Iresume my discourse, however, taking up that point of his argument which we originally set aside. “We do not refuse,” he says, “to call the Son, seeing He is generate, even by the name of ‘product of generation®’°, since the generated essence itself, and the appellation of ‘Son,’ make such a relation of words appropriate.” Meanwhile let the reader who is critically following the argument remember this, that in speaking of the “generated essence” in the case of the Only-begotten, he by consequence allows us to speak of the “ungenerate essence” in the case of the Father, so that neither absence of generation, nor generation, can any longer be supposed to constitute the essence, but the essence must be taken separately, and its being, or not being begotten, must be conceived separately by means of the peculiar attributes contemplated in it. Let us, however, consider more carefully his argument on this point. He says that an essence has been begotten, and that the name of this generated essence is “Son.” Well, at this point our argument will convict that of our opponents on two grounds, first, of an attempt at knavery, secondly, of slackness in their attempt against ourselves. For he is playing the knave when he speaks of “generation of essence,” in order to establish his opposition between the essences, when once they are divided in respect of a difference of nature between “generate” and “ungenerate”: while the slackness of their attempt is shown by the very positions their knavery tries to establish. For he who says the essence is generate, clearly defines generation as being something else distinct from the essence, so that the significance of generation cannot be assigned to the word “essence.” For he has not in this passage represented the matter as he often does, so as to say that generation is itself the essence, but acknowledges that the essence is generated, so that there is produced in his 573 yévvnua. This word, in what follows, is sometimes translated simply by the word “product,” where it is not contrasted with moinua (the “product of making”), or where the argument depends especially upon its grammatical form (which indicates that the thing denoted is the result of a process), rather than upon the idea of the particular process.
He then shows, from the instance of Adam and Abel, and other examples, the...
readers a distinct notion in the case of each word: for one conception arises in him who hears that it was generated, and another is called up by the name of “essence.” Our argument may be made clearer by example. The Lord says in the Gospel?”* that a woman, when her travail is drawing near, is in sorrow, but afterwards rejoices in gladness because a man is born into the world. As then in this passage we derive from the Gospel two distinct conceptions,—one the birth which we conceive to be by way of generation, the other that which results from the birth (for the birth is not the man, but the man is by the birth),—so here too, when Eunomius confesses that the essence was generated, we learn by the latter word that the essence comes from something, and by the former we conceive that subject itself which has its real being from something. If then the signification of essence is one thing, and the word expressing generation suggests to us another conception, their clever contrivances are quite gone to ruin, like earthen vessels hurled one against the other, and mutually smashed to pieces. For it will no longer be possible for them, if they apply the opposition of “generate” and “ungenerate” to the essence of the Father and the Son, to apply at the same time to the things themselves the mutual conflict between these names”’®. For as it is confessed by Eunomius that the essence is generate (seeing that the example from the Gospel explains the meaning of such a phrase, where, when we hear that a man is generated, we do not conceive the man to be the same thing as his generation, but receive a separate conception in each of the two words), heresy will surely no longer be permitted to express by such words her doctrine of the difference of the essences. In order, however, that our account of these matters may be cleared up as far as possible, let us once more discuss the point in the following way. He Who framed the universe made the nature of man with all things in the beginning, and after Adam was made, He then appointed for men the law of generation one from another, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply°’”°.” Now while Abel came into existence by way of generation, what reasonable man would deny that, in the actual sense of human generation, Adam existed ungenerately? Yet the first man had in himself the complete definition of man’s essential nature, and he who was generated of him was enrolled under the same essential name. But if the essence that was generated was made anything other than that which was not generated, the same essential name would not apply to both: for of those things whose essence is different, the essential name also is not the same. Since, then, the essential nature of Adam and of Abel is marked by the same characteristics, we must certainly agree that one essence is in both, and that the one and the other are exhibited in the same nature.
574 Cf. S. John xvi. 21 575 If, that is, they speak of the “generated essence” in contra-distinction to “ungenerate essence” they are precluded from saying that the essence of the Son is that He is begotten, and that the essence of the Father is that He is ungenerate: that which constitutes the essence cannot be made an epithet of the essence.
He then shows, from the instance of Adam and Abel, and other examples, the...
