On the Trinity, Book 4

The earlier books of this treatise, written some time ago, contain, I think, an invincible proof that we hold and profess the faith in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit that the Evangelists and Apostles teach, and that no dealings are possible between us and the heretics, since they deny the Divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ unconditionally, irrationally, and recklessly. Yet certain points remained that I have felt bound to include in this book and the ones that follow, in order to make our assurance of the faith even more certain by exposing every one of their falsehoods and blasphemies. Accordingly, we will first inquire what the dangers of their teaching are, and what risks such irreverence involves; next, what principles they hold, what arguments they advance against the apostolic faith we adhere to, and by what sleight of language they take advantage of the openness of their hearers; and lastly, by what method of interpretation they strip the words of Scripture of their force and meaning.

We are well aware that neither human speech nor the analogy of human nature can give us full insight into the things of God. The ineffable cannot submit to the bounds and limits of definition; what is spiritual is distinct from every class or instance of bodily things. Yet, since our subject is heavenly natures, we must use ordinary natures and ordinary speech as our means of expressing what our mind grasps; a means no doubt unworthy of the majesty of God, but forced on us by the weakness of our intellect, which can use only our own circumstances and our own words to convey our perceptions and our conclusions to others. This truth was already stressed in the first book, but it is repeated now so that, in any analogies we cite from human affairs, we will not be supposed to think of God as resembling embodied natures, or to compare spiritual Beings with our passible selves, but will instead be seen as offering the outward appearance of visible things as a clue to the inward meaning of invisible things.

For the heretics say that Christ is not from God, that is, that the Son is not born from the Father, and is God not by nature but by appointment; in other words, that He has received an adoption that consists in being given a name, and is God's Son in the sense in which many are sons of God; again, that Christ's majesty is evidence of God's widespread generosity, and that He is God in the sense in which there are many gods; although they admit that in adopting Him and naming Him God a more generous affection was shown than in other cases, since His adoption was the first in time, and He is greater than other adopted sons, and first in rank among the creatures because of the greater splendor that accompanied His creation. Some add, by way of confessing the omnipotence of God, that He was created into God's likeness, and that He, like other creatures, was raised up out of nothing to be the Image of the eternal Creator, commanded by a word to spring from non-existence into being by the power of God, Who can make the likeness of Himself out of nothing.

Moreover, they use their knowledge of the historical fact that bishops of an earlier time taught that Father and Son are of one substance to subvert the truth with the ingenious plea that this is a heretical notion. They say that this term 'of one substance,' in Greek homoousion, is used to mean and express that the Father is the same as the Son; that is, that He extended Himself out of infinity into the Virgin, and took a body from her, and gave Himself the name of Son in the body He had taken. This is their first lie about the homoousion. Their next lie is that this word homoousion implies that Father and Son share in something prior to Either and distinct from Both, and that a certain imaginary substance, or ousia, prior to all matter whatever, existed beforehand and was divided and wholly distributed between the Two; which proves, they say, that Each of the Two is of a nature that existed before Himself, and that Each is identical in matter with the Other. And so they claim to condemn the confession of the homoousion on the ground that the term does not distinguish between Father and Son, and makes the Father later in time than the matter He has in common with the Son. And they have devised this third objection to the word homoousion: that its meaning, as they explain it, is that the Son derives His origin from a partition of the Father's substance, as though one object had been cut in two and He were the severed portion. The meaning of 'one substance,' they say, is that the part cut off from the whole continues to share the nature of the whole it has been severed from; but God, being impassible, cannot be divided, for if He must submit to being lessened by division, He is subject to change, and will be made imperfect if His perfect substance leaves Him to reside in the severed portion.

They also think they have a concise refutation of Prophets, Evangelists and Apostles alike in their assertion that the Son was born within time. They declare us illogical for saying that the Son has existed from everlasting; and, since they reject the possibility of His eternity, they are forced to believe that He was born at a point in time. For if He has not always existed, there was a time when He did not exist; and if there is a time when He did not exist, time existed before Him. He who has not existed everlastingly began to exist within time, while He Who is free from the limits of time is necessarily eternal. The reason they give for rejecting the eternity of the Son is that His everlasting existence contradicts faith in His birth; as though by confessing that He has existed eternally we made His birth impossible.

What foolish and godless fears! What impious anxiety on God's behalf! The meaning they claim to detect in the word homoousion, and in the assertion of the eternity of the Son, is detested, rejected, denounced by the Church. She confesses one God from Whom are all things; she confesses one Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom are all things; One from Whom, One through Whom; One the Source of all, One the Agent through Whom all were created. In the One from Whom are all things she recognizes the Majesty that has no beginning, and in the One through Whom are all things she recognizes a might coequal with His Source; for Both are jointly supreme in the work of creation and in rule over created things. In the Spirit she recognizes God as Spirit, impassible and indivisible, for she has learned from the Lord that a spirit has neither flesh nor bones; a warning to keep her from supposing that God, being Spirit, could be burdened with bodily suffering and loss. She recognizes one God, unborn from everlasting; she also recognizes one Only-begotten Son of God. She confesses the Father eternal and without beginning; she also confesses that the Son's beginning is from eternity. This does not mean that He has no beginning, but that He is Son of the Father Who has none; not that He is self-originated, but that He is from Him Who is unbegotten from everlasting; born from eternity, that is, receiving His birth from the eternity of the Father. So our faith is free from the guesswork of heretical perversity; it is expressed in fixed and published terms, though no reasoned defense of our confession has yet been put forward. Still, so that no suspicion would linger about the sense in which the Fathers used the word homoousion, or about our confession of the eternity of the Son, I have set down the proofs by which we may be assured that the Son always remains in the substance in which He was begotten from the Father, and that the birth of His Son has not diminished anything of the Substance in which the Father exists; and that holy men, inspired by the teaching of God, pointed to no such flaws or defects as I have mentioned when they said that the Son is homoousios with the Father. My purpose has been to counter the impression that this ousia, this assertion that He is homoousios with the Father, is a denial of the nativity of the Only-begotten Son.

To assure ourselves that these two phrases are needed, phrases adopted and used as the best of safeguards against the heretical rabble of that day, I think it best to reply to the obstinate false belief of our present heretics, and to refute their empty and pestilent teaching by the witness of the evangelists and apostles. They flatter themselves that they can supply a proof for each of their propositions; in fact, they have attached to each some passage or other from holy Scripture; passages so grossly misinterpreted that they ensnare no one but the uneducated, through the semblance of truth with which perverted ingenuity has masked their explanation.

