Eranistes (The Beggar), or Polymorphus

Contents

Reading pages: 1.1–1.8 · 1.9–1.16 · 1.17–1.26 · 1.27–2.6 · 2.7–2.15 · 2.16–2.24 · 2.25–2.33 · 2.34–2.41 · 2.42–3.3 · 3.4–3.11 · 3.12–3.20 · 3.21–3.30 · 3.31–3.37 · 3.38–3.39 · 4.1–4.5

1. 1.1Orthodoxos invites Eranistes to seek the truth in the footsteps of the apostles and Fathers, and begins by defining substance and hypostasis as the common and the particular, as genus differs from individual.
2. 1.2Orthodoxos distinguishes what is common to the Trinity from what is proper to each hypostasis, gets Eranistes to admit that immutability is common to all three, and presses him on how 'the Word became flesh' without change.
3. 1.3Orthodoxos argues from glass, wine, vinegar and lime that a thing changed into something else takes a new name, so a Word changed into flesh could no longer be called God; Eranistes falls back on 'the Word became flesh'.
4. 1.4From Heb 2:16 and the promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Orthodoxos argues that the Word became flesh not by change but by taking hold of the seed of Abraham, a true body and rational soul.
5. 1.5Orthodoxos shows from Jacob's blessing of Judah, Micah's prophecy of Bethlehem, and Rom 9:5 that Christ is both God before the ages and human, born of Judah.
6. 1.6Eranistes cites Baruch 3:38 ('he appeared on earth') as proof that Christ was God only; Orthodoxos answers that the invisible God was seen through the visible flesh, as 1 Tim 3:16 says.
7. 1.7Eranistes cites Matt 18:10 and the visions of Abraham, Isaiah and the prophets; Orthodoxos answers that no one sees God's nature and that God gives visions measured to the capacity of those who see.
8. 1.8Orthodoxos argues that prophets and angels saw visions proportioned to them, not God's substance, and that after the incarnation the Godhead was seen through the flesh as through a veil (Heb 10:20), which Gen 49:11 calls a robe.
9. 1.9Orthodoxos reads Gen 49:11 of Christ's blood (he is the true vine) and explains that the Savior exchanged the names of his body and of the eucharistic symbols, so that communicants would believe the change made by grace without the symbols' nature being changed.
10. 1.10Orthodoxos argues that the eucharistic symbols are types of Christ's body and blood, not of his Godhead, and that Christ as high priest offered his own body, which the Spirit formed in the Virgin (Heb 10:5; Matt 1:20).
11. 1.11Eranistes repeats that the Word became flesh rather than assuming a body; Orthodoxos turns to God's oath to David in Ps 89 and gets him to admit that the promise was fulfilled not in Solomon but in Christ.
12. 1.12When Eranistes refers God's promise to David to Solomon or Zerubbabel, Orthodoxos charges him with siding with the Jews and argues that David's line and kingdom have ended, so the eternal promise is fulfilled only in Christ.
13. 1.13From Ps 89 (God's oath that David's seed and throne will last as long as sun and moon) and Isa 55:3–5, Orthodoxos argues that only Christ, David's seed according to his humanity, fulfils the eternal promise.
14. 1.14Orthodoxos reads Isa 11:1–6 of Christ, who has the fulness of the Spirit's gifts and judges as both man and God, and sees the wolf grazing with the lamb fulfilled in rich and poor, masters and slaves sharing one font and one table.
15. 1.15Orthodoxos shows from Isa 11:10, Peter's sermon (Acts 2:30–31), Paul at Pisidian Antioch, 2 Tim 2:8 and Rom 1:3 that Christ is David's seed 'according to the flesh', a phrase that itself implies his Godhead.
16. 1.16Orthodoxos argues that if the Word took nothing of our nature the promises, the Virgin, and our resurrection in Christ the firstfruits would be void, and interprets 'the Word became flesh' by 'dwelt among us' and by Phil 2:6–8.
17. 1.17Orthodoxos explains 'likeness of a human being' as the true nature of a servant, cites 1 John 4:2–3 against those who deny Christ's flesh, and begins the patristic witnesses with Athanasius' Letter to Epictetus.
18. 1.18Orthodoxos quotes Gregory of Nazianzus, a Western teacher (probably Ambrose), Flavian of Antioch and Gelasius of Caesarea, all interpreting 'the Word became flesh' as assumption of flesh, not change, and turns to John Chrysostom.