For Adam and Abel are both one so far as the definition of their nature is concerned, but are distinguished one from the other without confusion by the individual attributes observed in each of them. We cannot therefore properly say that Adam generated another essence besides himself, but rather that of himself he generated another self, with whom was produced the whole definition of the essence of him who generated him. What, then, we learn in the case of human nature by means of the inferential guidance afforded to us by the definition, this I think we ought to take for our guidance also to the pure apprehension of the Divine doctrines. For when we have shaken off from the Divine and exalted doctrines all carnal and material notions, we shall be most surely led by the remaining conception, when it is purged of such ideas, to the lofty and unapproachable heights. It is confessed even by our adversaries that God, Who is over all, both is and is called the Father of the Only-begotten, and they moreover give to the Only-begotten God, Who is of the Father, the name of “begotten,” by reason of His being generated. Since then among men the word “father” has certain significances attaching to it, from which the pure nature is alien, it behoves a man to lay aside all material conceptions which enter in by association with the carnal significance of the word “father,” and to form in the case of the God and Father a conception befitting the Divine nature, expressive only of the reality of the relationship. Since, therefore, in the notion of a human father there is included not only all that the flesh suggests to our thoughts, but a certain notion of interval is also undoubtedly conceived with the idea of human fatherhood, it would be well, in the case of the Divine generation, to reject, together with bodily pollution, the notion of interval also, that so what properly belongs to matter may be completely purged away, and the transcendent generation may be clear, not only from the idea of passion, but from that of interval. Now he who says that God is a Father will unite with the thought that God is, the further thought that He is something: for that which has its being from some beginning, certainly also derives from something the beginning of its being, whatever it is: but He in Whose case being had no beginning, has not His beginning from anything, even although we contemplate in Him some other attribute than simple existence.
Well, God is a Father. It follows that He is what He is from eternity: for He did not become, but is a Father: for in God that which was, both is and will be. On the other hand, if He once was not anything, then He neither is nor will be that thing: for He is not believed to be the Father of a Being such that it may be piously asserted that God once existed by Himself without that Being. For the Father is the Father of Life, and Truth, and Wisdom, and Light, and Sanctification, and Power, and all else of a like kind that the Only-begotten is or is called. Thus when the adversaries allege that the Light “once was not,” I know not to which the greater injury is done, whether to the Light, in that the Light is not, or to Him that has the Light, in that He has not the Light. So also with Life and Truth and Power, and all the other characters in which the Only-begotten fills the Father’s bosom, being all things in His own fulness. For the absurdity will be equal either way, and the impiety against the Father will He then shows, from the instance of Adam and Abel, and other examples, the...equal the blasphemy against the Son: for in saying that the Lord “once was not,” you will not merely assert the non-existence of Power, but you will be saying that the Power of God, Who is the Father of the Power, “was not.” Thus the assertion made by your doctrine that the Son “once was not,” establishes nothing else than a destitution of all good in the case of the Father. See to what an end these wise men’s acuteness leads, how by them the word of the Lord is made good, which says, “He that despiseth Me despiseth Him that sent Me?’”:” for by the very arguments by which they despise the existence at any time of the Only-begotten, they also dishonour the Father, stripping off by their doctrine from the Father’s glory every good name and conception.
He thus shows the oneness of the Eternal Son with the Father the identity...§4. He thus shows the oneness of the Eternal Son with the Father the identity of essence and the community of nature (wherein is a natural inquiry into the production of wine), and that the terms “Son” and “product” in the naming of the Only-Begotten include a like idea of relationship.
