Werke Athanasius von Alexandrien (295-373) Orationes contra Arianos Four Discourses against the Arians
Discourse III.

16.

For if it be not so, but the Word is a creature and a work out of nothing, either He is not True God because He is Himself one of the creatures, or if they name Him God from regard for the Scriptures, they must of necessity say that there are two Gods 1, one Creator, the other creature, and must serve two Lords, one Unoriginate, and the other originate and a creature; and must have two faiths, one in the True God, and the other in one who is made and fashioned by themselves and called God. And it follows of necessity in so great blindness, that, when they worship the Unoriginate, they renounce the originate, and when they come to the creature, they turn from the Creator. For they cannot see the One in the Other, because their natures and operations are foreign and distinct 2. And with such sentiments, they will certainly be going on to more gods, for this will be the essay 3 of those who revolt from the One God. Wherefore then, when the Arians have these speculations and views, do they not rank themselves with the Gentiles? for they too, as these, worship the creature rather than God the Creator of all 4, and though they shrink from the Gentile name, in order to deceive the unskilful, yet they secretly hold a like sentiment with them. For their subtle saying which they are accustomed to urge, We say not two ‘Unoriginates 5,’ they plainly say to deceive the simple; for in their very professing ‘We say not two Unoriginates,’ they imply two Gods, and these with different natures, one originate and one Unoriginate. And though the Greeks worship one Unoriginate and many originate, but these one Unoriginate and one originate, this is no differ P. 403 ence from them; for the God whom they call originate is one out of many, and again the many gods of the Greeks have the same nature with this one, for both he and they are creatures. Unhappy are they, and the more for that their hurt is from thinking against Christ; for they have fallen from the truth, and are greater traitors than the Jews in denying the Christ, and they wallow 6 with the Gentiles, hateful 7 as they are to God, worshipping the creature and many deities. For there is One God, and not many, and One is His Word, and not many; for the Word is God, and He alone has the Form 8 of the Father. Being then such, the Saviour Himself troubled the Jews with these words, ‘The Father Himself which hath sent Me, hath borne witness of Me; ye have neither heard His voice at any time nor seen His Form; and ye have not His Word abiding in you; for whom He hath sent, Him ye believe not 9.’ Suitably has He joined the ‘Word’ to the ‘Form,’ to shew that the Word of God is Himself Image and Expression and Form of His Father; and that the Jews who did not receive Him who spoke to them, thereby did not receive the Word, which is the Form of God. This too it was that the Patriarch Jacob having seen, received a blessing from Him and the name of Israel instead of Jacob, as divine Scripture witnesses, saying, ‘And as he passed by the Form of God, the Sun rose upon him 10.’ And This it was who said, ‘He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father,’ and, ‘I in the Father and the Father in Me,’ and, ‘I and the Father are one 11;’ for thus God is One, and one the faith in the Father and Son; for, though the Word be God, the Lord our God is one Lord; for the Son is proper to that One, and inseparable according to the propriety and peculiarity of His Essence.

  1. Vid. p. 75, note 7;de Syn.27 (2), and 50, note 5. The Arians were in the dilemma of holding two gods or worshipping the creature, unless they denied to our Lord both divinity and worship. vid.de Decr.6, note 5,Or.i. 30, n. 1. But ‘every substance,’ says S. Austin, ‘which is not God, is a creature, and which is not a creature, is God.’de Trin.i. 6. And so S. Cyrilin Joan.p. 52. vid. also Naz.Orat.31, 6. Basil.contr. Eunom.ii. 31.  ↩

  2. §11, n. 4.  ↩

  3. ἐπιχείρημα ,de Decr.1, note.  ↩

  4. Vid.supr.ii. 14, n. 7. Petavius gives a large collection of passages,de Trin.ii. 12. §5. from the Fathers in proof of the worship of Our Lord evidencing His Godhead. On the Arians as idolaters vid.supr. Or.i. 8, n. 8. alsoEp. Æg.4, 13. andAdelph.3 init.Serap.i. 29, d. Theodoretin Rom. i. 25.  ↩

  5. Or.i. 30, n. 1.  ↩

  6. συγκυλίονται , vid.Orat.i. 23. ii. 1 init.;Decr.9 fin.;Gent.19, c. cf. 2 Pet. ii. 22 .  ↩

  7. θεοστυγεῖς ,infr. Letter54. 1 fin.  ↩

  8. εἶδος· also in Gen. xxxii. 30, 31 . Sept. [a substitute for Heb. ‘face.’] vid. JustinTryph.126. andsupr. de Syn.56, n. 6. for the meaning of the word. It was just now used for ‘kind.’ Athan. says,de Syn. ubi supr.‘there is but one form of Godhead;’ yet the word is used of the Son as synonymous with ‘image.’ It would seem as if there are a certain class of words, all expressive of the One Divine Substance, which admit of more appropriate application either ordinarily or under circumstances, to This or That Divine Person who is also that One Substance. Thus ‘Being’ is more descriptive of the Father as the πηγὴ θεότητος , and He is said to be ‘the Being of the Son;’ yet the Son is really the One Supreme Being also. On the other hand the words μορφὴ and εἶδος [on them see Lightfoot,Philipp.p. 128] are rather descriptive of the Divine Substance in the Person of the Son, and He is called ‘the form of the Father,’ yet there is but one Form and Face of Divinity, who is at once Each of Three Persons; while ‘Spirit’ is appropriated to the Third Person, though God is a Spirit. Thus again S. Hippolytus says ἐκ [ τοῦ πατρὸς ]δύναμις λόγος , yet shortly before, after mentioning the Two Persons, he adds, δύναμιν δὲ μίαν ,contr. Noet.7 and 11. And thus the word ‘Subsistence,’ ὑπόστασις , which expresses the One Divine Substance, has been found more appropriate to express that Substance viewed personally. Other words may be used correlatively of either Father or Son; thus the Father is the Life of the Son, the Son the Life of the Father; or, again, the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father. Others in common, as ‘the Father’s Godhead is the Son’s,’ ἡ πατρικὴ υἱοῦ θεότης , as indeed the word οὐσία itself. Other words on the contrary express the Substance in This or That Person only, as ‘Word,’ ‘Image,’ &c.  ↩

  9. John v. 37 .  ↩

  10. Gen. xxxii. 31 , LXX.  ↩

  11. John xiv. 9, 10 ; x. 30.  ↩

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