19. 1.19Orthodoxos quotes John Chrysostom and his successor on 'the Word became flesh' (no change of substance, as 'became a curse' means bearing the curse), mentions Diodore and Theodore, and announces the florilegium from Ignatius, Irenaeus, Hippolytus and Methodius.
20. 1.20The florilegium of the first dialogue begins: Ignatius (to the Smyrnaeans, Ephesians and Trallians) on Christ truly born of Mary of David's race and truly suffering, and Irenaeus on the promise to David fulfilled.
21. 1.21Irenaeus (Against Heresies, book 3): Christ, born of the Virgin of David's line, recapitulates Adam by taking flesh from Mary, as his hunger, weariness, tears, and the blood and water from his side show.
22. 1.22Irenaeus on the Word made human so that humans might become sons of God, and against Gnostic 'appearances'; Hippolytus on Christ as the ark of incorruptible wood and on the firstborn Word joined to a firstborn human being in Mary's womb.
23. 1.23Hippolytus on Isa 19:1 (the light cloud is Christ's pure flesh), Methodius on Christ honoring martyrdom, and Eustathius of Antioch on Christ's rational soul and human body, born of a woman, as the temple in which God dwelt.
24. 1.24Eustathius on Christ as the temple of the Word and on Ps 45:7; Athanasius on Christ as the vine (we are his branches by kinship of body) and on 'became flesh' as putting on flesh, not being changed into it.
25. 1.25Athanasius' Letter to Epictetus rejects the claims that Christ's body is consubstantial with the Godhead, coeternal with it, or made from the divine substance: the body from Mary was human and real, the same as ours.
26. 1.26Basil on the God-bearing flesh as the 'shoe' of the Godhead and on Christ 'from a woman', and Gregory of Nazianzus to Cledonius against the claim that Christ's flesh came from heaven and that he lacked a human mind: what was not assumed was not healed.
27. 1.27Gregory of Nyssa: Christ's inability and weakness belong to the flesh, not the Godhead; the Lord hewed the tablets of his flesh from our earth through the Spirit; Wisdom built her house from the virginal body; 'He created me' refers to the assumed nature.
28. 1.28Fragments ascribed (the author's name is lost) on Christ's bodily temple born of Mary, his anointing, and 'My Father is greater than I' said of the flesh; then John Chrysostom on the Nativity: if God may not dwell in a human body, much less in pagan idols of stone and wood.
29. 1.29John Chrysostom: God the Word made himself a holy temple; Christ and the apostles spoke lowly things about him so that no one would think his flesh a shadow or appearance.
30. 1.30The first dialogue ends: Orthodoxos shows that even Apollinarius, whom Eranistes follows, taught that the Word assumed flesh without change, and Eranistes confesses that God the Word is immutable and assumed flesh.
31. 2.1The second dialogue opens: Eranistes recalls that the Word assumed flesh without change, and Orthodoxos shows from Scripture, against Apollinarius' two souls, that the Word assumed a rational soul and the whole human nature.
32. 2.2Eranistes would call Christ God only, naming him from the better nature; Orthodoxos insists on confessing both natures, and begins to show that Scripture names human beings from the body ('flesh') as well as from the soul.
33. 2.3Orthodoxos shows that Scripture names human beings 'flesh' and 'soul' alike, so Christ may be named human as well as God; and, as Arius and Sabellius need opposite remedies, so do opposite errors about Christ.
34. 2.4Orthodoxos lists the heresies that deny Christ's humanity, his Godhead, or part of his humanity, and argues by analogy with medicine and gardening that each error needs its own remedy.
35. 2.5Orthodoxos applies the rule of healing to each heresy, and argues that if they confess the realities (flesh and rational soul) they must not shun the name 'human', for denying the nature destroys the sufferings and with them salvation.
36. 2.6Against Eranistes' reluctance to call Christ human, Orthodoxos cites Christ himself, Peter and Paul, and 1 Tim 2:5, where the name 'mediator' shows both Godhead and humanity joined by the union of the natures.
37. 2.7Orthodoxos explains that Moses was 'mediator' and 'god' only as a type, as royal images resemble a king without having all his features, and turns to Melchizedek in Heb 7:1–3.
38. 2.8Orthodoxos argues that 'without father, without mother, without beginning or end' belong to Christ in truth (fatherless as man, motherless as God, eternal), and to Melchizedek only as a type, because Scripture records no parents or genealogy for him.