For they attempt, by praising the Godhead of the Father only, to deprive the Son of His Divinity, pleading that it is written, Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One, and that the Lord repeats this in His answer to the teacher of the Law who asked Him what the greatest commandment in the Law was; Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One. Again, they say that Paul proclaims, For there is One God, and One Mediator between God and men. And furthermore, they insist that God alone is wise, in order to leave no wisdom for the Son, relying on the words of the Apostle, Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that has been kept in silence through age-long times, but is now made manifest through the scriptures of the prophets according to the commandment of the eternal God, Who is made known to all nations for the obedience of faith; to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory forever and ever. They also argue that He alone is true, for Isaiah says, They will bless You, the true God, and the Lord Himself has borne witness in the Gospel, saying, And this is eternal life, that they should know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ Whom You have sent. Again they reason that He alone is good, to leave no goodness for the Son, because it was said through Him, No one is good except One, that is, God; and that He alone has power, because Paul has said, Which He will show to us in His own times, Who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords. And further, they claim to be certain that in the Father there is no change or turning, because He said through the prophet, I am the Lord your God, and I do not change, and the apostle James said, With Whom there is no change; certain also that He is the righteous Judge, for it is written, God is the righteous Judge, strong and patient; that He cares for all, because the Lord said, speaking of the birds, And your heavenly. Father feeds them, and, Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them falls to the ground without the will of your Father; but the very hairs of your head are numbered. They say that the Father has foreknowledge of all things, as the blessed Susanna says, O eternal God, who know secrets, and know all things before they come to be; that He is incomprehensible, as it is written, Heaven is My throne, and the earth is the footstool of My feet. What house will you build for Me, or what is the place of My rest? For My hand has made these things, and all these things are mine; that He contains all things, as Paul bears witness, For in Him we live and move and have our being, and the psalmist, Where shall I go from Your Spirit, and where shall I flee from Your face? If I climb up into heaven, You are there; if I go down to hell, You are present. If I take my wings before the light and dwell in the farthest parts of the sea, even there Your hand will lead me and Your right hand will hold me; that He is without body, for it is written, For God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth; that He is immortal and invisible, as Paul says, Who alone has immortality, and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see, and the Evangelist, No one has seen God at any time, except the Only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father; that He alone remains eternally unborn, for it is written, I Am That I Am, and This is what you shall say to the children of Israel, I Am has sent me to you, and through Jeremiah, O Lord, Who are Lord.

Who can fail to see that these statements are full of fraud and fallacy? However cleverly issues have been confused and texts combined, malice and folly are the character indelibly stamped on this laborious effort of cunning and clumsiness. For instance, among their points of faith they have included this: that they confess the Father alone to be unborn; as though anyone on our side could suppose that He, Who begot Him through Whom are all things, derived His being from any external source. The very fact that He bears the name of Father reveals Him as the cause of His Son's existence. That name of Father gives no hint that He who bears it is Himself descended from another, while it tells us plainly from Whom the Son is begotten. Let us therefore leave to the Father His own special and incommunicable property, confessing that the eternal powers of an omnipotence without beginning reside in Him. No one, I am sure, can doubt that the reason certain attributes are dwelt on in their confession of God the Father as uniquely and inalienably His own is so that He may be left in sole possession of them. For when they say that He alone is true, alone is righteous, alone is wise, alone is invisible, alone is good, alone is mighty, alone is immortal, they are raising up this word alone as a barrier to cut off the Son from His share in these attributes. He Who is alone, they say, has no partner in His properties. But if we suppose that these attributes reside in the Father only, and not in the Son as well, then we must believe that God the Son has neither truth nor wisdom; that He is a bodily being composed of visible and material elements, ill-disposed and feeble and lacking immortality; for we exclude Him from all these attributes of which we make the Father the sole Possessor.

We, however, who intend to speak of that most perfect majesty and fullest Divinity that belongs to the Only-begotten Son of God, have no fear that our readers will imagine that fullness of language in speaking of the Son detracts from the glory of God the Father, as though every praise given to the Son had first been withdrawn from Him. For, on the contrary, the majesty of the Son is glory to the Father; the Source from which He Who is worthy of such glory comes must be glorious. The Son has nothing except by virtue of His birth; the Father shares all the veneration received by that birthright. So the suggestion that we diminish the Father's honor is silenced, for all the glory that, as we shall teach, is inherent in the Son will be reflected back, to the increased glory of Him who has begotten so great a Son.

Now that we have exposed their plan of belittling the Son under cover of magnifying the Father, the next step is to listen to the exact terms in which they express their own belief about the Son. For, since we have to answer each of their allegations in turn and to display the impiety of their doctrines on the evidence of Holy Scripture, we must add, to what they say of the Father, the decisions they have put on record about the Son, so that by comparing their confession of the Father with their confession of the Son we may follow a uniform order in resolving the questions as they arise. They state as their verdict that the Son is not derived from any pre-existent matter, for through Him all things were created, nor is He begotten from God, for nothing can be withdrawn from God; but that He was made out of what did not exist, that is, that He is a perfect creature of God, though different from His other creatures. They argue that He is a creature, because it is written, The Lord has created Me as a beginning of His ways; and that He is the perfect handiwork of God, though different from His other works, they prove, as to the first point, by what Paul writes to the Hebrews, Being made so much better than the angels, as He possesses a more excellent name than they, and again, Therefore, holy brothers, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Jesus Christ, who is faithful to Him who made Him. For their disparagement of the might and majesty and Godhead of the Son they rely chiefly on His own words, The Father is greater than I. But they admit that He is not one of the common herd of creatures, on the evidence of All things were made through Him. And so they sum up the whole of their blasphemous teaching in the following words:

We confess One God, alone unmade, alone eternal, alone unoriginate, alone true, alone possessing immortality, alone good, alone mighty, Creator, Ordainer and Disposer of all things, unchangeable and unalterable, righteous and good, God of the Law and the Prophets and the New Testament. We believe that this God gave birth to the Only-begotten Son before all worlds, through Whom He made the world and all things; that He gave birth to Him not in appearance but in truth, following His own Will, so that He is unchangeable and unalterable, God's perfect creature but not as one of His other creatures, His handiwork, but not as His other works; not, as Valentinus maintained, that the Son is a development of the Father; nor, as Manichaeus has declared of the Son, a consubstantial part of the Father; nor, as Sabellius says, who makes two out of one, Son and Father at once; nor, as Hieracas says, a light from a light, or a lamp with two flames; nor as if He previously existed and was afterwards born or created anew to be a Son, a notion you yourself, blessed Pope, have often condemned publicly in the Church and in the assembly of the brothers. But, as we have affirmed, we believe that He was created by the will of God before times and worlds, and has His life and existence from the Father, Who gave Him a share in His own glorious perfections. For when the Father gave Him the inheritance of all things, He did not in doing so deprive Himself of the attributes that are His without origination, since He is the source of all things.

