesh. In the body only the passions destructive of the body itself are observed, not those that come upon us through a lack of useful thoughts; but anxieties over the passions are perceived in the soul. Therefore those outside too give this charge concerning …: “Flee quickly from earthly passions, flee far away, having the soul’s best eye and unswerving rays, from a pure soul and from the father’s aether …” … [he who prayed that we be delivered] from the present evil age; he who rebuked Peter when he was displeased, when he foretold that he must be crucified, and die, and rise on the third day; he who went up to the cross of his own will, and rejoiced like a giant to run his course; he who by his life-giving death put death to death and redeems all from death; whose … he raised up together with himself, and gave to the whole human nature the hope of resurrection; he who made death for him something no one fears, showed his passion to be something longed for, and caused people not to flee a noble end out of fear, but to restrain [fear] by the will of God, so that those who cling to him faithfully receive sufferings and death for his sake without grief or alarm, crying with Paul, “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” For it is natural that a mortal should [fear] death on your account, even if he trusts in the virtue of his life; but that the immortal God should cast away immortality and take up fear is impossible. Rather, he tasted death in the flesh, as he knew and willed, and remained immortal, supplying life to all even then. Otherwise a partial powerlessness is ascribed to the Father because of “if it is possible”; and a fear that does not exist is charged against the Son because of “let it pass”; and his loving and self-chosen ascent to the cross appears unwilling, and his mighty and weighty descent into Hades without impulse; and John is found false when he says, “He is life,” and, “He gives life to whom he will”; and Paul when he proclaims, “He emptied himself, taking the form of a servant,” and, “He humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even death on a cross,” that is, enduring even to the cross (for he did not say simply “unto death”); and the Lord when he said, “I am the light; I am the life and the resurrection,” and, “I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again.” And for what, then, would we give thanks, as to a guardian who has the first and only authority, to one who suffered for us unwillingly and under some compulsion, like those governed by another? Or why do we celebrate the thrice-desired and most provident Pascha every year — indeed every day, or rather every hour — by faith, with fear, partaking of his body and blood? Those who have been counted worthy of the highest and everlasting mystery know what I mean; for reverence and thanksgiving are owed to one who has provided some good of his own by his own will and without repenting of it.

Someone might say that it was out of pity for those of whom he said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing,” that he also said, “Let this cup pass”: from them, he means, so that they might not commit so great an impiety against me, to their own harm. It is not outside the truth to understand “Let this cup pass” in this way either. Since he saw that the devil shuddered and fled when the Savior showed himself God through his wonders, but approached when he spoke things proper to humanity, he who “catches the wise in their craftiness” showed the fear of death as present in him, so that, just as the devil had already dared to tempt him and had gone back without hope, dishonored and ridiculed, so here too, thinking him again a mere man, and not God, appearing in the flesh as he knows, he might come forward in haste and bring him to be crucified, and himself, the one who schemes to wound the invincible God, might be wounded unawares and withdraw in retreat; while we, having come to life by the cross of Christ and having been redeemed by his most provident death, cry out with Paul writing to the Corinthians: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O Hades, is your sting?” In the same way the Lord’s words were not of agony, since about God the Father too (“at whom,” as a holy man said, “all things shudder and tremble before the face of his power”) Isaiah, by some secret contemplation, speaks thus: “Hear then, O house of David: is it a small thing for you to give men trouble? And how do you give trouble to the Lord? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the Virgin will conceive in the womb and bear a Son, and they will call his name Emmanuel, which means, God with us.”