39. 2.9Orthodoxos shows that no image has all its archetype's features (man as God's image; the Son as the Father's image), so Melchizedek is a type of Christ's eternity only by Scripture's silence, while Christ is high priest after Melchizedek's order according to his humanity.
40. 2.10Eranistes says 'human' is only a name of the dispensation, used before the passion; Orthodoxos answers that the dispensation is real, so the name is true, and that Paul, Peter and Stephen called Christ human after the resurrection and ascension.
41. 2.11Orthodoxos argues that the faithful must be armed with the truth that Christ is human, as a general arms his soldiers, and that Christ taught each hearer what he lacked, showing the Jews and the Pharisees his Godhead because they already knew him as human.
42. 2.12Orthodoxos shows that Christ accepted the title 'son of David' from the blind men, the Canaanite woman and the crowds, and that Paul, near death and long after the resurrection, still called him 'of the seed of David' (2 Tim 2:8).
43. 2.13Orthodoxos shows that the risen Christ proved his humanity to the apostles, and argues against Eranistes' 'two natures before the union, one after' that before the union there was only one nature, the Word's, since the flesh did not pre-exist.
44. 2.14Orthodoxos argues that incarnation and union are simultaneous, so there are two natures after the union, not before; Eranistes says 'from two natures' but not 'two natures', and Orthodoxos answers that John 1:1–3 and the genealogies cannot both be fitted to one nature.
45. 2.15Orthodoxos presses that contraries (eternal Creator and descendant of Adam formed in the Virgin) cannot be fitted to one nature; Eranistes appeals to 'one incarnate nature of the Word', and Orthodoxos answers that the Word's nature is one but the flesh is of another nature.
46. 2.16Orthodoxos insists that the incarnation involved no change, so the natures remain unmixed, as Christ's own sayings (Son of God and Son of Man; son and lord of David) show; even soul and body keep their properties in a natural union.
47. 2.17Orthodoxos states the rule: when speaking of the natures, assign each its properties; when speaking of the one person, attribute both divine and human things to the one Christ. Eranistes accepts one person but fears that distinguishing the natures dissolves the union.
48. 2.18Orthodoxos would avoid both confusion and division of Christ; he asks how Eranistes would answer Arians who cite Christ's fear and trouble, and Eranistes replies that these belong to the dispensation and show the weakness of the assumed flesh and soul.
49. 2.19Eranistes himself proves from Scripture that the Word assumed a soul, against Arians who would treat Christ's 'soul' as figurative, and a rational soul, against Apollinarians, from Luke 2:40, 52.
50. 2.20Orthodoxos turns Eranistes' own distinctions against him (if two natures mean two sons, his three natures mean three) and rejects his claim that the humanity was swallowed by the Godhead like a drop in the sea: related natures may mix, but God and man differ infinitely.
51. 2.21Orthodoxos shows by the examples of lit air and red-hot iron that a thorough blending need not confuse natures, and that Christ's birth, circumcision, growth, hunger and weariness after the conception prove that his humanity was not changed into Godhead at the union.
52. 2.22Eranistes now says the flesh was changed into Godhead at the resurrection; Orthodoxos answers that the risen Lord showed his hands and feet, said he 'has' flesh and bones, and ate before the disciples to prove that his body was real.
53. 2.23Orthodoxos argues that the risen body is incorruptible and immortal yet keeps its nature, as Christ's wounds show; corruption and immortality are qualities that change, as sickness and health are accidents of one substance, the body.
54. 2.24The risen and ascended body of Christ, glorified and worshiped, remains a circumscribed body: he will come visibly as he ascended, those who pierced him will see him, and Paul calls it 'the body of his glory', to which the saints' bodies will be conformed.
55. 2.25The saints' bodies will share Christ's glory in quality, not quantity; and in the eucharistic argument, Orthodoxos answers Eranistes that the consecrated symbols, though called and worshiped as Christ's body and blood, remain in their own substance, as Christ's glorified body remains a body.
56. 2.26Orthodoxos answers that the eucharistic symbol is also called 'bread of life' and that Christ's body is called divine and life-giving as the body of one who is God and man, and introduces the Fathers who distinguish the natures after the union.
57. 2.27The florilegium of the second dialogue begins: Ignatius on Christ in the flesh after the resurrection, and Irenaeus on the union of God and man in the mediator, on Christ coming again in the same flesh, and on God passing into man.