So there are three Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God, for His part, is the cause of all things, utterly unoriginate and separate from all; while the Son, put forth by the Father outside time, and created and established before the worlds, did not exist before He was born, but, born outside time before the worlds, came into being as the Only Son of the Only Father. For He is neither eternal, nor co-eternal, nor co-uncreated with the Father, nor does He have an existence side by side with the Father, as some say who postulate two unborn principles. But God is before all things, as indivisible and the beginning of all. Therefore He is before the Son also, as indeed we have learned from you in your public preaching. Since, then, He has His being from God, and His glorious perfections, and His life, and is entrusted with all things, for this reason God is His source and has rule over Him as His God, since He is before Him. As to such phrases as from Him, and from the womb, and I went out from the Father and have come, if they are understood to mean that the Father extends a part and, as it were, a development of that one substance, then the Father will be of a compound nature and divisible and changeable and corporeal, according to them; and so, as far as their words go, the incorporeal God will be subjected to the properties of matter.

Such is their error, such is their pestilent teaching; to support it they borrow the words of Scripture, perverting its meaning and using human ignorance as their opportunity to gain credence for their lies. Yet it is certainly through these same words of God that we must come to understand the things of God. For human weakness cannot attain knowledge of heavenly things by any strength of its own; the faculties that deal with bodily matters can form no notion of the unseen world. Neither our created bodily substance nor the reason God has given us for the purposes of ordinary life is capable of ascertaining and pronouncing on the nature and work of God. Our minds cannot rise to the level of heavenly knowledge; our powers of perception lack the strength to grasp that limitless might. We must believe God's word about Himself, and humbly accept whatever insight He grants. We must choose between rejecting His witness, as the pagans do, or believing in Him as He is, and doing so in the only possible way, by thinking of Him in the aspect in which He presents Himself to us. Therefore let private judgment cease; let human reason refrain from crossing barriers divinely set. In this spirit we avoid all blasphemous and reckless assertions about God, and cling to the very letter of revelation. Each point in our inquiry will be considered in the light of the instruction of Him Who is our theme; there will be no stringing together of isolated phrases with their context suppressed, to trick and misinform the inexperienced listener. The meaning of words will be determined by considering the circumstances in which they were spoken; words must be explained by circumstances, not circumstances forced to conform to words. We, at any rate, will treat our subject completely; we will state both the circumstances in which words were spoken and the true meaning of the words. Each point will be considered in orderly sequence.

Their starting point is this: We confess, they say, One only God, because Moses says, Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One. But is this a truth anyone has ever dared to doubt? Or was any believer ever known to confess anything other than that there is One God from Whom are all things, One Majesty that has no birth, and that He is that unoriginated Power? Yet this fact of the Unity of God offers no opening for denying the Divinity of His Son. For Moses, or rather God through Moses, laid it down as His first commandment to that people, devoted both in Egypt and in the Desert to idols and the worship of imaginary gods, that they must believe in One God. There was truth and reason in the commandment, for God, from Whom are all things, is One. But let us see whether this same Moses has not confessed that He through Whom are all things is also God. God is not robbed; He is still God, if His Son shares the Godhead. For this is a case of God from God, of One from One, of God Who is One because God is from Him. And conversely the Son is no less God because God the Father is One, for He is the Only-begotten Son of God; not eternally unborn, so as to deprive the Father of His Oneness, nor different from God, for He is born from Him. We must not doubt that He is God by virtue of that birth from God which proves to us who believe that God is One; yet let us see whether Moses, who announced to Israel, The Lord your God is One, has also proclaimed the Godhead of the Son. To establish our confession of the Divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ we must use the evidence of the same witness the heretics rely on for the confession of One Only God, which they imagine involves denying the Godhead of the Son.

Since, then, the Apostle's words, One God the Father, from Whom are all things, and one Jesus Christ, our Lord, through Whom are all things, form an accurate and complete confession about God, let us see what Moses has to say about the beginning of the world. His words are, And God said, Let there be a firmament in the middle of the water, and let it divide the water from the water. And it was so, and God made the firmament and God divided the water through the middle. Here, then, you have the God from Whom, and the God through Whom. If you deny it, you must tell us through whom God's work in creation was done, or else explain it by pointing to an obedience in things not yet created, which, when God said Let there be a firmament, drove the firmament to establish itself. Suggestions like these are inconsistent with the clear sense of Scripture. For all things, as the Prophet says, were made out of nothing; it was not a transformation of existing things, but the creation of what did not exist into a perfect form.⁠a Through whom? Listen to the Evangelist: All things were made through Him. If you ask Who this is, the same Evangelist will tell you: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him. If you are inclined to dispute the view that it was the Father Who said, Let there be a firmament, the prophet will answer you: He spoke, and they were made; He commanded, and they were created. The recorded words, Let there be a firmament, show us that the Father spoke. But in the words that follow, And it was so, in the statement that God did this thing, we must recognize the Person of the Agent. He spoke, and they were made; the Scripture does not say that He willed it and did it. He commanded, and they were created; notice that it does not say they came into existence because it pleased Him. In that case there would be no role for a Mediator between God and the world that was waiting to be created. God, from Whom are all things, gives the order for creation, and God, through Whom are all things, carries it out. Under one and the same Name we confess Him Who gave the command and Him Who fulfilled it. If you dare to deny that God made is said of the Son, how do you explain All things were made through Him? Or the Apostle's words, One Jesus Christ, our Lord, through Whom are all things? Or, He spoke, and they were made? If these inspired words manage to convince your stubborn mind, you will stop regarding that text, Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One, as a denial of Divinity to the Son of God, since at the very foundation of the world He Who spoke it proclaimed that His Son also is God. But let us see what further benefit we can draw from this distinction between God Who commands and God Who carries out the command. For although even our natural reason rejects the idea that in the words, He commanded, and they were made, one single and isolated Person is meant, still, to remove all doubt, we must set out the events that followed the creation of the world.