What has been said, therefore, has clearly exposed the slackness which is to be found in the knavery of our author, who, while he goes about to establish the opposition of the essence of the Only-begotten to that of the Father, by the method of calling the one “ungenerate,” and the other “generate,” stands convicted of playing the fool with his inconsistent arguments. For it was shown from his own words, first, that the name of “essence” means one thing, and that of “generation” another; and next, that there did not come into existence, with the Son, any new and different essence besides the essence of the Father, but that what the Father is as regards the definition of His nature, that also He is Who is of the Father, as the nature does not change into diversity in the Person of the Son, according to the truth of the argument displayed by our consideration of Adam and Abel. For as, in that instance, he that was not generated after a like sort was yet, so far as concerns the definition of essence, the same with him that was generated, and Abel’s generation did not produce any change in the essence, so, in the case of these pure doctrines, the Only-begotten God did not, by His own generation, produce in Himself any change in the essence of Him Who is ungenerate (coming forth, as the Gospel says, from the Father, and being in the Father,) but is, according to the simple and homely language of the creed we profess, “Light of Light, very God of very God,” the one being all that the other is, save being that other. With regard, however, to the aim for the sake of which he carries on this system-making, I think there is no need for me at present to express any opinion, whether it is audacious and dangerous, or a thing allowable and free from danger, to transform the phrases which are employed to signify the Divine nature from one to another, and to call Him Who is generated by the name of “product of generation.”
I let these matters pass, that my discourse may not busy itself too much in the strife against lesser points, and neglect the greater; but I say that we ought carefully to consider the question whether the natural relation does introduce the use of these terms: for this surely Eunomius asserts, that with the affinity of the appellations there is also asserted an essential relationship. For he would not say, I presume, that the mere names themselves, apart from the sense of the things signified, have any mutual relation or affinity; but all discern the relationship or diversity of the appellations by the meanings which the words express. If, therefore, he confesses that “the Son” has a natural relation with “the Father,” let us leave the appellations, and consider the force that is found in their significations, whether in their affinity we discern diversity of essence, or that which is kindred and characteristic. To say that we find diversity is downright madness. For how does something without kinship or community “preserve order,” connected and conformable, in the names, He thus shows the oneness of the Eternal Son with the Father the identity...
where “the generated essence itself,” as he says, “and the appellation of ‘Son,’ make such a relation of words appropriate”? If, on the other hand, he should say that these appellations signify relationship, he will necessarily appear in the character of an advocate of the community of essence, and as maintaining the fact that by affinity of names is signified also the connection of subjects: and this he often does in his composition without being aware of it’”®. For, by the arguments wherewith he endeavours to destroy the truth, he is often himself unwittingly drawn into an advocacy of the very doctrines against which he is contending. Some such thing the history tells us concerning Saul, that once, when moved with wrath against the prophets, he was overcome by grace, and was found as one of the inspired, (the Spirit of prophecy willing, as I suppose, to instruct the apostate by means of himself,) whence the surprising nature of the event became a proverb in his after life, as the history records such an expression by way of wonder, “Is Saul also among the prophets?’??”
At what point, then, does Eunomius assent to the truth? When he says that the Lord Himself, “being the Son of the living God, not being ashamed of His birth from the Virgin, often named Himself, in His own sayings, ‘the Son of Man’”? For this phrase we also allege for proof of the community of essence, because the name of “Son” shows the community of nature to be equal in both cases. For as He is called the Son of Man by reason of the kindred of His flesh to her of whom He was born, so also He is conceived, surely, as the Son of God, by reason of the connection of His essence with that from which He has His existence, and this argument is the greatest weapon of the truth. For nothing so clearly points to Him Who is the “mediator between God and man?®” (as the great Apostle called Him), as the name of “Son,” equally applicable to either nature, Divine or Human. For the same Person is Son of God, and was made, in the Incarnation, Son of Man, that, by His communion with each, He might link together by Himself what were divided by nature. Now if, in becoming Son of Man, he were without participation in human nature, it would be logical to say that neither does He share in the Divine essence, though He is Son of God. But if the whole compound nature of man was in Him (for He was “in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin”?!
without sin”?!
), it is surely necessary to believe that every property of the transcendent essence is also in Him, as the Word “Son” claims for Him both alike—the Human in the man, but in the God the Divine.
If then the appellations, as Eunomius says, indicate relationship, and the existence of relationship is observed in the things, not in the mere sound of the words (and by things I mean the things conceived in themselves, if it be not over-bold thus to speak of the Son and 578 Oehler’s punctuation is here slightly altered.