But let our discourse return to where it set out. The highest impassibility, life, joy, and peace, the endurance of all things, he who gives bright days to all, does not weep for any other reason than to show, through what is seen, the compassion of his invisible Godhead. For everywhere, by words or by deeds, he mingles these dispositions, so that we, as from tracks, may set out on the hunt for an inspired understanding, and find that the whole of the economy is the work of divine tenderness. [He wept] also to reprove the mind of Lazarus’ sisters, as having nothing faithful or firm. For when he asked, “Where have you laid him?” they should have said, “You know all things, since you are the Son of God, as you foretold at a great distance from what was visible, Lazarus our friend has fallen asleep; and if you command, he will return from Hades, anticipating the common resurrection by his own; for all things are surely easy for you when you will it.” Though they should have said this, they said the opposite: “He has been dead four days; he already stinks.” We might also say to this that he wept as a king submitting to his own decrees, which say, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep,” and for this reason putting an end to our ancient lament. Nor is he weary according to the Godhead, but according to the consistency of the incarnation, he who heals the brokenhearted and gives rest to those who labor and are heavy laden, whose going forth is from the end of heaven and his circuit to the end of it; for in one who has no diminution or limit there is no weariness. For even if he is once seen seated on a colt, still he was praised as God by innocent children crying out, “Hosanna in the highest,” which is interpreted, “Save, you who are in the highest”; and by David in the forty-ninth psalm: “From the rising of the sun to its setting, out of Zion the splendor of his beauty; God will come openly.” Nor does the bread of life desire food against his will, he to whom all things look, according to the psalmist: “The eyes of all hope in you, and you give them their food in due season. You open your hand and fill every living thing with good pleasure”; and again, “All look to you …” … having fed five thousand with five loaves and two fish, besides women and children, and having caused twelve baskets of fragments to be left over; he who said to the devil, “Man shall not live by bread alone”; he who set before us all a self-sufficient and unfailing table, his own goodness, saying, “Whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst”; he who came to the fig tree as if hungry, but commanded as God that the plant should produce fruit no more, and set the deed upon the word, and showed that he himself was the one who said in the beginning, “Let the earth bring forth fruit-bearing trees.” Nor does the immortal spring thirst, except because of the economy, the spring that [gave] the Samaritan woman water of life …: [let them] remember the gospel saying: “Jesus, knowing that all was now [finished], so that the Scripture might be fulfilled, says, I thirst”; so that it is shown that the word came out not from the compulsion of thirst, but so that nothing said in the Scriptures should be left out. Nor was he overcome by sleep against his will; for he was not mastered by that affection, he who is Lord of all things and of sleep, who neither sleeps nor slumbers but guards Christians, and who remains impassible in his Godhead even in his sufferings; so that the psalmist cries out to him, “Awake, as one who sleeps, O Lord.” And the “as” does not show sleep in the full sense; for rising at once he rebuked [the winds] as God, and the winds were stilled, and the sea grew so calm … [that it could be rowed] with oars, and gave occasion for a hymn with a sailors’ song, all crying out with pleasure, “Christ, save!” For when the true life is thought of as sleeping, then all things would be thought of as dead, as not being given life. For suppose that, while it slept, death were awake, and it were granted to no one to pluck the breezes of life.

Nor, then, does he who is rich in mercy become poor, being without need from above …; [for Paul says] that in him all things hold together, and that every knee bows to him, of things in heaven and on earth and under the earth; and that in the economy itself angels came and ministered to him, as to one always in the Father and with God. What then does “An angel of the Lord appeared, strengthening him” mean? In place of: glorifying him. For Moses too set this down, singing such a song in the desert: “Let all the angels of God worship him, and let all the sons of God strengthen him,” that is, praise him. And another Scripture confirms this, introducing angels who say, “Yours is the glory, yours the might, yours the power, yours the strength.” And those [outside] too spoke well: “All things lie under the nods of the mind of great God, the beginning and spring of life, and pre-eminent … and might and force, and the imperishable vigor of strength, and mighty power, and all-encircling necessity.” Nor, then, does the great and true God, the radiance of the Father’s glory, the living Word of God and guardian of all, pray as being inferior in Godhead; for he does not change hardships by prayer, as we do, he who by willing alone and by his presence alone procures good hope for all and anticipates our supplications by his giving of good things (for “to him,” it says, “they will pray”); but he prays because he has become what we are, without confusion and without fault, and has been eager to show this through more conspicuous acts. For he who spoke such words, and was nailed in the flesh to the cross in hands and feet, raised to the height those for whose sake such things were done, and dashed the demons down to Hades. And this is what Paul writes: “Having disarmed the principalities and the powers, he made a public example of them, triumphing over them in him.” The refutation comes from the very things they accuse. For the same [Apostle], made wise by the Spirit of Wisdom, writes, in a way sharp to the utmost, … understanding his condescension, a saying which runs thus: “Who in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and supplications with loud crying to him who was able to save him from death, and having been heard for his reverence, although he was a Son, learned obedience from what he suffered.” So being shown to be the natural Son of God from both [statements], not at any other time, nor because of his own Godhead, but when he was in the flesh, because of the flesh and on behalf of the flesh, as “reverent,” that is, “sinless,” he lifted up supplications on behalf of sinners to him in whom he was and whom he had in himself, in that he was united with him in Godhead; and “from what he suffered,” having shared our flesh as his own, he learned generically, and wiped out the ancient disobedience of the flesh. It would be foolish, then, to reckon fear, or weeping, or weariness, and the other things mentioned, to the Godhead. For the Son, the Word, can do all things, except undergo these things according to his generation from the Father, as it is impossible for God to lie, as Paul writes, being displeased with such people. It runs thus: “In which it is impossible for God to lie.” … [Pressed hard, let the] heretics withdraw from what cannot be trodden, and not busy themselves with what is not lawful; for what need do they have of that? But hearing what has been set out, let them understand that some things he said in our condition, and others in his own; and let them acknowledge and worship with us his unspeakable and indescribable love for humankind, and cry out with the Apostle and with us, “The peace of God surpasses all understanding”; and, “The riches of Christ …”; “The judgments of the Lord are a great deep.” This is what the truly faithful and exact heralds say. And those outside too have advised and admonished thus: “Do not shake things unspeakable; do not search out God.”