When the world was complete and its inhabitant was about to be created, the words spoken about him were, Let Us make man in Our image and likeness. I ask you, do you suppose that God spoke those words to Himself? Is it not obvious that He was addressing not Himself, but Another? If you reply that He was alone, then He refutes you out of His own mouth, for He says, Let Us make man in Our image and likeness. God has spoken to us through the Lawgiver in a way we can understand; that is, He makes His action known to us by means of language, the faculty He has been pleased to give us. There is, indeed, an indication of the Son of God, through Whom all things were made, in the words, And God said, Let there be a firmament, and in the words that follow, And God made the firmament: but so that we would not think these words of God were wasted and meaningless, as if He issued the command of creation to Himself and then obeyed it Himself — for what idea could be further from the thought of a solitary God than giving a verbal order to Himself, when nothing was needed except an act of His will?— He decided to give us a more complete assurance that these words refer to Another besides Himself. When He said, Let Us make man in Our image and likeness, His reference to a Partner demolishes the theory that He was isolated. For an isolated being cannot be his own partner; and again, the words, Let Us make, are inconsistent with solitude, while Our can only be said to a companion. Both words, Us and Our are inconsistent with the idea of a solitary God speaking to Himself, and equally inconsistent with the idea that He was addressing a stranger who has nothing in common with the Speaker. If you interpret the passage to mean that He is isolated, I ask you: do you suppose that He was speaking with Himself? If you do not understand that He was speaking with Himself, how can you assume that He was isolated? If He were isolated, we would find Him described as isolated; if He had a companion, then as not isolated. I and Mine would describe the first state; the second is indicated by Us and Our.

So when we read, Let Us make man in Our image and likeness, these two words Us and Our show that there is neither one isolated God, nor one God in two dissimilar Persons; and our confession must be shaped to agree with the second truth as well as with the first. For the words our image— not our images— prove that there is one nature possessed by Both. But an argument from words is not sufficient proof unless its result is confirmed by the evidence of facts; and so it is written, And God made man; in the image of God He made him. If the words He spoke were, I ask, the soliloquy of an isolated God, what meaning are we to give this last statement? For in it I see a threefold reference: to the Maker, to the one made, and to the image. The one made is man; God made him, and made him in the image of God. If Genesis were speaking of an isolated God, it would certainly have said, And made him in His own image. But since the book was foreshadowing the Mystery of the Gospel, it did not speak of two Gods, but of God and God, for it speaks of man made through God in the image of God. So we find that God made man in an image and likeness shared by Himself and by God; that the mention of an Agent forbids us to assume that He was isolated; and that the work, done in an image and likeness that belonged to Both, proves that there is no difference in kind between the Godhead of the One and that of the Other.

It may seem a waste of time to bring forward more arguments, for truths about God gain no strength by repetition; a single statement is enough to establish them. Still, it is good for us to know everything that has been revealed on the subject, for although we are not responsible for the words of Scripture, we will have to give an account of the sense we have given them. One of the many commandments God gave to Noah is, Whoever sheds man's blood, for his blood his life shall be shed, for in the image of God I made man. Here again is the distinction between likeness, creature, and Creator. God bears witness that He made man in the image of God. When He was about to make man, because He was speaking of Himself, yet not to Himself, God said, In our image; and again, after man was made, God made man in the image of God. It would have been no inaccuracy of language if He had said, addressing Himself, I have made man in My image, for He had already shown by the words Let us make man in Our image that the Persons are one in nature. But to remove more completely all doubt as to whether God is or is not a solitary Being, when He made man He made him, we are told, In the image of God.

If you still want to assert that God the Father in solitude said these words to Himself, I can go along with you so far as to admit that He might possibly have spoken to Himself in solitude as if He were talking with a companion, and that it is believable that He meant the words I have made man in the image of God to be equivalent to I have made man in My own image. But your own confession of faith will refute you. For you have confessed that all things are from the Father, but all through the Son; and the words, Let Us make man, show that the Source from Whom are all things is the One Who spoke this way, while God made him in the image of God clearly points to Him through Whom the work was done.

And further, to rule out all self-deception, that Wisdom whom you have yourself confessed to be Christ will confront you with the words, When He was establishing the fountains under the heaven, when He was making the foundations of the earth strong, I was with Him, setting them in order. It was I over Whom He rejoiced. Moreover, I rejoiced daily in His sight, all the while that He was rejoicing in the world He had made, and in the sons of men. Every difficulty is removed; error itself must recognize the truth. There is with God Wisdom, begotten before the worlds; and She is not only present with Him, but setting in order, for She was with Him, setting them in order. Notice this work of setting in order, or arranging. The Father, by His commands, is the Cause; the Son, by carrying out what is commanded, sets in order. The distinction between the Persons is marked by the work assigned to Each. When it says Let us make, creation is identified with the word of command; but when it is written, I was with Him, setting them in order, God shows that He did not do the work in isolation. For He was rejoicing before Him, Who, He tells us, rejoiced in return; Moreover, I rejoiced daily in His sight, all the while that He was rejoicing in the world He had made, and in the sons of men. Wisdom has taught us the reason for Her joy. She rejoiced because of the joy of the Father, Who rejoices over the completion of the world and over the sons of men. For it is written, And God saw that they were good. She rejoices that God is well pleased with His work, which has been made through Her, at His command. She declares that Her joy comes from the Father's gladness over the finished world and over the sons of men; over the sons of men, because in the one man Adam the whole human race had begun its course. So in the creation of the world there is no mere soliloquy of an isolated Father; His Wisdom is His partner in the work, and rejoices with Him when their joint labor ends.

I am aware that fully explaining these words involves discussing many weighty problems. I do not avoid them, but put them off for now, reserving them for later stages of the inquiry. For now I devote myself to that article of the blasphemers' faith, or rather faithlessness, which claims that Moses proclaims the solitude of God. We do not forget that the claim is true in the sense that there is One God, from Whom are all things; but neither do we forget that this truth is no excuse for denying the Godhead of the Son, since Moses, throughout his writings, clearly indicates the existence of God and God. We must examine how the history of God's choice, and of the giving of the Law, proclaims God as equal in rank with God.