He thus shows the oneness of the Eternal Son with the Father the identity...the Father), who would deny that the very champion of blasphemy has by his own action been dragged into the advocacy of orthodoxy, overthrowing by his own means his own arguments, and proclaiming community of essence in the case of the Divine doctrines? For the argument that he unwillingly casts into the scale on the side of truth does not speak falsely as regards this point,—that He would not have been called Son if the natural conception of the names did not verify this calling. For as a bench is not called the son of the workman, and no sane man would say that the builder engendered the house, and we do 982 of the vine-dresser, but call what a man makes not say that the vineyard is the “product his work, and him who is begotten of him the son of a man, (in order, I suppose, that the proper meaning might be attached by means of the names to the respective subjects,) so too, when we are taught that the Only-begotten is Son of God, we do not by this appellation understand a creature of God, but what the word “Son” in its signification really displays.
>83> of the vine, not even so will And even though wine be named by Scripture the “product our argument with regard to the orthodox doctrine suffer by this identity of name. For we do not call wine the “product” of the oak, nor the acorn the “product” of the vine, but we use the word only if there is some natural community between the “product” and that from which it comes. For the moisture in the vine, which is drawn out from the root through the stem by the pith, is, in its natural power, water: but, as it passes in orderly sequence along the ways of nature, and flows from the lowest to the highest, it changes to the quality of wine, a change to which the rays of the sun contribute in some degree, which by their warmth draw out the moisture from the depth to the shoots, and by a proper and suitable process of ripening make the moisture wine: so that, so far as their nature is concerned, there is no difference between the moisture that exists in the vine and the wine that is produced from it. For the one form of moisture comes from the other, and one could not say that the cause of wine is anything else than the moisture which naturally exists in the shoots. But, so far as moisture is concerned, the differences of quality produce no alteration, but are found when some peculiarity discerns the moisture which is in the form of wine from that which is in the shoots, one of the two forms being accompanied by astringency, or sweetness, or sourness, so that in substance the two are the same, but are distinguished by qualitative differences. As, therefore, when we hear from Scripture that the Only-begotten God is Son of man, we learn by the kindred expressed in the name His kinship with true man, so even, if the Son be called, in the adversaries’ phrase, a “product,” we none the less learn, even by this name, His kinship in essence with Him that has “produced?**” Him, by the fact that wine, which is called the “product” of the vine has been found not to be alien, as concerns 584 yeyevvnKota: which, as answering to yevvnua, is here translated “produced” rather than “begotten.”
He thus shows the oneness of the Eternal Son with the Father the identity...
the idea of moisture, from the natural power that resides in the vine. Indeed, if one were judiciously to examine the things that are said by our adversaries, they tend to our doctrine, and their sense cries out against their own fabrications, as they strive at all points to establish their “difference in essence.” Yet it is by no means an easy matter to conjecture whence they were led to such conceptions. For if the appellation of “Son” does not merely signify “being from something,” but by its signification presents to us specially, as Eunomius himself says, relationship in point of nature, and wine is not called the “product” of an oak, and those “products” or “generation of vipers”*°,” of which the Gospel somewhere speaks, are snakes and not sheep, it is clear, that in the case of the Only-begotten also, the appellation of “Son” or of “product” would not convey the meaning of relationship to something of another kind: but even if, according to our adversaries’ phrase, He is called a “product of generation,” and the name of “Son,” as they confess, has reference to nature, the Son is surely of the essence of Him Who has generated or “produced” Him, not of that of some other among the things which we contemplate as external to that nature. And if He is truly from Him, He is not alien from all that belongs to Him from Whom He is, as in the other cases too it was shown that all that has its existence from anything by way of generation is clearly of the same kind as that from whence it came.
585 yevvrjpata exidvev. E.g. S. Matt. iii. 7.
He discusses the incomprehensibility of the Divine essence, and the saying...§5. He discusses the incomprehensibility of the Divine essence, and the saying to the woman of Samaria, “Ye worship ye know not what.”