58. 2.28Irenaeus against a merely apparent incarnation (Christ took flesh from Mary to recapitulate Adam), and Hippolytus on heretics who deny either Christ's Godhead or his humanity, on the risen Christ inviting Thomas to touch him, and on the Word who raised the first-formed man.
59. 2.29Hippolytus lists the human and the divine acts of Christ (On Psalm 2) and describes the first ascent of flesh through the heavenly gates (On Psalm 24); Eustathius on Christ's risen body with its wounds.
60. 2.30Eustathius on the human body of Christ as the image of the Son and his coming 'under the law' at his circumcision and presentation; Athanasius on why the Word had to be truly God and his flesh truly human for our deification.
61. 2.31Athanasius (Letter to Epictetus) denies that Christ's human body adds a fourth to the Trinity; texts under his name apply 'Sit at my right hand', the eucharistic words, and the exaltation of Phil 2:9 to Christ's body, not to his Godhead.
62. 2.32Texts under Athanasius' name refer Christ's glorification to his flesh; an exposition of faith ascribed to Ambrose confesses one Christ in two perfect, unconfused natures, consubstantial with the Father and with us, and anathematizes those who confuse or divide them.
63. 2.33Passages ascribed to Ambrose (continuing the previous section): Christ speaks sometimes as God and sometimes as man because both natures are in the one Son; the Lord of glory was crucified in his human nature; to call Godhead and flesh one nature is worse than Arianism.
64. 2.34Passages ascribed to Ambrose: the Nicene fathers called the Word, not the flesh, consubstantial with the Father; one must distinguish what is ours from what is the Word's. Basil: Christ's tears, hunger, thirst and weariness belong to his human nature.
65. 2.35Basil on 'the form of God' as the divine substance; Gregory of Nazianzus on Christ's coming again in a godlike body, on two natures but not two sons ('not one and another person'), against those who say the flesh was laid aside, and on Christ's obedience as the form of a servant.
66. 2.36Gregory of Nazianzus: Christ came forth from the Virgin as one from two, flesh and spirit; his weariness and tears belong to his human nature; the Father is 'God' of Christ's humanity and 'Father' of the Word; Christ still intercedes as man with the body he assumed.
67. 2.37Gregory of Nazianzus refers Christ's ignorance to his humanity; Gregory of Nyssa denies that the Godhead is confined in the flesh, assigns brotherhood, touch and movement to the human nature, and reads 'exalted by the right hand of God' of the humanity raised through the union.
68. 2.38A fragment on John 5:19: the risen Christ entered through shut doors and showed his wounds to prove that his body was the same but transformed; then passages against Origen's view that Christ's soul is one with the Word as the Son is one with the Father.
69. 2.39John Chrysostom: our nature, the firstfruits of the race, has been raised to the royal throne above every power; Christ showed his wounds after the resurrection to confirm his true flesh; God clothed shipwrecked humanity and led it up to heaven.
70. 2.40More of John Chrysostom: God raised our nature to the throne; 'the God of our Lord Jesus Christ' refers to the flesh; the Word 'dwelt' in the flesh as one thing in another, united without confusion; Christ joins the divine nature to the human like one joining two parties with his hands.
71. 2.41Chrysostom on Christ as mediator who reconciled the two natures and offered our nature's firstfruits to the Father; Cyril of Jerusalem: 'Christ was twofold; do not confuse the natures'; and a passage (from Hilary's On the Trinity, book 9) on knowing Christ as true God and true human.
72. 2.42A Greek version of Hilary of Poitiers (On the Trinity, book 9): the incarnate Son speaks at different times as God, as God and man, and as man, so his sayings must be referred to the right time and nature, though he did everything by the power of his own nature.
73. 2.43The end of the passage from Hilary; then passages ascribed to Augustine on Christ the mediator joining both natures in one person, God mingled with human nature without confusion; and a letter to Eupsychius on the impassible Godhead and the death in the flesh.
74. 2.44Passages of Cyril of Alexandria: the union of two natures without confusion, for which Mary is called Theotokos (the letter to the Easterners); one Christ from both natures, each remaining what it is, the Word dwelling in the humanity as one thing in another.
75. 2.45After the florilegium, Orthodoxos quotes Apollinarius himself to show that even he taught an unconfused union: the Godhead and the body keep their properties, as iron keeps its nature in fire and soul and body remain in a human being.