After God had spoken with Abraham many times, Sarah grew angry with Hagar, jealous that she, the mistress, was barren while her maidservant had conceived a son. Then, when Hagar had gone from her sight, the Spirit says this about her: And the angel of the Lord said to Hagar, Return to your mistress, and submit yourself under her hands. And the angel of the Lord said to her, I will multiply your seed greatly, and it shall be too many to be counted, and again, And she called the Name of the Lord who spoke with her, You are God, Who has seen me. It is the Angel of God Who speaks, and He speaks of things far beyond the powers that a messenger, for that is what the word means, could have. He says, I will multiply your seed greatly, and it shall be too many to be counted. The power to multiply nations lies outside the ministry of an angel. Yet what does the Scripture say of Him Who is called the Angel of God, yet speaks words that belong to God alone? And she called the Name of the Lord who spoke with her, You are God, Who has seen me. First He is the Angel of God; then He is the Lord, for She called the Name of the Lord; then, third, He is God, for You are God, Who has seen me. He Who is called the Angel of God is also Lord and God. The Son of God is also, according to the prophet, the Angel of great counsel. To distinguish the Persons clearly, He is called the Angel of God; He Who is God from God is also the Angel of God, but, so that He may have the honor due to Him, He is also given the titles Lord and God.

In this passage the one Deity is first the Angel of God, and then, in turn, Lord and God. But to Abraham He is God only. For once the distinction of Persons had first been made, as a safeguard against the delusion that God is a solitary Being, His true and unqualified name could then be spoken safely. And so it is written. And God said to Abraham, Behold Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall name him Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him as an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him. And as for Ishmael, behold. I have heard you and have blessed him, and will multiply him greatly; he shall father twelve nations, and I will make him a great nation. Can anyone doubt that He Who was previously called the Angel of God is here, later on, spoken of as God? In both instances He is speaking of Ishmael; in both it is the same Person Who will multiply him. So that we do not suppose this was a different Speaker from Him who had addressed Hagar, the Divine words expressly confirm that He is the same, saying, And I have blessed him, and will multiply him. The blessing is repeated from an earlier occasion, for Hagar had already been addressed; the multiplication is promised for a future day, for this is God's first word to Abraham about Ishmael. Here it is God Who speaks to Abraham; to Hagar the Angel of God had spoken. So God and the Angel of God are One; He Who is the Angel of God is also God the Son of God. He is called the Angel because He is the Angel of great counsel; but afterward He is spoken of as God, so that we would not suppose that He Who is God is only an angel. Let us now go over the facts again in order. The Angel of the Lord spoke to Hagar; He spoke also to Abraham as God. One Speaker addressed both. The blessing was given to Ishmael, along with the promise that he would grow into a great people.

In another instance the Scripture shows through Abraham that it was God Who spoke. He receives a further promise of a son, Isaac. Afterward three men appear to him. Abraham, though he sees three, worships One, and acknowledges Him as Lord. Three were standing before him, Scripture says, but he knew well Which of them he must worship and confess. There was nothing in their outward appearance to tell them apart, but by the eye of faith, the vision of the soul, he knew his Lord. Then the Scripture continues, And He said to him, I will certainly return to you at this time, later on, and Sarah your wife shall have a son; and afterward the Lord said to Him, I will not hide from Abraham My servant the things that I will do; and again, Moreover the Lord said, The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is full, and their sins are very great. Then after a long conversation, which I will omit for the sake of brevity, Abraham, distressed at the destruction that awaited the innocent as well as the guilty, said, In no way will You, Who judge the earth, carry out this judgment. And the Lord said, If I find in Sodom fifty righteous people within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake. Afterward, when the warning to Lot, Abraham's brother, was over, the Scripture says, And the Lord rained on Sodom and on Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven; and, after a while, And the Lord visited Sarah as He had said, and did to Sarah as He had spoken, and Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time God had spoken of to him. And later, when the maidservant and her son had been driven from Abraham's house, and she was afraid that her child would die in the wilderness for lack of water, the same Scripture says And the Lord God heard the voice of the boy where he was, and the Angel of God called to Hagar out of heaven, and said to her, What is it, Hagar? Do not fear, for God has heard the voice of the boy from the place where he is. Get up, and take the boy and hold his hand, for I will make him a great nation.

What blind faithlessness it is, what dullness of an unbelieving heart, what headstrong impiety, to remain ignorant of all this, or else to know it and yet neglect it! Surely it is written for the very purpose that error or forgetfulness will not stand in the way of recognizing the truth. If, as we will prove, it is impossible to escape knowing the facts, then denying them must be nothing less than blasphemy. This record begins with what the Angel said to Hagar: His promise to multiply Ishmael into a great nation and to give him countless offspring. She listens, and by her confession reveals that He is Lord and God. The story begins with His appearance as the Angel of God; at its end He stands confessed as God Himself. So He Who is God's Angel while He carries out the ministry of declaring the great counsel is Himself God in name and nature. The name matches the nature; the nature is not falsified to make it fit the name. Again, God speaks to Abraham about this same matter; he is told that Ishmael has already received a blessing, and will be increased into a nation; I have blessed him, God says. This is no change from the Person indicated before; He shows that it was He Who had already given the blessing. The Scripture has clearly been consistent throughout as it moves from mystery to clear revelation; it began with the Angel of God, and goes on to reveal that it was God Himself Who had spoken in this same matter.

As the Divine narrative proceeds, the doctrine develops step by step. In the passage we have discussed, God speaks to Abraham and promises that Sarah will bear a son. Afterward three men stand by him; he worships One and acknowledges Him as Lord. After Abraham has worshiped and acknowledged Him, the One promises that He will return later at the same season, and that Sarah will then have her son. This One is seen again by Abraham in the form of a man, and greets him with the same promise. The change is one of name only; Abraham's acknowledgment in each case is the same. It was a Man whom he saw, yet Abraham worshiped Him as Lord; no doubt he saw in a mystery the coming Incarnation. Faith so strong did not fail to be recognized; the Lord says in the Gospel, Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; and he saw it, and was glad. To continue the story: the Man Whom he saw promised that He would return at the same season. Notice the fulfillment of the promise, remembering all the while that it was a Man Who made it. What does the Scripture say? And the Lord visited Sarah. So this Man is the Lord, fulfilling His own promise. What follows next? And God did to Sarah as He had said. The narrative calls His words those of a Man, tells us that Sarah was visited by the Lord, and proclaims that the result was the work of God. You are sure that it was a Man who spoke, for Abraham not only heard, but saw Him. Can you be less certain that He was God, when the same Scripture that had called Him Man confesses Him as God? For its words are, And Sarah conceived, and bore Abraham a son in his old age, and at the set time God had spoken of to him. But it was the Man who had promised that He would come. Believe, then, that He was nothing more than man; unless, in fact, He Who came was God and Lord. Connect the incidents. It was, admittedly, the Man who promised that He would come so that Sarah might conceive and bear a son. And now accept instruction, and confess the faith; it was the Lord God Who came so that she might conceive and bear. The Man made the promise in the power of God; by the same power God fulfilled the promise. So God reveals Himself both in word and deed. Next, two of the three men whom Abraham saw leave; He Who stays behind is Lord and God. And not only Lord and God, but also Judge, for Abraham stood before the Lord and said, In no way shall You do this thing, to kill the righteous with the wicked, for then the righteous shall be like the wicked. In no way will You, Who judge the whole earth, carry out this judgment. So by all his words Abraham instructs us in the faith for which he was justified; he recognizes the Lord among the three, he worships Him alone, and confesses that He is Lord and Judge.

