NPNF2-04. Athanasius: Select Works and Letters

But if at any time, when the Angel was seen, he who saw it heard God’s voice, as took place at the bush; for ‘the Angel of the Lord was seen in a flame of fire out of the bush, and the Lord called Moses out of the bush, saying, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob2899,’ yet was not the Angel the God of Abraham, but in the Angel God spoke. And what was seen was an Angel; but God spoke in him2900. For as He spoke to Moses in the pillar of a cloud in the tabernacle, so also God appears and speaks in Angels. So again to the son of Nun He spake by an Angel. But what God speaks, it is very plain He speaks through the Word, and not through another. And the Word, as being not separate from the Father, nor unlike and foreign to the Father’s Essence, what He works, those are the Father’s works, and His framing of all things is one with His; and what the Son gives, that is the Father’s gift. And he who hath seen the Son, knows that, in seeing Him, he has seen, not Angel, nor one merely greater than Angels, nor in short any creature, but the Father Himself. And he who hears the Word, knows that he hears the Father; as he who is irradiated by the radiance, knows that he is enlightened by the sun.

15. For divine Scripture wishing us thus to understand the matter, has given such illustrations, as we have said above, from which we are able both to press the traitorous Jews, and to refute the allegation of Gentiles who maintain and think, on account of the Trinity, that we profess many gods2901. For, as the illustration shows, we do not introduce three Origins or three Fathers, as the followers of Marcion and Manichæus; since we have not suggested the image of three suns, but sun and radiance. And one is the light from the sun in the radiance; and so we know of but one origin; and the All-framing Word we profess to have no other manner of godhead, than that of the Only God, because He is born from Him. Rather then will the Ario-maniacs with reason incur the charge of polytheism or else of atheism2902, because they idly talk of the Son as external and a creature, and again the Spirit as from nothing. For either they will say that the Word is not God; or saying that He is God2903, because it is so written, but not proper to the Father’s Essence, they will introduce many because of their difference of kind (unless forsooth they shall dare to say that by participation only, He, as all things else, is called God; though, if this be their sentiment, their irreligion is the same, since they consider the Word as one among all things). But let this never even come into our mind.

For there is but one form2904 of Godhead, which is also in the Word; and one God, the Father, existing by Himself according as He is above all, and appearing in the Son according as He pervades all things, and in the Spirit according as in Him He acts in all things through the Word2905. For thus we confess God to be one through the Triad, and we say that it is much more religious than the godhead of the heretics with its many kinds2906, and many parts, to entertain a belief of the One Godhead in a Triad.

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 Gods2907, 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 distinct2908. And with such sentiments, they will certainly be going on to more gods, for this will be the essay2909 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 all2910, 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 ‘Unoriginates2911,’ 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 difference 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 wallow2912 with the Gentiles, hateful2913 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 Form2914 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 not2915.’ 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 him2916.’

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 one2917;’ 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.

17. The Arians, however, not even thus abashed, reply, ‘Not as you say, but as we will2918;’ for, whereas you have overthrown our former expedients, we have invented a new one, and it is this:—So are the Son and the Father One, and so is the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father, as we too may become one in Him. For this is written in the Gospel according to John, and Christ desired it for us in these words, ‘Holy Father, keep through Thine own Name, those whom Thou hast given Me, that they may be one, as We are2919.’ And shortly after; ‘Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on Me through their Word; that they all may be one, as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me. And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them, that they may be one, even as We are one; I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that Thou didst send Me2920.’ Then, as having found an evasion, these men of craft2921 add, ‘If, as we become one in the Father, so also He and the Father are one, and thus He too is in the Father, how pretend you from His saying, “I and the Father are One,” and “I in the Father and the Father in Me,” that He is proper and like2922 the Father’s Essence? for it follows either that we too are proper to the Father’s Essence, or He foreign to it, as we are foreign.’

Thus they idly babble; but in this their perverseness I see nothing but unreasoning audacity and recklessness from the devil2923, since it is saying after his pattern, ‘We will ascend to heaven, we will be like the Most High.’ For what is given to man by grace, this they would make equal to the Godhead of the Giver. Thus hearing that men are called sons, they thought themselves equal to the True Son by nature such2924. And now again hearing from the Saviour, ‘that they may be one as We are2925,’ they deceive themselves, and are arrogant enough to think that they may be such as the Son is in the Father and the Father in the Son; not considering the fall of their ‘father the devil2926,’ which happened upon such an imagination.