76. 2.46The last fragments of Apollinarius call Christ's body a robe glorified with the king's glory and the instrument of divine activities; Orthodoxos concludes that even the inventor of the 'blending' used division, calling the body a robe, creature, instrument and servant. The text then breaks off.
77. 3.1Eranistes argues that the body alone sinned and so alone dies; Orthodoxos shows that the soul leads the body in both sin and virtue.
78. 3.2Orthodoxos argues that the immortal soul, and even the devil, cannot die because their nature is immortal, so the eternally immortal Word cannot have died either.
79. 3.3Orthodoxos argues that God can do whatever he wills but wills only what fits his nature, so there are things, like sinning or becoming darkness, that he cannot do.
80. 3.4Orthodoxos argues that God’s inability to change for the worse shows his infinite power, and asks why Eranistes makes immortality and impassibility alone changeable.
81. 3.5Orthodoxos argues that Christ suffered as man and remained impassible as God, showing from Scripture that words can refer to the body or the soul according to the context.
82. 3.6Orthodoxos argues that, as Scripture speaks of whole persons while reason distinguishes soul and body, so in Christ we must distinguish what belongs to the Godhead and what to the humanity without dividing the union.
83. 3.7Orthodoxos argues from Christ’s weariness at the well and Isaiah’s “he will not grow weary” that weariness belongs to Christ’s body and not to his uncircumscribed Godhead, while the one person receives both.
84. 3.8Orthodoxos argues that, just as Scripture says “Jacob” or “James” was buried or killed while meaning only the body, so the passion of the Son of God belongs to his body, not to the impassible divine nature.
85. 3.9Orthodoxos explains Heb 2:11–15: the impassible Word took passible flesh as a sinless firstfruits, so that death, by seizing it unjustly, lost its tyranny over the whole race.
86. 3.10Orthodoxos argues from Rom 5 and 1 Cor 15 that, as Adam’s condemnation brought death to all, so Christ’s sinless human nature, unjustly killed and raised, brings resurrection to the whole race.
87. 3.11Orthodoxos reads Rom 8:32 in the light of Abraham’s sacrifice, where the son was spared and a ram died, as a type of Christ’s flesh suffering while his Godhead remained impassible.
88. 3.12Orthodoxos argues that the Old Testament types, such as Isaac and the ram and the two goats of the Day of Atonement, divide between them the death and the life of Christ, showing his passible humanity and impassible Godhead.
89. 3.13Orthodoxos defends the typology of lambs, goats, and birds for Christ’s two natures, and explains the angel’s “where the Lord lay” by the custom of naming a saint’s relics by the saint’s name.
90. 3.14Orthodoxos shows from the four Gospel burial accounts that the body of Jesus was laid in the tomb, so that the angel’s “where the Lord lay” names the body by the name of the person, as Scripture often does.
91. 3.15Orthodoxos argues that Paul in 1 Cor 15 proves the resurrection of human bodies from Christ’s resurrection, which therefore is the resurrection of his body, the firstfruits of ours.
92. 3.16Orthodoxos argues that Christ suffered as man, not as God, and that Scripture joins the passion to the name “Christ” but never to the title “God the Word.”
93. 3.17Orthodoxos argues that, as Eranistes will not call the Spirit “Son” or “unbegotten” because Scripture does not, he should not join the passion to the title “God,” and that even Christ’s human soul did not die.
94. 3.18Orthodoxos rejects the formula that God the Word “suffered impassibly,” arguing that God alone is immortal by nature and that even Christ’s human soul, not his Godhead, shared the body’s pains.
95. 3.19Orthodoxos proves from John 2, John 6, and the words of institution that it was Christ’s body that was destroyed, given, and nailed to the cross.
96. 3.20Orthodoxos shows from the risen Christ’s hands and feet, from Peter’s Pentecost sermon, and from Ezekiel’s dry bones that death and resurrection belong to Christ’s body and soul, not to his Godhead.
97. 3.21Orthodoxos argues that, as Eranistes explains “James the Lord’s brother” by the flesh, he must also refer “they crucified the Lord of glory” to the flesh.
98. 3.22Orthodoxos explains that the union makes the names of the two natures common to the one person without confusing them, so the Jews crucified the human nature they knew, not the Godhead they did not know.