So that you do not fall into the error of supposing that this acknowledgment of the One was honor paid to all three whom Abraham saw together, notice the words of Lot when he saw the two who had left; And when Lot saw them, he rose up to meet them, and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground; and he said, Behold, my lords, turn aside into your servant's house. Here the plural lords shows that this was nothing more than a vision of angels; in the other case the faithful patriarch pays the honor due to One only. So the sacred narrative makes it clear that two of the three were mere angels; it had already proclaimed the One as Lord and God in the words, And the Lord said to Abraham, Why did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I really bear a child? But I have grown old. Is anything impossible for God? I will return to you at this season, later on, and Sarah shall have a son. The Scripture is accurate and consistent; we find no such confusion as the plural used of the One God and Lord, and no Divine honors paid to the two angels. Lot, no doubt, calls them lords, while the Scripture calls them angels. The first is human reverence, the second literal truth.

And now the vengeance of a righteous judgment falls on Sodom and Gomorrha. What can we learn from it for the purposes of our inquiry? The Lord rained brimstone and fire from the Lord. It is The Lord from the Lord; Scripture makes no distinction between Their natures by a difference of name, but distinguishes the One from the Other. For we read in the Gospel, The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son. So what the Lord gave, the Lord had received from the Lord.

You have now seen evidence of God the Judge as Lord and Lord; next, learn that God and God hold the name jointly in the same way. When Jacob fled out of fear of his brother, he saw in his dream a ladder resting on the earth and reaching to heaven, and the angels of God ascending and descending on it, and the Lord resting above it, Who gave him all the blessings He had given to Abraham and Isaac. Later God spoke to him in this way: And God said to Jacob, Get up, go up to the place Bethel, and live there, and make an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you fled from the face of your brother. God demands honor for God, and makes it clear that the demand is made on behalf of Another, not Himself. His words are, He who appeared to you when you fled: He takes care to guard against any confusion of the Persons. It is God Who speaks, and God of Whom He speaks. Their majesty is asserted by joining Both under Their true Name of God, while the words plainly declare Their separate existence.

Here again, considerations occur to me that a complete treatment of the subject would have to take into account. But the order of the defense must follow the order of the attack, and I am saving these remaining questions for discussion in the next book. For now, regarding God Who demanded honor for God, it is enough for me to point out that He Who was the Angel of God when He spoke with Hagar was God and Lord when He spoke of the same matter with Abraham; that the Man Who spoke with Abraham was also God and Lord, while the two angels who were seen with the Lord and whom He sent to Lot are described by the prophet as angels and nothing more. And it was not only to Abraham that God appeared in human form; He appeared as Man to Jacob too. And not only did He appear, but, as we are told, He wrestled; and not only did He wrestle, but He was defeated by His opponent. Neither the time I have nor the subject will allow me to discuss the typological meaning of this wrestling. It was certainly God Who wrestled, for Jacob prevailed against God, and Israel saw God.

And now let us ask whether, apart from the case of Hagar, the Angel of God has been shown elsewhere to be God Himself. He has, and He is found to be not only God, but the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob. For the Angel of the Lord appeared to Moses from the bush; and Whose voice do you think we should suppose was heard? The voice of Him Who was seen, or of Another? There is no room for deception; the words of Scripture are clear: And the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from a bush, and again, The Lord called to him from the bush, Moses, Moses, and he answered, What is it? And the Lord said, Do not come near here; take your shoes off your feet, for the place on which you stand is holy ground. And He said to him, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He who appeared in the bush speaks from the bush; the place of the vision and of the voice is one; He Who speaks is none other than He Who was seen. He Who is the Angel of God when the eye sees Him is the Lord when the ear hears Him, and the Lord Whose voice is heard is recognized as the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob. When He is called the Angel of God, it is revealed that He is not a self-contained and solitary Being: for He is the Angel of God. When He is called Lord and God, He receives the full title due to His nature and His name. So in the Angel Who appeared from the bush, you have Him Who is Lord and God.

Continue studying the witness Moses gives; notice how diligently he seizes every opportunity to proclaim the Lord and God. You take note of the passage, Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One. Note also the words of his Divine song: See, see that I am the Lord, and there is no God besides Me. While God has been the Speaker throughout the poem, he ends with, Rejoice, you heavens, together with Him, and let all the sons of God praise Him. Rejoice, you nations, with His people, and let all the Angels of God give Him honor. God is to be glorified by the Angels of God, and He says, For I am the Lord, and there is no God besides Me. For He is God the Only-begotten, and the title 'Only-begotten' excludes anyone from sharing that character, just as the title 'Unoriginate' denies that anyone, in that respect, shares the character of the Unoriginate Father. The Son is One from One. No one is unoriginate except God the Unoriginate, and likewise no one is only-begotten except God the Only-begotten. Each of Them stands single and alone, being respectively the One Unoriginate and the One Only-begotten. And so the Two of Them are One God, for between the One and the One Who is His offspring there is no gulf of difference in nature within the eternal Godhead. Therefore He must be worshiped by the sons of God and glorified by the angels of God. Honor and reverence are demanded for God from the sons and from the angels of God. Notice Who it is that will receive this honor, and by whom it is to be paid. It is God, and they are the sons and angels of God. And so that you do not imagine that honor is not demanded for God Who shares our nature, but that Moses is thinking here of the reverence due to God the Father — though, indeed, it is in the Son that the Father must be honored — examine the words of the blessing God gave to Joseph at the end of the same book. They are, And let the things that are pleasing to Him Who appeared in the bush come on the head and crown of Joseph. So God is to be worshiped by the sons of God; but it is God Who is Himself the Son of God. And God is to be revered by the angels of God; but it is God Who is Himself the Angel of God. For God appeared from the bush as the Angel of God, and the prayer for Joseph is that he may receive whatever blessings He pleases. He is no less God because He is the Angel of God, and no less the Angel of God because He is God. The Divine Persons are clearly indicated; the line is firmly drawn between the Unbegotten and the Begotten. A revelation of the mysteries of heaven is granted, and we are taught not to imagine God as dwelling in solitude, when angels and sons of God will worship Him Who is God's Angel and His Son.