… [the saying] about the general end, which says: “But concerning that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father”: they do not view it soundly. For Matthew, who before him went through the other words without omission, did not say that the Son is ignorant, but set out that he knows even the manner of the end, thus: “But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but the Father alone. For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in the days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they did not know until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.” And the other evangelists did not mention this at all; but against this heretical contradiction the apostles provided a solution, saying in the Gospel according to John: “Now we know that you know all things”; since, he means, he is the Son, the Word of God, through whom all things came to be, among all of which is the last day too. And what was denied with forethought must be taken not in its proper sense. For just as for our sake he chose to take the form of a servant, so also to say that he does not know. He used this like a medicine, because it profits humanity not to know the answer to its question; so that, always expecting and thinking the time of judgment to be at the doors, it may be ready through works and faith to be saved. For he did not unawares create a time that he did not understand; nor again was he ignorant of his own second coming, he who is in the Father and has the Father in himself, clearly with his knowledge too; for if the Father, who knows all things, is in him, he too knows, he who beholds all things in the Father. For how could he not see, he who has the light in himself, who brought all things into order and arrangement, who knows all things before their coming into being, the maker of the times, who also set a limit to creation and fixed the number of the days of its constitution, and said, “The last day comes like a thief in the night”; and again, “It will not be in the night, so that the day may overtake you in darkness”; who foretold the signs that will be about that time, and who is to make that fearful day without evening dawn, who also [is Lord] of the judgment …; who has been shown to have treasures of wisdom and knowledge, and foretold, “There will be heresies and divisions among you,” and the betrayal of Judas, and Peter’s denial before the cock crowed, and the destruction of the temple; who foretold the false prophets that will come in the last times; who says, “No one knows the Father except the Son,” and, “As the Father knows me, so I know him”? And it is clear that [he knows] with the knowledge with which the Father knows. And if knowing the Father is one thing, and knowing the things of the Father another, it will be greater to know God the Father than to know his things, that is, the last day too, inasmuch as each one is himself greater than his own things.

Or perhaps “No one knows that day or hour, not even the Son, but the Father” can also be such as one of the Fathers among the saints, full of wisdom, taught without forced reasoning (his name was Basil): in place of, “If the Father did not know, neither would the Son know”; from which it follows: since the Father knows, it is not possible that I am ignorant; but I do not say it, he says; for I do all things according to the will of the Father; and that you should know this is not the will of the Father. For you, then, he says, I do not know, though in truth I am not ignorant; for I foretold to you through the psalmist, “Far from [my] salvation [are the words of my transgressions]”; that is, far from my Godhead are my words in the incarnation. He does so too in the case of Lazarus, foretelling, as knowing all things, “Lazarus has fallen asleep,” but asking, as knowing nothing, “Where have you laid him?” and then raising him as God. So too in the case of the woman with the flow of blood, saying, as a man who does not know, “Who touched me?” but healing her as Savior. Just as God the Father too somewhere asked Adam, as if not knowing, “Where are you?” and Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?” and Moses, “What is that in your hand?” and elsewhere, “The Lord knows those who are his,” as if, forsooth, not knowing those who are not. And he said also to Abraham when he was willing to sacrifice his son to him, “Now I know that you fear God,” as if he had not known it before. And again, “Where is Sarah your wife?” That he admittedly said this too knowing, what follows shows. For when he said that she would bear, and she disbelieved because she had grown old, and smiled in the inner chamber, he said, “Sarah laughed, being inside.” Further, he said also to Lot, “I cannot do this (that is, bring the punishment on the Sodomites) until you have come there. Therefore he called the name of the city Segor”; and elsewhere, “Depart from me, workers of lawlessness; I never knew you.” And other things of his are reported that seem small with respect to Godhead, such as, “I will go down and see whether they have done altogether according to their outcry that comes to me; and if not, that I may know”; and elsewhere, “I repent that I made man”; and again, “I repent that I anointed Saul king”; and in the hundred and fifth psalm, “And he remembered his covenant, and repented according to the abundance of his mercy, and gave them into …”