Now if any one should ask for some interpretation, and description, and explanation of the Divine essence, we are not going to deny that in this kind of wisdom we are unlearned, acknowledging only so much as this, that it is not possible that that which is by nature infinite should be comprehended in any conception expressed by words. The fact that the Divine greatness has no limit is proclaimed by prophecy, which declares expressly that of His splendour, His glory, His holiness, “there is no end?®°:” and if His surroundings have no limit, much more is He Himself in His essence, whatever it may be, comprehended by no limitation in any way. If then interpretation by way of words and names implies by its meaning some sort of comprehension of the subject, and if, on the other hand, that which is unlimited cannot be comprehended, no one could reasonably blame us for ignorance, if we are not bold in respect of what none should venture upon. For by what name can I describe the incomprehensible? by what speech can I declare the unspeakable? Accordingly, since the Deity is too excellent and lofty to be expressed in words, we have learnt to honour in silence what transcends speech and thought: and if he who “thinketh more highly than he ought to think°®”,” ance of things incomprehensible, and recognizes a difference of unlikeness in that which is tramples upon this cautious speech of ours making a jest of our ignorwithout figure, or limit, or size, or quantity (I mean in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit), and brings forward to reproach our ignorance that phrase which is continually alleged by the disciples of deceit, “Ye worship ye know not what’, if ye know not the essence of that which ye worship,” we shall follow the advice of the prophet, and not fear the reproach of fools”®’, nor be led by their reviling to talk boldly of things unspeakable, making that unpractised speaker Paul our teacher in the mysteries that transcend knowledge, who is so far from thinking that the Divine nature is within the reach of human perception, that he calls even the judgments of God “unsearchable,” and His ways “past finding out?”’,” and affirms that the things promised to them that love Him, for their good deeds done in this life, are above comprehension so that it is not possible to behold them with the eye, nor to receive them by hearing, nor to contain them in the heart??!, Learning this, therefore, from Paul, we boldly declare that, not only are the judgments of God too high for those who try to search them out, but that the ways also that lead to the knowledge of Him are even until 586 Cf. Ps. cxlv. 3 He discusses the incomprehensibility of the Divine essence, and the saying...
now untrodden and impassable. For this is what we understand that the Apostle wishes to signify, when he calls the ways that lead to the incomprehensible “past finding out,” showing by the phrase that that knowledge is unattainable by human calculations, and that no one ever yet set his understanding on such a path of reasoning, or showed any trace or sign of an approach, by way of perception, to the things incomprehensible.
Learning these things, then, from the lofty words of the Apostle, we argue, by the passage quoted, in this way:—If His judgments cannot be searched out, and His ways are not traced, and the promise of His good things transcends every representation that our conjectures can frame, by how much more is His actual Godhead higher and loftier, in respect of being unspeakable and unapproachable, than those attributes which are conceived as accompanying it, whereof the divinely instructed Paul declares that there is no knowledge:—and by this means we confirm in ourselves the doctrine they deride, confessing ourselves inferior to them in the knowledge of those things which are beyond the range of knowledge, and declare that we really worship what we know. Now we know the loftiness of the glory of Him Whom we worship, by the very fact that we are not able by reasoning to comprehend in our thoughts the incomparable character of His greatness; and that saying of our Lord to the Samaritan woman, which is brought forward against us by our enemies, might more properly be addressed to them. For the words, “Ye worship ye know not what,” the Lord speaks to the Samaritan woman, prejudiced as she was by corporeal ideas in her opinions concerning God: and to her the phrase well applies, because the Samaritans, thinking that they worship God, and at the same time supposing the Deity to be corporeally settled in place, adore Him in name only, worshipping something else, and not God. For nothing is Divine that is conceived as being circumscribed, but it belongs to the Godhead to be in all places, and to pervade all things, and not to be limited by anything: so that those who fight against Christ find the phrase they adduce against us turned into an accusation of themselves. For, as the Samaritans, supposing the Deity to be compassed round by some circumscription of place, were rebuked by the words they heard, “‘Ye worship ye know not what,’ and your service is profitless to you, for a God that is deemed to be settled in any place is no God,”—so one might well say to the new Samaritans, “In supposing the Deity to be limited by the absence of generation, as it were by some local limit, ‘ye worship ye know not what,’ doing service to Him indeed as God, but not knowing that the infinity of God exceeds all the significance and comprehension that names can furnish.”
Thereafter he expounds the appellation of “Son,” and of “product of generation,”...§6. Thereafter he expounds the appellation of “Son,” and of “product of generation,” and very many varieties of “sons,” of God, of men, of rams, of perdition, of light, and of day.