Let this be taken as our answer from the books of Moses, or rather as the answer of Moses himself. The heretics imagine that they can use his assertion of the Unity of God to disprove the Divinity of God the Son; this is blasphemy in defiance of the clear warning of their own witness, for whenever he confesses that God is One, he never fails to teach the Son's Divinity. Our next step must be to cite the many statements of the prophets about the same Son.

You know the words, Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One; if only you knew them rightly! As you interpret them, I look for their sense in vain. It is said in the Psalms, God, Your God, has anointed You. Impress on the reader's mind the distinction between the Anointer and the Anointed; distinguish between the You and the Your: make it clear to Whom and of Whom the words are spoken. For this definite confession concludes the preceding passage, which reads: Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; the scepter of Your kingdom is an upright scepter. You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness. And then he continues, Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You. So the God of the eternal kingdom, as a reward for His love of righteousness and hatred of wickedness, is anointed by His God. Surely some broad difference, some gap too wide for our minds to span, is drawn between these names? No; the distinction of Persons is indicated by You and Your, but nothing suggests a difference of nature. Your points to the Author, You to Him Who is the Author's offspring. For He is God from God, as these same words of the prophet declare: God, Your God, has anointed You. And His own words testify that there is no God prior to God the Un-originate: Be My witnesses, and I am a witness, says the Lord God, and My Servant Whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe and understand that I am, and before Me there is no other God, nor shall there be after Me. So the majesty of Him Who has no beginning is declared, and the glory of Him Who is from the Unoriginate is safeguarded; for God, Your God, has anointed You. That word Your declares His birth, yet does not contradict His nature; Your God means that the Son was born from Him to share the Godhead. But the fact that the Father is God does not prevent the Son from being God also, for God, Your God, has anointed You. Both Father and Son are mentioned; the single title of God assures us that They are One in character and majesty.

But so that these words, For I am, and before Me there is no other God, nor shall there be after Me, are not used as a handle for blasphemous presumption, as if they proved that the Son is not God, since after the God Whom no God precedes no other God follows, we must consider the purpose of the passage. God is His own best interpreter, but His chosen Servant joins Him in assuring us that there is no God before Him, nor shall there be after Him. His own witness about Himself is indeed sufficient, but He has added the witness of the Servant Whom He has chosen. So we have the joint testimony of the Two that there is no God before Him; we accept this truth, because all things are from Him. We also have Their witness that there shall be no God after Him; but They do not deny that God has been born from Him in the past. The Servant was already there, speaking in this way and bearing witness to the Father; the Servant born in that tribe from which God's elect was to come. He also sets out the same truth in the Gospels: Behold, My Servant Whom I have chosen, My Beloved in Whom My soul is well pleased. This, then, is the sense in which God says, There is no other God before Me, nor shall there be after Me. By asserting that there is no God before or after Himself, He reveals the infinity of His eternal and unchanging majesty. But He gives His Servant a share both in bearing witness and in possessing the Name of God.

This is obvious from His own words. For He says to the prophet Hosea, I will no longer have mercy on the house of Israel, but will be their enemy altogether. But I will have mercy on the children of Judah, and will save them in the Lord their God. Here God the Father unambiguously gives the name of God to the Son, in Whom He also chose us before countless ages. Their God, He says, for while the Father, being Unoriginate, is independent of all, He has given us to His Son as an inheritance. Likewise we read, Ask of Me, and I will give You the Gentiles as Your inheritance. No one can be God to Him from Whom are all things, for He is eternal and has no beginning; but the Son has God, from Whom He was born, as His Father. Yet for us the Father is God and the Son is God; the Father reveals to us that the Son is our God, and the Son teaches that the Father is God over us. What we must remember is that in this passage the Father gives the Son the name of God, the title of His own unoriginate majesty. But I have said enough about these words of Hosea.

Again, how clear is the declaration God the Father makes through Isaiah about our Lord! He says, For this is what the Lord says, the holy God of Israel, Who made the things to come: Ask me about your sons and your daughters, and command Me concerning the works of My hands. I have made the earth and man on it, I have commanded all the stars, I have raised up a King in righteousness, and all His ways are straight. He shall build My city, and shall bring back the captives of My people, not for price or reward, says the Lord of Sabaoth. Egypt shall labor, and the merchandise of the Ethiopians and Sabeans. Men of stature shall come over to You and shall be Your servants, and shall follow You, bound in chains, and shall worship You and pray to You, for God is in You and there is no God besides You. For You are God, and we did not know it, O God of Israel, the Savior. All who resist Him shall be ashamed and disgraced, and shall walk in confusion. Is any opening left for contradiction, or any excuse for ignorance? If blasphemy continues, does it not survive only in brazen defiance? God from Whom are all things, Who made all things by His command, asserts that He is the Author of the universe, for unless He had spoken, nothing would have been created. He asserts that He has raised up a righteous King, who builds a city for Himself, that is, for God, and brings back the captives of His people, for no gift or reward, for we are all saved freely. Next, He tells how, after the labors of Egypt and after the trade of the Ethiopians and Sabeans, men of stature shall come over to Him. How should we understand these labors in Egypt, this trade of the Ethiopians and Sabeans? Let us recall how the Magi of the East worshiped the Lord and paid Him tribute; let us consider the weariness of that long pilgrimage to Bethlehem of Judah. In the wearisome journey of the Magian princes we see the labors of Egypt to which the prophet refers. For when the Magi carried out, in their spurious, material way, the duty ordained for them by the power of God, the whole heathen world was offering, in their persons, the deepest reverence its worship was capable of. And these same Magi presented gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh from the merchandise of the Ethiopians and Sabeans; this was foretold by another prophet, who said, The Ethiopians shall fall down before His face, and His enemies shall lick the dust. The Kings of Tharsis shall offer presents, the Kings of the Arabians and Sabeans shall bring gifts, and He shall be given some of the gold of Arabia. The Magi and their offerings stand for the labor of Egypt and for the merchandise of the Ethiopians and Sabeans; the worshiping Magi represent the heathen world, and offer the finest gifts of the Gentiles to the Lord Whom they worship.