99. 3.23Orthodoxos argues that the Nicene creed names the one person “Lord Jesus Christ” so as to ascribe both divine and human things to him, while its anathema against calling the Son mutable shows the Godhead is impassible.
100. 3.24Orthodoxos argues that suffering is a change, which the Nicene anathema forbids ascribing to the Son, and introduces a collection of testimonies from the Fathers.
101. 3.25The florilegium of the third dialogue opens with testimonies from Ignatius, Irenaeus, and Hippolytus that the flesh of Christ suffered, died, and rose.
102. 3.26The florilegium continues with Hippolytus on the blood and water from Christ’s side and Eustathius of Antioch arguing that the death, resurrection, and exaltation belong to the man Christ assumed, not to the Word.
103. 3.27Eustathius of Antioch’s testimonies continue: the incorporeal Word cannot be touched, die, or be defiled, but raised his own temple, while the weakness and the cross belong to the man.
104. 3.28The florilegium continues with Eustathius on the Songs of Ascents and on Ps 22, and with Athanasius’s Letter to Epictetus, all ascribing the sufferings to the humanity and impassibility to the Word.
105. 3.29Athanasius’s Letter to Epictetus and further patristic testimonies hold that the Word, living and immutable, raised the body and the complete man he had assumed, while the death belonged to that man.
106. 3.30The florilegium gives Athanasius against the Arians and On the Incarnation: the Son is said to be raised and given life because his body was, and the immortal Word took a mortal body to die for all and make it incorruptible.
107. 3.31The florilegium continues with Athanasius on the incarnation, Damasus’s anathema, a Latin work on the catholic faith, Basil on Acts 2:36, and Gregory of Nazianzus’s letter to Nectarius against the Apollinarians.
108. 3.32The florilegium gives Gregory of Nazianzus against making the Godhead mortal or passible, and Gregory of Nyssa on the resurrection of Christ’s flesh as the resurrection of the whole human nature.
109. 3.33The florilegium gives Gregory of Nyssa against Eunomius and Amphilochius of Iconium: tears, weariness, and the cross belong to the man, miracles and life to the Word, and lowly sayings to the flesh.
110. 3.34The florilegium gives further Amphilochius fragments, unattributed festal passages, Gelasius of Caesarea, and the start of a sermon on John 2:19, all assigning the passion to Christ’s body and not his Godhead.
111. 3.35The florilegium ends with sermons ascribing Christ’s fear and prayer in Gethsemane to his flesh; Orthodoxos claims the agreement of East and West, explains the Fathers’ strong language, and turns to quotations of Apollinarius himself.
112. 3.36Quotations of Apollinarius show that even he ascribed the passion to Christ’s flesh and kept the divine power impassible.
113. 3.37Orthodoxos quotes Eusebius of Emesa, an Arian sympathizer, who argued that the divine power in Christ could no more suffer the nails than the soul can, while the sufferings of the body are referred to the one who dwells in it.
114. 3.38Eusebius of Emesa argues that the incorporeal divine power can no more suffer than an angel or a soul, and imagines heretics answering for their opinions at the judgment; Orthodoxos concludes that even the Arian party denied that the Godhead suffered.
115. 3.39Orthodoxos ends the third dialogue by urging Eranistes to gather what is useful from Scripture and the Fathers, as bees do, and declares himself clear of responsibility if he refuses.
116. 4.1The epilogue begins its syllogisms on immutability: since the one divine substance is immutable, “the Word became flesh … and dwelt among us” means that the Word took and dwelt in flesh, not that he was changed into it.
117. 4.2The syllogisms on immutability conclude from Christ’s descent from Abraham and David, and those on the unconfused union argue from Christ’s infancy, circumcision, sufferings, and sleep that his two natures were not mixed.
118. 4.3The syllogisms on the unconfused union continue from Christ’s weariness, his agony in Gethsemane, and his risen and ascended body, and the third group, on impassibility, begins from the Son’s consubstantiality with the impassible Father.
119. 4.4The syllogisms on impassibility argue from the Son’s sameness of substance with the Father, the good shepherd giving his body and soul, Christ as firstborn and firstfruits of the dead, and 1 Pet 4:1 that the passion belongs to the flesh.
120. 4.5The epilogue ends by explaining “into your hands I commit my spirit” of Christ’s soul, closing the syllogisms on impassibility, and adding verses that sum up the three dialogues: the Word is immutable, unconfused, and impassible.