As for the men of stature who shall come over to Him and follow Him in chains, there is no doubt who they are. Turn to the Gospels: Peter, when he is going to follow his Lord, is bound. Read the Apostles: Paul, the servant of Christ, boasts of his chains. Let us see whether this 'prisoner of Jesus Christ' agrees in his teaching with the prophecies God uttered about God His Son. God had said, They shall pray to You, for God is in You. Now note and take in these words of the Apostle: God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself. And then the prophecy continues, And there is no God besides You. The Apostle promptly matches this with, For there is one Jesus Christ our Lord, through Whom are all things. Clearly there can be no other than He, for He is One. The third prophetic statement is, You are God and we did not know it. But Paul, once the persecutor of the Church, says, Theirs are the fathers, and from them is Christ, Who is God over all. This is to be the message of these men in chains; men of stature they will indeed be, and they shall sit on twelve thrones to judge the tribes of Israel, and shall follow their Lord, witnesses to Him in teaching and in martyrdom.

So God is in God, and it is God in Whom God dwells. But how is There is no God besides You true, if God is within Him? Heretic! To support your confession of a solitary Father you use the words, There is no God besides Me; what sense can you give to the solemn declaration of God the Father, There is no God besides You, if your explanation of There is no God besides Me denies the Godhead of the Son? In that case, to whom can God have said, There is no God besides You? You cannot suggest that this solitary Being said it to Himself. It was to the King Whom He summoned that the Lord said, through the mouth of the men of stature who worshiped and prayed, For God is in You. The facts do not fit with solitude. In You implies that there was One present within range, so to speak, of the Speaker's voice. The complete sentence, God is in You, reveals not only God present, but also God dwelling in Him Who is present. The words distinguish the Indweller from Him in Whom He dwells, but the distinction is of Person only, not of character. God is in Him, and He, in Whom God is, is God. God cannot reside within a nature strange and alien to His own. He dwells in One Who is His own, born from Himself. God is in God, because God is from God. For You are God, and we did not know it, O God of Israel, the Savior.

My next book is devoted to refuting your denial that God is in God; for the prophet continues, All who resist Him shall be ashamed and disgraced and shall walk in confusion. This is God's sentence, passed on your unbelief. You set yourself against Christ, and it is on His account that the Father's voice is raised in solemn rebuke; for He, Whose Godhead you deny, is God. And you deny it under the cloak of reverence for God, because He says, There is no other God besides Me. Accept your shame and confusion; the Unoriginate God has no need of the dignity you offer; He has never asked for this majesty of isolation that you attribute to Him. He rejects your meddling interpretation, which would twist His words, There is no other God besides Me, into a denial of the Godhead of the Son Whom He begot from Himself. To defeat your plan of demolishing the Divinity of the Son by assigning the Godhead to Himself in some special sense, He completes the glories of the Only-begotten by attributing absolute Divinity to Him: — And there is no God besides You. Why make distinctions between exact equivalents? Why separate what is perfectly matched? It is the distinctive characteristic of the Son of God that there is no God besides Him; the distinctive characteristic of God the Father that there is no God apart from Him. Use His words about Himself; confess Him in His own terms, and plead with Him as King: For God is in You, and there is no God besides You. For You are God, and we did not know it, O God of Israel, the Savior. A confession framed in such reverent words is free from any taint of presumption: its terms can provoke no objection. Above all, we must remember that refusing it means shame and disgrace. Dwell in thought on these words of God; use them in your confession of Him, and so escape the shame that threatens you. For if you deny the Divinity of the Son of God, you will not be increasing the glory of God by adoring Him in lonely majesty; you will be slighting the Father by refusing to revere the Son. In faith and reverence confess of the Unoriginate God that there is no God besides Him; claim for God the Only-begotten that apart from Him there is no God.

As you have already listened to Moses and Isaiah, listen now to Jeremiah teaching the same truth as they did: This is our God, and no other shall be compared to Him, Who has found out the whole way of knowledge and has given it to Jacob His servant and to Israel His beloved.⁠a Afterward He showed Himself on earth and lived among men. For earlier he had said, And He is Man, and Who shall know Him? So you have God seen on earth and living among men. Now I ask you what sense you would give to No one has seen God at any time, except the Only-begotten Son, Who is in the bosom of the Father, when Jeremiah proclaims God seen on earth and living among men? The Father admittedly cannot be seen except by the Son; Who then is This who was seen and lived among men? He must be our God, for He is God visible in human form, Whom men can touch. And take to heart the prophet's words, No other shall be compared to Him. If you ask how this can be, listen to the rest of the sentence, so that you are not tempted to deny the Father His share in the confession. Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One. The whole passage is, No one shall be compared to Him, Who has found out the whole way of knowledge and has given it to Jacob His servant and to Israel His beloved. Afterward He showed Himself on earth and lived among men. For there is one Mediator between God and Men, Who is both God and Man; Mediator both in the giving of the Law and in the taking of our body. Therefore no other can be compared to Him, for He is One, born from God into God, and He is the One through Whom all things in heaven and earth were created, through Whom times and worlds were made. In short, everything that exists owes its existence to His action. He is the One Who instructs Abraham, Who speaks with Moses, Who testifies to Israel, Who dwells in the prophets, Who was born through the Virgin from the Holy Spirit, Who nails to the cross of His passion the powers that are our enemies, Who kills death in hell, Who strengthens the assurance of our hope by His Resurrection, Who destroys the corruption of human flesh by the glory of His Body. Therefore no one shall be compared to Him. For these are the distinctive powers of God the Only-begotten; He alone was born from God, the blessed Possessor of such great prerogatives. No second god can be compared to Him, for He is God from God, not born from any alien being. Nothing new or strange or recent is created in Him. When Israel hears that its God is one, and that no second god, whom men might consider God, is compared to God Who is God's Son, the revelation means that God the Father and God the Son are altogether One, not by confusion of Person but by unity of substance. For because God the Son is God, the prophet forbids us to compare Him to some second deity.